The Blue Site

No Subject

A few things- the movie Bubba Ho-Tep is a nice concept, and it sounds funny on paper, but it's way too slow, most of the jokes are just vulgar and unfunny, and when the plot actually gets going, the movie ends right after. They could have cut the first 40 minutes, but then it would have been a half hour movie. Maybe it should have stayed a short story (the film is adapated from a short story) and not a full length film. I did laugh when Ossie Davis (a nut who thinks he's a black JFK- the CIA dyed him black to hide him in '63) asked Elvis if he wanted a ding dong...and Elvis looks down at him like he's nuts...Overall, a good idea- but terribly drawn out and slow. Then again, there were naked egyptian babes (out of nowhere and for no reason)- so, I guess it's not all bad.

The power was out all night last night (Sunday night), and that nearly drove me insane...It was so dark, nothing to do, couldn't sleep, kept waiting for the power to come on any minute- finally it did at about 5:30 AM I guess? I left the house at one point and drove around a bit, and I passed one of the trucks, pointing this big light on the side of the truck all over the lines on the poles, looking for I have no idea what? It would seem they would have it all connected to some system that would show exactly where a downed line is or whatever. No idea how they do all of that. Work was a bit crazy as well, since I had to send out ten thousand alerts, dealt with the transmitter going down- which means the emergency phone was ringing off the hook with the transmitter computer, all the networks went down at one point, so I was sitting on a still store that said 'network difficulties, please stand by.' Somewhat hectic.

I was off today, but I didn't do much of anything, besides sit around, watch TV, finished organizing some of the tv shows on tapes...pretty boring. I work tomorrow at 7:30 AM. I got Sundays off- well, the next 3 Sundays while I work Mon- Sat, days on Mon-Fri and 2:30 to 10:30 PM on Sat. I'll bring a book so I won't be bored to death. I started Sean Hannity's newest book, Deliver Us from Evil...finished the book A VINEYARD ENIGMA last night at work- going to get more of that book series soon.

I also rented a movie called Dark Harvest, but I fell asleep Saturday night and didn't watch it...and it was due back Sunday before they closed, so I returned it. Some horror movie that I noticed in the new releases section, so I picked it up. Looked decent. I guess I'll never know!

It sort of sucks that I'm working days the next three weeks, since I figured out that the show I was talking about before- An American In Canada, feeds Mondays at 6PM. That means I'll be gone by then (at 4 or 4:30 PM) and I won't be able to tape the episodes. Poor me. :( See? Poor poor Josh.

I need to email or call this lady from Full Sail in Orlando. They called and sent me e mail asking if I was still interested and wanting to know if I needed more information on anything. I say I'll call them, but who knows if I really will anytime soon. I need to do SOMETHING that's for sure.

Well, I guess I will be off to finish taping some stuff onto new tapes, and taking out commercials, and umm I dunno what I'll do after that. Nothing too exciting.

Kiki

Tell me Kiki isn't hot. I always see those Fanta commercials with the 4 chicks (the fantanas, I think they're called) and I thought I would share.

Al Gore- the Screaming Liar

Al Gore, the complete nutjob who before claimed that Bush created the entire war in Iraq for political gain (along with the usual claims that Bush lied, blah blah blah), today blamed the president for what happened at abu gharib prison in Iraq.

Very dishonest to blame the president for the actions of a few soldiers in Iraq tens of thousands of miles away. His use of this situation for political means is disgusting...just as it was disgusting when Ted Kennedy did the same thing recently. Both men, and others on the left, are playing right into the hands of the terrorists with such despicable comments.

The simple fact that Gore, who served as vice president of this nation, speaks at a gathering for a group (the extreme whackos at moveon) that compares the democratically elected president of this country to Hitler is disgusting in itself. Gore should be ashamed of himself, but we know he won't be. It's men like Gore that have caused so many to become so disallusioned with politics in general.
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An example of the crazy statements from Gore:

Arrogance? What about Congress who supported all of this? What about the UN that called for "Serious consequences"? What about the many nations of the world that agreed- Hussein was not complying and had to face punishment if he refused to comply in this, his "last" chance to do so?

'Insulting the religion and tradition of people in other countries'? That is completely ridiculous to even say, since no one has done any such thing.

Thousands of innocents killed because of HIS policy? Again, what about Congress who supported all of this as well? What about Clinton's attacks on Iraq- I'm sure many of the missiles he sent over (without finishing the job) killed some innocent people. Hypocritial? Of course.

Finally, Gore says Bush stirred up hornets' nest that pose no threat? Why did his man Clinton attack Iraq numerous times if there was no threat? How come the UN passed 17 resolutions that Hussein thumbed his nose at? Gore, himself, said that we MUST remove Saddam Hussein because he poses a threat!! Gore is dishonest...maybe that's why he lost the election in 2000. He couldn't even carry his own home state- maybe it's the fact that he's a liar? Possibly?

