The datamining scare: another nonthreat to your civil liberties.

More UN 'gibberish'

While I am fearful of nuclear weapons falling into the hands of terrorists, they seem to overlook the fact that nuclear weapons don't 'fall into the wrong hands' by just falling out of the sky.

'Nuke threat greater from terrorists than Iran'
Sify - Taramani,Chennai,India
Amsterdam: The world should be more worried about nuclear weapons falling into the hands of terrorists than about Iran's nuclear programme, the head of the ...

Rogue countries developing nuclear weapons and purposefully letting nukes 'fall into the wrong hands' is precisely the concern.

ElBaradei goes on to say that the "international community needed an equitable collective security system that does not have an exclusive nuclear club, 'a system where every country feels secure.' Otherwise, 'we are going to see proliferation of nuclear weapons'."

This is clearly, unintelligible poppycock.

Bolivia and Venezuela resist calls to soften policies
Euronews.net - Lyon,France
Venezuela and Bolivia have continued to ruffle feathers, remaining defiant at a summit of EU and fellow Latin American leaders. ...

This will make alot of malitov cocktails

Venezuela sends 100,000 barrels of diesel, gasoline to Haiti
People's Daily Online - Beijing,China
... attend Preval's inauguration on Sunday. Preval paid an official visit to Venezuela in April and met with President Hugo Chavez.

GM says it's the end of road for Hummer H1
The 2006 model year will be the last for the Hummer H1, the hulking, gas-guzzling status symbol that has attracted celebrities and off-road enthusiasts but also has drawn the ire of environmentalists.

Moussaoui begins serving life sentence

Texas teenager dies of rabies from bat bite

Bush Considering use of National Guard at Border

The President will be speaking on immigration on Monday night, May 15th. He is expected to announce plans to help seal the nation's borders which may include, perhaps, using the National Guard.

Apparently, he is considering making federal aid available to states that deploy their National Guard to help patrol US borders, and allow border states to make use of National Guard troops from other states to bolster their ranks.

Related story:

Bush eyes border role for military
President Bush is looking at ways for the military to play a broader role along the U.S.-Mexico border and will announce new immigration initiatives in a prime-time address from the Oval Office on Monday night.

"When al-Qa'ida itself knows we're winning this war [in Iraq], how come Democratic politicians and the media elite in America want us to declare defeat?"

—Investor's Business Daily

HP China to recruit over 1,000 people
Xinhua - China
... Packard (HP), US technology giant, plans to recruit more than 1,000 workers on the Chinese mainland by the end of this year, reported Saturday's China Daily. ...

Most Americans Get It

Not so 'controversial': Most Americans get NSA program
Once again the American people prove they are smarter than the media and political elites. They understand that we are at war, that the enemy had infiltrated our country successfully and unleashed devastating attacks against their fellow citizens, and that all this talk about an imperial presidency and violations of privacy rights is ACLU pabulum.

Congress upset at lord of the spies

BY ROBERT NOVAK
SUN-TIMES

The surprise sacking and replacement of Porter Goss as CIA director obscured dissatisfaction with the official behind the change. Ambassador John Negroponte, the first director of national intelligence, in effect determined that Goss had to go. His replacement by Negroponte's deputy, Gen. Michael V. Hayden, may mean further ''militarization'' of U.S. intelligence and a return to business as usual at a CIA plagued by catastrophic intelligence failures. Full column.

Report: Foreign Islamic militia control 80 percent of Mogadishu

WASHINGTON — Islamic forces loyal to such countries as Iran, Libya and Saudi Arabia have been gaining control in the the streets of Somalia's capital. More details.

Israelis intercept Gaza-bound ship with TNT in Mediterranean

WORLD TRIBUNE.COM

TEL AVIV — Israel has stopped a shipment of TNT from Egypt bound for a Gaza port.
The Israeli military said it retrieved more than a half ton of TNT from a boat that was sailing in the Mediterranean. The military said the episode took place on May 3 when the boat sought to transport TNT from Egyptian territorial waters to the Gaza Strip. Read on.

Insurgents using new advanced Russian RPG from Iran

WORLD TRIBUNE.COM

BAGHDAD — The U.S. military has identified an advanced variant of a Soviet-origin rocket-propelled grenade system being used by Iraqi insurgents since early this year.

Officials said the military has detected shipments of the RPG-29 in Iraq. They said the weapon system has been smuggled from Syria into Iraq by operatives of the Iranian-sponsored Hizbullah.

"This is the most advanced RPG that the insurgents have," an official said. "The [RPG-] 29 can rip through just about any armored platform." Read more.

UI researcher makes crude oil from pig manure

(Arlington Heights) Daily Herald

HAMPSHIRE, Ill. - Can the other white meat's manure make black gold?

They say you can't turn a sow's ear into a silk purse, but University of Illinois researchers are working some interesting magic at the other end of the animal.

"We are the first to actually do this," professor Yuanhui Zhang says proudly of his team's ability to turn swine manure into crude oil. He's a bio-environmental engineer at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign who has led the 10-year research project that recently announced a breakthrough in porcine petroleum.

That neat trick may sound crude.

But it also sounds good to a pork industry swamped with oceans of swine manure, and it sounds like the national anthem to those looking to reduce America's dependence on foreign oil.

Read on.

Dialing and the Democrats

New York Sun Editorial

It was President Clinton who signed into law the Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act of 1994, after it was passed in both the House and Senate by a voice vote. That law is an act "to make clear a telecommunications carrier's duty to cooperate in the interception of communications for law enforcement purposes, and for other purposes." The act made clear that a court order isn't the only lawful way of obtaining call information, saying, "A telecommunications carrier shall ensure that any interception of communications or access to call-identifying information effected within its switching premises can be activated only in accordance with a court order or other lawful authorization."

