baldilocks

Handling the Truth

From Byron York at the Washington Examiner:

Two days before Christmas, Politico reported that White House officials believed [the health care fight] would last until February -- after which Obama would make a "very hard pivot" to the jobs issue.

But health care dragged on even longer; the bill didn't pass until March 21. Even then, with his No. 1 priority accomplished, Obama did not execute the long-awaited pivot and go full-tilt on the economy. In fact, at times it was hard to tell just what he was doing.

(…)

Then came months during which Obama sometimes talked about the economy and sometimes talked about energy and sometimes about immigration and sometimes the Middle East and sometimes about other stuff. Watching the polls, Democrats squirmed, seeing their hopes for November grow dimmer and dimmer. Republicans looked on, bewildered.

"I don't get it," GOP pollster David Winston told me at the time. "I don't understand what he is doing. He's not addressing the No. 1 issue that Americans want him to address.

(…)

In a flurry this week, he's proposing spending $50 billion on the nation's roads and railways. He's proposing a $100 billion research tax credit for businesses.

Who will be the first mainstream personality of either party to come out and say that the destruction of the American economy and, therefore, America herself has been the entire purpose of the Obama Administration and the leading lights in the Democrat Party from the beginning?

That some are confused about the Administration’s strategy speaks merely to the inability to accept a hard and distasteful truth: that the majority of voters elected a man as POTUS who has this country’s demise at heart and who has repeatedly demonstrated this in word, deed and associations well before the election.

Around the right side of the political blogosphere, one can read the posts and comments of many who excoriate President Obama for his “stupidity.”   These people don’t get it either.  Those who look at the Obama Administration’s policies and programs and observe President Obama’s obliviousness and lack of empathy in the face of acute and on-going national crises and make a summary low judgment of the president’s intellect do so with the premise that the man really is trying to improve the economy and other conditions in the USA. 

That premise is wrong. 

This is what people need to realize about destruction: it is the total opposite from building/improving.  This seems like an obvious truth, but when comparing the concept, we must take it further.  Construction of anything requires carefully ordered planning and implementation.  For example, when constructing a solid, stable building, the architect recommends proven construction methods and using the right materials.  But before doing these things, the builder gains certain knowledge of future purpose of the building and, from there, makes his decisions on how to proceed.

Destruction, however, is not only opposite in purpose; it is so in methodology. (We’re talking malicious destruction here.)  Using the building analogy again, think of what happens when someone blows up a building—or flies an aircraft into it.  Are any orders or rules to be followed for the goal to be achieved?  No.  In fact, the more chaos perpetrated by malicious destruction, the faster a building disintegrates.  The same is true for a nation.

President Obama, the Democrat Party, and whoever sits behind the scenes sow method after method of chaos—and, in some cases, inaction is the chaos sowed.  They stab the giant repeatedly, hoping it will finally fall, hoping for utter destruction.

In light of this conclusion, it seems that establishment Republicans and reasonable Democrats do not want to acknowledge--possibly not even to themselves-- the demonstrable bad intentions of the Socialists presently in charge and, therefore, they don't have to think about what may follow should the Republican Party fail to take back one or both houses of the Legislative Branch.  

To be honest, I, too, don’t want to think about what kind of country the USA may become in the aftermath of a GOP failure.

[Re-edited]

(Thanks to Hot Air)

Book Delivery News

For those of you who have bought Tale of the Tigers via its website, I will get my next delivery of books next week, on Friday the 17th at the very latest.  I have all the mailers addressed and ready to go, so when the books arrive, all I have to do is sign them, put them in the mailers, and send them.

My apologies for the delay, but being out of stock is a good sign, no? Thanks for buying and for your patience.

BTW, I've posted a new excerpt at the site.

Laboring

Today, I'm going to be changing how this website looks, so if strange things happen here, you'll know why! Additionally, I'll be looking at how the build a website for my American dad's business.  I think I have just enough knowledge for both tasks--enough to be dangerous, that is.

Oh yes, and will be cooking too!

Labor Day Book (Sales) Report

Here’s the tally!

145 Kindle Editions (Target: 2000)

Roughly 300 total paperbacks between Amazon, etc. and the Tale of the Tigers website (target: 1145).

$4,000+ in sales and donations (target: $10,000).

Thank-you emails for donations sent.

At present, I’m out of copies of the book and have ordered more. So if you’ve bought the book at the novel website, it should be in your mailbox next week.  My publisher is set to give me an ETA today or tomorrow.  If he gets back to me today, I will post an update.  BTW, I’ve posted a new Excerpt at the novel website.

Meanwhile, my gratitude goes to the following people:

Ace of Spades HQ

The Anti-Idiotarian Rottweiler

Blackfive (who was kind enough to float me a Blog Ad; Go Army!)

Charles Hill

Cindy Munford

A Conservative Lesbian

Daily Pundit

Day by Day Cartoon

Double Plus Undead

Fausta Wertz

Grim’s Hall

Instapundit

Iowahawk

James Myers

King Shamus

Michelle Malkin

The Mudville Gazette

Nice Deb

The Other McCain (who needs some assistance of his own)

NewsReal Blog

Patterico

Protein Wisdom

Pundit and Pundette

Ric Locke

Rockport Conservatives

Sissy Willis

If I left your site off the list, please send me an email and I will add you to it.

A Reminder of the Other Black Genocide (UPDATE)

In 2008, I posted the following video via YouTube. It had been part of a series which exposed the truth about the Islamic Civilization with special emphasis on the horrors of the Trans-Saharan Slave Trade.  My intent was to counter the exhortations of Barack Obama's former pastor, Jeremiah Wright, and the like-minded who continue to excoriate America and the rest of Western Civilization for past sins against black African Slaves and Americans of African descent.

The owners of YouTube, however, have blocked the account of John Alembillah Azumah--the man interviewed in the series and the author of the book, The Legacy of Arab-Islam in Africa: A Quest for Inter-religious Dialogue. One can guess that some people were offended by the series--a state of affairs which often occurs when the truth is told.

This particular copy of the video, entitled "Muslim Black Slavery - Islam Slave History of Black Africa," is now posted at MetaCafe by a third party.

Here's Azumah's preamble:

The success of Mohammedan Islam in deceiving, misinforming, deforming and contorting both history and reality over a period of almost fourteen hundred years has been astounding--that is, until now.

The greatest tragedy about this particular subject is that most of the descendants of African slavery--the black people in the Americas, around the world, as well as among the African blacks--are totally ignorant of the actual facts.

Before we lose the concentration of our visitors, I would like to make the following statement and then prove it: that the worst, most inhumane and most diabolical of the black African Slave Trade was initiated, refined, perpetrated and implemented by the Mohammedan Arabs and, later, aided and abetted by the black converts to Mohammedan Islam.

I predict that, as usual, the two subcultures--those of denial of facts and of Political Correctness--will attack us without once disproving a single statement and/or conclusion that we make.

And here are some pertinent excerpts:

While the European involvement in the African Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade to the Americas lasted for just over three centuries, the Arab involvement in the African Slave Trade has lasted fourteen centuries and, in some parts of the Mohammedan world, is still continuing to this day.

(...)

It should also be noted that black slaves were castrated based on the assumption that the blacks had an ungovernable sexual appetite.

(...)

A comparison of the Islamic Slave Trade to the American Slave Trade reveals some extremely interesting contrasts.

While two out of every three slaves shipped across the Atlantic were men, the proportions were reversed in the Islamic Slave Trade: two women for every man were enslaved by the Muslims.

While the mortality rate of slaves being transported across the Atlantic was as high as ten percent, the percentage of slaves dying in transit in the Trans-Sahara[n] and East African Slave market was a staggering eighty to ninety percent.

(...)

While many children were born to slaves in the Americas--the millions of their descendants are citizens in Brazil and the United States of today--very few descendants of the slaves that ended up in the Middle East survived.

While most slaves who went to the Americas could marry and have families, most of the male slaves destined for the Middle East were castrated and most of the children born to the women were killed at birth.

Azumah pronounces the denial of the facts concerning the on-going Islamic Slave Trade as 'obscene.'

To those whose male ancestors survived American Slavery long enough to ensure that the former would be alive in the twenty-first century and, therefore, be able to refer to me as a House Negro for suspecting the motives of the putative builders of the "Ground Zero" Mosque, I feel pity.

That pity is mixed with a sense of astonishment, however, at this conclusion: that so many black people are so well indoctrinated with perpetual anger at the sins of America's past, that they would ignore the more egregious sins of Islam's present and desired future.  Hurling epithets and pretending that the opponents of the "Ground Zero" Mosque want to stifle freedom of religion is a lot easier than gathering the pertinent facts, connecting them, analyzing them and coming to a cogent conclusion, it seems.

On the other hand, perhaps such people have indeed concluded that Islam would like to expand its decimation of those of African descent--with black men being the special and specified targets for annihilation.  Perhaps the slinging of epithets, etc. is merely a smokescreen--an insurance for the future.  Such people will be able to say to their future masters, "see? I stood up for the Ummah against that infidel, Ochieng."

Maybe such people are merely trying to protect their own testicles--such as they are.

Enslave a man's mind and the rest of him--including his testicles-- will follow; no more need for physical chains.

UPDATE: John Alembillah Azumah's bonafides: he is the Director of the Centre for Islamic Studies at the London School of Theology.  I would imagine that he has competent security and, no doubt, he is in need of our prayers.

The Day by Day Crew Reads Tale of The Tigers: Finale

 

Chris Muir’s Day-by-Day Cartoon Strip concerns itself mostly with political topics.  But its main characters, Zed, Sam, Damon and Jan--white, Asian, black and Hispanic--demonstrate what America is by their love and friendship. 

It’s one of those serendipitous occurrences that my novel, a book featuring several relationships between Americans of different races, fits perfectly with Chris’s characters. And it’s one of those blessed occurrences that Chris reached out to me to put my book in his characters’ hands.

Never underestimate the power of faith and love.

The Day by Day Crew Reads Tale of the Tigers: Men and Women

Day by Day

Tale of the Tigers

A Voice Crying in the Wilderness

"You want black babies dead so shut up."

You go, girl.

Were the people with whom this lady was arguing on something? Were those who were walking away from iron-clad logic on some sort of drug? Yes. It's call Evil.

