Bill's Bites -- 2006.09.25
Contributed by Bill Faith
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Destitute Dog -- Please read this and help if you can.
Bill's Bites -- 2006.09.26
'A Rather Hyperactive Imagination'
The campaign for Senate in Virginia has descended into one of the most mud-filled dirty contests in recent history. Not since the nomination of Clarence Thomas has a political campaign stooped as low as have the supporters of Jim Webb against incumbent George Allen. Ken Shelton, one of Allen's long-time critics and once a college-football teammate of Allen, suddenly recalled -- after several years of opposing Allen politically -- that Allen regularly used a particularly vile racial epithet during his years at the University of Virginia: [...]
Allegations this explosive would require responsible publications to get more than one source on the record. Michael Scherer and Salon failed to find even one other source to go public, nor did they reveal that Shelton's political activities put him in opposition to Allen. Instead, they used Shelton and two supposedly frightened and anonymous UV alums to publish these scurrilous charges. ...
Video: Napolitano fact-checks the hell out of Clinton’s legal argument
From yesterday’s interview: If you can criticize me for one thing, you can criticize me for this, after the Cole I had battle plans drawn to go into Afghanistan, overthrow the Taliban, and launch a full scale attack search for Bin Laden. But we needed baseing rights in Uzbekistan which we got after 9/11. The CIA and the FBI refused to certify that Bin Laden was responsible while I was there. They refused to certify. So that meant I would have had to send a few hundred special forces in helicopters and refuel at night.
Cue the judge:
[video link]
Olbermann’s planning to finish off that massage he gave Clinton on Friday with a “happy ending” tonight as he foists yet another “special comment” upon his eight viewers. Sneak preview: ...
Cancelled due to Islamism:
Mozart opera, car dealership commercial
The highest of high culture, the lowest of low, and everything in between. Jihad makes no distinctions.
Egypt banned two prominent European newspapers over the weekend, too. For insulting the prophet.
Memory lane: ...
Video: Franken doesn’t know about
AA’s financial future, admits receiving no pay
Air America’s non-paid talk show host Al Franken appeared on MSNBC’s “Tucker” last Thursday to discuss Ahmadinejad and his best pal Hugo Chavez’s speech; Air America; and his new documentary God Spoke. It’s about Franken’s life over the course of two years, zzzzzzz.
Below you will find a cut of the video and a partial transcript with important points bolded. ...
Video: Musharraf calls Armitage’s 9/11 threat “very rude”
Whereas I call it hot. Bethany-level hot. So hot I’m almost willing to forgive Tricky Dick his complete douchebaggery in sitting silent for three years while Plamegate spun out of control.
Almost.
Musharraf’s book is out today and the Times of London has excerpts. Here’s a selection from the passage about 9/11 that made me laugh: ...
Air America host tells MSNBC Coulter can’t commit to men
That’s the second time in three months someone’s gotten personal towards her on MSNBC, and Tucker Carlson’s been present both times. And both times, to his credit, he’s refused to participate.
Remember the last time? Hardball, June 9th: ...
Isaac Tells All
Contributed by John Werntz
Entitled "Fear and Loathing in The Land of the Pure," Isaac Schrödinger's long-awaited manifesto appeared on September 25, 2006. Far too long and much too good to be excerpted here, the manifesto is a long and colorful essay in four parts. The first part is biographical, and clarifies how his adherence to the ideal of freedom of thought and expression has caused him to abandon the Islamic theocratic edicts of the culture in which he was raised. Part 2 details provisions of Islamic law that deal with apostasy and blasphemy, in particular Article 295C of the penal code of his native land, Pakistan. Those who are not legal scholars may content themselves with skimming legalistic details. ...
AP runs to the Washington Post
Michelle Malkin
What do you do when you are a global news organization under fire for suppressing five-month-old news of the capture of one of your employees by American troops in a Ramadi apartment with an alleged al Qaeda leader and a weapons cache?
You run to a sympathetic news organization to help you whitewash the story and smear the U.S. military. Naturally.
On Saturday, the Washington Post op-ed page published a shameless CYA screed by Associated (with terrorists) Press president and chief executive Tom Curley on the Bilal Hussein case. The inanity begins with the very first paragraph of the piece titled "In Iraq, a Journalist in Limbo:" Bilal Hussein, an Iraqi photographer who helped the Associated Press win a Pulitzer Prize last year, is now in his sixth month in a U.S. Army prison in Iraq. He doesn't understand why he's there, and neither do his AP colleagues.
