I saw this earlier in the week, and thought; are you fucking kidding me? Keeping secrets? Then again, it's Slate and they can be expected to drool all over themselves in the effort to make Obama out to be the conquering hero, but when it comes to the death of Usama Bin Laden (UBL) we already know the following:
* a 40-man SEAL team took out UBL.
* The initial tip came from waterboarding KSM
* The tip led to the identity of UBL's courier
* the Courier (which FoxNews has already named) was followed for years to establish his bonafides
* The house where UBL was supposed to be living in was under surveillance for four years
* The Pakistanis were not informed, and could not be trusted, so as to get their help
* UBL is shot in the face
* UBL is shot in the face, futilely trying to use his wife as a human shield.
* UBL"s wife confirmed UBL's identity by calling out his name
* UBL's body was disposed of in an Islamically-approved way, by dumping it into the Arabian Sea
* The government identified UBL by his DNA and facial-recognition software
* The government is in possession of UBL's computers, notebooks, diaries, etc. and busily pouring over the intelligence within so as to find other terrorists
* UBL Had two cell phones/telephone numbers and 500 Euros sewn into his clothing.
* UBL's wife called out his name, and was wounded, in the course of the gunfight.
* UBL Might have ben captured, and then executed.
* SEAL Team 6 practiced the raid -- for a year -- in a secret mock-up of the compound somewhere in the United States.
* DNA testing has sorta-kinda confirmed that the dead man was, or at least very strongly indicated that it was, UBL.
* A 'treasure trove' of information on all-things Al'Qaeda was found at the compound and is being checked with a fine-toothed comb by US Intelligence, and as of today, DOJ and others are saying that indictments and arrests are pending, and that DOJ may be asking for wiretap permission and search warrants, and issuing subpeonas very soon.
* The names of others inside that compound have already been released. I'm surprised they haven't identified the cleaning lady and Bin Laden's plumber by name, yet.
Just what secrets, if any, are being kept? It seems to me that President Obama is doing nothing but talking about the raid -- understandable, as it is the ONLY accomplishment of his otherwise-disastrous administration -- and the Press is doing nothing but publishing/broadcasting all sorts of details, and that, obviously, means the government leaks information -- and secrets -- like a fucking sieve.
But even more troubling, and somewhat confusing, is that the Administration is not going to release any photographs of UBL to prove that he's actually dead, and the reason given is that no one wants to 'inflame' Islamic sensibilities with US Troops in combat zones, and US diplomats still in Islamic countries. That's when the excuse is not protecting National Security or the protection of sources and methods and so forth, in the meantime neglecting that so much information has already been released that it would take years for any investigative reporter with integrity and half-a-brain (oxymoron) just to run it all down.
It seems as if the Administration, true to form, is attempting to decide what is and what is not secret depending on what the perceived political and propaganda needs of the Administration are at any particular moment, and in the process only reinforcing what so many already think; that Barack Obama is a doofus, surrounded by bigger doofuses, who can't decide if it's Tuesday or Wednesday, and when confronted by the possibility of having to make a decision, unfailingly make the wrong one.
Having made the right decision to get UBL, the Won is now fucking it all up for himself by making -- or allowing his minions to make -- all the wrong ones.
First of all, who gives a crap about Islamic Sensibilities? If you say that not releasing the photographs and other evidence is the proper thing to do on the grounds that it's all too gruesome and graphic, I'd like to remind you that the images of 9/11 are just as horrific, and I just saw them all over again this entire week plastered all over my television screen, as the Press helps Obama take his, by now, extremely aggravating extended bow.
Second, the amount of data that has already been released (all of it for PR purposes) is astounding, if often contradictory, and has probably already let quite a few cats out of any number of bags, which begins to make a mockery of the idea of operational security.
We've been treated to pictures of the White House Situation Room during the raid, with their grave Obama, praying Joe Biden, and looks-as-if-she's-about-to-puke Hillary Clinton, but only because those images serve an ulterior purpose: making the Obama Administration seem competent, serious, concerned, and all Presidentially-like. Yeah, we get to see THOSE pictures, on the assumption that we really, really need to (really on the assumption that Obama needs us to), but we don't get to see the end result? Go figure.
