Quick Takes Tuesday

We often lead off Quick Takes column's with an interesting quote. However, this time around an excerpt from Winston Churchill's Nobel Prize winning history of the Second World War seems more appropriate. It's a catalog of lost opportunities at the hands of appeasers and "peace" activists:

Here is a line of milestones to disaster. Here is a catalogue of surrenders, at first when all was easy and later when things were harder, to the ever-growing German power. But now at last was the end of British and French submission. Here was decision at last, taken at the worst possible moment and on the least satisfactory ground, which must surely lead to the slaughter of tens of millions of people. Here was the righteous cause deliberately and with a refinement of inverted artistry committed to mortal battle after its assets and advantages had been so improvidently squandered. Still, if you will not fight for the right when you can easily win without bloodshed; if you will not fight when your victory will be sure and not too costly you may come to the moment when you will have to fight with all the odds against you and only a precarious chance of survival. There may even be a worse case. You may have to fight when there is no hope of victory, because it is better to perish than live as slaves.
--Winston Churchill

Why No Lie Detector Test for Sandy Berger?

Two links from the American Pundit lead off today's Quick Takes. First, this item about Felon Sandy Berger, the former Clinton National Security Adviser who admitted stealing and destroying some of the most sensitive national security documents taken from the National Archives. Anyone else committing such a crime would have been told "Go directly to jail. Do not pass go and do not collect $200."

The Inspector General of the National Archives called the Berger incident a "breach of National Security" (see Inspector Generals report from link here)

As part of the plea deal that amounted to a slap on the wrist (anyone else would have sent to prison, just ask Scooter Libby)Berger agreed to take a polygraph. Whether that lie detector test would have helped us learn what was on the documents Berger destroyed is unclear. But there has been no move by the Bush Justice Department to enforce the provisions of the plea deal (again, you or I would be in jail for failing to comply).

Meanwhile, Hillary hires Berger as a consultant on her campaign. Consider that move in light of what she said regarding the commutation of Scooter Libby's sentence:

"This commutation sends the clear signal that in this administration, cronyism and ideology trump competence and justice."- Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y.

Americans DEAD Because Dem's Granted Civil Liberties to Foreign Terrorists!

Second from American Pundit, The New York Post article describing how Democrats insistence on extending civil liberties protection to the communications of foreign terrorists has resulted in the deaths of Americans in Iraq.

'Wire' Law Failed Lost G.I.
10-HOUR DELAY AS FEDS SOUGHT TAP TO TRACK JIMENEZ CAPTORS IN IRAQ
By Charles Hurt
New York Post
October 15, 2007

...Sometime before dawn, heavily armed al Qaeda gunmen quietly cut through the tangles of concertina wire surrounding the outpost of two Humvees and made a massive and coordinated surprise attack.

Four of the soldiers were killed on the spot and three others were taken hostage.

A search to rescue the men was quickly launched. But it soon ground to a halt as lawyers - obeying strict U.S. laws about surveillance - cobbled together the legal grounds for wiretapping the suspected kidnappers.

Starting at 10 a.m. on May 15, according to a timeline provided to Congress by the director of national intelligence, lawyers for the National Security Agency met and determined that special approval from the attorney general would be required first.

For an excruciating nine hours and 38 minutes, searchers in Iraq waited as U.S. lawyers discussed legal issues and hammered out the "probable cause" necessary for the attorney general to grant such "emergency" permission.

Finally, approval was granted and, at 7:38 that night, surveillance began.

"The intelligence community was forced to abandon our soldiers because of the law," a senior congressional staffer with access to the classified case told The Post.

"How many lawyers does it take to rescue our soldiers?" he asked. "It should be zero."

The FISA law applies even to a cellphone conversation between two people in Iraq, because those communications zip along wires through U.S. hubs, which is where the taps are typically applied.

U.S. officials had no way of knowing if Jimenez and his fellow soldiers were still alive during the nearly 10-hour delay.

The body of one was found a few weeks later in the Euphrates River and the terror group Islamic State of Iraq - an al Qaeda offshoot - later claimed in a video that Jimenez and the third soldier had been executed and buried.

Heather Wilson, (R-NC) and a former intelligence officer in the U.S. military pointed out the abusrdity of the current Democrat policy: "Al Queda, you can shoot 'em but don't listen to their phone calls."

There has not been ONE valid complaint of an American citizen whose civil liberties have been infringed by Bush Administration to monitor terrorist communications. Yet here we have an example of Americans whose lives have been lost because Democrats were more concerned with the civil liberties of terrorists rather than the lives of American soldiers!

Hillary Flip Flops on Iraq Withdrawal?

Hillary's spinning so furiously on the subject of Iraq that I have no doubt the Secret Service is on standby to catch her if she gets too dizzy and falls down.
The woman who told a New Hampshire audience in June that : "The Iraq War is Bush's war" changed her tune in September and along with other leading Dem presidential candidates refused to pledge to end the Iraq war by end of her first prospective term in 2013.

One month later she's back to withdrawing most U.S. troops from Iraq in the first sixty days after she takes office.