Oh, sweet merciful crap. ...
RNC fact-checks Clinton’s “Fox News Sunday” interview;
Update: Was Clinton’s speech slurred?
Allahpundit
Here you go. Lots of boldface and underlining and boldfaced underlining. I wouldn’t normally link them but Billy Jeff asked for it. Go forth, and let the record be corrected.
I said yesterday I’d be curious to know what Michael Scheuer thought of Clinton’s interview. CBS was curious too so they had him on the “Early Show” this morning, much to fair and impartial newsman Harry Smith’s chagrin. Newsbusters has video. There’s actually nothing much new there; Scheuer’s been ripping Clinton for his ham-fisted attempts to kill Bin Laden for years. Listen to the audio of his interview about it with Fox News on 9/11. ...
Weeping war widow tells Bush she blames him for husband’s death
An amazing article: They sat on two frayed chairs in a teacher’s lounge, the president and the widow, just the two of them so close that their knees were almost touching.
She was talking about her husband, the soldier who died in a far-off war zone. Tears rolled down her face as she mentioned two children left fatherless. His eyes welled up, too. He hugged her, held her face, kissed her cheek. “I am so sorry for your loss,” he kept repeating…
Halley, 41, lost her husband, National Guard Capt. Patrick Damon, also 41, in June in Afghanistan to what officially was ruled a heart attack. ...
Aznar: Muslims should apologize too
Geese and ganders, pots and kettles. Muslims seems to like forcing Westerners to apologize for various alleged sins of the past and present. Former Spanish President Jose Maria Aznar says Muslims should apologize for the Islamic occupation of Spain. Muslims should apologize for occupying Spain for 800 years and a U.N.-backed program to encourage dialogue between them and West is stupid, former Spanish prime minister Jose Maria Aznar has said. Aznar made his comments Friday night in a speech at the Hudson Institute, a thinktank in Washington, D.C., as he discussed Pope Benedict XVI’s recent remarks on Islam and violence.
He has a point. ..
Osama death rumor was passed along at … an embassy party
Allahpundit
What kind of chit-chat do Saudi diplomats make with French attachés at a non-cocktail party in Islamabad? This kind. Which drew a laugh from ISI: Pakistani intelligence sources say few, if any, of the Saudi sources [in Pakistan] “are of any value” and that “the Saudis repeatedly get conned by these individuals who claim to have exclusive information.”
But note this: ...
Allen campaign responds to “N-word” allegations
Salon used one named source and two corroborating anonymous sources. Allen HQ fires back with four named sources who claim not only never to have heard Allen use a racial slur but who dispute the origin of Shelton’s team nickname and the reason Shelton gave for Allen’s matriculation at UVA. Henke’s post lays out the whole point-counterpoint. ...
Safia Amajan, R.I.P., and the threat in Afghanistan
Terrible news: A leading Afghan official working on women's rights has been shot dead in the southern province of Kandahar.
Safia Amajan, head of the province's women's department, was leaving her home for work when a gunman on a motorcycle opened fire, police said.
She may have been targeted by Taleban militants because of their opposition to women taking part in politics and education, the BBC's Dan Isaacs says. ...
Wishing war away; pining for a caliphate
Michelle Malkin
The Code Pinkos took over the Hart Senate Office Building on Friday (hat tip: E.) Here's video of their "War is not the answer" sing-a-long:
[video link]
Someone should have handed them the lyrics to "Give jihad a chance."
***
Meanwhile, their fellow travelers in Britain turned out for an anti-war pow-wow. Moonbat Media was there to capture the keffiyehs and peace signs and stickers like this one. Look closely: ...
Frist fence flakeout?
Scott Johnson
Mickey Kaus poses the question whether Senator Frist was signalling an imminent flakeout on the border fence legislation on This Week yesterday. There is a cynicism in Kaus's instincts that I hope is not warranted, especially given the high regard in which we hold Senator Frist, but it is a cynicism that has been amply warranted in Kaus's past analysis of the politics of immigration reform.