The fact is that the Obama Administration, by playing to this nonsense about 'Islamic Sensibilities' -- burying Bin Laden according to Islamic custom (something they apparently fucked up, anyway), not wanting to rub salt in the wound of a major loss and dead folk hero -- and apparently trying, without much success, to return to it's 'beg Islam to be nice to us' policy, is doing itself, and us, a major disservice.
The disservice is that without evidence, no one in the Islamic World believes that Bin Laden is really dead. Without evidence, the same people who burned braincells and wasted air over Obama's birth certificate have new grist for the conspiracy theory mill. There are even some going as far as to say that those images are deliberately being kept from the public until Obama, about to lose the 2012 election, pulls an October Surprise and releases them a day or two before the election in a desperate bid to save his sorry ass. Already, there are those in the Islamic Sandbox saying the enitre thing is a fiction cooked up by a desperate Obama.
Obama, who has now scored major points in an area which was one of his biggest weaknesses (He's been soft on the War on Terror), has gone and squandered that advantage -- and re-opened the floodgates of conspiracy theory and charges of incompetence. The left hand doesn't seem to know what the right hand does here; one day UBL is said to have resisted, and the next that he was unarmed. One day UBL was found in part because of what happens at Gitmo, and the next, it was painstaking intelligence work done over a series of years,like someone doing a giant jigsaw puzzle in the dark and with one hand tied behind his back. The CIA says one thing, the Pentagon another. The State Department (which on a good day might be able to find it's own collective ass with both hands and a roadmap) says something else, entirely, and they all contradict and step all over each other in the process.
The disinformation may be deliberate, granted, but from here it appears as if no one in the government is on the same page, and that always leads one to the conclusion that no one in Washington can muster enough intellectual firepower to burn calories, and in this political climate (Throw the Bums Out!), that's rather dangerous for a sitting President (even if I do think he's a con man).
Offered as proof of that lack of attention to detail: You'll be glad to know that the FBI is STILL offering a $25 million reward for UBL. Administrative oversight, probably (The FBI probably requires 700 bureaucrats to remove a staple from a two-page memo), but you just know what conspiracy theorists will do with this sort of detail.
Leave it to Barack Obama to create a rather strange dialectic in which Americans may actually thank God that Wikileaks exists.
If you did the thing right in the first place, you wouldn't have these problems, and you wouldn't have to expend so much energy trying to look the part of legitimate, in-charge, hands-on, involved, know-everything, competent President.
UBL is dead; Great! I'm proud of you. Now prove it. Considering the track record of this President and this Administration, documented, authenticated, carved-in-stone proof is required. They have no one but themselves to blame for it because they way they 'do business' leaves them vulnerable to charges of not being truthful. Their inability to ever nail down details -- do they even care about details? -- makes them look bad; as if they're just winging it, and leads to the sort of distrust that allows a two-year kerfuffle over birth certificates to fester. It'll take all of five minutes to do, and who gives a shit what Achmed in Riyadh thinks, besides Larry King?
I believe that UBL is, in fact, fish food, but let's face it; there's millions of people, here in the United States and abroad, who won't until they've been given solid evidence. And even at that, there are still going to be those who will never believe it anyway, so why not just release the damned things and spare yourself the multitude of self-inflicted wounds, accusations of blind stupidity, and attributions of sinister political motivations?
Show the damn pictures.This is par for the course with President Obama; even when he does something awesome and worthy of praise, he ruins it by leaving so many loose ends, refusing to release information that is readily available and which the public has a right to because political motive gets in the way, and because he and his people often feel the need to take that Victory Lap before the Public has been convinced that he's acually won something. I think at this point it's become an automatic, reflex, defensive routine on the part of the Administration: declare victory, take the photo ops and good press, go home, refuse to answer questions that might rain upon your parade, then complain about the 'unfairness' of having to be held to some sort of higher standard than past Presidents, cry racism.
Wednesday, May 04, 2011
Tuesday, May 03, 2011
The (Overly-)Friendly Skies...
Man arrested for rubbing flight attendant's crotch in flight.
He could at least have offered her a drink, first. Sheesh. Some guys just don't know how to treat a lady.