Book and Solvency Report

Knock and the door shall be opened.

Here is today’s Tale of the Tigers/keep Ochieng off the pole dole report:

32 books sold at the Tale of the Tigers site;

48 dead tree books and 122 Kindle Editions sold at the commercial booksellers site;

And the donations combined for a total of: $4,177.

There have been some very generous donations—not just in amount, but in value.  Then, there have been the intangibles like Chris Muir’s series at Day by Day--and there has been the love and the encouragement.

BTW; any monetary donations received over the goal of $10,000 will go here.

The Day by Day Crew Reads Tale of the Tigers

Day by Day

by

Chris Muir

Who Raised This Guy?

Since I stopped watching TV in the morning, I tend to miss fun stuff like watching Fox and Friends morning host Gretchen Carlson make White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs look foolish--something that requires no effort really. Enjoy.

It's curious that President Obama's two most public representatives, Gibbs and Vice President Joseph Biden, seem so--how to put this gently--dim. Gibbs' mental deficiencies are particularly vexing (and, ironically, funny) because they are joined with sneering condescension in the same small space. He thinks he's smarter than anyone interviewing him and he unfailingly attempts to prove it--to show that interviewer who his/her intellectual better is. 

But every time Gibbs tries this, he ends up looking all the dimmer for it. Who didn't know that Carlson was going to put Gibbs in his place when he attempted to interview her? (And don't you just love trying to have a conversation with a person who throws up the "playing games" smoke screen when they are trying to avoid answering a question honestly?)

I feel sorry for Robert Gibbs;  but if I had to interview the guy, it's probable that my sympathy level would be much lower.  Look at the expression on Carlson's face! Not a drop of sympathy for the learning disabled.

:)

(Thanks to Yid with Lid)

Conservatism, Political Ads, Art-Ace Interviews Ladd Ehlinger, Jr (KS)

Who is Ladd Ehlinger Jr, you ask?  He's the guy behind the Dale Peterson campaign ad, viewed by all right-thinking people as the greatest political commercial ever.  Check it out.

Anyhoo, AceofSpades gets a great interview from Ehlinger.  In a wide-ranging discussion, Ace and the filmmaker talk about everything from the nature of artists to the difference between TV ads and internet spots.

This exchange was really interesting.

Ace:  Is there any danger you see of a ghettoization sort of effect, where conservative artists are doing expressly conservative art? And only that, and are engaged in a parallel media universe but not the main media universe?

Ehlinger:  I don't think the main media universe has much longer to live. So it doesn't matter. Everything is fracturing and falling apart. The smart money realizes that and is doing what it can now to build a brand before it's impossible to do so any longer.

Ace:  I've read a lot that tv's model is unsustainable but there aren't many good alternatives. you mean like that? magazines and newspapers first, then tv, then Hollywood?

Ehlinger:  It'll devolve into national tribes. Online tribes. Like your website. And then no one will make any money anymore.

Ace:  to some extent I think that's sort of the case now but one tribe -- the one that dominates the media -- won't concede it's tribal even after it consistently goes out of the way to insult the other tribes. You ever watch a movie with no political content at all, just about a human story, and then, pow, out of nowhere, some [conservative-baiting] insult? it's like -- what was doing there? Did they WANT 30% of the audience to walk out badmouthing it?

Ehlinger:  Well, it's a case of the cool kids in high school... they eventually get fat, turn into drunks, and get DUI's when they get older. That is their collective media career destinies.

Ya gotta read the whole piece.  It is truly elucidating stuff.  Seriously.  Go now.

Re:  Conservative art-I'll be honest.  This has troubled me for a while.  Maybe not 'troubled', but it's an issue that has certainly puzzled me.

It's sorta obvious that the old media paradigm...a liberal monopoly that runs the big TV networks/large newspapers/national glossy magazines/La-La Land...is circling the drain.  For instance, 2008 was probably (hopefully) the last election where MSNBC, The New York Times and a raft of music industry hacks could simply pick up a left-wing presidential candidate and carry his butt across the finish line.

I've basically viewed the crack-up of the old-skool media environment as a good thing.  But a part of me has been concerned about what Ace calls ghettoization.  What happens when there is no national news/entertainment culture?  Do we Balkanize?

First, there's pretty much nothing anybody can do about it, so there's really no point in fretting about it too much.  It's almost like worrying about the Sun being hot.  Best to get over it and deal with the consequences of any potential Balkanization when/if it occurs.

Now, if the breakdown of the media universe we inhabit is inevitable, then the idea of conservative art has to be entertained.  The vast anti-statist/pro-free market tribe is going to need culture.  It'll need cultural artifacts like songs, novels and dramatic works.  As Ehlinger said, right-wing documentaries have their place, but they're not enough.

Conservatives should do what they can to support right-of-center art and artists.  The creators are going to need money in order to...you know...eat.  It's one thing to make a great short-length Obama satire  that gets thrown onto DailyMotion and has a million views.  It's another thing to actually get paid to do creative stuff.

In the long run, how is this all going to play out?  I really don't know.  The outlines of the new media paradigm are only just starting to form.  But in a lot of ways, it'll be better for the Right than it has been in 50 years.  Listening to guys like Ladd Ehlinger Jr., one gets a sense of the great possibilities that are available to conservative artists right now.

Before I brain-cramp:  I sorta beefed on the whole Balkanization line I was toying with.  As I was thinking about it some more I realized I hadn't really explained myself very well.

An interesting facet of the old media environment was that it had created a national culture of sorts.  Remember that until the early 80's there were only three TV networks, talk radio was lost in the sauce of the Fairness Doctrine and there were large nationwide systems for distributing movies and music.  Thus if you were a consumer of mass culture, you were basically seeing or hearing or watching what everybody else did.  

But what did people do before there was a national media culture?  There were regional tastes that determined what people did to entertain themselves.  Music and musicians patronized in the South was different than what people tended to like in places like New York City or Massachusetts.

My feeling is that once the nationwide system that reigned from the late 1940's till the late 1980's finally drifts into obsolescence, we will see a renaissance of the older more separated cultures.  They will be less determined by location and more organized by tastes, age and yes, political ideology.

It will be quite different than what many people are used to.  But as I stated before, it could result in a new flowering of right-of-center culture.   

Cross-posted at Blog De KingShamus.  Thanks, Juliette.

A Good Morning (UPDATE)

A quick report: 23 books sold from the Tale of the Tigers website, $2,100 in sales and donations, 74 Kindle Editions sold (the price is right!) and an untold number of copies sold at Amazon!  I've got books to autograph and send, thank-you notes to send out and some blogging to do.  This is my kind of morning!

UPDATE: Amazon rank was 270K+ this morning; now it's down to 2,732...it's overwhelming...

How To Steer into a Disaster

Also known as the 'Abilene Paradox.'

And the perfect cliff notes version:

[T]he Abilene Paradox theory was created by the typical management "consultant" as a fancy term to explain to senior management why it is a bad idea to surround yourselves with ass kissing yes men.

Of course it helps to have a leader who isn't a narcissist.

(Thanks to Ace of Spades HQ)

Tale of the Tigers: My Personal Debt and Ours (UPDATE: Yes!!)

At Real Clear Politics this morning, the Top 5 Stories are as follows:

Record Number in Government Anti-Poverty Programs

More than 40 million people get food stamps, an increase of nearly 50% during the economic downturn, according to government data through May. The program has grown steadily for three years.

The Folly of Subsidizing Unemployment

The unemployment-insurance program involves a balance between compassion—providing for persons temporarily without work—and efficiency. The loss in efficiency results partly because the program subsidizes unemployment, causing insufficient job-search, job-acceptance and levels of employment. A further inefficiency concerns the distortions from the increases in taxes required to pay for the program.

Why the Recovery Lags

The recovery is a creature of confidence, or its absence. "In normal times, psychology doesn't matter much. It reflects economic conditions," says Zandi. "But in abnormal times, it's the reverse. Psychology determines economic conditions." What the boom and bust left is a massive case of collective doubt.

The Obama Vision of Federal Government

[President Obama gave] a stirring Sunday secular sermon [in New Orleans on the anniversary of Hurricane Katrina] on the value of the federal government—and on the idea of national community that, in its best incarnations, it does or should represent to us all.

He wanted to prove not only to the people of the [Louisiana] but the people of the nation that the feds can be a source for good.

70% of Americans Know They’ve Been Conned

Two years into what had been sold as a new politics and a new approach, the 70 percent are fully aware that they have been conned, suckered, and taken to the cleaners by a hyper-ideological amalgam of leftist public intellectuals, snarling bloggers, career politicians with limited abilities who are often corrupt, and a president wholly inexperienced in the management of complex problems who is in way over his head and prisoner to slogans and schemes that make for great campus debates -- but for disaster in the real world.

The Total Outstanding Public Debt as of today: 13 trillion dollars and change. (See what I did there?)

It’s a High-Tech Looting of We, the People; it’s reparations to the "deserving" from the "undeserving."  Forget about the injustice and the immorality of it all and follow the mass dependence on public funding to its logical conclusion:  what happens when there are no jobs to service this debt via tax revenue?  What happens to all and sundry who are fed, clothed and sheltered by American treasury monies when the treasury money is gone?

Speaking of unemployment, I’ve been laid off from my position as Social Media Consultant at Carmel Coast Publishing Enterprises—no worries; it’s a friendly parting and but a sign of the times.  And even though it was only a part-time job, it was sufficient for my needs.  But now, my only source of income is…you guessed it, my novel.

I’ll get right to the point: I need to raise $10,000 to pay my bills and my taxes.  So far, I’ve sold 23 books from Amazon and Barnes & Noble, 15 via Kindle and 150+ via my novel’s website.  Here’s what I need:

556 books sold from Amazon and B&N;

589 books sold from the Tale of the Tigers website;

2000 Kindle Editions sold. (Only $5.00!)

I will accept any combination thereof and, of course, donations will be much appreciated.

You can do so here:

It’s tough for me to get out and do the hard-core, in-person marketing I need to do because I’m the sole caregiver for my great-aunt.  (My inability to be away from home for long periods stands as one of the reasons that I finished the novel and took the chance on self-publishing.  Therefore, nearly all of my marketing has been online, word-of-mouth and reputational.)  All of the reviewers have judged Tale of the Tigers to be an exceptional work and I am grateful to those who have bought, read and commented.  But now I need more.