The law that President Clinton signed into law and that was approved by voice votes in 1994 by a Democrat-majority House and a Democrat-majority Senate not only made clear the phone companies' "duty" to cooperate, it authorized $500 million in taxpayer funds to reimburse the phone companies for equipment "enabling the government, pursuant to a court order or other lawful authorization, to access call-identifying information that is reasonably available to the carrier." Again, the law, by referring to "other lawful authorization," states clearly that a court order isn't the only form of lawful authorization possible. Read on.

UN finds new uranium traces in Iran - diplomats
Scotsman - United Kingdom
BERLIN (Reuters) - UN inspectors have discovered new traces of highly-enriched uranium on nuclear equipment in Iran, deepening suspicions Tehran may still be ...

Iran and Turkey fire salvo over Iraq
Asia Times Online - Kowloon,Hong Kong
DAMASCUS - Both Turkey and Iran have been launching military raids into northern Iraq against a Kurdish paramilitary group that is based there, posing a ...

Yikes!! I am OPPOSED to a World Government

Cold War Talk Prompts Russian Call for 'World Government'

Elaph, U.K.

“Russian Foreign Secretary Lavrov called for the establishment of a world government, bringing together the United States and Russia.”

Yes, indeed, I am. Our founding fathers must be spinning in their graves over such talk.

Read the article here.

Our Education System

Even the Middle East ridicules our educational system. In the Dar Al-Hayat (Lebanon) an article appears with the title, " U.S. Youth Geographically Clueless; Can't Find Iraq ... or New York!"

Mexicans Reclaim Lands That America Once Annexed

La Jornada, Mexico

“Mexico lost half of its territory, one of the largest takeovers in world history.” Read article here.

Chavez Says 'Empire's' Navy Doesn't Intimidate Him

Cadena Global, Venezuela

“If the U.S. thinks it can come here and enslave us, there will be nothing left for us to do than go to the mountains and resist the aggression.”—Hugo Chavez, President of Venezuela

Read article here.

The United States is No Superhero, and Iran No Villain

From El Universal, Venezuela

“The powers that the United States wields by virtue of the threat of force are beyond divine.”

Read more.

Near the Precipice

Advice from China to Iran: 'Back Away from the Cliff's Edge'

“Compared to the muscularity of the United States, Iran is a weak and tiny country.”

Best Buy Heads for China

TheStreet.com - USA
... Best Buy agreed to pay $180 million to take a majority interest in Jiangsu Five Star Appliance, China's fourth-largest ...More details.

Iran's president casts himself as Muslims' regional hero

Financial Times

Mahmoud Ahmadi-Nejad stole the international limelight again this week with his long-winded letter to George W. Bush. Seen as bold by some and clumsy by others, his move was quickly dismissed by Washington as a deliberate diversion. But it may yet serve another key objective of the Iranian president to widen his appeal in the Muslim world.

The new radical face of Iran has been bidding for a leadership role beyond his country's borders. Building on his popularity at home, where Mr Ahmadi-Nejad is seen as a pious man of the people, he has sought to craft an image as a regional hero. He told students yesterday during a trip to Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim country, that Iran was "defending the rights of many other countries" in maintaining its nuclear programme. More.

Dubai firm implicated in Iran 'bomb components' investigation in ...
Khaleej Times - Dubai,United Arab Emirates
... Dubai engineering consultancy is at the center of an international criminal investigation into a scheme to smuggle banned weapons technology from the US to Iran ...

"The foundation of national morality must be laid in private families. . . . How is it possible that Children can have any just Sense of the sacred Obligations of Morality or Religion if, from their earliest Infancy, they learn their Mothers live in habitual Infidelity to their fathers, and their fathers in as constant Infidelity to their Mothers?"

-- John Adams

Tax-Cut Bill Prompts Partisan Wrangling

Darned Republicans, giving more tax breaks to the wealthiest Americans. Darned Democrats, opposing a bill that will encourage further economic growth. And so goes the long-running argument in Washington over tax-cut legislation that's expected to reach President Bush's desk...

Think $2.90 for Gasoline Is High? Try $5.17
A conservative market analyst says the current national average of $2.90 for a gallon of gas isn’t hurting American families any more than paying 29 cents a gallon did more than 50 years ago. Using the inflation and income adjustments, the current average gallon of gas that costs the consumer $2.90 would have cost closer to $5.17 per gallon in 1955, he said...

PHONE DATABASE KERFUFFLE

CBS anchor Bob Schieffer: “Does the government need to know who you've been talking to on the phone?"

James Lileks was talking to Hugh Hewitt and Lileks had this profundity on intelligence gathering: "[The critics] want us to 'connect the dots' but they don't want us to collect the dots."

That's about the size of it.

Troops in Iraq Say Media Make Americans 'Run up the White Flag'

All the News That's Fit to be Misrepresented

From Newsbusters:

World Net Daily points out that the Associated Press drove by a Swedish study that finds lesbians react differently to sex hormones than heterosexual women. Evidently, the desire of the AP was to claim that homosexuality is genetic, that it can't be helped. This, presumably, would make homosexuals a protected class affording special legal protections. Specifically, the AP made claims like "the findings add weight to the idea that homosexuality has a physical basis and is not learned behavior."

The problem is that the study says no such thing. In fact, Dr. Ivanka Savic of the Stockholm Brain Institute and the author of the study said: "This is incorrect and not stated in the paper."

(Emphasis mine - H.H.)

Sure it's false; but at least it's inaccurate.

Lamenting the Loss of the 'Good Old Days'

Chris Mathews and author Tom Wolfe kvetching about the lack of turbulance on American campuses. Where has campus mayhem gone?

