Boo Frickin' Hoo...
Lot's of news reports lately about "anti-Muslim" bias in America, especially in California. To this I say:

Are Muslims being rounded up and shipped off to camps?

Are Muslims being lined up and shot out of hand?

Have state, local and federal authorities been given permission to begin a systematic program of street executions?

Are mosques being blown up on a daily basis?

Are schoolbuses full of Muslim children being targeted for RPG's and suicicde bombers?

Are hospitals turning away people of obvious Middle-eastern extraction or Islamic tendencies and denying them emergency treatment? Surgery?

Is the US Government equipping, funding and encouraging Americans to strap explosives to themselves and blow up shopping centers frequented by Muslims? Is it adding rat poison, manure, caustic chemicals and possibly biological agents to the shrapnel from such devices?

Has there been a law passed stating that it is now illegal to buy, sell, trade in, import or export halal foods? Is there a law stating that new construction of mosques or any buiulding that could be conceivably used for the purposes of practicing the Muslim religion is expressly forbidden?

Is it illegal to read the Koran?

Are Muslims being killed in the streets, their bodies subject to desecration by rowdy crowds without jobs, and then hung from the Golden-Gate bridge?

Are American television stations showing hooded Muslims having their throats cut or their brains blown out by their captors/tormentors as an example of something to celebrate or emulate?

Are Catholics, Protestants and Jews issuing fatwas calling for the deaths of all Islamic nutjobs, the destruction of what passes for their culture and the complete erasure of their progeny and posterity from the face of the earth and claiming that God has commanded them to act that way?

Since the answer to all of the above is NO, I recommend that anyone who is complaining take a pork-fat enema and call me in the morning.
In case you haven't noticed; there's a war on. And while I'm positive that not all Muslims are of the fur-breasted, kill-the-Jews, Death-to-the Great-Satan variety, there will, of course, be those who cannot, or will not make the distinction --- in fact, I've written enough nasty stuff about Islam to claim membership in the latter, but that's only because I sometimes let my mouth engage before my brain. No excuse, but there ya go --- human nature at work.

It could be worse. After all, you could be a Halliburton truck driver trying to help rebuild a bombed-out country full of ungrateful masses of lunatics.

Pots and Kettles...I'm sure we're all shocked, SHOCKED, that American GI's have apparently been abusing Iraqi POW's. From what I can tell, this abuse has included:

-Making them stand naked in front of women.
-Having their pictures taken in compromising positions.
-Allegations of the use of electrical equipment in interrogations.
-Making them wear hoods when posing for photographs.
-Embarrassing them and denying them dignity.

This, of course, from people who have no compunction about ethnically cleansing their homelands of "apostates", Jews, and those that defy the strongman-du-jour. The same folks believe it virtuous and a reason for a party when they desecrate our dead, embarrass and humiliate our prisoners. The same critics who hold the United States Military to standards they won't even abide by, of course, have no problems with indiscriminately killing non-combatants who either happen to be in the way or who have (had) utility as human shields.

You know what? They should be overjoyed that their POW's haven't been fried, shot or gassed, because if they thought they could get away with it (and they often do), ours would be. We're somewhat handicapped in Iraq by the facts that reporters are everywhere, we're a free society that requires and demands audit of our troops and their actions, and laboring under the misapprehension that the other side will play nice if we do too.

Fallujah should have been leveled. Najaf should have been leveled. Iraq should have been leveled and Iran should be made unihabitable for even insect life for the next 10,000 years. Then perhaps Muslims that delight in the slaughter of 3,000 innocents, get bent out of shape by an Israeli fence, and routinely attack peole trying to supply them with food, medicine, order and basic services, would have a point.

Remember this: The United States has it in it's power to completely and permanently destroy what passes for Muslim civilization and doesn't. The United States has the ability to make sure that the only place that Arabic or Farsi can be spoken is in the deepest depths of Hell, and it restrains itself.

You guys cut men's throats or blow their brains out on television and call it justice. Your sense of propriety is completely warped, you know that?

An Interesting Dichonomy...
The 9/11 Commission, we're told, is supposed to investigate all relevant evidence regarding government (in-)action vis-a-vis the Spetember 11, 2001 attacks upon the World Trade Center. Once the commission has reviewed all the evidence (such as it is) relating to how the government failed us on that day, it is supposed to recommend a bunch of changes that will "streamline" the process so that such mistakes become either a rarity or impossible to repeat.

That's the public explanation, anyway.

What will happen, of course, is that the poilitical points will be scored, the taxpayer's money will have been spent, and the Beltway Folks can point to their (ultimatly failed) efforts to make "government more responsible to the needs of the people". The purpose, we're told, is to make sure our intelligence agencies "work" the "way they were intended to".

In the end, this commission will fix nothing, or at least, fix something way too late to be of any use, and government will find a way to fail us again that had nothing to do whatsoever with what has been investigated. The nature of bureacracy is that it will ultimately collapse for one reason, and when that is corrected, it will find another excuse to collapse, and the new reason will be just as pregnant with political intrigue. You can bet on it.

"Your government" no longer exists to ensure that the citizen "has hhis/her needs" met. It no longer exists to be responsive to the people who pay for it and it not longer exists yo even pretend that it speaks and acts on behalf of the people who foot the bill. If you ever doubt this, just ask yourself when was the last time government ever did anything that had more than a momentary, transitory effect on your everyday life?

Government is NEVER held accountable for it's breakdowns by the public at large because for all intents and purposes, no one knows just WHO the government is. You have senators and Congresspersons, but they are just the face on the TV screen. The real government is stashed away in various federal bureacracies and toils away anonymously. The sentaors, congress-critters, and Presidents all come and go. The heads of various federal agencies do likewise. However, the vast bulk of the government consists of unknown bureaucrats that are never identified (unless they show up on your doorstep with a warrant) and without accountability (ever get the "I don't make the policies, I just enforce/follow/abide by them" spiel from a bureaucrat?).

If you don't think so, try asking the Social Security Administration just how it is that when they possess four tons of paper pointing out that you are disabled, numerous, repetitive requests for further information (duly answered), and a mountain of consent forms for further investigation, just how it is they can go about denying the benefits you were taxed for? The response I got was: "it is policy to reject at least 90% of all claims the first time around". The reason? "That's just the way it is --- listen, I don't make the rules, I just have to follow them, okay?"

Submit all the evidence you wish. Review every policy your little heart desires. In the end, it is not the faces on the commission, nor the ones in Congress, nor even the ones that sit in the White House that will run anything. It will be an anonymous voice on the other end of the telephone telling you "this is how it works, now shut up and eat it".

We expect the government to work when it comes to things like terrorism, but somehow, no one gets bent out of shape when the government doesn't bring forth a promised benefit even when all the bureaucratic sumersaults have been duly done. The FBI and CIA will never work as long as the Social Security (Mis-) Administration doesn't.