Maybe he was just checking her for explosives?
You know, I think it'sabout time Airport Security (an oxymoron) did something useful, and instead of making nursing mothers drink breast milk, or feel up six year olds and take knitting needles away from wheelchair-bound grandmothers, they could start keeping drunks off airplanes.
And how did this guy get a bottle of scotch on board the plane when that very self-same crack security regime demands that all bottles and liquids be placed in a clear plastric bag for inspection? Oh right: union security screeners.
He could at least have offered her a drink, first. Sheesh. Some guys just don't know how to treat a lady.
Maybe he was just checking her for explosives?
You know, I think it'sabout time Airport Security (an oxymoron) did something useful, and instead of making nursing mothers drink breast milk, or feel up six year olds and take knitting needles away from wheelchair-bound grandmothers, they could start keeping drunks off airplanes.
And how did this guy get a bottle of scotch on board the plane when that very self-same crack security regime demands that all bottles and liquids be placed in a clear plastric bag for inspection? Oh right: union security screeners.
Green Energy is a Scam...
British taxpayers pay Scottish Wind Farms NOT to generate Electricty.
My American ex-pat bud in Watford, England told me about this yesterday, and he was incensed.
By the way, contrary to the assertion made by the screaming doofus quoted in the article, there is no such thing as a 'storage facility' for electricity; it's an on-demand commodity, and if you produce more than you use, the excess is wasted. It cannot be 'stored' like grain, water, or winter clothing.
But here's yet one more reason to finally come to the conclusion that Green Energy is a scam; the wind farm gets paid when it produces, but it also gets paid -- 20 times more-- to shut down, and I can promise you that all those windmills were paid for by a government subsidy (i.e. paid for by taxpayer money, with the taxpayer having no say in how the funds were spent).
Here's how the Green Energy Scam works:
Some douchebag screams about Greenhouse gasses and Global Warming and impending environmental doom.
Then some bigger douchebag, usually with a title like 'Minister of Parliament' or 'Congressman' figures there's some money to made here, or at least votes, and the possibility of getting some good PR.
The MP and the Congressroach get their rich buddies together (I think they call them 'constituents') and they craft a Green Energy Policy, a dire necessity if we're all to avoid dying of a really nasty sunburn or melting ice caps, and since the Private Sector -- i.e. people with brains who put them to use so as to make themselves rich -- won't invest in it (the return ain't worth it), then the Government simply must, as a last resort. It's the duty of the government to 'protect' it's citizens against the possibility of changing climate, you see, while neglecting to tell them that the same government can do jack shit if a comet were to be on collision course with the planet, every volcano on Earth blew at the same time, or some virus evolved into a Super-Bug that gave us all polka-dotted skin and jock itch before killing us, but no matter.
The 'Government', usually via closed-door session, or by the clever alternative of slipping a provision at the last minute into a absolutely humongous bill that no one ever bothers to read before voting on it, grabs billions in taxpayer funds to subsidize Green Energy Companies. Green Energy Companies, by the way, which the MP's or Congresscritter's friends, start -- at least on paper -- in expectation of a massive government grant.
The MP's and Congressdouche's friends might build a few windmills, shuffle some official papers about, and go through the motions of appearing to be a real company providing a real service to real customers, all the while reaping huge benefits in terms of further subsidies, grants, tax benefits, and the extraordinarily-and-purposely vague and ridiculous terms of contracts written with government aid that still allow them to get paid -- by the taxpayer -- handsomely whether they actually produce anything, or not.
In a few years, when the REAL energy companies (utilities, oil companies, etc) get...ahem...wind...of how lucrative this windfarm scheme is, they simply make a takeover bid for the comeptition, and more cash changes hands, The instigators of the scam have gotten paid fifty times over, the public gets the shaft (because even if Exxon-Mobil now owns the windfarm, it's operating it under the same conditions as the previous owner -- i.e. get paid, no matter what), and your MP or Congressfucker gets a little on the side because they were the first people called when the IPO hits the market, and the first to know when the takeover offer is made so that they can get in and out of the stock at just the right time as to make a fortune.