About the national debt:  many observers conclude that it is impossible for the United States to recover from such a crushing weight.  I’m not sure that I believe this, though.  Oh, it isn’t that I don’t believe that the debt isn’t lethal or isn’t meant to be so.  It’s merely that God-inspired human inventiveness and ingenuity always seem to save the day.  Sometimes we see through a glass darkly as to how, but, with faith, hope, love—and work—the light can be turned on.

God gifted to me an allotment of talents and I chose to invest them rather than bury them.  I know for a fact that I am far from being the only recipient.

UPDATE: Love ya, Jeff.

UPDATE: To the fine gentlemen at the RoadRaceAutoX.com message boards: I would say that my work isn't "chick book," but others might be a better judge.  There's no bodice-ripping and there's some cussing and violence, so there's that. :)  At any rate, welcome and thanks for the link!  I think you will enjoy it; my reviewers are mostly men.

UPDATE:  Welcome Instapundit and Ace of Spades HQ readers! I'm humbled by your purchases, donations and good wishes.  As for the tally: 37 additional Kindle Editions sold and $1,100 in sales and donations!  As for Amazon, I have to get a report from my publisher but I can tell that the book is selling when my rank drops.  More report--and blogging tomorrow.  I'm very grateful!

On Love,Taking a Stand, and Clear Vision (UPDATE)

After you give your life to God, when He commands you to stand, you have no choice.

--Glenn Beck

It was a joy and a privilege to watch Glenn Beck, Marcus Lutrell, Alveda King, Bishop Harry Jackson, and hundreds of thousands of others as they stood to remind the government that our rights are a free gift from God and that no man or government of men may insert its being in between that providential connection.  Like all who love liberty, I would have found it a blessing to have attended, but other responsibilities took precedence.

However, during my morning reading and prayer, it “occurred” to me—again--to ask God what His will is for my life.  I wanted to know what I was or wasn’t doing that is against His will.  Was there something I needed to do more of?  Had I failed to say ‘how high’ when God told me to jump?  Every person still breathing has an assigned mission, whether it be great or small.

After admitting publically that I had had an abortion, I received many compliments for my courage and honesty, but I felt neither courageous nor particularly honest.  It wasn’t false humility; it was simply a feeling that there was more—as if there was something else I needed to face.  And there was.

The accolades I received for that admission were watered down by a very sobering state of affairs in my life.  The one person from whom I needed love and support has, because of my confession, repeatedly ridiculed me for it--seeming to want to induce shame in me for being so public.  The irony contained therein is that, prior to my admission, I had avoided blogging about abortion due to the shame I had felt for doing away with my own child.  Admitting it publicly was an attempt to free myself from that shame and it was done in the hope that at least one young woman reading would realize that she did not have to be the fool that I had been.

Abortion was my greatest shame and, though my eternal guilt has been washed away by the acceptance of Jesus Christ as my Savior, its earthly effects have been extremely painful, spiritually and emotionally—the consciousness of sin and the regret at committing a form of suicide. 

The interesting part is this: when God opens your eyes, your spiritual vision is 20-20.  The person who wants me to feel shame for my admission once claimed to love me.  But, my being continues to be shaped by God and when He says, “Stand,” I have no choice.  And what I’ve had to face is this: anyone who would ridicule me and attempt to provoke shame from me for my obedience to the Lord cannot possibly love me.

Even more interesting is the realization that when you are doing what you know is morally correct in the sight of God—when you take a stand in the name of Jesus Christ—any chastisement you receive is an indication that you are on the right path.  Additionally, the source of that chastisement will give you a clear window into the soul of that source.  Be sure to pray for that soul, however.

In Glenn Beck’s decidedly pastoral address on the Mall in Washington, DC, the emphasis was on Restoring Honor.  The primary recipient of our honor as individual human beings is to God and is simply outlined in Mark 12:30-31; each human being is commanded to love God with an entire heart, and with full mental power and to love one’s neighbor as self.  Love is the variant of honor that should constantly pour from our being—the highest type of honor.

For the longest time, I did not understand what it meant to love God, this incorporeal being.  But how does one love a sentient earthly being?  We communicate.  We talk to that person and, most importantly, we listen to them and when we do this, we trust that the communication consists of truth—we extend good faith to our beloved.  (And we show love by rejoicing in our beloved’s happiness and comforting him in his pain.  And we never, never, never ridicule our beloved when he reveals his soul.)

With God, loving Him has an extra component, of course.  Since He’s omnipotent and omniscient, we show our love to Him by doing what He commands and trusting that the commandments of a loving God are meant for good.  We extend to God the ultimate in Good Faith.

After talking to Him (praying in the name of Jesus Christ) and listening to Him (reading the Word), we do what He puts in our hearts, in spite of any earthly consequences.  We take a stand.

So my eyes are open and my vision is clear.  I will continue to stand for the unborn and the murdered.

And I will remember that true love is (Holy) spiritual.

UPDATE: Though the story seems sad, I feel set free; very happy and peaceful. Peace is what I prayed for.  It's a great birthday gift.

                                                                                                                                                                     

Comments on a Love Note (UPDATE: Field Negro Responds and So Do I)

Yesterday, a blogger styling himself as the Field Negro dubbed me the "House Negro of the Day":

(JULIETTE OCHIENG) I SWEAR SOME OF YOU NEGROES MUST GET PAID BY THE WORD TO SAY DUMB STUFF. THIS CONSERVATIVE BLOGGER CALLS THE MOSQUE AT GROUND ZERO A "SECURITY RISK". SAYING DUMB S#*T JUST BECAUSE YOU CAN IS ALWAYS HNB

[Link added by me; don't worry--it leads to my post, "Beacon."]

Field Negro--may I call you Negro?--would it actually hurt you to expound on why you think my opinion is "dumb?"

Show your lack of "dumbness" by explaining to your readers how building such a mosque--set to be funded and "pastored" by a person who has continually called for the the implementation of Sharia law in the United States--is not a security risk. Take it step by step.

I can further defend my position.  Are you capable of defending yours?  I'd sure like to read it.  You never know--if you're premises are sound and your conclusion follows logically from them, I would be compelled to change my opinion.  In case you have never heard of this concept, it's called 'intellectual honesty.'  Try it, you'll like it--eventually.

Otherwise, I'll merely write you off as one of the conditioned.

UPDATE:

Field Negro is “gracious” enough to respond:

Ms. House Negro, you may call me whatever you like, just as long as you don't call me collect. Now let me "expound" -just a little-on why I think your opinion is dumb:

You argue that putting this Mosque two blocks from Ground Zero would put Americans at risk because the leader of the Mosque believes in a strict form of Islamic law. (Sharia) That, in of itself, is ludicrous. Iam not connecting the dots between an interpretation of an ancient religious philosophy and bombs dropping on suburbia.

And, just for argument sake, let's assume that Faisal Abdul Rauf does believe in the most negative and regressive form of Sharia law as you allege; what difference would it make if he built his Mosque a block from Ground Zero or in Jersey City?

Just because you are unable to connect the dots, it does not follow that my opinion is ludicrous.  You may have a shortcoming or two. However, I will assist you.

Islam’s raison d’être is to convert the world to Islam, by force if necessary.  One of the tools of force is fear.  And inducing fear is the goal of terrorism.

Of course, we know that many Muslims consider the Islamist attacks of September 11, 2001 to be one of Islam’s greatest victories against the United States/Great Satan.  Building a mosque adjacent to what used to be the Twin Towers would be like planting a flag of victory for Allah.  This is not an unprecedented concept; armies of Islam and many other armies use this sort of symbolism to say to observers the equivalent of “we won; you lost.”  In the eyes of others wishing to spread Islam by the “sword,” such a statement would be a…Beacon, one drawing those of like desire; this beacon would encourage other Soldiers for Allah to perpetrate further attacks in America in order to win more victories for Allah, in order to win his blessings and in order to gain glory for themselves.

Does that help?

But my rebuttal above assumes that you were right about Rauf and his position when it comes Sharia Law. You were not. Only a person whose mind has been poisoned by right wing ideology -A poison that was inflicted by the likes of Newt Gingrich- could view a man who has published writings such as this in such spurious and mendacious manner. Parroting right wing talking points to score "brownie points" with your ideological soul mates does not make you a critical thinker, or, for that matter, someone capable of "intellectual honesty". It makes you a fraud, and a fraud of the worse kind: one whose sole purpose in life is to remain in the comfort of a poorly constructed house.

So many assumptions in one short paragraph!  I haven’t listened to or read anything by Newt Gingrich since he appeared in that Global Warming TV ad with Nancy Pelosi.  However, here is some of what I have read about Ra’uf:

Feisal Abdul Rauf is the imam behind the “Cordoba Initiative” that is spearheading plans to build a $100 million Islamic center at Ground Zero, the site where nearly 3,000 Americans were killed by jihadists on 9/11. He is also the author of a book called What’s Right with Islam Is What’s Right with America. But the book hasn’t always been called that. It was called quite something else for non-English-speaking audiences. In Malaysia, it was published as A Call to Prayer from the World Trade Center Rubble: Islamic Dawa in the Heart of America Post-9/11.

Now it emerges that a “special, non-commercial edition” of this book was later produced, with Feisal’s cooperation, by two American tentacles of the Muslim Brotherhood: the Islamic Society of North America and the International Institute of Islamic Thought.

(…)

Both ISNA and IIIT have been up to their necks in the promotion of Hamas, the Muslim Brotherhood’s ruthless Palestinian branch, which is pledged by charter to the destruction of Israel. In fact, both ISNA and IIIT were cited by the Justice Department as unindicted co-conspirators in a crucial terrorism-financing case involving the channeling of tens of millions of dollars to Hamas through an outfit called the Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development. For the last 15 years, Hamas has been a designated terrorist organization under U.S. law.

(…)

The purpose of dawa, like the purpose of jihad, is to implement, spread, and defend sharia.

(…)

In considering Imam Rauf and his Ground Zero project, [Yusuf] Qaradawi [spiritual leader of the Muslim Brotherhood] and the Muslim Brotherhood are extremely important. Like most Muslims, Rauf regards Qaradawi as a guide, and referred to him in 2001 as “the most well-known legal authority in the whole Muslim world today.”

