To Win This War: First, Know Your Enemy

Snap out of it folks! There is a war on, and it's time to get serious about it. The attacks in London and new warnings from Al Queda should be a wake up call. Will we wait until something far worse than September 11th happens? It's time for the left to stop the excuse making, terror apologist and appeasement and move beyond Bush name-calling and join their fellow Americans, and Britons and peace and freedom loving people around the globe in a united effort to prevent calamity that would darken this world for generations.

But first, you have to be honest about who and what we are fighting.

Just before his throat was cut down to the spinal cord ending his life, Dutch filmmaker Theo van Gogh begged for mercy: "Can't we talk about this?" he said to his killer, Mohammed Bouyeri, Dutch born of Morrocan parents. At Bouyeri's sentencing for murder he turned to the Theo's mother and said: "I don't feel your pain. I don't have any sympathy for you. I can't feel for you because I think you're a non-believer." Holding a copy of the Koran in one hand Bouyeri told the court: "the law compels me to chop off the head of anyone who insults Allah and the prophet".

What was van Gogh's insult to Allah and the prophet? Was he a defender of U.S. foreign policy and the Iraq war? Did he support Israel at the expense of the Palestinians? No... sorry lefty apologists. He had recently produced a documentary on the role of women in Islam entitled "Submission."

A subject of that film, Hirsi Ali, a member of the Dutch Parliament and a former Muslim describes the path she took to escape the abuse and killing of women under Islamic law:

How did she do it? "The American dream," says Hirsi Ali. "I think it's in every individual, if you have the will to improve your life."

She shook up Dutch politics by pointing to the blind spots in this tolerant democracy, like the murder of Muslim women who stray from the faith, so-called honor killings.

"My accusation towards the Dutch society was, 'You think you are tolerant, but if you look behind those curtains in Amsterdam and Rotterdam, there are women who are abused. There are women who are taken to Morocco and Turkey and are killed there. They're murdered. And there are no records of those murders,' " says Hirsi Ali.

For that insult to Islam, van Gogh was murdered and Ms. Ali lives under 24 hour armed guard.

Zawahiri's Latest Propaganda Lie: Appealing to Lefty Playbook

In the latest video tape Al Queda #2, Ayman Zawahiri listed another string of demands designed to further split resolve in wavering democracies:

"Our message to you is crystal clear: Your salvation will only come in your withdrawal from our land, stop stealing our oil and wealth and stop supporting corrupt rulers.
...
[W]hat you saw in New York and Washington [on September 11] and what you are seeing in Afghanistan and Iraq, all these are nothing compared to what you will see next. If you go on with the same policy of aggression against Muslims, you will see, with God's will, something that will make you forget the horrible things that you saw in Vietnam.
...
bin Laden told you that you will not dream of security before there is security in Palestine and before all the infidel armies withdraw from the land of Mohammed."

So basically, paying over $60 for a barrel of oil is "stealing" and the only thing that will satisfy these butchers is the complete and total withdrawal of the West from the Middle East. And what would happen then? After the inital bloodbath where millions of the apostates (anyone who disagrees with the radicals) were murdered, a Caliphate or extreme Islamic superstate would be created.

And of course the ultimate goal of that Caliphate is the extension of Islam to the entire world where the rest of us will be offered a choice: convert, submit or die!

From the London Times: God sent Muhammad as the last of His prophets and the bearer of His ultimate message, Islam. With the advent of Islam all previous religions were "abrogated" (mansukh), and their followers regarded as "infidel" (kuffar). The aim of all good Muslims, therefore, is to convert humanity to Islam....the Western-dominated world is too mired in corruption to hear any argument, and must be shocked into conversion through spectacular ghazavat (raids) of the kind we saw in New York and Washington in 2001, in Madrid last year, and now in London.

If you think 3,000 Americans killed on September 11 was horror, pay close attention to what Zawahiri said "nothing compared to what you will see next." This is global jihad in which all "good" Muslims are called on to obey the teachings and take whatever steps are necessary to ensure the domination of Islam.