Scientists Find Evidence of Global Warming…More Than 10,000 Years Ago

Newsbusters asks, "How does this fit into the global warming debate? Well, according to Dr. Dale Guthrie of the University of Alaska in Fairbanks, ‘The new patterns of dates indicate a radical ecological sorting during a uniquely forage-rich transitional period, affecting all large mammals, including humans.’

And what happened during this 'ecological sorting': '…climate shifts transformed the dry, arid and cold region. The wetter, warmer summers led to changes in vegetation to which mammoths and wild horses could not adapt'.”

Adjust your tin-foil hats, and let's please try and remember this was well before SUV's and the industrial revolution.

Senate revives bill giving illegal immigrants chance to become US ...
CBC News - Canada
WASHINGTON (AP) - Senate leaders reached a deal Thursday on reviving a broad immigration bill that could provide millions of illegal immigrants a chance to ...

From Opinion Journal:

Howard Fineman's Nightmare
Politics is about to get ugly, Newsweek's Howard Fineman warns:

The conventional notion here is that Democrats want to "nationalize" the 2006 elections--dwelling on broad themes (that is, the failures of the Bush Administration)--while the Republicans will try to "localize" them as individual contests that have nothing to do with, ahem, the goings on in the capital.

That was before the GOP situation got so desperate. The way I read the recent moves of Karl Rove & Co., they are preparing to wage war the only way open to them: not by touting George Bush, Lord knows, but by waging a national campaign to paint a nightmarish picture of what a Democratic Congress would look like, and to portray that possibility, in turn, as prelude to the even more nightmarish scenario: the return of a Democrat (Hillary) to the White House.

Rather than defend Bush, Rove will seek to rally the Republicans' conservative grassroots by painting Democrats as the party of tax increases, gay marriage, secularism and military weakness. That's where the national message money is going to be spent.

This prompts an amusing observation from erstwhile blogger Steven Den Beste, in a letter to Power Line:

One of my favorite B movies from the early 1960's is "The Raven," . . . starring Vincent Price, Boris Karloff, and Peter Lorre. . . .

Lorre, Karloff, and Price play wizards, with Lorre being by far the weakest and least powerful of the three. At one point the three of them are eating together, and Lorre gets drunk and challenges Karloff to a magic duel.

Karloff's magic is so much more powerful than Lorre's that he is able to foil each of Lorre's attacks with just a simple gesture of his hands, leading Lorre to mutter those immortal words, "You're defending yourself, you coward!" . . .

I keep running into this from lefties. They criticize others (us), and if in turn they're criticized suddenly they squeal about "censorship!" and "McCarthyism!" Their freedom of speech demands that we not say anything in our own defense, let alone actually point out their problems.

And so it is here. Howard Fineman is deathly afraid that the Republicans will point out what the Democrats actually stand for. How dare those scheming Republicans actually defend themselves!

Though in Fineman's description, Republicans aren't defending themselves but "waging war" and "painting Democrats" in unflattering ways. How come, though, the Republicans are being negative and nasty, while Democrats are merely "dwelling on broad themes" when they talk of "the failures of the Bush Administration"?

Pope Benedict XVI Worries About Catholic Church in Venezuela
Voice of America - USA
By VOA News. Pope Benedict XVI has told Venezuela's President Hugo Chavez that he is concerned about religious reforms in the largely Catholic nation. ...

Is it any surprise that....

........... Venezuela and the Chicoms are getting along so well?

Venezuela, China Sign $1.3 Billion Tanker Deal
Voice of America - USA
Venezuela has signed a $1.3 billion agreement with China to purchase 18 oil tankers to facilitate the south American country's expanding Asian market. ...

ON THE JUDICIARY

"At the establishment of our constitutions, the judiciary bodies were supposed to be the most helpless and harmless members of the government. Experience, however, soon showed in what way they were to become the most dangerous; that the insufficiency of the means provided for their removal gave them a freehold and irresponsibility in office; that their decisions, seeming to
concern individual suitors only, pass silent and unheeded by the public at large; that these decisions, nevertheless, become law by precedent, sapping, by little and little, the foundations of
the constitution, and working its change by construction, before any one has perceived that that invisible and helpless worm has been busily employed in consuming its substance. In truth,
man is not made to be trusted for life, if secured against all liability to account."

-- Thomas Jefferson

Iran News

Turkey, Iran send troops, artillery to border with Iraq
Taipei Times - Taiwan
Hundreds of Kurds had to flee their homes in the mountain village of Razqa, Iraq, when artillery shells came whistling down from Iran early this month, blowing ...

Russian security official warns against Iran military action
RIA Novosti - Moscow,Russia
MOSCOW, May 11 (RIA Novosti) - Any military operation in Iran could exacerbate problems in the Mideast region, the secretary of Russia's Security Council said ...

China sticks to diplomacy call in Iran dispute
Washington Post - United States
BEIJING (Reuters) - Under growing pressure from Washington, China on Thursday stuck to calls to defuse the Iran nuclear row through diplomacy and said it ...

Ahmadinejad: Iran open to talks
CNN International - USA
JAKARTA, Indonesia (CNN) -- Iran's president has said he is willing to negotiate with the United States and other world powers over his country's nuclear ...

Iran president says ready for dialogue, brands Israel 'evil regime ...
Ha'aretz - Tel Aviv,Israel
Iran is "ready to engage in dialogue with anybody," Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said during a live interview with Indonesia's Metro television ...

West Prepares 'Incentive Package' for Iran to End Nuclear Row
Zaman Online - Istanbul,Turkey
... Western countries that could not surmount the obstacle presented by Russia and China for “nuclear pressure on Iran are preparing a new incentive package ...

World powers to meet May 19 on Iran nuke issue
IranMania News - Iran
LONDON, May 11 (IranMania) - World powers are to confer again in London on May 19 to try to rescue their high-stakes effort to persuade Iran to renounce ...