(…)

Qaradawi regards the United States as the enemy of Islam. He has urged that Muslims “fight the American military if we can, and if we cannot, we should fight the U.S. economically and politically.”

And why do you assume that my goal in saying the things I say is the accrual of “brownie points.”  Brownie points from whom, consisting of what?  I know the history of Islamic conquest in Africa, how it weakened that continent, making it ripe for further conquest by Europeans and how its adherents continue to rape, murder and pillage on my father’s fragmented continent.  And I know what non-black Muslims think about black people—even those in the latter number who are foolish enough to convert. Which one of us is the "House Negro" and the "fraud" again?

A rapidly weakening USA is quickly becoming a target for those who would like to remake it in their own image, whatever that image may be.  Right now, this country is just a financial target, but that could change. The giant is ailing and the wolves—like Russia, China, and Islam—are waiting for it to fall.  So you might say that the “brownie point” I wish to accrue is survival.

I hope you didn't trip over my steps.

Darling, I’m starting to get the feeling that you don’t like me. My heart is broken to be disliked by such a charming gentleman!  :-}

However, I hope that you awaken and decide that you want to survive also.  Really.  And I hope you save a little bit of that snarl for your real enemy.

Christian Terrorism? Moral Equivalence? Get A Grip (King Shamus)

I want to look at something the preeminent jerkweed of our time, Mike Bloomberg, belched out the other day in reference to the Ground Zero Mosque:

"Every time they pass the basket in your church and you throw a buck in, [do you want someone to] run over and say, 'OK, now where do you come from, who are your parents, where'd you get this money?' . . . A handful of people ought to be ashamed of themselves."  

Not only is this a classless little smear on the part of Nurse Bloomie, it's got a whiff of our old friend, Moral Equivalence.  Because nothing gives a liberal a rock hard boner more than negatively comparing Christianity to Islam.

But hey, why not indulge Mayor Mike's magnificent retardation for a moment?

What would it take to make Christianity the moral equivalent to Islam?

There would have to be groups of Christians that call for violent acts in the name of Jesus.  It could not just be the rare lone gunman-type with a Bible stuffed into his drawers and a raging desire to kill people for Christ wilding out.  You'd need to have densely populated structures incorporated for the purpose of fomenting Jesus-inspired terror.  These organizations would be populated by leaders that call for Christians to use terror to spread Christianity.  The power of Christ would compel the members of these religious groups to do violence to other humans.

Ideally, the Christian terrorists in our scenario should be internationalist in scope.  These Super Splodey Jesus Freaks should have sleeper cells and quasi-independent franchises in places like Jakarta, Mumbai, Fallujah, Jerusalem, Aden, London, Paris, Philadelphia and Toronto.  All of them should be vocal about the supremacy of the Christian faith and how Jesus commands them to acts of violence.  Along with the multinational flavor of these groups, there should be members of Christian governments that covertly sponsor our hypothetical Christian terrorists.

There would also have to be a long history of Christian terrorism in the 20th and 21st centuries.  We're talking about elements of the Kooky Christian Thrill Kill Cult carrying out acts of terror over the course of many decades.   As before, these atrocities should be happening all over the world.

Finally, there would have to poll after poll showing rank and file Christian opinion was ambiguous-if not supportive-over the use of terrorism to spread the word of Christ.  Leaders of the Genocidal Jesus Peeps should be supported by disturbing pluralities of Christians. 

Do any of these hypotheticals exist in the real world?  Not even close.  Not even within a light-year.  But still the lefty thumbsuckers just have to make their moral equivalence arguments/slime jobs.

The truth of the matter is that our Muslim friends have a serious existential problem.  Their religion has been infected by vicious life-hating cancers.  The faith desperately needs to kill these tumors before it's too late.  Christians, Jews, Hindus and Buddhists cannot do this for them.  We can support reformers and decry the back-asswards types within Islam, but in the end it's up to them to figure out how to exist peacefully within a multi-religious world.

There are Muslims of good faith who want to see real positive change.

In fact here's one now, talking about the Ground Zero Mosque: 

“This is not a humble Islamic statement. A mosque such as this is actually a political structure that casts a shadow over a cemetery, over hallowed ground. 9/11 was the beginning of a kinetic war, it is not an opportunity for cultural exchange. It was the beginning of a conflict with those who want to destroy our way of life,” Dr. Zuhdi Jasser, president and founder of the American Islamic Forum for Democracy, told The Daily Caller.

  “I am in no way looking to infringe on First Amendment issues. I approach this as a Muslim that is dedicated to reform,” he said.

Jasser sees the danger inherent in the Ground Zero Mosque.  He also realizes the need for a peace-loving tolerant renaissance within Islam.  Because he's accepted some hard truths about his faith, he doesn't engage in bullshit moral equivalence.  

We have more than enough head-in-the-sand unrealists like Mike Bloomberg.

The Muslim religion...and the rest of us...desperately need more clear-eyed people like Zuhdi Jasser.

Let's Try This Again (Update: Success!)

Hopefully Blog Talk Radio is ready for the Fausta show this morning after our false start on Monday.  I'll be on today at 8am PDT/11am EDT to talk about Tale of the Tigers.

UPDATE: I had a great time talking with Fausta about the novel, about writing and, of course, about politics--in spite of the fact that my laptop decided to overheat while I was in the middle of a sentence. That's why God made cell phones.

If you want to listen to the interview again, go here!

Love ya, Fausta!

Beacon (Update: What Bill Whittle Said)

Pretty much all who follow the news regularly—and many who don’t—know about the controversy surrounding the proposed construction of a Mosque near the site of what used to be the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center in New York City.

The backers of this project and many others –including the mayor of New York--have cast the intent as a “freedom of religion” issue.

The opponents of the project—which are many—cast it mostly in emotional terms; I’m with them, but those terms, by their very nature, allow themselves to be argued down.

However, there is one reason to be against it—one which sets itself above all the others, one which is existential and practical rather than emotional. 

A “Victory Mosque” set in the shadow of Ground Zero will be just that: a symbol of victory for the Islamists at the site of one of the greatest body counts in the name of Allah.  And the existence of such symbols will invite more attempts at military conquest from the Soldiers of Allah.

Go on about the First Amendment and about misinterpretations of the phrase ‘hallowed ground.’  Keep pretending that blocking the construction of this particular mosque is somehow preventing New York Muslims from freely exercising their religion—as if permission to build a church or a synagogue anywhere in NYC would automatically be granted.  But know this: our enemies will take our notions of “fairness” and explode it in our faces; not just in Afghanistan or Iraq, but right here on the Hallowed Ground which stretches from sea to shining sea.

By the way, if we infidels aren’t quickly jumping to convert to Islam, to die or to become dhimmis, are we violating the First Amendment?  Just wondering.  Because that would be the full flowering of the free exercise of Islam.

Lots of First Amendment violations in that, don’t you think?

UPDATE: Confirmation.

The Muslim Canadian Congress (MCC) is urging the Cordoba House Initiative to abandon its proposed Ground-Zero Mosque in New York in the face of outrage expressed by large segments of the American population calling the proposal an act of 'fitna' or mischief.

In a letter to Imam Faisal Rauf that will be delivered on Tuesday, August 10 by MCC’s board member Raheel Raza, the MCC says, “Many Muslims suspect that the idea behind the Ground Zero mosque is meant to be a deliberate provocation, to thumb our noses at the 'infidel.' We believe the proposal has been made in bad faith and, in Islamic parlance, is creating  'fitna,' meaning 'mischief-making,' an act clearly forbidden in the Qur’an.”

(Thanks to The Anchoress)

UPDATE:

(Thanks to Instapundit)

Don't Forget to Listen (UPDATE: Re-sked Due to BTR issues)

I'll be on Fausta's Blog Talk Radio Show at the top of the hour to talk about the book.  I'm having technical difficulties with my wifi so I will probably have to use my cell phone.

UPDATE: Fausta and I are going to re-sked the interview for Wednesday morning at 11EDT/8PDT; BTR and AT&T are on our list--not the good one!!!

Interview with Fausta Monday Morning

Join us at Fausta Wertz' Blog Talk Radio Show tomorrow at 11am EDT/8am PDT where we'll talk about my novel Tale of the Tigers!  Also check out all the great posts at Fausta's blog.

My marketing campaign has picked up. Thirteen Kindle Editions, seven copies of the paperback from my book site, and an untold number of paperbacks from Amazon were sold on Saturday alone, dropping my Amazon ranking down under 100K for the first time!   There will be no letting up though.  However, don't worry about every post having my shameless self-promotion as its subject.

I just want to live my dream while I can.

To achieve great things, two things are needed; a plan, and not quite enough time. --Leonard Bernstein

Repost: Throwing Away the Crutches

Originally Posted July 15, 2004

What have Republicans/conservatives done for black Americans? I hear that question constantly when I disclose that I am a conservative Republican. Often I will provide the usual facts that seem to be missing from the historical lexicon these days: freed the slaves, were 90%+ in the majority in the votes for the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965. However, something about the question sets steel to my nerves and I’ve been meaning to articulate the reasons for it here for some time now.

Implied in the question is that a political party must “do something” for blacks. Not merely the usual “something” that a government entity does for all of its constituents, e.g. provide utilities, regulate commerce, etc., but something special.

That word ‘special’ has taken on a new meaning in recent years and I think that it applies to the special items that liberals/leftists believe that the government should provide for the ‘special’ people, the “congenitally retarded” folk.

Yes, we ‘special’ people--with ‘special’ needs--require special handling: special education and special employment. You can’t expect black people to live up to the standards of ‘normal’ people. Like paraplegics or the blind or the deaf or those afflicted with Down’s syndrome, singular accommodations must be made for the great handicap of being born with black skin. To liberals/leftists, black people are a crippled class that can never be made whole just as long as they can never be made not-black. What’s this notion called?

And if anyone tries to treat us as full, competent adults, the liberals/leftists will scream in righteous anger and protest about the unfairness of it all. And if some of us ‘handicapped’ verbally express the desire to be treated like full, competent adults and act in a manner that demonstrates that desire, we are deemed as traitors by those who share the same racial makeup, but buy into the ‘handicap’ philosophy. Yes, we are “traitors,” because if some of us refuse to take advantage of the special needs offered and succeed anyway, the vast majority of America will begin to think that we don’t really require the “handicap slot.”