Three years before September 11th Zawahiri issued this warning:" We will be sending a message to Americans, which we hope they read with care, because we will write it, with God's help, in a language they will understand."

If you are still not convinced that the goals of fanatic Islamists extend to world domination, the Islamic Thinking Society in New York gives it to you in their video, which I discussed in June.

In New York accented English, these hometown terrorists trampel an American flag underfoot while holding a Koran high and declaring : "Our loyalty does not belong to this flag but to the laws of Allah...[the goal of Islam is] to dominate all other religions, to dominate the United States, to dominate the world."

This monster goes on to encourage fellow American Muslims to join their Jihad "Do not be afraid, this is not so much like your countries at home where you raise your voice and they come after you and they take you in for torture. No! One of the loopholes in this country is that they allow the freedom of expression. "

Admitting that the great freedoms he enjoys to practice hate is a "loophole" and encouraging others to do the same because you won't be "tortured" won't win him any votes in the leftwing borroughs of New York, but should give the rest of us pause to consider how the enemy uses our own freedom against us.

Cleaning this mess up before something worse than September 11th happens is not going to be easy. But the first step is to know your enemy and stop swallowing the propaganda about how the U.S. is to blame. Readers will recall that these Muslim "greivances" go all the way back to the Crusades, FIVE HUNDRED YEARS before this nation was founded. Blaming Americans for the Crusades and every bad thing that has happened to Muslims is like expecting white emmigrants to the United States to pay reparations for slavery which was abolished before they arrived.

Was this little boy rescued from the school house massacre in Beslan, Russia to blame for offenses against Islam? More graphic images from the school house slaugher are available if you know a lefty apologist who still wants to excuse terrorists!

Iraq Central Front In War On Terror

Those on the left who constantly bleat that "Iraq has nothing to do with the war on terror" may wish to re-read Zawahiri's statement. Terrorists, or as the reporter Steven Vincent, who was recently killed in Bara Iraq, called them "paramilitary death squads" are pouring into Iraq precisely because they know if they can hang tough until Democrats force a premature withdrawal of American troops, that we will not have the will to resist them when they begin a civil war in Saudi Arabia.

Bush's strategy in Iraq has always been as a keystone in the war on terror. Success there changes the dynamic in the whole region. Failure there means darker clouds that offer no hope for peace or safety.

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For an expanded discussion on the pathology which seems to block the left from uniting in efforts to win this war, see a thoughtful piece by NeoNeocon.

Also, one of the most comprehensive resources for monitoring Islamic jihad is at Jihad Watch. You're unlikely to see many of the reports described at Jihad Watch in the "mainstream" media until AFTER another attack.

Jackson's Junction also had another interesting report from the mouths of the Jihadis themselves.

Our new motto here at Mike's America: "Inform, Defend, Prepare."

Adoptive Families Outraged Over Times Investigation of Roberts' Children

Michelle Malkin has reader reaction to the news that the New York Times was investigating the adoption of Judge Roberts' children, both of whom came from Latin America. Here's a sample:

It seems clear to me that the goal and hope of the Timesfolk was to find the birth mothers of the two Roberts children; send a reporter (and photographer!) to some poor Latin American village and interview the two women. After some coaxing and editing the following would appear on the front page of the (Sunday) NY Times:
Maria Sanchez earns twenty five cents a year and survives without medical care and in a cardboard shack. Five years ago an American helicoptered into her poor mountain village (there are no roads) and offered her the equivalent of four year's salary to hand over her newest child, one month old Jose. Eighteen year-old Maria, who couldn't feed her other six children went to her local Priest who advised her that it would be best for all the children if she accepted the "Gringo's generous offer."

The New York Times has now learned that Jose is Jack. The adorable adopted son of John Robert, George Bush's nominee to the US Supreme Court. The Times was able to interview Maria who has never forgotten the day that Jose waved goodbye from the window of the departing helicopter.

"Maria, do you want your son back?"

"Maria: Si."

"Maria, do you think that fellow Catholic, ultra-conservative Supreme Court nominee John Roberts stole your baby?"