Iran finds an ally in Indonesia
Asia Times Online - Kowloon,Hong Kong
... "Iran was receptive," Yudhoyono's spokesman said. Jakarta is on good. terms with Iran and other Middle East countries, as well as with the West. ...

Oil gains on US refinery outages, rising gasoline demand, Iran ...
Forbes - USA
LONDON (AFX) - Oil prices rose as refinery outages in the US, improved gasoline demand and geopolitical tensions with key producers Iran and Nigeria ...

No such thing as a free lunch when taxpayer helps pick up tab for Bill

FROM THE SCOTSMAN

BILL Clinton, the former president of the United States, flew into Scotland yesterday to speak at a gala lunch subsidised by tens of thousands of pounds of taxpayers' money.

"That money would have been far better spent in Malawi, rather than on a booze-up for members of the Executive. They have lost all sense of priority. If people want to have lunch with Bill Clinton, fine, but not at a total abuse of taxpayers' money." - Alex Neil, SNP MSP for Central Scotland

Read more.

900 terrorist suspects in Britain leave MI5 and police unable to cope

THERE are now so many terror suspects in Britain that the police and security services are unable to monitor them all, counter-terrorist officials have warned.

CASH FOR BABIES

Population proposition from Putin: Be fruitful

Russia is losing Russians and yesterday became the latest European government to offer hard cash to get its women to have more babies.

REINING IN SPENDING NOT POPULAR ON THE HILL

Coburn seeks slash in federal spending

Even though Republicans control the White House and both chambers of Congress, Washington remains a hostile place for any conservative determined to rein in federal government spending.

SLIDING BACK IN TIME

Putin warns arms race not over yet

President Vladimir Putin warned yesterday that the U.S.-Russian arms race is not over and called for a strengthening of his nation's nuclear and conventional forces so Moscow can better resist foreign pressure.

Demanding Government Sponsorship

By Michael Medved
Beyond the News

The New York Times recently reported on the two parties' "wedge issues" in the fall election campaign, with Republicans stressing resistance to gay marriage, while Democrats focus on stem cell research. Actually, the liberal position on both these controversies shows the left's odd refusal to take any initiative seriously unless it's backed by government.

On stem cells, conservatives have not moved to ban private funding for any form of research; they just want to avoid using government money to sponsor science that's morally questionable. Similarly, on same-sex relationships, conservatives make no effort to block private relationships; they just want to avoid governmental endorsement of forms of love that defy traditional morality.

On both issues the Democrats insist on governmental sponsorship--bizarrely suggesting that, without the government's backing, neither medical research nor intimate relationships could possibly succeed.

Hispanic Groups Challenge Arizona's Voter ID Rules

CARING VS. UNCARING

A very good article by Walter Williams

"Here’s a little test. Which entities produce greater consumer satisfaction: for-profit enterprises such as supermarkets, computer makers and clothing stores; or nonprofit entities such as public schools, post offices and motor vehicle departments? I’m guessing you’ll answer the former. Their survival depends on pleasing ordinary people, as opposed to the latter, whose survival is not so strictly tied to pleasing people..." Read on.

Iranian Letter to Bush Seen as Invitation to Embrace Islam

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s letter to President Bush is essentially a call on the American leader to embrace Islam, according to an Islamic specialist and author...

'Sex Info' Text Messages Target Kids, Exclude Parents
A new text messaging service sponsored by the San Francisco Health Department is promoted as a convenient way for young people to get “sexual health information.” But critics charge that the service circumvents the legitimate authority and moral influence of parents...

Hurricane-global warming link questioned
Monsters and Critics.com - Glasgow,UK
CHARLOTTESVILLE, VA, United States (UPI) -- US climatologists have called into question a proposed link between major Atlantic hurricanes and global warming. ...

Courageous Lawyers Challenge China

By David Aikman
Beyond the News

For two years the Chinese regime of Hu Jintao has been conducting a relentless harassment of China's Christians. House church groups, printers of Christian materials, lawyers trying to represent persecuted communities, have all been hounded by government authorities.

Now, however, China's Christians are beginning to fight back. Their chosen weapon? The Chinese constitution itself. On paper, it guarantees such things as freedom of religious expression and the right to peaceful protest. Chinese Christian lawyers across the country have been responding to police raids by citing the Constitution and demanding to see arrest and search warrants.

In Washington a delegation of brave Chinese lawyers and writers met with officials to plead their case. Their hope?--a Chinese Martin Luther King to lead Chinese society into legal due process, human rights and democracy. We should back them completely.

"I propose that we rename all of the 'African American' and 'Diversity' programs on college campuses in honor of their help in promoting racial paranoia on the university (and American) landscape. From now on, we could call them 'Woefully Hypocritical Initiatives for Never-Ending Racial Scapegoating.' Or...we could save time and ink by calling them WHINERS." —Mike Adams

Dirty Politics

"One of the things that always made me feel good in the morning was waking up and realizing I did not belong to the same political party as Chuck Schumer. It made me feel clean—even before I took a shower." —Tony Blankley

Rising gas prices.....

"When you think about rising gas prices the first thing to understand is that the people we expect to solve this problem—the folks in Washington—are the very people who do not want it solved. To ask politicians to do something about the skyrocketing cost of gasoline at the pump is like asking Osama bin Laden to do something to prevent terrorism." —Michael Reagan

No free pass

"Life is hard and sometimes terrible, and that is a tragedy. It explains much, but it is not a free pass." —Peggy Noonan

Big Government's Love... for you

"[President Bush's] compassionate conservatism [involves] a core faith that not only can the government love you, but it should spend money to prove its love. Beyond that, there seems to be no core set of principles that define Bush's approach."