The vast majority of Americans will begin to think that we’re not really inferior after all. (Optimistically speaking, I believe that the vast majority think this anyway.)

"You do not own, and you are not the arbiters of, African-American authenticity," said [Rod] Paige [to NAACP leaders], who rose from segregated Mississippi to become President Bush's education chief.

(Thanks to reader Wesley J.)

Or, as I might put it, who died and made you the head of the Brutha/Sista Card Registry?

This idea of our race-wide ‘handicap’ is so ingrained in the mindsets of some, however, that it has morphed into the very existentiality of black identity: a black person who believes that black Americans need extra help to succeed is “authentically black.” Conversely, one who doesn’t buy it “isn’t really black” and is, therefore, a traitor to black identity.

In short, blacks who believe in their own inferiority are the real deal and those who don’t, aren’t. How's that for twisted dogma?

(This is why Condoleezza Rice comes in for special scorn among the liberals/leftists, especially black ones. Having been born with not merely one, but the proverbial two strikes against her, her very existence gives lie to the entire notion of black inferiority: she has succeeded through innate intelligence, raw talent and hard work. I’m sure that white supremacists hate her just as much. Now there's a marriage made in...somewhere.)

So when some black people find out that Republicans don’t want to “do anything” for them except to encourage them to take part in the American dream of prosperity, stemming from work and ingenuity, they’re like, “WTF? Where’s my money?” So it is that white Republicans/conservatives, those whose ideology purports to treat blacks as equals are considered Devils. We blacks who agree with this are merely the Devils’ minions.

Those that have wondered why the vast majority of the Republican party don’t spend time on “minority outreach” miss the point. Republicans do outreach already. They just don’t do handicapped outreach, not unless you're really handicapped.

Not Much of a Reader

...is the President of the United States. 

Karl Rove once claimed that President George W. Bush read 95 books in a year as part of a bet.

...

[President Obama:] "Yeah, you have very little chance to really read. I basically floss my teeth and watch Sports Center."

And play, golf, of course. 

This isn't surprising, however.  There's a segment of the so-called highly-educated populace which never reads anything unless there's some immediate gain involved--usually monetary in nature. Additionally, President Obama strikes me as someone who believes he knows all of the things he needs to know.

I'm guessing that means that he won't read my book.  Too bad; he might learn something.

(Thanks to Instapundit)

Tale of the Tigers: A Bit of a Bleg (Update: New Review Comments)

According to my publisher, between Amazon and Barnes&Noble, I have sold a grand total of ten copies of my novel, Tale of the Tigers.  Yes, you read that correctly.  Counting the copies that were sold via the novels website, Kindle copies [UPDATE: Kindle price dropped to $5!] and copies which I’ve sold in person, that’s approaching only about 200.  Included in this number are giveaways for review purposes—none of which have been yet published that I know of—and giveaways to family and close friends.

Because I self-published (POD publisher), marketing is up to me and, no, it isn’t my strong suit.  However, I will continue urge readers of this blog to buy the novel.  To be honest, we won’t be able to have the book release party unless sales pick up dramatically.

I know that this is a time of great economic uncertainty, but buying my book will not only provide the reader with an inexpensive form of entertainment, it will give the reader a bit of insight with what’s happening right now in America.  Well, at least I think so. A morality play? You could call it that, but, as all successful novelists attempt to do, I tried to show more than tell.  I hope that I succeeded.

And, naturally, I want to have an independent source of income using whatever talent and inspiration that God gave me.  But I can’t do that without your help. 

Buy my novel.  You won’t be sorry.  And if you’ve already bought it, please put up a review at Amazon or B&N; those can contribute greatly to my sales and publicity.

By the way: I have fifteen copies here at home for sale.  When a customer buys a copy via the novel's website, that’s its origin and it’s the reason that a copy arrives so quickly at its destination.

UPDATE: And, right on cue, here’s another five-star review!

And, from a fan of the Tale of the Tigers Facebook page:

You know what I really enjoyed about this book? It didn't skirt politically correct comments, afraid of offending anyone. What a pleasure to read how people actually speak. Great first novel!!!!

Pump It! (King Shamus)

I know this is probably old as dirt for many of the military folks that come here, but I'm just seeing it.

100% pure awesomeness.

 

Big thanks to NoOneOfAnyImport.  Also, her husband has recently been deployed, so send prayers and positive vibes to her.  

Reid Feeds the Racial Discord Tree (Updated)

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid on the campaign trail in his native Nevada:

REID: "I don't know how anyone of Hispanic heritage could be a Republican, okay. Do I need to say more?"

How the Left stirs racial discord between Americans of Hispanic decent and other Americans is a topic I want to address in detail in the third part of my "Herding" series. But the assumptions in Senator Reid's short assertion need to be addressed right now.

Leaving aside the 2007 Republican establishment's push for amnesty for illegal aliens already living in the United States, most conservatives are for strict border enforcement first and decisions about illegal aliens already present afterward.  In Harry Reid's statement lies the assumption that, Americans of Hispanic descent must naturally be in favor of allowing any and all Hispanics from Mexico (and other Spanish-speaking countries) into the USA without any controls at all--that, to Hispanic Americans, it's better to have more Spanish-speakers in the country, than it is to enforce the federal and state immigration laws.

A more important Reid assumption is this one:  because conservatives want the borders of the country secure--because the Republican base does not want to give Hispanic Americans what he presumes they want-- Republicans and conservatives hate Hispanics.

Need he say more? No.  The Coconut Treatment proceeds apace.

(Thanks to The Weekly Standard)

UPDATE:  Sissy Willis notes that "A growing chorus of 'minority' Republicans are finding their voice." One, Cubachi, the American-born daughter of of Cuban exiles, has a few words for Senator Reid--well, more than a few:

My father [who had been political prisoner of Castro's Cuba] looked at the platform of the republican party that endorsed small government, lower taxes, and strong defense, while the democrat party embraced Che Guevara and Fidel Castro, murderers and tyrants, as some sort of folk heroes, and endorsed larger governments taking power away from the people.

...

Sweet justice for me, would be to see Marco Rubio enter the senate as you exist your way out to hand the keys to Sharron Angle.

Heh.  I guess I'm so used to Democrats, Liberals and Leftists treating conservative non-whites, women, etc. like their intellectual runaways slaves, I don't even get mad at this stuff anymore.  But it's nice to see Harry get a chewing.  The only problem is this: I'm not sure that the senior Democrat senator from Nevada has enough marbles to comprehend what Cubachi or  Marco Rubio or the good folks at African American Conservatives or LtC. Allen West are saying to him and his party.

Perhaps, in November, we will be able to explain in terms simple enough for even Senator Reid to understand.

The Herding, Part Two

Over at Ace’s, there’s a commenter who continually tells Ace’s presumably mostly white readership that it’s pointless to go on about the history of race relations in this country and that white Americans should simply join the battle which the Obama Administration and the organized Left are trying to provoke.  When I responded with a condensed version of how black American social and political allegiance has been manipulated over the past ten decades, he stated that a people who could be so easily (sic) manipulated must really be inferior.

This man demonstrates the type of limited perspective that I sketched out in Part One and, actually, his type could have furnished me with an additional bullet point; not only is he unable to think strategically, he actually rebukes the notion that such analysis has any value.  Moreover, such a person is blind to how his own thinking and emotional state have been shaped and molded by Leftist ideology in a much shorter time span than was so for black Americans.

In this second part, my purpose is to detail another tactical weapon of the Left, the purpose of which has been to instill a set of attitudes in the minds of the American populace; in this case, the mindset is meant for white Americans.

If the Left has been successful at keeping racial grievance in the forefront of black American agenda—in indoctrinating black Americans into believing that retaining racial anger at whites is inherent in being black and essential for black survival--it has also been successful in later years of producing a certain mindset in white Americans.  Actually this seems to be two mindsets, but it is really a singular one—a two-headed beast.  The first is guilt-fear and the second is unproductive anger.

The Herding, Part One

From American Thinker:

 

The proper purpose of law is to use the power of its collective force to stop this tendency to plunder instead of work. The law should protect property and punish plunder. The law, whether made by one man or one group of men, operates with the sanction and support of a dominating force, and this force must be entrusted to those who make the laws. Legal plunder occurs when the law takes from one person and gives to another. The law benefits one citizen at the expense of another by doing what the citizen himself cannot do without committing a crime. If such a law is not abolished, it will spread, multiply, and develop into a system. 

Have you noticed that there are some people—many people--who have no concept of time?  No, I’m not referring to the chronically tardy, though I do suspect that many of them fall into the categories of which I’m about to outline.

Those to whom I’m referring do not have a concept of the following; they are

• Unable to consider individual events from the past as anything but singular and isolated occurrences, e.g. unable to connect those events with each other and—further--with contemporaneous, on-going events,
• Unable to use known, available and pertinent information/ideas to analyze the sum (or, to use a better mathematical term, the product) of events in order to come to a plausible conclusion as to what is going, and
• Unable to take that conclusion and reasonably project what may happen in the future.

The ability to do this is called strategic thinking—the ability to recognize patterns and figure out what is true and what is false.  Most of the time, this inability has nothing to do with IQ and can be selective and temporary.  I believe that, in the latter two types of cases, the inability is due to a syndrome to which almost all of us are prone: wishful-thinking.

Many do not want to or cannot put together the events which have lead this country to its present state, much less come to a reasonable conclusion.  However, I don't fall into either category.  Believe me, sometimes I wish I did.

But the more I learn about the history of the twentieth century, the more I consider it against what is known about human nature, the more I observe the state in which this country finds itself in at present--the more I believe that the peril anticipated by all too many observers, was planned by the Left.

Tale of the Tigers: Book Release Party

Buy, Donate, Read, Review.  Details below the fold.

Calling Out the New Slavery

Speaking of breaking the mental chains...

Many black Americans are waking up to the fact that the proliferation of Margaret Sanger's Planned Parenthood and its promotion of abortion were planned to succeed where more overt forms of oppression against black Americans could not and did not.

God bless Maafa21 for being obedient to Him by opening eyes and ears.

Repost: Why is the Black Vote in the Democrats' Pocket?