The downside is that your electric bills go up, the government passes more regulations to screw your life up in order to protect what they have created, and your taxes continue to rise. Your life isn;t improved in any meaningful way, and guess what? All the talk about saving the environment was just that; talk. Because the people who can be counted upon to make the loudest noises about being Green are the people who usually know the absolute least...about everything.
My American ex-pat bud in Watford, England told me about this yesterday, and he was incensed.
By the way, contrary to the assertion made by the screaming doofus quoted in the article, there is no such thing as a 'storage facility' for electricity; it's an on-demand commodity, and if you produce more than you use, the excess is wasted. It cannot be 'stored' like grain, water, or winter clothing.
But here's yet one more reason to finally come to the conclusion that Green Energy is a scam; the wind farm gets paid when it produces, but it also gets paid -- 20 times more-- to shut down, and I can promise you that all those windmills were paid for by a government subsidy (i.e. paid for by taxpayer money, with the taxpayer having no say in how the funds were spent).
Here's how the Green Energy Scam works:
Some douchebag screams about Greenhouse gasses and Global Warming and impending environmental doom.
Then some bigger douchebag, usually with a title like 'Minister of Parliament' or 'Congressman' figures there's some money to made here, or at least votes, and the possibility of getting some good PR.
The MP and the Congressroach get their rich buddies together (I think they call them 'constituents') and they craft a Green Energy Policy, a dire necessity if we're all to avoid dying of a really nasty sunburn or melting ice caps, and since the Private Sector -- i.e. people with brains who put them to use so as to make themselves rich -- won't invest in it (the return ain't worth it), then the Government simply must, as a last resort. It's the duty of the government to 'protect' it's citizens against the possibility of changing climate, you see, while neglecting to tell them that the same government can do jack shit if a comet were to be on collision course with the planet, every volcano on Earth blew at the same time, or some virus evolved into a Super-Bug that gave us all polka-dotted skin and jock itch before killing us, but no matter.
The 'Government', usually via closed-door session, or by the clever alternative of slipping a provision at the last minute into a absolutely humongous bill that no one ever bothers to read before voting on it, grabs billions in taxpayer funds to subsidize Green Energy Companies. Green Energy Companies, by the way, which the MP's or Congresscritter's friends, start -- at least on paper -- in expectation of a massive government grant.
The MP's and Congressdouche's friends might build a few windmills, shuffle some official papers about, and go through the motions of appearing to be a real company providing a real service to real customers, all the while reaping huge benefits in terms of further subsidies, grants, tax benefits, and the extraordinarily-and-purposely vague and ridiculous terms of contracts written with government aid that still allow them to get paid -- by the taxpayer -- handsomely whether they actually produce anything, or not.
In a few years, when the REAL energy companies (utilities, oil companies, etc) get...ahem...wind...of how lucrative this windfarm scheme is, they simply make a takeover bid for the comeptition, and more cash changes hands, The instigators of the scam have gotten paid fifty times over, the public gets the shaft (because even if Exxon-Mobil now owns the windfarm, it's operating it under the same conditions as the previous owner -- i.e. get paid, no matter what), and your MP or Congressfucker gets a little on the side because they were the first people called when the IPO hits the market, and the first to know when the takeover offer is made so that they can get in and out of the stock at just the right time as to make a fortune.
The downside is that your electric bills go up, the government passes more regulations to screw your life up in order to protect what they have created, and your taxes continue to rise. Your life isn;t improved in any meaningful way, and guess what? All the talk about saving the environment was just that; talk. Because the people who can be counted upon to make the loudest noises about being Green are the people who usually know the absolute least...about everything.
Herman Cain: Man, Mitt Romney: Pussy...
Cain to attend South Carolina GOP debates.
I'm liking Herman more and more with each passing day.
Romney can make whatever excuses he wants about not attending, the real reason is that he knows he'll have to answer all sorts of redneck questions about his Mormon faith. To a South Carolinian, being a Mormon is the next best thing to being an openly-professed Child Molester. And they should know; they're expert Child (and livestock) Molesters, themselves.