"Maria: Si."

Although the editors of the New York Times are proudly ignorant of how incentives and disincentives alter human behavior the rest of us know better.

Action: America's best-known newspaper tries to find dirt on a public figure by investigating the figure's adoption of two children.

Reaction: There will be fewer adoptions.

Some good has come of all this, I suppose. At least we can now be sure of at least one thing: John Roberts has never rented an X-rated video. If he had we'd surely know about that by now.

Alabama Leads the Way with Property Rights Legislation

The reaction to the liberal bloc's Supreme Court decision to seize private property for the benefit of big developers is heating up. Alabama leads the way with the signing today of a law designed to protect property rights.

State of Alabama - Office of the Governor Bob Riley - Press Releases:

"'Alabamians can rest assured that their homes, their farms, their businesses and other private property are safe from being seized by government for a shopping center or a factory, an office building or new residential development. With this new landmark law on the books, Alabamians will have the strongest property protections in America,' said Governor Riley. "

Liberals Attack Four Year Old Roberts' Boy

Judge Roberts' family at the White House during his nomination announcement.

A new low, as reported in the Drudge Report:

The NEW YORK TIMES is looking into the adoption records of the children of Supreme Court Nominee John G. Roberts, the DRUDGE REPORT has learned.

The TIMES has investigative reporter Glen Justice hot on the case to investigate the status of adoption records of Judge Roberts' two young children, Josie age 5 and Jack age 4, a top source reveals.

Roberts' young son Jack delighted millions of Americans during his father's Supreme Court nomination announcement ceremony when he wouldn't stop dancing while the President and his father spoke to a national television audience.

Previously the WASHINGTON POST Style section had published a story criticizing the outfits Mrs. Roberts had them wear at the announcement ceremony.

It's worse than that folks! Not only is the Times digging for dirt on Roberts' adopted children, not only did the Post run a distasteful column on the kids appearance, but in the dark corners of socialist hell holes they are saying much worse. I won't validate those cretins by repeating it, but suffice it say that if you said that about a liberal nominee's family there would be riots.

Roberts is about the tamest, least controversial nominee that President Bush could appoint. But the left demonstrates yet again a propensity to show more bile than brains and no inclination to act in the bipartisan manner which epitomized radical Justice Ginsburg (get rid of Mothers Day and the Boy and Girl Scouts) Ginsburg.

After witnessing the opening shots in this sad parade of left wing desperation I am glad that we have FOUR MORE YEARS! And frankly, Mr. President, you might as well make the next appointment an "in your face" conservative. I'm recommending Ann Coulter.

Liberal "Americans Coming Together" Bites the Dust!

One impetus for me beginning this blog was my incredulity at a lengthy New York Times piece entitled "Who Lost Ohio?" which I excerpted and commented on here.

Bush WON Ohio, it wasn't Kerry's to lose. But aside from taking issue with the title, the story did provide an excellent contrast with the approaches of the two campaigns in a way which points to results in future elections.

The Democrats, led primarily by a massive infusion of money from billionaire George Soros and others, funded a nationwide effort called "Americans Coming Together" or ACT that had a heavy presence in Ohio. They shipped in tie-dyed hippie freak tree worshipping neosocialists from safe states to promote voter registration and voter turnout in Ohio for Kerry. It wasn't hard to spot them. I was in Ohio shortly before the elction and saw more than one car with an Illinois license plate adorned with Kerry-Edwards stickers carting around yard signs.

The Bush effort was homegrown. It concentrated on volunteers who lived and worked in the local communities to reach out to their friends and neighbors.

Dem voter registration efforts had their problems. One over eager Dem registered Mary Poppins, George Forman, Janet Jackson, Dick Tracy and more in the smallish town of Defiance. In the resulting scandal it was learned he was to be paid with crack cocaine for his efforts. Perhaps he was given a bit of an advance payment before he begun work.

Imagine you are an Ohio voter and the doorbell rings at night. You answer and it's some hippie freak from out of state mumbling about how he hates Bush and how "the corporations" are ruining the world. You'd call the cops!