I wrote the following op-ed for Pajamas Media on July 30, 2008. Since one still sees many asking this very same question, I think that a re-post is appropriate. It is slightly edited from the original version; I can't help myself. 

********

A few weeks back, I lambasted prominent black conservatives for even thinking of voting for Barack Obama, a man who embodies only one part of the two-word description “black conservative.” Several black conservatives were quoted in the article to which I was responding. However, the most revealing quote came from former U.S. Representative J.C. Watts:

J.C. Watts, a former Oklahoma congressman who once was part of the GOP House leadership, said he’s thinking of voting for Obama. Watts said he’s still a Republican, but he criticizes his party for neglecting the black community. Black Republicans, he said, have to concede that while they might not agree with Democrats on issues, at least that party reaches out to them.

“And Obama highlights that even more,” Watts said, adding that he expects Obama to take on issues such as poverty and urban policy. “Republicans often seem indifferent to those things.”

Watts’ turnaround suggests one of three things to me: 1) that he has changed his political philosophy and should probably change parties; 2) that when he was running for office he was saying what he needed to say to get elected in conservative Republican Oklahoma, rather than saying that in which he believed; that is, he was never really a conservative Republican; or 3) that he realizes the futility of trying to attract most black Americans to his party on the basis of principle.

I don’t know which is the answer, but there’s a logic to Watts’ statement regarding Obama and that logic undergirds the astounding Democrat/liberal/Left success among the black electorate in contrast with the Right’s failure in the same area. The key to understanding lies in the assumptions inherent in the phrase “reaching out.” Who should reach out to whom on the basis of what? What smaller actions fall under the large umbrella of “reaching out”? Here are the blanks filled in:

1. Who: the Republican Party should do the reaching out.
2. To whom: the party should reach out to the black community, that is, to black people as a singular entity — a collective.
3. How: the outreach should be done on the same basis as it is performed by the modern Democratic Party.

1. Programs
2. Policies

In short, the Republican Party must “do things” for black Americans which it does not do for other citizens and which are identical to the things that the Democratic Party does. Or better. But the Republican Party can’t be what it isn’t.

The bottom line: Republicans want black Americans to pursue happiness and the Democratic Party wants to provide happiness to black Americans.

A party and its principles

The Republican Party that Buckley, Goldwater, and Reagan (re)built has not been designed to reach out to a group on the basis of identity, but on the basis of a given group’s ideas and values. By the party’s very definition — its basic principles — this precludes reaching out to groups which have race, ethnicity, or gender as their sole criterion for coalescing as a political entity. So when some observers wonder what the Republican Party is going to “do for” the “black community,” most Republicans will have a certain look of puzzlement on our faces, as if someone just asked why we don’t offer attachable wings so that our prospective party members can fly.

Many black Americans cannot shake the notion that a political party is supposed to provide quid pro quo. That the Republican Party won’t do anything for them besides get off their backs, get other citizens off their backs, and get out of their way so they can pursue happiness just isn’t good enough. But where did the idea come from?

The idea that the government should step in when overt oppression is being practiced but should not help or hinder black American advancement certainly precedes Buckley, Goldwater, and Reagan. And, in practice, as Bruce Bartlett (H/T Sigmund, Carl, and Alfred) and La Shawn Barber point out, before the Civil War and during the century that followed the abolition of slavery, the Republican Party was responsible for several federal measures designed to protect Americans of African descent from their fellow citizens and to punctuate the basic citizenship rights guaranteed to the freed slaves and to their progeny. Fact is, however, the Republican Party would not have had a leg to stand on had not the founders of the United States based the principles in the Constitution on certain philosophies.

Obviously, black Americans were happy to receive the protection. However, after the Republicans clamped down on the racists, they (mostly) removed themselves from the equation to allow the country’s black citizens to be free. But when they did that, the nemeses fell in, masquerading as friends.

It is here that black Americans found themselves attacked from the top and from the bottom. Forty years ago most black Americans were used to being physically and socially restrained to an extent. However, what happened to black Americans in the 60s is that their enemies found a way to accomplish what the physical barriers of slavery, the legal oppression of northern segregation, and the overt terror of Jim Crow could not.

The mental chains

At the top, President Lyndon Baines Johnson — a Democrat whose pre-Kennedy legislative career had been that of a typical Dixiecrat — put forth a set of programs and policies infamously known as the Great Society, actually giving a part of the public funding to those who qualified to receive it. The bottom line? Many of the programs amounted to life subsidy — “reward” for indolence, whoredom, and irresponsibility. At the bottom, liberals, leftists, and Democrats inserted themselves wholesale into the educational processes of the black poor. That education put forth a portrait of America as a full-scale villain, which made her history unneeded — except the parts necessary to understand the crimes perpetrated on her perennial victims. With that in mind, why would liberals, leftists, and Democrats teach their captive audience about the historical role that their political opponents played in setting and keeping them free? Between the manipulation of education and the government handouts by Democrats, the Left could even convince black Americans that it was the Republicans who had actually been black America’s oppressors — and that idea, that lie, would become far more useful to the Democrats than any Great Society program, as LBJ allegedly foresaw.

An even more serious deficiency has been nurtured by the systems dominated by leftist philosophies of education, and that deficiency leads us, finally, to the answer to our question.

Too few people put enough thinking into principles — their nature or, of utmost importance, their foundation. As a matter of fact, what many people call principles aren’t really that, but are commodities — items to be bought and sold. And it is one’s principles — or one’s commodities — that inform the decision as to whom one should give his/her allegiance.

Example: consider the admonition to “do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” Or is it “do unto others as you suspect they would do unto you”? Or “do unto others before they do unto you”? Or “do unto others as they’ve already done unto you and not one minute before they do”?

Like all other axioms, the Golden Rule has its origin in a way of thinking, a school of thought — a philosophy, in this case, biblical. One forms his/her principles from a philosophy, usually one or several taught at school and/or at home. Now I can’t speak for what is taught in all homes, only my own. However, I can authoritatively say that few bases for forming principles — as opposed to commodities — were taught at the public schools I attended in South Central Los Angeles. Barely were the particulars of our Declaration of Independence, our Constitution, and our Bill of Rights covered. Of course we had heard the phrase “unalienable rights,” but what did that mean, really? And the men who formed these words, these ideas, and built a nation on top of them, where did they get these ideas about rights and government from? Did they just pop up, unbidden? Or were the men simply building on the philosophies of someone(s) else?

Who knew the answers to these questions? Not I; not then. Where I went to school, one was taught what to think, but not how and definitely not why. One was not taught how to build a foundation for one’s principles or that a foundation even needed to be built.

Into that vacuum jump many notions, but the one specific to the subject at hand is the idea that the party which is giving you the most things — the one that will “do something for you” — is the party to which you should belong. And if “principles” have no foundation, those “principles” — and their owners — can be purchased. And though there are a few black so-called conservative Republicans out there, all too many of them — like Watts — still find themselves reverting to the “do something for us” idea, a liberal Democrat ideal. No wonder some believe that conservative political persuasion is grounded in advantage rather than principle.

The Democratic Party has counted on this absence — of history taught/learned and of principles adhered to — in all of its members, but most especially has it counted on this dearth in black Americans, a dearth which has allowed too many black Americans to stick themselves to the Democratic Party like glue, or chain themselves to the party like …

The Democrats should take pride in a job well done.

LeBron-The Disappointment (King Shamus)

As a Knicks fan, it kills me to say this but...Michael Jordan is exactly correct.

 The latest Big Three backlash came Sunday from none other than Michael Jordan, who contributed his weighty opinion to the debate about whether LeBron James should've teamed up with two superstars instead of trying to beat them.

"There's no way, with hindsight, I would've ever called up Larry, called up Magic and said, 'Hey, look, let's get together and play on one team,'" Jordan said after finishing tied for 22nd in the American Century Championship golf tournament in Stateline, Nev. "But that's ... things are different. I can't say that's a bad thing. It's an opportunity these kids have today. In all honesty, I was trying to beat those guys."

Bingo.

The thing about LeBron is that he has consciously modeled himself on Jordan's career.  That means that he's supposed to be the guy who's taking the last shot at the end of games.  He's the leader in the locker room.  Most importantly, he's taking slightly less money to help his franchise bring a supporting cast to him and his team. 

Instead, Bron-Bron decided to join the three-headed monster in Miami.  More and more, the free agent summit Bosh, Wade and James held in June looks like just a cheesey attempt to rig the system to get their spoiled-brat way.  While it's not collusion in the legal sense, it looks really bad.  Perception in the NBA is really important.  LeBron has done great damage to the way he is perceived by non-Heat fans nowadays.

The idea that James is the next coming of Michael Jordan has been forever tarnished by him leaving Cleveland to join Wade and Bosh in Miami.  In MJ's Chicago, there was no doubt who was taking the big shot at the end of games.  It wasn't Horace Grant and it sure wasn't Scottie Pippen.  On and off the floor, Jordan was the undisputed leader of the Bulls.

One more thing:  Jordan never left Chicago to team up with his buddies.  He just went out and beat everybody.  He whipped absolutely phenomenal players in the most pressure-filled situations.  Look at who he defeated in order to get his championships.  Magic Johnson, James Worthy, Clyde Drexler, Charles Barkley, Tom Chambers, Shawn Kemp, Gary Payton, John Stockton and Karl Malone:  These are just some of the all-world players MJ beat in order to win his hardware.  That doesn't take into account playoff series wins and conference championships, where he scored victories against mega-stars like Larry Bird, Patrick Ewing and Isiah Thomas.

Compare Jordan's resume to LeBron's curriculum vitae.  He hasn't beaten anybody.  No last second heroics, no monster performances to carry his team and no rings.  Sure, he's been stellar in the regular season.  But god-like players aren't born beating up on the Nets or the Kings in the middle of a December road trip. 

One gets the feeling that LeBron has little interest in being 'the guy' and much more interest in getting paid.  This is weird considering that everybody connected with him keeps telling us he's the greatest player in the world.  It's hard to be the number 1 star when you're a supporting cast member in somebody else's show.  I think James is going to be in for a rude awakening as NBA fans rethink Bron-Bron's place in the basketball world's hierarchy of stars.

Congratulations LeBron.  You've just turned yourself into a second tier star.  Enjoy being Dwayne Wade's caddie.