For some strange reason it seems as if the people who should be the GOP front-runners don't want to take that mantle. Romney avoids debates, and Newt Gingrich remains virtually invisible, and so we're approaching a point in which it might be possible that -- once again -- the very WORST the GOP has to offer will be in position to win the nomination for 2012, which is a very bad situation to be in when your poor competition has to pray for Miracles and depend upon SEAL raids just to continue justifying it's own existence.
Obama may have gotten Osama, but he's still easy meat come next fall without a massive economic turnaround.
Mark my words: if the GOP manages to vomit up Pawlenty, Palin or Santorum, we're sunk come 2012. If Huckabee wins out, it's, at best, a 50/50 proposition that he squeaks one out. Your front-runners have to act like front-runners, and we also need to be listening to and including some of these second-tier candidates, like Herman Cain (who should be on someone's ticket, top or bottom doesn't matter as long as he's in there) who have more to offer than kissing Evangelical ass.
I'm liking Herman more and more with each passing day.
Romney can make whatever excuses he wants about not attending, the real reason is that he knows he'll have to answer all sorts of redneck questions about his Mormon faith. To a South Carolinian, being a Mormon is the next best thing to being an openly-professed Child Molester. And they should know; they're expert Child (and livestock) Molesters, themselves.
For some strange reason it seems as if the people who should be the GOP front-runners don't want to take that mantle. Romney avoids debates, and Newt Gingrich remains virtually invisible, and so we're approaching a point in which it might be possible that -- once again -- the very WORST the GOP has to offer will be in position to win the nomination for 2012, which is a very bad situation to be in when your poor competition has to pray for Miracles and depend upon SEAL raids just to continue justifying it's own existence.
Obama may have gotten Osama, but he's still easy meat come next fall without a massive economic turnaround.
Mark my words: if the GOP manages to vomit up Pawlenty, Palin or Santorum, we're sunk come 2012. If Huckabee wins out, it's, at best, a 50/50 proposition that he squeaks one out. Your front-runners have to act like front-runners, and we also need to be listening to and including some of these second-tier candidates, like Herman Cain (who should be on someone's ticket, top or bottom doesn't matter as long as he's in there) who have more to offer than kissing Evangelical ass.
Monday, May 02, 2011
Usama Bin Laden Death Round-up...
Bin Laden Buried at Sea?
It didn't work for Megatron, you know. Bin Laden's stinking, syphilitic, bullet-riddled corpse should have been hung from a meat hook in Times Square, getting the Full Mussolini.
Was Burial At Sea Islamically-Correct? Who gives a fuck? Personally, I would have desecrated the bastard's corpse in the public square, on World-Wide Television, and who gives a fig about Islamic sensibilities? The Jihadis have no regards for ours, after all.
Some Libtards are declaring the War on Terror Officially over with the execution of UBL. This is the "Mission Accomplished" moment of people who for the last 10 years have questioned the efficacy and propriety of American military operations in the Islamic world, the chance for the rabid and vapid anti-War Left who vilified George W. Bush on a daily basis to do what they've always wanted to; stop fighting an enemy who has made it clear that they aren't interested in negotiating with us, or in being our friends.
They're wrong. Bin Laden is dead, but there's still a billion potential footsoldiers who might follow in his footsteps, and they're being funded by America's dependence upon Muslim Oil, and the international Opium Trade. Wars don't often end because the Generals are dead; this one will only end when we're either the slaves of a New Caliphate, or they're all pushing up the daisies.
It didn't work for Megatron, you know. Bin Laden's stinking, syphilitic, bullet-riddled corpse should have been hung from a meat hook in Times Square, getting the Full Mussolini.
Was Burial At Sea Islamically-Correct? Who gives a fuck? Personally, I would have desecrated the bastard's corpse in the public square, on World-Wide Television, and who gives a fig about Islamic sensibilities? The Jihadis have no regards for ours, after all.
Some Libtards are declaring the War on Terror Officially over with the execution of UBL. This is the "Mission Accomplished" moment of people who for the last 10 years have questioned the efficacy and propriety of American military operations in the Islamic world, the chance for the rabid and vapid anti-War Left who vilified George W. Bush on a daily basis to do what they've always wanted to; stop fighting an enemy who has made it clear that they aren't interested in negotiating with us, or in being our friends.