How do the "Bush Lied" crowd feel about a candidate who candidate who changes their stand on such an important issue more often than most hippies (Dem voters) change their underwear?

Hillary's entire Foreign Affairs "Essay" here.

Democrats Damage Alliances
Dem slaps at Turkey not the first hit at our friends!

At Mike's America, we're fond of recalling the famous words of former President Jimmy Carter: "The United States has alienated its allies, dismayed its friends and inadvertently gratified its enemies by proclaiming a confused and disturbing strategy."

This is the same Jimmy Carter who insulted then British Prime Minister Tony Blair by calling him "Abominable. Loyal, blind, apparently subservient" to President Bush. And that's just the tip of a very large Carter iceberg.

And of course who can forget that Hillary Clinton would as president annoint hubby Bill as Ambassador to the World to repair the damage to the U.S. image overseas?

So, we ask, why do elected Democrats insist on continuing to damage the image and reputation of the United States overseas?

A coming vote in the U.S. House of Represenatives condeming the now defunct Ottoman Empire for genocide against Armenians in World War I is seen by modern day Turkey, a NATO ally, as a slap severe enough to recall their Ambassador to Washington and threaten to end cooperation with U.S. forces in nearby Iraq. Meanwhile, our leverage in lessening tensions along the Turkish/Kurdish-Iraq border has been lost.

News headlines condemning this senseless, ill-timed resolution include:

• Pelosi's War, Newsmax
• Right Intentions, Wrong Time Washington Post
• Thanks, Democrats! Oil price rises with US-Turk tensionsHot Air
• Tensions with Turkey Spur Oil Price IncreaseNPR
• US-Turkey alliance shaken by vote on Armenia 'genocide'Scotsman, U.K.
• Turkey assails US vote on genocideInternational Herald Tribune
• Turkey may cut US access to key air baseCNN
• US genocide move reopens old wounds in TurkeyReuters
• Keeping Our Troops Safe Means Keeping An AllyYahoo! News
• Dangerous watersGuardian Unlimited, UK

President Bush Touting Economic Progress, Free Trade and "Fiscal Responsibility

If your favorite news channel has been doing wall to wall coverage of the latest turn in the Britney Spears or Anna Nichole Smith saga, you might have missed the efforts of President Bush to highlight economic progress, benefits of free trade and fiscal responsibility as he cajoles Congress into passing responsible budgets for next year.

Here are a couple of highlights:

On October 11, 2007, the Bureau of Labor Statistics released new jobs figures – 110,000 jobs created in September. September 2007 is the 49th consecutive month of job growth, setting a new record for the longest uninterrupted expansion of the U.S. labor market. Significant upward revisions to employment in July and August mean employment growth has averaged 97,000 per month over the last three months. Since August 2003, our economy has created more than 8.1 million jobs.

Real after-tax per capita personal income has increased by over 12.5 percent – an average of over $3,750 per person – since President Bush took office. More than 30 percent of the Nation's net worth has been added since the President's 2003 tax cuts.

Real wages have grown 2.2 percent over the 12 months that ended in August. This is much higher than the average growth rate during the 1990s, and it means an extra $1,266 in the past year for a family with two average wage earners.

Exports have increased by over 14.8 percent in the 12 months that ended in July. This has resulted in an $8.3 billion reduction in the trade deficit.

Budget numbers for Fiscal Year 2007 released today by the Department of Treasury and Office of Management and Budget show the Federal deficit declined by $250 billion in the last three years.

President George W. Bush addresses his remarks to an audience at the John Q. Hammons Convention Center in Rogers, Ark., Monday, Oct. 15, 2007, urging Congress to be fiscally responsible with the taxpayer’s money. White House photo by Eric Draper

Focusing on fiscal responsibility during a trip to Arkansas on Monday, President Bush had the following exchange the significance of which transcends the singular topic:

Q First of all, thank you for being here. And I've got two children. I was talking with my 15-year-old son about what would be a great question to ask the President had I -- if I had the opportunity, and we settled on this: In this day of information that's so accessible to all of us, if you're a 15- year-old looking for the truth, which is often hard to get -- an adult looking for the truth in election time or non-election time, where would you recommend someone that's hungry for the truth to go to get the truth about potential elected officials, programs to support, that kind of information?

THE PRESIDENT: Yes, great question. I guess if I was advising a 15-year-old child where to seek the truth, I would say go to your mother and father, is where I would ask them to seek the truth. ...

And so, as far as you finding the truth, hopefully [parents are] wise enough and old enough and experienced enough to be able to discern that which is true and not true....

Notice President Bush didn't say the child should accept the word of the government, or the government funded schools. Returning responsibility AND authority to parents is about as conservative value as you can get!

No wonder people love him:

Well-wishers wave and show their support for President George W. Bush at his departure aboard Air Force One Monday, Oct. 15, 2007, from Waco TSTC Airport in Waco, Texas. President Bush flew on to Arkansas touring a manufacturing facility, meeting with local business leaders and delivering a speech on fiscal responsibility. White House photo by Eric Draper

"W Thanks for all you do"

Amen!