—Jonah Goldberg

It's not name calling

"Some people say it is 'name-calling' if you refer to someone as a liberal. There is nothing inherently negative about the word 'liberal.' If it has acquired negative overtones, that is because of what liberals have done and the consequences that followed."

—Thomas Sowell

A Dangerous Trait

"[T]here is not in all America a more dangerous trait than the deification of mere smartness unaccompanied by any sense of moral responsibility."
—Theodore Roosevelt

Why do I think of the tax code when I read this quote?

"It will be of little avail to the people that the laws are made by men of their own choice if the laws be so voluminous that they cannot be read, or so incoherent that they cannot be understood." —James Madison

This all fine and dandy.......

.....But how about border control?

Senators agree on tougher rules against hiring illegal immigrants
JURIST - USA
... reform bill [JURIST news archive] they hope to vote on by Memorial Day have tentatively agreed to toughen rules on the hiring of illegal immigrants by forcing ...

COMMENTARY

Inspecting all incoming seaport cargo: misguided and wasteful
FROM: The Heritage Foundation

COMMENTARY

Why energy independence isn't good for national security
FROM: Reason Foundation

COMMENTARY

Michael Lewis: Romney’s health care plan is a sham
FROM: Human Events Online

Who Likes High Gas Prices?
THE BALANCE SHEET

Most Americans believe gas prices are too high. But there are those in the media and politics who want to see prices climb. The Business & Media Institute (formerly the Free Market Project) reveals the tax-boosting agenda of the anti-SUV crowd. READ ON.

Morality .... Morality?

Tom Ramstack of the Washington Times reports that the United Nations has quietly adopted a code of conduct for businesses worldwide to promote socially responsible investing. This is pretty funny; the UN pushing for morality in investments.

GOP OKs deal on tax cuts
Republican leaders in Congress yesterday agreed to a $69 billion bill on tax-cut extension, which could be approved by both chambers by the end of the week, handing President Bush one of his top tax goals.

World Bank says China, India growing contributors to CO2 emissions
Forbes - USA
UNITED NATIONS (AFX) - China and India helped to drive up global greenhouse gas emissions by 15 pct between 1992 and 2002, fuelling the effects of climate ...

New UN Rights Group Includes Six Nations With Poor Records
New York Times - United States
UNITED NATIONS - Six nations with poor human rights records were among those elected to the new Human Rights Council on Tuesday, although notorious ...

Venezuela's takeover
Washington Times - Washington,DC,USA
By M. Ron Wahid. Sometimes it seems as though the United States must face the increasingly authoritarian regime of Hugo Chavez in Venezuela alone. ...

The 'Day Without Immigrants' Backfires
San Francisco Chronicle - CA, USA

The one thing the boycott did achieve was to expose the lie that the country cannot function without the labor of illegal immigrants. While some may have been inconvenienced by the experience, the economy hardly came to a grinding halt. It seems there are still some jobs Americans are willing to do.

Few Americans Express Confidence in United Nations to Handle Iran
Gallup Poll News - Washington,DC,USA
PRINCETON, NJ -- A recent USA Today/Gallup poll finds that just 33% of Americans say they are confident in the United Nations to handle the situation relating ...

Sinai bombings suspect killed

EL-ARISH, Egypt (AP) — The leader of an al-Qaeda-inspired group wanted for last month's bombings at a Red Sea resort was killed in a gunbattle Tuesday in the mountains of the Sinai Peninsula.

Nasser Khamis el-Mallahi, the head of Egypt's Monotheism and Jihad, was the mastermind behind last month's attacks in north and south Sinai that killed 23 people and was the seventh suspected extremist killed by Egyptian security forces since a massive sweep was launched in the Sinai following three bombings in Dahab that killed 21 people on April 24.

El-Mallahi was killed in a half-hour gunbattle after security forces surrounded him in an olive grove in el-Karama district, south of el-Arish, the main town in the northern Sinai, said the commander of North Sinai security, Lt. Gen. Essam el-Sheik.

Muslim illegals take over churches

Sanctuary displayed banner heralding 'Allah'

Illegal immigrants using churches to stage sit-ins in Belgium are turning the houses of worship into virtual mosques, says Paul Belien in the online Brussels Journal.

Belgian Roman Catholic bishops have opened up 20 churches and chapels to illegal immigrants who mostly are Muslims.

Although Belgian law requires the illegals to be expelled, the bishops are joining in the effort to pressure authorities into granting amnesty.

Domestic Surveillance Program

"IN A BOLD AND CONTROVERSIAL DECISION, the president authorized a program for the surveillance of communications within the United States, seeking to prevent acts of domestic sabotage and espionage. In so doing, he ignored a statute that possibly forbade such activity, even though high-profile federal judges had affirmed the statute's validity. The president sought statutory amendments allowing this surveillance but, when no such legislation was forthcoming, he continued the program nonetheless. And when Congress demanded that he disclose details of the surveillance program, the attorney general said, in no uncertain terms, that it would get nothing of the sort."

President George W. Bush? Nope. FDR.

"In short, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt charted a bold course in defending the nation's security in 1940, when he did all of these things."

Read on.

Stop the Scapegoating

By Ben Stein

There is something profoundly disturbing about the national craze to blame the oil companies for higher gasoline prices. It's not disturbing that people are upset about having to pay hugely more for gasoline and oil products. It's not disturbing that they are looking for someone to blame. The disturbing part is that we as a nation and as a government are blaming entities that have absolutely nothing or next to nothing to do with causing the high oil prices. It is as if we just arbitrarily decided that all left-handed people were to blame for the oil prices. That's how crazy it is.