Tactical Analysis

In the wake of the al Qaeda terror attack in Uganda, the Obama Administration states, for the record that:

...U.S. intelligence has indicated that al Qaeda leadership specifically targets and recruits black Africans to become suicide bombers because they believe that poor economic and social conditions make them more susceptible to recruitment than Arabs," the [Obama Administration ] official said. "Al Qaeda recruits have said that al Qaeda is racist against black members from West Africa because they are only used in lower level operations."

By now, however, anyone who has been close observing what this administration says and does knows that nothing can be taken at face value--especially a statement which should produce a "duh" in the minds of anyone who is familiar with Islam's history in Africa.

So, what to make of such an unneeded statement? Here's what.

Most recently, the online commentariat on the Right has been abuzz about the NAACP and its formal statement condemning the Tea Party movement for its alleged racism against blacks (more about that in a later post). 

So, when President Obama calls al Qaeda terrorists racist (true, but who cares? dead is dead) and his minions in the NAACP call the Tea Party movement racist (untrue), they are attempting to plant seeds in the minds of the uninformed and still evaluating.

They are attempting to paint the Tea Party movement as a terrorist movement in the arena of public opinion. Sissy Willis comes to the same conclusion before I do. 

And if the attempt is strategically successful, the president will attempt to make the designation public policy.

[Edited]

Scarred Souls: More About Abortion

The Confession I posted on June 9, 2010 couldn't just stand as is was, mainly since it was an answer to a specific question, "Should Black Women Stop Getting Abortions."

Of course all women should stop having abortions.  But since the question singled out black women, and since that conversation is between two black American women, myself and Jessica Ann Mitchell, and since we find the state of the black American family in near death, I felt it necessary to tailor my further response to black Americans.

The first part of my response has already been publicized here, but I posted the following originally in a Facebook note. For that reason, I will only post here what I deem to be the second part of the answer.  There might be a little preaching.  That's an essential part of me.  He's a part of me.

A Birthday and Independence

Today has always been a special day for me. Yes, I celebrate the anniversary of the birth of the country in which I have survived and thrived. However, today is also the birthday of my great-aunt, Alma Jenkins Simpkins.

Today she is eighty-nine and she is the last surviving of and has experienced the most years of all of her siblings. She is the seventh of eight; she had four brothers and three sisters. Her lone younger sibling, my grandmother, went to live in the next world in 2008.

The four elder siblings were born in Mississippi and the rest were born in Oklahoma.

Her father and three of the four brothers died young--violent deaths, One, William, was executed for murder by the state of Arkansas. (William's race is listed as 'Native American' and they are, certifiably, one quarter Indian.)

Aunt Alma's eldest brother and three sisters died of diseases of the spirit--one cannot say that any of them were unpreventable: un-medicated high blood pressure and untreated cancers.

All of them were wild men and women, something I know both from reputation and from observation. Aunt Alma says that her father and all of her brothers carried a handgun on their persons wherever they went and weren't afraid to use them. She says that white people called her mother and her sisters "Mrs." and "Miss" in 1930s Oklahoma.

Last night, I made a green salad, and today I have cooked her an extensive breakfast, something not normally done because of her high blood pressure. Later, I'll prepare macaroni and cheese and broil slabs of boneless ribs. Aunt Alma will probably have a beer. And, of course, there is ice cream and cake.

Then, we're going to start a conversation--something which is now sometimes difficult due to her teeth. It will be a conversation about the men of our family who died before I was born--men who took their independence seriously and, sometimes, paid dearly.

Convert or Die

Boss sent me a Microsoft Publisher file.  I have Office 2007, but not Publisher. I tried using the Adobe Acrobat program that my wonderful readers bought me.  No go.

I wish I knew how to pimp market like Bill Gates.

Any suggestions, geeks?

UPDATE: Boss sent a .pdf version this morning. Now I can work!

Devastating Video on Obama's Response to Oil Spill

It needs no introduction.

Oil Spill Timeline from RightChange on Vimeo.

(Thanks to Ace of Spades HQ)

Senator Robert C. Byrd: RIP (King Shamus) (UPDATED by KS and baldilocks)

RIP.

Senator Robert Byrd of West Virginia, the longest-serving senator in American history, died Monday at the age of 92, a spokesman for the family said.

Byrd, a Democrat who served in the U.S. Senate since 1959, had been plagued by health problems in recent years and was confined to a wheelchair. He had skipped several votes in Congress in the past months. 

Jesse Jacobs, a family spokesman, said Byrd died peacefully at about 3 a.m. at Inova Hospital in Fairfax, Va. 

So ends the life of Robert C. Byrd.

As Ted Kennedy was a symbol of the moral rot within the modern Democratic Party, the career of Robert Byrd is a manifestation of a distinctly American type of political corrosion.  Much is made of the fact that Byrd was the longest serving member of the Senate in US history.  Why is that such a magnificent accomplishment?  It only means he was able to win a bunch of popularity contests over the years.  If Darth Vader gave away $3.3 billlion in other people's money to West Virginia, he'd be awfully popular with the voters as well.

You know who else polls really well, year after year, without fail?  Santa Claus.  Why?  Because he gives away free toys and all you have to do is behave yourself and you get a first class ticket on the Christmas gravy train.  Unlike jolly ol' Saint Nick, Robert Byrd's pork masquerading as generosity came directly from the US taxpayers.  It's quite easy to be Mister Awesomely Popular when there is never some federally subsidized boondoggle you'll say no to. 

It would've taken real leadership for Senator Byrd to tell his constituents that they can't have their cake (paid for by the other 49 states) and eat it too.  He probably wouldn't have every left-wing douche fighting to fellate him for the last 50 years.  He might've lost an election and go back into private life.  Perhaps he would not have been able to create a Senatorial fiefdom based on ring-kissing patronage and barely concealed graft.  Then again, he might instead be remembered as a responsible steward of taxpayer money.  It's not nearly as sexy as 'longest sitting Senator evah', but it would be a far more respectable legacy.

Let us not forget the overarching American concern over racism and Robert Byrd's role in the evolution of racial policies in the nation.  The Senator was a former member of the KKK, but continued to kiss their asses for years after he supposedly left the group.

The ex-Klansman allegedly ended his ties with the group in 1943. He may have stopped paying dues, but he continued to pay homage to the KKK. Republicans in West Virginia discovered a letter Sen. Byrd had written to the Imperial Wizard of the KKK three years after he says he abandoned the group. He wrote: "The Klan is needed today as never before and I am anxious to see its rebirth here in West Virginia" and "in every state in the Union."

...The ex-Klansman vowed never to fight "with a Negro by my side. Rather I should die a thousand times, and see Old Glory trampled in the dirt never to rise again, than to see this beloved land of ours become degraded by race mongrels, a throwback to the blackest specimen from the wilds."

Although he later denounced the Ku Klux Klan, his renunciation didn't stop him from fillibustering the 1964 Civil Rights Act.  He also had a habit of opposing black Supreme Court nominations; both Thurgood Marshall and Clarence Thomas got the thumbs down from Senator Byrd, which makes his opposition to them seem less about ideological differences and more about personal animus towards African-Americans.  Only in the soft-bigoted topsy-turvy bizarro world of the American progressive movement can a man with that kind of record of blatant racism rise to become the 'conscience of the Senate'.  The fact that such a rancorous bigot could soar to the heights of political grandeur is a testament the 'power for power's sake' mentality within the contemporary Left.

There will always be racists.  There will forever be pockets of bigotry in America.  People are born flawed and unfortunately racism is one of mankind's unwashable sins.  Hatemongers will be with us in one form or another till the end of time.  But we don't have to elevate racist dickbags like Senator Byrd to the pinnacle of American political life.

Having said all that, surely Byrd's family is mourning the loss of a towering figure in their lives.  It is said that the Senator was a devoted family man and a born again Christian.  These things do not erase his public legacy.  But they are yet another sign that people are complicated creatures, capable of magnanimity, generosity and love or cruelty, selfishness and hate. 

It should also be noted that the Senator was ailing for quite some time.  It is hoped that with his passing from this world, Mr. Byrd finds the comfort and grace of his Creator.

Rest In Peace.

AWESOME UPDATE:  If you are not charitably inclined towards Senator Byrd...and I cannot say I blame you...take a spin over to Feed Your ADHD.  Snarky Basterd's byline?  Hell.

Satan, [Ted] Kennedy’s rival for control of Hell, welcomed Byrd to his kingdom of filth.

“It is with great honor that I bestow the title of KKK Grand Dragon on Senator Byrd,” Satan said. “Only a true Democrat – and we’re all Democrats down here in Hell – could have uttered the great statements he has made over the years.”

Check that stuff out, yo.

ANOTHER AWESOME UPDATE:  Nick Gillespie has a nice cold showerfor the Byrd-o-philes.  Oooof.

But it's Byrd's status as the Babe Ruth of pork-barrel spending and taxpayer-funded narcissism that is his real legacy and the one we should never forget or forgive. Here lies a man who pushed his home state to build a statue of him in defiance of a rule that such honorees be dead for 50 years.

Back in 2006, Citizens Against Government Waste called Byrd the "Emperor Palpatine of Pork" and gave him their lifetime achievement award...

STILL ANOTHER AWESOME UPDATE:  Ed Driscoll has a sweet take down.

President Obama’s potential words of praise to a racial demagogue far worse than even Rev. Wright himself should be especially interesting to watch.

UPDATE (baldilocks): Byrd refused to serve in World War Two due to blacks being a part of the force, even in their lowly status before the desegregation of the US Armed Forces in 1948.  I cited that here using Wiki, but the reference has been cleaned up.

If, by some chance Byrd got to go to Heaven, I hope he gets to be Dorie Miller's butler.

White is Not Right

I've been having my hair cut/head shaved every two weeks for about twenty years now.  However, every so often I decide to let my hair grow just for grins.  Three weeks ago, I made that decision yet again and I have a very tiny TWA.  (Short-and-curly has a different connotation to me than it does to most other people.)  This time, however, something was different.

Yesterday, I was hand-washing dishes in my great-aunt's kitchen.  The house is old-school, almost eighty years in existence.  (We've even had to add electrical outlets because it was built when electricity was as new and rickety as iPhones are now.)  Anyway, over the sink are a medicine chest with a mirror and a light which shines down on the head of whomever is standing at the sink.  As I washed dishes, I happened to look at my new growth of hair and guess what!