They're wrong. Bin Laden is dead, but there's still a billion potential footsoldiers who might follow in his footsteps, and they're being funded by America's dependence upon Muslim Oil, and the international Opium Trade. Wars don't often end because the Generals are dead; this one will only end when we're either the slaves of a New Caliphate, or they're all pushing up the daisies.
The Left Hand Know Not What The Right Doeth...
Mark Steyn on the Debt Ceiling thingy. Your government is run by ignoramuses,and it's your fault; you have voted for people who can't add or subtract, and who believe that giving money to poor and stupid people to waste on rims, gold teeth, and pork rinds is an enlightened social policy.
The First Step towards True Economic Recovery is to cut up the Government credit cards. Call your Congresscritter and tell the bastard to vote 'No' on raising the debt ceiling. Second Step: get on him or her about the Budget-- no spending that isn't absolutely necessary. Third Step: remember that there are these things called 'elections' that we hold every so often, and try to convince yourself to vote for the person who seems smarter than your cat -- the one that looks like he/she might be able to do basic math -- and forget the rest. Forget the One-Issue-Demogoging, the Interesting Personal Story, the Fascinating Racial Mix, the Good Speech, The Sun-the-Moon-and-the-Stars Promises That You Don't Have to Pay For.
Vote for competent people who can spell their own names without assistance. If you're incapable of doing that, for some reason, then do us all a favor, and don't vote at all.
The First Step towards True Economic Recovery is to cut up the Government credit cards. Call your Congresscritter and tell the bastard to vote 'No' on raising the debt ceiling. Second Step: get on him or her about the Budget-- no spending that isn't absolutely necessary. Third Step: remember that there are these things called 'elections' that we hold every so often, and try to convince yourself to vote for the person who seems smarter than your cat -- the one that looks like he/she might be able to do basic math -- and forget the rest. Forget the One-Issue-Demogoging, the Interesting Personal Story, the Fascinating Racial Mix, the Good Speech, The Sun-the-Moon-and-the-Stars Promises That You Don't Have to Pay For.
Vote for competent people who can spell their own names without assistance. If you're incapable of doing that, for some reason, then do us all a favor, and don't vote at all.
It's Worked So Well For New Yorkistan, After All...
Detroitizan? Santa Detroito?
This is why no politican should be allowed to serve a SECOND term, let alone a THIRD.
Detroit can have Mayor Doucheberg, in addition to all these new immigrants -- if they'll have him -- and the combination of strange food, disgusting smells and Obnoxious Regal Busy-Body Jerkoff With a Billion Bucks and No Brains which has certainly done wonders (not!) for my hometown can safely work it's magic someplace no one cares about, out of view of decent human beings.
There's a reason why Detroit is already a Third World city: it's been run by the sure-as-shit-to-fail-and-super-destructive combination of the Unions, Democrats, and The Recipient Class. Adding a few million new recipient classes ain't gonna make it any better, and the only advantage to the whole thing might be that at least all the scumbags would be in one place for convenient nuking.
Including Mayor Bloomdouche.
What an asshole.
This is why no politican should be allowed to serve a SECOND term, let alone a THIRD.
Detroit can have Mayor Doucheberg, in addition to all these new immigrants -- if they'll have him -- and the combination of strange food, disgusting smells and Obnoxious Regal Busy-Body Jerkoff With a Billion Bucks and No Brains which has certainly done wonders (not!) for my hometown can safely work it's magic someplace no one cares about, out of view of decent human beings.
There's a reason why Detroit is already a Third World city: it's been run by the sure-as-shit-to-fail-and-super-destructive combination of the Unions, Democrats, and The Recipient Class. Adding a few million new recipient classes ain't gonna make it any better, and the only advantage to the whole thing might be that at least all the scumbags would be in one place for convenient nuking.
Including Mayor Bloomdouche.
What an asshole.
Why Every Home Should Have an Iowahawk...
Iowahawk on the Royal Wedding.
Remember:; if you're still not reading Iowahawk on a regular basis, then do us all a favor and don't sign that organ donor card.
Remember:; if you're still not reading Iowahawk on a regular basis, then do us all a favor and don't sign that organ donor card.
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