UPDATE: Stephen Smith, Senator Frits's online communications coordinator, has copied us on the following message he has sent Mickey Kaus in response to the post linked above:
*** Put up or shut up
Michelle Malkin
I've already told you how underwhelmed I am by the GOP's empty, election-season, unfunded border fence gestures. Mickey Kaus detected signs of a Frist fence flake-out on ABC's This Week with George Stephanopoulous yesterday, and I think Mickey's radar is dead-on: Has Sen. Frist given up on the border fence? It sure sounded that way on George Stephanopoulos' This Week. The Senate Majority Leader said a bill containing the proposed 700-mile barrier was "hopefully what we'll be voting on the floor of the Senate this week." But then, with a guilty, knowing grin,** he added: "Right now I got a feeling the Democrats may obstruct it."
Pope Benedict Demands Reciprocity
Pope Benedict XVI met with envoys from several Muslim nations today, greeting them warmly and emphasizing the need for dialogue between the faiths. He did not offer another apology for his remarks at Regensburg two weeks ago, but he did remind the envoys that they have not fulfilled their responsibilities in ensuring freedom of religious practice for Christians: Pope Benedict XVI told Muslim diplomats Monday that ''our future'' depends on dialogue between Christians and Muslims, an attempt to ease relations strained by his recent remarks about Islam and violence. ...
Jules Crittendon: AP Plays For The Other Side
Jules Crittendon, the excellent Boston Herald columnist, wrote a fiery piece yesterday about the AP and its engagement with terrorists. Crittendon wonders when the AP decided to become a propaganda shill for al-Qaeda and the Islamists and laments the betrayal of its long and lustrous history in pioneering objectivity in journalism: ...
Video:
McCain names three procedures “torture” bill would/should ban
Among others, of course; these are just the first three that came to mind. And according to this WaPo article, one of the ones he names hasn’t actually been used in years.
I’m being coy. Watch the clip.
[video clip]
Frist declined comment yesterday on this subject for reasons I don’t quite fathom: Asked repeatedly on ABC’s “This Week” what the legislation would allow, Frist said, “I’m not going to comment on individual techniques,” and he condemned doing so. ...
*** McCain Can't Keep His Mouth Shut
During the negotiations over the legislation intended to authorize CIA detentions and interrogations of terrorists, officials in all agencies and in Congress took pains to avoid specifying the kinds of techniques approved or forbidden by the competing proposals. The CIA and the White House explicitly told reporters that revealing those techniques could allow terrorists to prepare for future interrogations. So it probably surprised everyone when John McCain decided to reveal the limits within the compromise legislation on national television yesterday: Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) named three measures that he said would no longer be allowed under a provision barring techniques that cause serious mental or physical suffering by U.S. detainees: extreme sleep deprivation, forced hypothermia and "waterboarding," which simulates drowning. He also said other "extreme measures" would be banned.
*** John McCain seizes the moral high ground on behalf of his country
Paul Mirengoff
A day or two ago, I explained why I consider it fair to say that Senators McCain, Graham, and Warner comprise the terrorist rights wing of the Republican party. In essence, the reference is fair because all three want to expand the rights that terrorists and terrorist suspects have.
Yesterday, Senator McCain listed some of the rights that terrorists now have thanks to his work. According to McCain, they have the right not to be subjected to water-boarding, extreme sleep deprivation, and forced hypothermia. Terrorist organizations also have the right, thanks to McCain, to know in advance which practices apparently are off-the-table....
Clinton: Conspiracy Theorists Out to Get Me
(2006-09-26) -- The morning after Fox News aired reporter Chris Wallace's interview with a feisty Bill Clinton, the former president today said, "Right-wing, neocon conspiracy theorists are out to get me."
Mr. Clinton dismissed allegations that he appeared paranoid on TV, saying, “people who call me paranoid are the exact same right-wingers, who worked behind the scenes with Chris Wallace to engineer my emotional outburst. It’s what they call a ‘wag the finger’ strategy to distract attention from the Bush administration’s foreign policy failures.” ...
*** 
ClintonRage: The morning after
Michelle Malkin
On Fox and Friends this morning, Chris Wallace had some interesting comments about his interview with the Finger-Jabber:
His reaction to Clinton accusing him of having a "smirk:"
"What it was was sheer wonder at what I was witnessing."
Heh. On what happened after the interview:
"There was no making up with him. He was angry. And when he left, he chewed out his staff."