After spending 200 million dollars, what did Americans Coming Together have to show for it? Byron York points out in this National Review column that after all that, the only election they won was for Secretary of State in Missouri!

After the election, ACT downsized, sending a fresh wave of unemployed hippies back to their Dem enclaves to lick their wounds, smoke their crack and spin their conspiracy theories about "the corporations." But now we learn the organization is folding up shop permanently.

I cannot say it will be missed. The sheer arrogance of big money Democrats thinking that sending an army of smelly hippies into Ohio or any other state was a good idea just shows how completely out of touch they are with voters. Think they will learn their lesson? Nah! As we've been discovering here at Mike's America, liberal brain cancer requires a willingness to ignore the obvious. And the disease seems to be an epidemic on the left.

Goodies from Sacred Cow Burgers (click image to enlarge)

Three goodies from Sacred Cow Burgers...Click image for larger size.

Caption Contest: Newly installed Ambassador John Bolton presents his credentials to UN Secretary General Kofi Annan on Tuesday. My caption is: "Here Kofi, a subpoena requiring you to testify for allowing your family members to loot the Iraq oil for food program." Children died, because Kofi lied!

Liberals Loot Boys and Girls Club to Keep Air America Alive

How many times have you heard some lefty say that their socialist agenda is "for the children?" Well, apparently one of those oh-so-concerned lefties looted funds from the Gloria Wise Boys & Girls Club in New York to promote that agenda. The New York Sun and Michelle Malkin have the story of "Evan Montvel Cohen who served as both director of left wing radio Air America and Development Director of the Boys and Girls club. Mr. Cohen is suspected of defrauding the club for $875,000 to fund operations of Air America.

Mr. Cohen claimed to have "brain cancer" and told the clubs board of directors that he needed the money for chemotherapy. Defrauding a children's social service organization to support left wing kookery is bad enough, but much of the club's money comes from government grants. That's right, TAXPAYER money being stolen to support a socialist agenda whose ultimate goal is the confiscation of private property and the redistribution of income.

If you haven't heard about this story in the "mainstream" media or from your lefty friends, no surprise there! They are all to busy with more important stuff like conspiracy theories about Karl Rove or undermining effective efforts in the war against radical Islam. Perhaps that brain cancer Mr. Cohen has is catching.

Next time some lefty gives you the old moral superiority claim of doing it "for the children" just turn to them and say "you mean doing it TO the children." But be nice about it... he/she/it may have brain cancer.

FINALLY! John Bolton receives his recess appointment to become our Ambassador to the United Nations. Even though a clear majority of Senators were prepared to vote in favor of his confirmation in that role, a minority of Senate Democrats abused their power and refused to allow a vote using their well honed tools of obstruction, denial and delay. The tough talking Bolton is the right man to give some tough love to the UN weanies in New York where the typical diplomatic style of "play nice" has resulted in the near ruin of that international organization. President Bush announces the appointment with a smiling Bolton center and Secretary of State Rice on the right.

Another Journey from Left to Right

Another journey from the left to the right comes from excellent bloggist "The Quietest:" As do so many, he realizes that the empty promises of the left do no great service to mankind and it led him to become conservative, where good outcomes matter more than good intentions.

When I defined myself according to my angry revolutionary politics in college, it was, more than anything else, less an infatuation with "social justice" and more a means of feeling good about myself in a context where you aren't allowed to be yourself, where the only good Latino is an angry one (or else you're "selling out"), and where official and unofficial recognition depends on how loud you are. Working in the favelas abroad, however, I found nobody gave a shit about all the injustices I'd assumed they were simmering about (and which my professors had taught me about). That kind of hyper-ideological world CAN ONLY EXIST in situations of excessive wealth and leisure -- that is, an American university campus. In the favela, people simply wanted GOOD JOBS, and were willing to vote for whomever promised them.