Oil companies do not set oil prices. Oil prices are set on gigantic world markets by young millionaire hedge fund traders, by university endowments speculating in commodities, by Chinese importers seeking new sources of oil for their red hot economy, by India doing the same thing, by us Americans needing cars to make us feel big and tough. Read more.

"All men having power ought to be distrusted to a certain degree."

--- James Madison

Of course their business is picking up.....

While our elected spineless weasels put on their fake debates, mired in political correctness and multicultural nonsense and displaying an obvious unwillingness to take a stand on immigration and border protection, Jerry Seper of The Washington Times reports that the Guest-worker debate boosts alien-smuggling business.

Intelligence agency's focus turns to spies on the ground
by Bill Gertz

The Central Intelligence Agency will continue a shift toward developing networks of agents overseas while losing some of its role in analyzing intelligence, Bush administration officials said yesterday.

Deterring Tehran
By Daniel Pipes

As the Iranian regime barrels forward, openly calling for the destruction of Israel and overtly breaking the nuclear non-proliferation rules, two distinctly undesirable prospects confront the West. The first is to acquiesce to Tehran and hope for the best. The second prospect involves the destruction of key Iranian installations, thereby delaying or terminating Tehran’s nuclear aspirations…

Our Government at work...............

Further proof that our government does not give a hoot about border security:

US Tells Mexico Where Minutemen Patrols Are

Someone is telling the Mexican government where Minuteman patrols are, and it's the U.S. government, the Daily Bulletin reports. Three documents on the Mexican Secretary of Foreign Relations website reveals that the U.S. Border Patrol is telling the Mexican government the location of Minutemen and other civil border patrol groups, when they apprehend illegal immigrants and if any violence is used against illegals. "Now we know why it seemed like Mexican officials knew where we were all the time," the Daily Bulletin quoted Chris Simcox, founder of the Minuteman Civil Defense Corps, as saying. "It's unbelievable that our own government agency is sending intelligence to another country. They are sending intelligence to a nation where corruption runs rampant, and that could be getting into the hands of criminal cartels. Read News on the Web

Pence: Mideast nations want to stop Iran, too
Indianapolis Star - United States
WASHINGTON -- Middle Eastern countries are eager to have the United Nations confront Iran's nuclear threat but don't want military force used, said US Rep. ...

Breyer Calls High Court 'Boundary Patrol'

AP - The job of a justice on the nation's highest court is to patrol the boundaries of American society, not to decide what kind of society it should have, Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer said Tuesday. Read on...

Dems block medical liability bill
Republicans offered two versions of the bill, one applying to all malpractice cases and the other limited to obstetrics and gynecology, an area with high malpractice insurance costs.

Blue Helmets & a Big Mess

Eric Shawn exposes the United Nations.

An NRO Q&A

“The U.N. has been incapable of confronting the gravest issues of our time, from terrorism to nuclear proliferation,” Eric Shawn tells National Review Online. “ It should stand as a beacon of hope and humanity. But instead, that ideal has been perverted by compromise, appeasement, and graft.” More...

CIA run amok

The White House must act quickly to correct the impression that the renegades have won
Read on...

UN Taxation of Americans – A Persistent Problem

By Paul M. Weyrich

The United Nations continues advancing a global taxation agenda. Americans who believe in national sovereignty are indebted to Clifford Kincaid for his diligent monitoring of an important issue that “mainstream” news media long has ignored. The quotations which Kincaid has compiled in a publication issued recently by his organization, America’s Survival, A CHRONOLOGY: UN CAMPAIGN FOR GLOBAL TAXES ON VERGE OF SUCCESS, clearly demonstrate the deepest desire of UN bureaucrats – to pick our pockets. Wasting the regular contributions made by our Government and others is simply not sufficient to sate their appetite for money.

The UN rarely expresses its intention in such crass terms, preferring the more diplomatic euphemism “new and innovative sources of funding” to mask intent. Continue.

Scooter Libby's Revenge

Count us among those who aren't shedding any tears over the departure of Porter Goss as director of the Central Intelligence Agency. When Mr. Goss was nominated back in August of 2004, we wrote that that he "has shown precious little evidence so far of being the right man for the job." At the time, we questioned Mr. Goss's bona fides in the area of personnel management, and we breasted a fair amount of acrimony from friends who thought we were overly harsh.

Now Mr. Goss has borne out precisely those concerns. Read on.

WHAT IS IT GOING TO TAKE?

By Frosty Wooldridge
NewsWithViews.com

On 9/11, 19 illegal aliens bombed the World Trade Center into rubble and America into an ongoing nightmare. That single act by illegal aliens caused the deaths of 3,000 civilians. Further, it caused the deaths of 2,500 US soldiers and 15,000 wounded in Iraq and Afghanistan—from the US response. It caused the deaths in excess of 50,000 Iraqi citizens.

Two years ago, Theo Van Gogh, the great grandson of the famed Dutch painter, Vincent Van Gogh, suffered knife wounds to his throat by a Muslim immigrant who didn’t like Van Gogh’s right to free speech. A Dutch teacher I traveled with last summer in Europe predicted that Holland would suffer civil violence within five years. She said, “We’ll have civil war and it’ll be our immigrants against us!”

In Sweden, Muslim immigrants rape Swedish women because those women “ask for it” by not totally covering their bodies. Sweden suffers the greatest cultural dilemma its nation has experienced in hundreds of years.

Last December, in Paris, France, legal Muslim immigrants firebombed 10,000 cars in a violent melee that terrified French citizens during four solid weeks before authorities regained control. Today, French citizens fear traveling into immigrant enclaves in France. It stands as a country at odds with itself.

The same thing happened in Sydney, Australia where 5,000 people rioted against immigrants who would not and did not respect Australian laws. Immigrants demanded that Sharia Law become a part of Australia to satisfy Muslim immigrants. Thankfully, they mandated, “If you don’t like parliamentary law, you may choose to move to another country with Sharia Law.”

