Apologies

Work and family take up my time, mostly work. and I have tired of posting about politics, what is the point? judging by who gets thru the primary process the electorate is as dumb as a box of rocks, and the days of this Republic are numbered because of it.

I may post a bit on social issues from time to time, who knows.

Huckabee

I really wanted to support Mike, but the sheer number of pardons and clemencies, the whining over Gitmo and Bush, and the blatant pandering to the whiny-ass liberals has turned me off where he's concerned. I think there should be a difference between liberals and conservatives. frankly, it's hard to tell the difference between Mike and Barack these days. the only thing left to like is his support for the fair tax.

Gateway pundit correctly identifies the real quagmire, lying ass reporters

Read all about it!

Words are not enough

Michelle Malkin has a post all should read.

Remember them

Yet even more evidence our state dept. is bugshit friggin crazy

?what the ??????? is Condi thinking? this is nuts!

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TRAIL OF TERROR
'Mr. Suicide Bomb' goes to Washington
Rice, lawmakers met with Muslim sheik known for justifying attacks on Israelis for Islam'

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Posted: November 13, 2007
1:00 a.m. Eastern

© 2007 WorldNetDaily.com

Sheik Taysir Tamimi

A senior Muslim cleric who is a prominent justifier of suicide bombings met last week with senators and congressmen and consulted last month with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, WND has learned.

Sheik Taysir Tamimi, chief Palestinian justice, also claimed in a recently released book for which he was interviewed that the Torah was "falsified," Jewish and Christian history were "invented," the Jewish Temples never existed and the Al Aqsa Mosque was built by angels.

"I am very glad to have this occasion to speak to Congress and the Senate and have access to groups and individuals that form American policy," said Tamimi in a statement.

"I emphasized in the meetings the importance of religious coexistence and that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict cannot be solved without creating a Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital," the he said.

Tamimi is considered the second most important Palestinian cleric after Muhammad Hussein, the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem.

(Story continues below)

He met in Washington last week with a slew of lawmakers as part of a new interfaith religious organization – the Council for Religious Institutions in the Holy Land – formed with the stated purpose of promoting Israeli-Palestinian peace.

The council includes Israeli chief rabbis, top Muslim Palestinian judges and leading Catholic, Orthodox and Protestant clerics from Israel and the Palestinian areas. It is reportedly funded by the United States Agency for International Development, which also provides millions in annual aid to help the Palestinians build infrastructure in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

Tamimi and the council met Nov. 6 with Sens. Joseph Liebermann, I-Conn.; Tom Coburn, R-Okla.; and John Ensign, R-Nev. The next day the sheik held meetings with more than a dozen House members, including Rep. Keith Ellison, D-Minn., the first Muslim elected to Congress.

Tamimi also reportedly met last week with David Welch, U.S. deputy assistant secretary of state for near eastern affairs, and consulted last month with Rice regarding how to promote a future Palestinian state.

His office told WND the Islamic cleric is slated to meet with President Bush, but no such visit could be verified.

Tamimi's Washington trip was timed to generate support for an upcoming U.S.-sponsored Annapolis summit at which Prime Minister Ehud Olmert is expected to outline a Palestinian state including most of the West Bank. Some reports claim Olmert also is willing to cede sections of Jerusalem.

According to media reports, Tamimi and his group expressed to U.S. lawmakers last week a six-point platform that includes plans to set up a panel representing all the faiths that would condemn media or government incitement against any religious group; a board that would review educational materials for incitement; and a "hot line" to address any emerging crisis surrounding access to holy sites.

But in the recently released book, "Schmoozing with Terrorists," by WND Jerusalem bureau chief Aaron Klein, Tamimi presented a different attitude, stating Jews have no right to Jerusalem or to Judaism's holiest site, the Temple Mount.

Tamimi also is well-known for his justification of Palestinian suicide bombings and was accused by Israel of inciting violence at the beginning of the second Palestinian intifada that started in September 2000.

When asked to condemn suicide attacks during a video-taped interview with Klein for "Schmoozing" earlier this year, Tamimi refused.

Instead Tamimi stated: "A suicide bomber who sees he will get killed by F-16s prefers to defend himself and has nothing but himself to defend himself. ... We believe he who gets killed will go to Allah in the sky and be with the prophets and the martyrs and the just people."

Tamimi went on during the interview with Klein to claim Jews have no historical connection to Jerusalem or Israel and that the Jewish Temples never existed.

"Israel started since 1967 making archeological digs to show Jewish signs to prove the relationship between Judaism and the city, and they found nothing. There is no Jewish connection to Israel before the Jews invaded in the 1880's," said Tamimi.

"About these so-called two Temples, they never existed, certainly not at the Haram Al- Sharif (Temple Mount)," Tamimi said.