Several years abroad, working for idealistic NGOs doing "international development" and "community building" -- terms that sound great but usually consist of paying bribes to local officials and/or sitting around and boozing with unemployed locals -- and I became "conservative." Not "conservative" in the sense that I don't desire to alleviate poverty and end injustice where it is so obvious in the world, but "conservative" in the sense that in my experience, many of the leftist/activist solutions to those problems had ended up doing nothing at best, or much harm at worst.

My organization built solid, brick houses for people living in shacks in the Brazilian favela. A good thing, right? How can that be bad? Most of the families that had to live in shacks were those whom the father had abandoned, or who the father came around once a year, impregnated the mother, and then took off again to who knows where. Sure, globalization, capitalism, free trade, and whatever Bob Geldof and the comfortable professional protesters in Edinburgh are angry about might be part of the problem. But the most immediate, the most direct problem was the fact that the family didn't stay together. Those families that had a strong religious faith stayed together, and they lived in real houses in MUCH better conditions. They were equally as poor -- nobody has any money in the favela -- but because they worked as a coherent family unit they were able to improve their living conditions. The difference was profound. So what was helping people in the most direct, most effective way -- partying protesters in the rich countries or the local neighborhood church that kept families together?

One time, my organization built a house for an abandoned mother and her four small children. They had been living in a little shack made of scrap metal and cardboard. They moved into their new house and it was a happy occasion. Then the NGO left. At some point, the father heard that his "wife" had a new house. He moved back in and turned the place into a drug-dealing center for the favela. The family I lived with told me that crime skyrocketed in the neighborhood almost immediately, and all kinds of people from outside came in and caused problems for all the local families (favelas are extremely close-knit communities where everybody knows each other). But nobody could do anything about it because they were afraid of the drug dealers. Drugs are a huge problem in those communities. It took them years to get rid of it, and mostly because they let the house fall into disrepair and they simply moved their operation to another area.

So my question is: did my NGO help the people in that neighborhood with their aid? Or did they worsen it by merely dealing with the symptom of a deeper problem: the breakdown of the family?

So then the people in the neighborhood refused to help build these houses unless a) the father (if alive) had a job, b) the mother wasn't on drugs or alcoholic, and c) any able-bodied unemployed men in the family had to help build the house. Many people cried foul, calling this unfair and a punishment and cruel. How can you deny people housing simply because they have a drug problem? Maybe if they had a house they would be able to kick the drugs! Etc. etc. etc. But there it was: sometimes you have to set these limits or else you step on the toes of good citizens in order to temporarily help the law-breaking.

If you agitate all through college for "social justice" (without ever stopping to think what that even means), and then move directly onto K Street in Washington when you graduate, or go directly into law school and onto the do-gooder busybody groups, you will never be forced to deal with the reality. Nobody in the favela is clamoring for socialist revolution; no, the educated children of the wealthy who have never been in a favela do that. Nobody in the favela wants revolution, they want JOBS, and no pampered rich college kid from the US is going to give that to them by calling Bush a fascist and writing for the Socialist Worker newspaper. Every campus activist and rich angry leftist ideologue should be forced to live for a year in a Brazilian favela. If they still insist on socialism, then I'd like to hear their arguments. But until then, I'm convinced, like Phillippe above, that they're full of shit.

I learned conservatism not because I was taught that way in school or at home, but while watching my most cherished leftist ideals and principles sink into (and contribute to) the impoverished swamp of the Brazilian favela as I volunteered there. So I ask my leftist friends, am I a "racist" now? Am I "anti-worker?" Screw you.

More on Dean Supreme Court Comments

Unbelievable. Democrats are actually defending Howard Dean's stupid remark about the Supreme Court and the Kelo decision.

The quietest has a good roundup of these fools falling all over themselves to say that such nonsense is somehow ok. But what convinced me to blog it here was this:

The Quietist: 07/01/2005 - 07/31/2005: "In that vein, spread the news! Howard Dean molested me when I was 13. It doesn't matter whether or not I can prove it -- what's important is that, while not literally true, it is accurate in its essence. Don't censor me with your obsolete dedication to 'facts' and 'proof.'"