In England, Muslim immigrants demanded that swimming pools be changed from co-ed to distinct times for women and men—to satisfy Muslims’ need to separate the sexes. The ethnic and religious tension in the United Kingdom makes it about as ‘united’ as a scorpion and a caterpillar in a box.

In the past month, Mexican ILLEGAL aliens marched in the streets of major cities demanding their right to occupy the United States via an unarmed invasion. They commandeered America’s streets in a show of ongoing lawlessness that would make Billy the Kid proud!

What do all these events share in common? Read on.

Iraqi army captures terrorist cell leader in east Baghdad

MULTI-NATIONAL DIVISION - BAGHDAD
4th Infantry Division
CAMP LIBERTY
BAGHDAD, IRAQ
APO AE 09344

May 8, 2006


BAGHDAD, Iraq – Soldiers from the 1st Battalion, 2nd Brigade, 6th Iraqi Army Division, along with 4th Battalion, 320th Field Artillery, 506th Infantry Regiment's Military Transition Team, dealt the anti-Iraqi forces a blow when they detained an al-Qaeda in Iraq cell leader and seven other anti-Iraqi forces in two different raids in the Adhamiyah area May 4.

The first raid led to the capture of the AQIZ cell leader and two other suspects, along with 17 full AK-47 magazines, 20 rolls of TNT, three pistols, two belts of 7.62 mm ammunition and eight boxes of pistol ammunition.

The suspects were then taken into custody and questioned.

“The apprehension of the cell leader was entirely the work of the Iraqi Army,” said Capt. Joshua Brandon, 4-320th FA MiTT. “We (U.S. and Iraqi forces) have been tracking this guy and gathering joint intelligence for the last four months, but the Iraqi Soldiers took the lead and detained this guy and got information on another weapons cache.”'

Iraq arrests general over death squads - minister

Source: Reuters


BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraq's interior minister said on Sunday his police had arrested a general in the ministry on suspicion of involvement in kidnaps and death squads.

Bayan Jabor, who is fighting to keep his job in a new government in the face of criticism that he has tolerated Shi'ite militias inside his ministry, made the announcement in an interview on Al Jazeera television.

"We have arrested an officer, a major general ... along with 17 people who kidnapped citizens and in some cases killed them. He is now in jail and under investigation," he said.

"A free people ought not only to be armed and disciplined but they should have sufficient arms and ammunition to maintain a status of independence from any who might attempt to abuse them, which would include their own government."

-- George Washington

"He who dares not offend cannot be honest."

-- Thomas Paine

"I would rather be exposed to the inconveniences attending too much liberty than to those attending too small a degree of it."

-- Thomas Jefferson

The Internet Under Attack Again

Congress shaping telecom law in private.

Real work will be done in conference committee, where the public has no influence but lobbyists do.

By Marilyn Geewax
WASHINGTON BUREAU


WASHINGTON — The House and Senate are preparing to vote on telecommunications legislation that could affect every American who surfs the Internet, watches cable TV or uses a phone.

But no one should waste much time watching the floor debates on C-SPAN. The lawmakers admit their goal is not to pass definitive legislation in public in the coming weeks. More details.

Moussaoui Fails in Bid to Withdraw 9/11 Guilty Plea

By Jerry Markon
Washington Post Staff Writer

Facing transfer to the nation's toughest federal prison, Zacarias Moussaoui served up what may be his final legal surprise yesterday: The al-Qaeda conspirator said he was not involved in the Sept. 11, 2001, terror plot after all and wants a new trial to prove it.

His efforts were immediately rejected by a federal judge. Story.

Islamic moderate warns of militants

By Sharon Behn
THE WASHINGTON TIMES

The leader of Indonesia's second-largest Muslim organization says he is worried that the Islamic extremism undermining Iraq could spread and destabilize moderate Muslim nations like his own.

Din Syamsuddin, president of Muhammadiyah, said in an interview that moderate groups such as his were not capable of staving off an extremist threat.

"This threat is real. It is a threat not only to the United States, but to Muslims and Muslim leaders, and we don't have the capability -- like the state -- to equip ourselves for our defense," Mr. Syamsuddin told The Washington Times.

Established Islam in Indonesia is represented by major organizations such as Muhammadiyah, which is supported by about 35 million Muslims. Extremist groups such as al Qaeda say the moderate communities have sold out to secular governments and are therefore fair targets. Read on.

Rightist leads poll in president's race

The Washington Times
By Traci Carl
ASSOCIATED PRESS

"MEXICO CITY -- He wasn't expected to win his party's primary, let alone surge ahead in the latest poll for the presidency. But soft-spoken conservative Felipe Calderon has managed to overtake his charismatic left-wing opponent, and suddenly the campaign is looking like a roller coaster.

Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, until recently the front-runner, still has two months to regain the upper hand, but if Mr. Calderon wins on July 2, it would break a wave of leftist victories in Latin America and give Washington a close ally at a time of tense relations over shifting U.S. immigration policies.

Mr. Calderon was already slightly ahead in two newspaper polls. Then came a survey published Wednesday in the newspaper Reforma that showed him leading Mr. Lopez Obrador by 40 percent to 33 percent, with Roberto Madrazo of the Institutional Revolutionary Party at 22 percent. The nationwide survey of 2,100 persons, conducted April 28-30, had a margin of error of 2.3 percentage points." Read on.

This is good news. Let's hope Mr. Calderon can pull this off.