The Palestinian cleric denied in "Schmoozing" the validity of dozens of digs verified by experts worldwide revealing Jewish artifacts from the First and Second Temples throughout Jerusalem, including on the Temple Mount itself; excavations revealing Jewish homes and a synagogue in a site in Jerusalem called the City of David; or even the recent discovery of a Second Temple Jewish city in the vicinity of Jerusalem.

He said descriptions of the Jewish Temples in the Hebrew Tanach, in the Talmud and in Byzantine and Roman writings from the Temple periods were forged and that the Torah was "falsified" to claim Biblical patriarchs and matriarchs were Jewish when indeed they were prophets for Islam.

"All this is not real. We don't believe in all your versions. Your Torah was falsified. The text as given to the Muslim prophet Moses never mentions Jerusalem. Maybe Jerusalem was mentioned in the rest of the Torah, which was falsified by the Jews."

Asked about the Western Wall, one of the holiest Jewish structures, Tamimi said the wall was a tying post for Muhammad's horse and that it is part of the Al Aqsa Mosque, even though the Wall predates the mosque by over 1,000 years.

"The Western Wall is the western wall of the Al Aqsa Mosque. It's where Prophet Muhammad tied his animal which took him from Mecca to Jerusalem to receive the revelations of Allah."

Tamimi went on to claim to Klein the Al Aqsa Mosque, which has sprung multiple leaks and has had to be repainted several times, was built by angels.

"Al Aqsa was build by the angels 40 years after the building of Al-Haram in Mecca. This we have no doubt is true," he was quoted as saying in "Schmoozing."

U.N. eaten up with the dumbass alert

UN Blames Israel for Palestinian Terrorism. Yes, Really...

In the UN's bizzaro world, it's Israel's fault Hamas uses Gaza as a launching pad to fire daily barrages of Qassam rockets at Serdot....

The head of the U.N. agency responsible for aiding Palestinian refugees said Wednesday that Israel's near economic blockade of the Gaza Strip is fueling support for extremists and shattering hopes for a peaceful future.

"They're trying to punish those who've taken control of Gaza but in fact they're punishing everybody inside Gaza, a very small percentage of whom support the people who are controlling Gaza right now," (they voted Hamas into power you fucking shithead -ed.) Karen Koning AbuZayd of the United Nations Works and Relief Agency said.

The violent takeover of the Gaza Strip last June by the Islamic militants of the Hamas movement, and their continual rocketing of Israel, has led to Gaza's increasing isolation. In September, Israel declared Gaza a "hostile entity," clearing the way for economic sanctions.

from Weasel Zippers

Hope for peaceful co-existence in Iraq

I pray that stories such as this become commonplace over there.

Thanks and Praise

Thanks and Praise: I photographed men and women, both Christians and Muslims, placing a cross atop the St. John’s Church in Baghdad. They had taken the cross from storage and a man washed it before carrying it up to the dome.

A Muslim man had invited the American soldiers from “Chosen” Company 2-12 Cavalry to the church, where I videotaped as Muslims and Christians worked and rejoiced at the reopening of St John’s, an occasion all viewed as a sign of hope.

The Iraqis asked me to convey a message of thanks to the American people. ” Thank you, thank you,” the people were saying. One man said, “Thank you for peace.” Another man, a Muslim, said “All the people, all the people in Iraq, Muslim and Christian, is brother.” The men and women were holding bells, and for the first time in memory freedom rang over the ravaged land between two rivers. (Videotape to follow.)

Web Administrator Notes:

Michael Yon is making this photograph available to media outlets, such as print publications and cable and television news broadcasts, at no cost for a limited period of time. For more information, please contact us here.

Michael Yon does not receive funding or financial support from Fox News, or from any network, movie, book or television deals at this time. He is entirely reader supported. He relies on his readers to help him replace his equipment and cover his expenses so that he may remain in Iraq and bring you the stories of our soldiers. If you value his work, please consider supporting his mission.

A local son dies in Iraq

Petty officer 2nd Class Kevin R. Bewley was from the little town of Hector, Ark. — but he was among the thousands of enlisted Navy personnel who for a year or two make Whidbey Island their home.

Petty Officer Bewley, 27, died Monday while performing one of the more dangerous duties in Iraq.

He was part of an Explosive Ordnance Disposal (EOD) team, and he died of wounds suffered when a bomb detonated while he was conducting operations in Salah ad Din province, said the Navy.

Petty Officer Bewley was a member of EOD Mobile Unit 11, based at the Naval Air Station at Whidbey Island. So far, out of 160 members in the group, six have been killed in Iraq, said a spokeswoman for the base.

His father, Ron Bewley, of Hector, said, "Let me tell you, man, it's hard to bury your boy when he gets killed in Iraq. ... My son's name is Kevin Ronald Bewley. He was born April 18, 1980. He was born at St. Mary's Hospital in Russellville, Ark. He weighed 7 pounds, 6 ounces. I'm his daddy."

Petty Officer Bewley was part of a tight-knit group of EOD members, said his brother, Jay Patrick Bewley, 32, a San Francisco consultant.

