State of denial

“Unlike any other change of power of the past, we seem to be at the beginning of the end,” Antonio Medina wrote to America’s News Source. (ANS). “Radical Muslims hate us (USA). They will wait. When the time arrives they will strike, harder broader, and with the help of the new democracy. Remember. I said that.”

Amir Taheri-DON'T EXPECT THE MADRID EFFECT

"It is, therefore, time to have real debate on the way ahead in Iraq.

For such a debate to take place Americans must ask themselves three questions: What are we doing in Iraq? Is it worth doing? Are we doing it well?

They key question, of course, is the first one."

Municipal election tomorrow ........and crime's down???

http://www.citynews.ca/news/news_5221.aspx

Crime beat-some people have pretty feeble anwers for not cleaning this up-living off the avails

Ed Koch

"I asked my radio caller what would he do in this Gaza event. He said he didn't know and had no suggestion other than not shooting the women. I support the statement by U.S. State Department spokesman, Sean McCormack, who is quoted in The Times, "The U.N. has a point of view," commenting on another critical statement by Kofi Annan, adding, "Israel has the right to defend itself. The reason why all of this developed in the first place is because you have continuing attacks on Israel from Palestinian Authority areas."

Would a spokesman in a John Kerry administration have said that?"

[Ed Koch]

Bruce Thornton- the Sage and the Sword

"The West’s condemnation of Israel’s accidental shelling of two Palestinian Arab houses that killed 18 people once more reveals the bizarre incoherence that addles our thinking. The jihadists for years have purposely used their own families as cover for attacks in order to create exactly what we are seeing now: Israel’s accidental killing of women and children while attempting to protect their own elicits from the West vehement condemnations that ignore the jihadists’ culpability in putting their own people at risk. Meanwhile, deliberate killing and shelling of Israelis is met with generic condemnations of the “cycle of violence,” usually delivered with an accusatory finger pointed at Israel.

The moral principle involved isn’t hard to understand. If I shoot at your wife and child while standing behind mine, it is my fault if my wife and child are killed when you try to defend yourself. There is no moral imperative that says I must value the lives of your family more than the lives of my own. Except for Israel, apparently. Only the Jews are required year after year to sacrifice their citizens and show “restraint” as the necessary preconditions for some mythic “peaceful solution.” Meanwhile there is no evidence that this “solution” is really what the majority of Palestinian Arabs and Muslim nations want more than they want the destruction of Israel."

[Bruce thornton]

"Much of what you know about Donald Rumsfeld is wrong."

"If an ideologue is someone to whom the facts don't matter, then Rumsfeld is the opposite of an ideologue. He insists that briefings for him be full of facts, thoughtfully organized and rigorously sourced. He demands that facts at odds with his key policy assumptions be brought to his attention immediately. "Bad news never gets better with time," he says, and berates any subordinate who fails to rush forward to him with such news. He does not suppress bad news; he acts on it."

Blogging- Jeff Jarvis- ..."the speed of the snark has changed radically."

"KURTZ: And Jeff Jarvis, you don't seem terribly concerned about the fact that these lines either don't exist or are blurry between active participation in politics and advocacy and sounding off and being smart on the Web.

JARVIS: No, because I think that the issue is, as Mike said, is transparency. And when you're not transparent it's a big problem.

But the truth is, Howie, that journalism is more advocacy than we've ever admitted in this country. Journalists choose what stories to cover and choose what causes to go after as an active advocacy.

I think the real line here is, when you work for a candidate and get paid by a candidate, that's an important line to cross, and you've got to be very, very transparent about that, or else people won't know that you're not so much for the cause as the person. KURTZ: Well, but hold on. I mean, certainly journalists have opinions, and certainly by choosing what to write about, what to play up, what to put on the front page, they help frame an issue in a campaign or in any other time. But they don't see themselves as advocates. They're not -- they're trying to be fair to both sides, whereas bloggers, the more partisan ones, make no bones about the fact that they are partisans of one side or the other.

JARVIS: By advocate, I don't necessarily mean you're backing a candidate, though that's an issue, too. I think it means that you are seeing a cause.

When you decide to go after and tackle the cause of poverty, you're an advocate. Journalists are advocates, and they just don't admit it. And that's part of the problem, is they may not see themselves as advocates, but the audience certainly does.........


KURTZ: Jeff Jarvis, you're a big advocate of, you know, citizens becoming journalists, or at least becoming information and video- gatherers. So, are we really seeing that happening with YouTube? And what's the fallout for the mainstream media?

JARVIS: Well, I think the fallout, first, for politicians is that all life is now on the record. And anyone can record what you're doing any time, and it can be spread around the world.

I think the next fallout is that the speed of the snark has changed radically. It used to be you had days to try to deal with the spin of something. Now you better deal with it immediately, whether you're Allen and "Macaca" or, for that matter, to be fair here, John Kerry and the supposed joke. If you don't react immediately, it's spread all around the Web and people already have their reactions and they've already re-mixed it and already rethought it. By the time it gets to the evening news, we already know it.

KURTZ: The speed of the snark has changed dramatically.

Do you agree with that?

KREMPASKY: I absolutely do.

KURTZ: And so that -- that means that what journalists say, whether it's on the evening news or the next morning's papers, which now seem, you know, an eternity after the original event, is a lot less important?

KREMPASKY: I think that's true. I think that people are reacting, and that that first impression has become so important, because if something becomes immediately interesting it gets shared everywhere.

KURTZ: Well, you guys are powerful."

Trust disclosure- there never seems to be a rush when it comes to protecting investors

Islamists infiltrate four universities

Melanie Phillips

Media Research center- Nets recognize that left winger "liberals" will take over committees-after the election but not before

"After ignoring for months how Democratic control of the House and Senate would put left-wingers in charge of key committees, on Thursday night the ABC, CBS and NBC evening newscasts acknowledged that reality as they sprinkled the "liberal" label in their stories."

"Cyberspace is where the threat is," said Samuel Rascoff, director of intelligence analysis for the NYPD. "It's become more subtle and pervasive."

Geopolitics

"The Islamic radicals, however, inspired by another historic victory, will move to unite with their brothers in the faith in Kyrgyzia, Tadjikistan, and Dagestan. They will foster a rebellion in the Fergana Valley and other hotspots where the ground has already been prepared for the noble ideals of the Islamic revolution.



This advance of the sons of Allah will be halted on the approaches to Kazakhstan—not by Moscow, but by Beijing. Russia’s great strategic ally in the Shanghai Co-operation Organization cannot and will not allow the Islamic radicals to swallow Kazakhstan, which in the future is to be China’s principal supplier of energy resources. Having crushed the Islamists decisively, China will go on to establish a military and political protectorate over the entire region of what used to be Soviet Central Asia. After this, the geopolitical fate of Siberia and the Russian Far East will be sealed."

Trend for copy desks?- offshoring

Remembrance Day coverage

BSO deputy killed, another wounded in shooting during 'routine' stop in Tamarac

David Warren

Jeremy Rabkin reviews Mark Steyn's book- America Alone

Municipal election tomorrow

Lorrie Goldstein

Weston- Liberal B Team

Earl McRae-Draped by the flag

Licia Corbella- Steep price for victory

Licia Corbella- Steep price for victory

Trial balloon? ...and the consequences of such a retreat? would the terrorists suddenly become pacified or more energized?

John Bolton...............via LGF

"Good people sleep peaceably in their beds at night only because rough men stand ready to do violence on their behalf."