COMMENTARY

Late Word from the Oil Patch
By Alan Caruba

Yes, you’re paying more for oil and, yes, you will continue to do so because the U.S. government has failed to grant access to our own known reserves of oil and it has created “environmental” roadblocks to the building of new refineries. We don’t have an oil problem. We have a government problem…

Trust the people

"We who live in free market societies believe that growth, prosperity and ultimately human fulfillment, are created from the bottom up, not the government down. Only when the human spirit is allowed to invent and create, only when individuals are given a personal stake in deciding economic policies and benefiting from their success—only then can societies remain economically alive, dynamic, progressive, and free. Trust the people. This is the one irrefutable lesson of the entire postwar period, contradicting the notion that rigid government controls are essential to economic development." —Ronald Reagan

Does this make sense? Ah, no!

"I travel frequently to the United Kingdom. The stamp the immigration officer puts on my passport says, 'Leave to enter for six months. Employment and recourse to public funds prohibited.' I can't hold a job and I can't apply for welfare or other benefits paid for by the heavily taxed citizens of the UK. But I am told by the 'immigrants rights' crowd in my own country that not only should I welcome illegal aliens here, I should willingly pay for the education of their children in public schools, their emergency medical care and any additional benefits they might require. Does this make sense? Why aren't they working to improve their lot and economy in their native countries instead of piggybacking on what we have already built here?" —Cal Thomas

Venezuela rules out OPEC increasing output
El Universal - Venezuela
... as quoted by AP. Venezuela is one of the OPEC members that have insisted on restricting production in order to keep high prices.

N. Korea weaponizing bird flu?

The G2 Bulletin (available by paid subscription only) is reporting that North Korea is weaponizing the bird flu. "Bio-warfare experts call it '‘greatest threat al-Qaida could unleash'."

Unfortunately, this is the world we now live in. It is a far more dangerous place than it has ever been in my humble opinion.

UPDATE: This article now available at WorldNet Daily.

Prince Marries Prince

By Albert Mohler
Beyond the News

Parents now have something entirely new to worry about: What is being read to your kids in the public schools? Robin Wirthlin, mom of a 7-year-old student at Estabrook Elementary School in Lexington, Massachusetts found that out the hard way. Her son came home and told of being read the book, King & King at school.

The book is about a prince that marries another prince, rather than a princess. It's a straightforward attempt to normalize same-sex marriage, packaged as a fairy tale. "My son is only seven years old," said Wirthlin. "By presenting this kind of issue at such a young age, they're trying to indoctrinate our children. They're intentionally presenting this as a norm, and it's not a value that our family supports."

The school system insists that all this is in its mission, and the school will not allow parents to opt out their children from such instruction. Now we know what parents are up against.

GOP embraces local issues for 2006 elections
Republican campaign officials are urging their candidates to focus on local issues to blunt what they think is a sour national mood that could cut deeply into House and Senate majorities in the November elections.

Bipartisan caution over CIA nominee
Republicans and Democrats voiced concerns yesterday about the expected appointment of a military general to replace outgoing CIA Director Porter J. Goss, who resigned abruptly last week.

Thomas More Law Center: “Judge’s Order To Remove The Mt. Soledad Cross Is Not The End Of the Story.”

ANN ARBOR, MI – Following a 17-year battle between the city of San Diego and the atheist Philip Paulson, Federal District Judge Gordon Thompson ordered San Diego officials to remove the historic Mount Soledad Cross in accordance with an order he issued in 1991 within ninety days or face fines of $5,000 per day thereafter. The 43-foot Cross was erected in 1954 and currently is the centerpiece of a national memorial honoring American veterans of all wars.

The Thomas More Law Center, a national public interest law firm based in Ann Arbor, Michigan, has been intimately involved in defense of the Mt. Soledad Cross and National Memorial. In 2004, just weeks before the Cross was to be removed, the Law Center devised the legal blueprint to designate the land a national veteran’s memorial, which the area’s congressmen implemented in a federal omnibus appropriations act on December 8, 2004. Transfer of the land from city ownership to federal ownership, which would negate the constitutional basis for any order removing the Cross, looms as the bone of contention.

Just days before Judge Thompson’s order to remove the Cross, Charles LiMandri, the west coast regional director of the Law Center, hand delivered a supplemental legal memo on behalf of San Diegans for the Mt Soledad National Memorial pointing out how recent federal court decisions supported keeping the Cross where it is. Read on..

US to send CIA officials to fight Al-Qaeda remnants in Chitral

PakTribune.com

ISLAMABAD: Under a deal reached last week with Pakistan, the United States has decided to send Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) officials to confront with the remarks of Al-Qaeda in Chitral.

It may be recalled that Chitral area is on the border with Afghanistan. It is close to Shia-dominated areas of Gilgit, according to report of Radio Tehran.

Postal Worker Arrested in Bomb Threat

SILVER SPRING, Md. — A U.S. Postal Service worker was arrested Saturday in a bomb threat that forced police to evacuate two charter buses and close the Capital Beltway for 90 minutes, authorities said. Read on.

The Future Jihad

"Wahhabi influence has infiltrated the US academic world, and Middle East Studies was taken over by pro-Wahhabi money, and grants." Read on.

Militia Hunt Al-Qaeda in Somalia

U.S. bankrolling militia loyal to warloads in hunt to kill or capture al-Qaeda sympathizers.

NAIROBI - Militia loyal to US-backed Somali warlords have launched a campaign to capture or kill Islamic extremists in lawless Somalia, according to officials and diplomats familiar with the covert operation.

Washington is bankrolling the hunt as part of its war on terrorism to prevent new attacks in east Africa, halt training of foreign fighters in Somalia and curb "creeping Talibanisation" in the anarchic nation, they said. Read on.

Since they don't follow the prescripts.......

Does it really make any difference?

Iran Threatens to Quit Nuclear Treaty
New York Times - United States
The Iranian government said today that Iran would reject any United Nations resolution that punishes it for its nuclear activities, and threatened to stop ...