The Finger-Jabber. Always, always blaming someone else for his failures.
Noel Sheppard at The American Thinker weighs in on "Bill Clinton, Bin Laden, and Hysterical Revisions." Howard Kurtz does a brief take on Clinton's finger-wagging moment. ...
Video flashback:
Wallace sides with Clinton over “Path to 9/11″
From the Johnny Dollar archives, here’s rabid right-wing conservative-hit-job- perpetrating hatchet man smear artist Chris Wallace behaving rather oddly two weeks ago on “Fox & Friends.” Perhaps he’d already devised his plot to viciously blindside Clinton with a sandbag question about Bin Laden and wanted to create plausible denial for his bias by defending him in advance? That must be it.
Click the image to watch. ...
*** Play it as it lies
Scott Johnson
The most striking feature of Bill Clinton's bloviations on FOX News Sunday with Chris Wallace yesterday was the incredibly low ratio of facts to whoppers. If Chris Wallace could prompt that red-faced response with such an innocuous question, I wonder if a few minutes with Richard Miniter (author of Losing bin Laden, interviewed by NRO here), might not send him to intensive care. I would love to hear Miniter ask Clinton a few questions about Clinton's treatment of the 1993 attack on the World Trade Center -- an attack that Clinton shrugged off in a few paragraphs of his subsequent Saturday morning radio talk, never to return to the subject. (Miniter quotes the relevant paragraphs of the radio address at pages 28-30 of his book.)
Our friends at RealClearPolitics have posted a tough column by Ronald Cass that begins to address Clinton's rewriting of the record. Reader and former Marine intelligence analyst Kevin Groenhagen has also taken a look at the assertion that the Bush administration demoted and fired Richard Clarke -- the man who apparently was the key to fighting terrorism in every administration since the Reagan administration. ...
Massive Anti-Hezbollah Rally Held North of Beirut
(Hat tip: Eric Bogomolny)
BEIRUT, Lebanon — An anti-Syrian Christian leader dismissed Hezbollah's claims of victory in its war with Israel as tens of thousands of his supporters rallied Sunday in a show of strength that highlighted Lebanon's sharp divisions.
The rally north of Beirut came just two days after a massive gathering by the rival Shiite Muslim Hezbollah that attracted hundreds of thousands. The two sides have been at sharp odds over the future of the Lebanese government since this summer's Israeli-Hezbollah war.
Samir Geagea, a notorious former leader of a Christian militia, scoffed at Hezbollah leader Sheik Hassan Nasrallah's declaration that his guerrillas achieved "a victory" against Israel.
About that National Intelligence Estimate
Michelle Malkin
The NYTimes and WaPo went big yesterday with news of a leaked classified National Intelligence Estimate report, which reportedly claims that the Iraq war is exacerbating Islamic terrorism. WaPo: The war in Iraq has become a primary recruitment vehicle for violent Islamic extremists, motivating a new generation of potential terrorists around the world whose numbers may be increasing faster than the United States and its allies can reduce the threat, U.S. intelligence analysts have concluded. ...
[...]
The White House sent out a response yesterday. I'm reprinting the whole thing here:
The Rest Of The Story: The National Intelligence Estimate ...
Falwell: Hillary more feared than Satan
Ian Schwartz
She has me scared: WASHINGTON — If Hillary Rodham Clinton is the Democrats’ presidential nominee in 2008, it will motivate conservative evangelical Christians to oppose her more than if the devil himself were running, the Rev. Jerry Falwell has told pastors at a “values” conference.
Fleecers
From AP, who still thinks Abbas is a "moderate": Abbas says unity effort 'back to zero'. (via LGF) Accusing the Islamic militant group Hamas of backtracking, moderate Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas warned on Saturday that his efforts to set up a national unity government that is acceptable to the West are "back to zero."
*** Palestinian Situation Crumbling
Mahmoud Abbas says he will try once more to get Hamas into a unity government that will abide by the agreements signed with Israel, but several militias threatened open rebellion to any government that offers official recognition of Israel. The developments leave the Palestinian Authority with almost no mandate and no chance to convince the West to restart aid to the territories: Four Palestinian armed groups on Sunday threatened to target any Palestinian government that recognizes Israel's right to exist and attacked Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas for "succumbing" to US pressure. ...
Bill's Bite's 2006.09.24
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