"It's very much a brotherhood in his unit. They were all transplants," said Jay Bewley.

The brothers loved to travel together; they made a driving trek to the Arctic Circle.

"We lived our lives with no regrets. We took a trip at every opportunity. We did things together. There was nothing left unsaid. It was just the way we lived," Jay Bewley said.

After first joining the National Guard, Petty Officer Bewley joined the Navy in November 2001. He already had served a deployment in Iraq in 2006. "He literally had disarmed hundreds of bombs. Each one he disarmed saved someone's life," Jay Bewley said.

In addition to his brother and father, Petty Officer Bewley is survived by his mother, Connie Whitaker of Greenbrier, Ark.; and his daughter, McKinnzie Bewley of San Antonio.

Although the Navy news release said Petty Officer Bewley died when a bomb detonated, his brother said the Navy told him Bewley had disarmed two bombs when there was small-arms fire.

"That's important," said the brother. "He did his job right."

Services will be held in Arkansas. Details are pending.

I remember this kid working in the local grocery store and didn't even know he'd joined the Navy, small town kids go to school and move to the "big city" quite often. This is not the news you want to hear from such, My Prayers to Petty Officer Bewley and his Family. Thank you for your service to the country, I'm so sorry it cost you so much.

IAEA jumps in update

I mentioned the IAEA jumping in to investigate the claims that Israel had bombed a secret reactor in Syria in a previous post

Here's an update from LGF:

IAEA Chief Springs Into Action, Condemns Israel

Sun, Oct 28, 2007 at 1:05:11 pm PST

The United Nations’ nuclear watchdog, Mohamed ElBaradei, who has never succeeded in stopping a single country from developing nuclear weapons, is condemning Israel for the airstrike on Syria’s nuclear facility: IAEA chief lashes out over Israeli raid in Syria.

Because the UN is the “eyes and ears of the international community.” We’re not supposed to notice that those eyes are willfully blind, and those ears willfully deaf.

Chief UN nuclear watchdog Mohamed ElBaradei Sunday accused Israel of taking “the law into their own hands” with a raid on Syria, and demanded more information about what was hit.

Neither Israel nor the United States has furnished “any evidence at all” to prove that the Syrian site bombed last month was a secret nuclear facility, the director of the International Atomic Energy Agency told CNN.

“That, to me, is very distressful because we have a system; if countries have information that the country is working on a nuclear-related program, they should come to us. We have the authority to go out and investigate,” he said.

“But to bomb first and then ask questions later, I think it undermines the system and it doesn’t lead to any solution to any suspicion, because we are the eyes and ears of the international community.”

Well, one thing you can say about El-Baradei and the UN, at least they're predictable.

The scariest jack-o-lantern ever carved

Can be seen here

state dept. foolishness alert

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Anxious not to repeat mistakes of past Middle East peace-making, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has turned to former presidents Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter for tips ahead of her own conference this year.

Rice invited Carter, a vocal critic of Bush administration policies, to the State Department on Wednesday where the two discussed his Arab-Israeli peacemaking efforts in the 1970s, State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said on Friday.

Their talks were "good and cordial," he said. They focused on the Middle East and not Carter's recent criticism of President George W. Bush's policies in Iraq and elsewhere.

A Soviet specialist, Rice also telephoned another former Democratic president, Bill Clinton, who tried, and ultimately failed, in his eight years in office to bring the Israelis and Palestinians together.

"She's trying to draw on the historical record and the experiences of others to see -- see what she can glean and how that may be applicable to the current day," McCormack said.

"She is a student of history and has a keen appreciation for how we can apply the lessons of history, what we can learn from those who have gone before us," he said.

Other sources of advice have been former U.S. negotiator Dennis Ross and ex-secretaries of state James Baker, Henry Kissinger and Madeleine Albright. Rice meets frequently for lunch with Albright, whose father taught Rice at Denver University.

Rice has made clear she will devote all her energy in the Bush administration's final 14 months to get what others have failed to attain in the past -- a viable, independent Palestinian state living side by side with a secure Israel.

The top U.S. diplomat, who has been to Israel and the Palestinian Territories seven times this year and returns next week, is preparing the ground for a Palestinian statehood conference expected to be held in late November or early December, in Annapolis, Maryland.

Clinton hosted many Middle East peace summits at Camp David, the presidential retreat in Maryland, even in his final month in office in January 2001, but never managed to get an Israeli-Palestinian deal.

Carter held secret negotiations at Camp David that led to a 1978 deal between Egyptian President Anwar Sadat and Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin.

Rice also has been scouring historical records for pointers. During her summer break in August, she checked out volumes of historical background from the State Department's library on Israeli-Palestinian peacemaking, a department official said.

Nothing like this to inspire confidence in our state dept. huh? seek advice from the guy responsible for Iran being fully controlled by shia fundmentalists, and the guy who elevated a ruthless self serving terrorist to the level of statesman. Great! that's using your noggin Dr. Rice.