There is a whole frickin' lot of salt in my used-to-be unadulterated pepper.

See you tomorrow, my beloved barber.

Scenario

The federal government--read President Obama--plans to sue the state of Arizona due to the state's new illegal immigration law.

Let's say that such a travesty does occur and let's say that Arizona loses in court.  They will be penalties, prescriptions and proscriptions laid out for the state.

If the lawsuit plays out in this manner, what would the federal government do if the state of Arizona refuses to accept the judgment of the court; what would the fed do if AZ refused to comply with the penalties and continued to enforce its law? 

What would President Obama do should Arizona defy such a judgment?

To Dad, With Love

The Best Teacher

There are good guys out there.  My mom found one of them.

Here's a post about him from years back.  He has only gotten to be a better man.

Another Repeat!

Congratulations to the 2010 NBA Champion Los Angeles Lakers.  I know you hate them, but I can't.  Call them family. 

And, yes, it's a little loud out there!

British Clown Fears Fatwah (King Shamus)

I don't know who Rory Bremner is. I do know that he seems spooked.

Bremner was discussing the future of satire with David Frost on Frost on Satire, a BBC documentary. “The greatest danger now is that one of the toughest issues of our time is religion,” says Bremner, as quoted in the Daily Telegraph. He says that, when he’s writing a sketch about Islam, “I’m writing a line and I think, ‘If this goes down badly, I’m writing my own death warrant there.’ Because there are people who will say, ‘Not only do I not think that’s funny but I’m going to kill you’ – and that’s chilling.”

Bremner cites the case of a Danish cartoonist, who isn’t named in the Telegrapharticle, but is likely to be Kurt Westergaard, who drew a cartoon of Mohammed with a bomb in his turban. His life changed after that and other cartoons appeared in Jyllands-Posten, and Muslims reacted with violence.

“If you’re a Danish cartoonist and you work in a Western tradition, people don’t take that too seriously,” Bremner tells Frost in the interview, to be aired Thursday.

“Suddenly you’re confronted by a group of people who are fundamentalist and extreme and they say, ‘We’re going to kill you because of what you have said or drawn.’ Where does satire go from there, because we like to be brave but not foolish.”

This may seem like a very small nit to pick with Islam. After all, we're talking about one yappy performer expressing nervousness over making fun of a religion. Aren't there larger issues-the Israel/Gaza situation, the threat of Iranian nukes, the ongoing Afghan War-that we could be dealing with? All these issues touch on the question of Islam and it's interactions with the West to one degree or another and they seem more pressing than some British jokester's jitters.

I agree that the foreign conundrums involving Islam are dire. In some cases, these are civilizational questions we face. What kind of world will it be when Iran gets the bomb? What lengths must Israel go to in order to ensure it's existence? What if America loses the war against the Taliban? Clearly, these are not mundane policy decisions here, but truly deep concerns.

But none of these issues-as deadly serious as they are-lap so directly upon our shores as the way Islam is practiced within Western nations. Rory Bremner may be one guy, but his reaction to the potential actions of Muslims is to avoid making fun of them. Why does he do this? Because he fears the very real possibility that he will be physically attacked by a Muslim who has taken offense to Bremner's act.

Wrap your mind around that sad state of affiars for a while.

For every cultural relativist out there who wallows in multi-culti feel goodisms, consider the absurdity of extremist Presbyterians kicking the crap out of a comedian who pokes fun at Christians. No matter how much one strains to find a case that fits that general description, one simply can't be found. It doesn't exist, except in the minds of lefty handwringers that kvetch about the oft-feared yet somehow never-occurring anti Islamic backlash coming from psychotic Christian racist teabaggers.  Meanwhile, as the Muslim-coddlers worry over non-existent Jesus Freak violence, out in the real world members of the Islamic faith continue to use gangster style threats to cow people into submission and fear. 

Remember when liberals complained that Bush's domestic surveillance programs were creating a chilling effect on free speech? It was bullshit of course, but now we have real actual-factual proof that freedom of expression is being severely curtailed in England.  Not by the government of course, but by followers of Islam.  Where are the leftists beating their chests and writing 10,000 word treatises on the chilling effect on free speech Muslims are creating in Great Britain?

Truth be told, the stifling of criticism of Islam is an existential threat to the West.  It might not be as dramatic as a shooting war or foreign policy brinkmanship.  However, it affects the general population-both liberals and conservatives-of the Western nations.  More importantly, it's probably going to take all facets of the political spectrum pulling together to turn the tide of this new-fangled form of dhimmitude.

Rory Bremner is yet another canary in the coal mine, warning us of the decay that is happening to our culture.  Will we mobilize ourselves in time to win?  

UPDATE (baldilocks): King Shamus has permission to call me PC.

Word from the Winner

To all who have sent their blessings, comfort and well-wishes to me in regard to my Confession, I extend a heart-felt Thank You.

In spite of the losses I've experienced--almost all due to my own choices--God has given me many, many gifts free of charge and at the pinnacle is His Greatest Gift: salvation and absolution from my sins.

For that reason, I'm always looking to win!

Love,

Juliette

Tale of the Tigers: High Praise

Here are six reviews at my novel's website, including one just posted at Amazon today.

Cheap, easy entertainment. And they keep telling me they can't put it down until they finish!

You'll like it, too.

A Confession (UPDATED times 2)

I posted the following at a site run by a rather liberal black lady who is a business associate, the business of writing.  I'd rather not link to the post--one about whether black women should abort their children--because it isn't necessary for my audience to comment there. [See UPDATE below.] However, I think it's something I need to post here.

I’m 48 and I’ve been pregnant twice but I have no children for two reasons: immorality and morality.

My first pregnancy occurred when I was 17 and not married. I had an abortion because it was convenient–I had no spiritual beliefs at the time. My second pregnancy occurred 13 years later when I was married. It was planned and conception happened after the nuptials were said, but I miscarried–it was an ectopic pregnancy and it happened because, before I married, I continued to fornicate and contracted chlamydia, a venereal disease which is easily cured but which scars the fallopian tubes and can prevent the fertilized egg from traveling to the uterus where it needs to implant and grow. In an ectopic pregnancy, the fertilized egg implants in the fallopian tube–a place too small for a growing human. If an ectopic pregnancy is allowed to advance past 1 month, it will kill the mother and, obviously, the baby.

I still mourn both of my children. Afterward, however, I decided to do things God’s way–the God of the Bible–even if it meant that I would never have children. (My ex asked me for a divorce right after I miscarried and I have never remarried.) There are always miracles.

My point is that if I had conducted my relationship and reproductive lives differently, I’d have children. However, I am content to carry on my life as is and to accept God’s grace.

Faith, forethought and behavior are the keys. Some of you [commenters] may not agree with my premises, but, perhaps a young lady or two reading this will take my words as a cautionary tale.

So now my readers know a little bit more about me...a little bit about why my life turned out the way it has, a little bit about how imperfect I am, and a little bit about why I think the way I do.

Suffice it to say, I haven't been perfect in this area of my life--or in any other area--since the horrid details listed came to pass. But my motive here, as I mentioned in the comment, is the hope that a young lady reading this will take it to heart and turn away from a faulty life.

BTW, aside from the interracial and racial discord aspects, Tale of the Tigers, my novel, is the story of a "bad" girl turned good by love and trust.

UPDATE:  The admirable Jessica Ann Mitchell encouraged me to link to the original place at which I posted the comment, so I will.  The op-ed's title: "Should Black Women Stop Getting Abortions?"

UPDATE: An already-finished follow-on to this post will be here tomorrow Monday, June 14th.

Tale of The Tigers: Review from Dustbury

Old blog friend Charles G. Hill posts a review at his place and at Amazon.

If you've read my novel, please post a review at Amazon or Barnes & Noble.

Living in CA (UPDATE: Day of Shaking)

Just felt this quake.

Yes, I'm still awake.

UPDATE(6:42 pm): There seems to be a whole lot of shaking going on around here today, but that's not an odd thing. The odd thing is that I haven't felt any of them except for the one mentioned above. Strange. However, Little Miss Attila and Cobb are feeling it plenty. Perhaps it's because they live closer to the ocean.

(From USGS.gov; Click on pic for larger view)

Thoughts on the Anniversary of D-Day

¹Now the LORD had said unto Abram, Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father's house, unto a land that I will shew thee:

 ²And I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great; and thou shalt be a blessing:

 ³And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee: and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed.

Genesis 12:1-3 (KJV)

Isn’t it interesting that Europe finds itself in financial straits and that some on the continent are lamenting the gradual incursion of Islam in very many of its countries?

From reading Carroll Quigley’s Tragedy and Hope (I read it years before Glenn Beck recommended it), I discovered what a death toll World War One had taken on the population of its European participants.  Present-day protesters against the American wars in Iraq and Afghanistan would have committed serial seppuku over the type of casualties taken in any single battle of the Great War—the great numbers of dead being caused by contemporaneous weapons combined with American Civil War-era tactics.  Then there were the civilian casualties.  Overwhelming to ponder at the time, no doubt, but small potatoes compared to what was to come a few years after the “War to End All Wars.”

Europeans murdered each other thoroughly in that war, in World War Two, in between the wars and afterward. They did so via gas chambers, ovens, starvation and government prison camps and most of them viciously turned on the Jews using the means stated.  Because of that--and abortion--there have not been enough indigenous Europeans left to reproduce and, thereby, fund the welfare states in which they so desperately believe and which are become their undoing.  So they had to invite in immigrants from Africa and Asia--mostly Muslim.

And therein lies the interesting part.  Murdered Jews—the monetary experts and culture of Europe--who would have reproduced to populate a far stronger and more admirable Europe, IMO--have been replaced by those who hate both Jews and non-Muslim white Europeans and who reproduce at a far greater rate than do their hosts.  And the kicker is that the white post-Christian Europeans invited in their would-be conquerors.

The children and grandchildren of those who coveted Jewish possessions will soon be in a struggle with those who simultaneously claim that there was no Holocaust and who long to perpetrate the next one.  No, hatred doesn't have to make sense.

That struggle will be over possession of a land which is covered with the ashes of the Jews.

You don't think God doesn't keep his promises?  Think again.