The Nonstop Rhetoric from the Left

Hilarious. You all know moveon is a left wing nut group that is so far extreme, it's just plain scary. Check this out. I find it funny- I don't see anywhere on their site where they ever wanted to censure President Clinton who attacked Iraq himself (but never finished the job). Then again, this whole group was started to support Clinton when he was LYING to congress, the american people, etc. about his affair, and his commiting perjury, and his trying to get other to perjur themselves. It was NEVER just about sex, folks, and every honest person knows it.

The UN, who passed resolution 1441, because the entire security council agreed Hussein had ONE LAST CHANCE to comply with the international community, isn't being attacked- no one is calling for censure of any of these people or anyone in the US who supported the UN's view.

There is no evidence whatsoever that Donald Rumsfeld initiated a plan to sexually abuse prisoners in Iraq- a total falsehood, yet this same group claims that he did this, and that he needs to be fire, and we all need to vote out Bush because he hasn't fired this guy. Rumsfeld has done nothing wrong...no evidence to suggest he did, yet groups like this come out with this nonsense.

Ralph Nader is calling for impeachment, because he claims Bush lied about Iraq. Too bad congress supported war in Iraq! I guess he can't attack the many democrats that supported all of this, or the UN who agreed Hussein never fully complied, or France, Germany, Russia, arab nations, etc. that all agreed as well.

Hillary Clinton is calling for impeachment as well, claiming Bush lied- tho, I believe she voted in support of of going to war. Funny. She says that our rights and freedoms will be killed if Bush is reelected- more rhetoric that cannot be backed up with any evidence at all.

This is a fringe group, but they have some power, and millions of poor, pathetic souls in this nation follow the lies of such groups, and promote the ideas listed on this site and others.

The new movie out, The Day After Tomorrow- a movie that all scientists say is WAY WAY out there, and none of this could happen like it does in the film...the critics are panning it as well as a joke. The same group (moveon) is saying this is the film the white doesn't want you to see. Tho, there's very little evidence of possible global warming, and there's actually evidence that there is global COOLING taking place- these enviromental nuts tout this pseudo-science as fact, and try to get legislation passed to deal with these non issues. The group tries to paint the Bush white house as a disaster when it comes to environmental issues- tho, there has been no disaster, and the environment has been improving every year for decades. More dishonest from left wing groups that can make everything on earth a political issue if they think it'll get some clueless souls to bash Bush.

We're in a very sad state of affairs in this country, and nearly all of the absurd rhetoric and hateful nonsense is coming from the left...from Al Gore, moveon, Kucinich, Sharpton, Pelosi the list goes on and on. Men and women who should know better, but clearly don't and probably never will.

A Reminder to the Peace Hippies

Just a reminder to why we're fighting this savages...and why we need to always be ready for another attack. To not whine when military operations take longer than a couple of weeks and people, gasp, actually die...

Also, why it's so important that we have a leader who will fight these animals and not wait until the UN says it's okay for us to protect ourselves...begging on his hands and knees for them to vote in favor of a resolution as the chemical/bio/nuclear attacks are actually taking place.
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AP Exclusive: Terrorists Are Here and Preparing to Strike Hard

WASHINGTON - U.S. officials have obtained new intelligence deemed highly credible indicating al-Qaida or other terrorists are in the United States and preparing to launch a major attack this summer, The Associated Press has learned.

The intelligence does not include a time, place or method of attack but is among the most disturbing received by the government since the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, according to a senior federal counterterrorism official who spoke to the AP on condition of anonymity Tuesday.

Of most concern, the official said, is that terrorists may possess and use a chemical, biological or radiological weapon that could cause much more damage and casualties than a conventional bomb.

"There is clearly a steady drumbeat of information that they are going to attack and hit us hard," said the official, who described the intelligence as highly credible.

The official declined to provide any specifics about the sources of the information but said there was an unusually high level of corroboration.

Despite that, the official said there was no immediate plan to raise the nation's terrorism threat level from yellow, or elevated, to orange, or high. The threat level has been at yellow - midpoint on the five-color scale - since January.

Attorney General John Ashcroft and FBI Director Robert Mueller plan a news conference Wednesday to outline an intensive effort by law enforcement, intelligence and homeland security officials to detect and disrupt any potential plots. And the FBI plans to dispatch a bulletin to some 18,000 state and local law enforcement agencies warning of the threat.

The FBI also has already created a special task force that is focused solely on dealing with this summer's threat. The task force, whose existence until recently was classified, is intended to ensure that no valuable bits of information or intelligence fall through the cracks - as happened repeatedly before the Sept. 11 attacks.

Other actions to be taken include new FBI interviews with people who may have provided valuable information in the past and a fresh examination of older investigative leads to determine if they might point to elements of the summer plot.

Beginning with Saturday's dedication of the new World War II Memorial in Washington, the summer presents a number of high-profile targets in the United States. They include the G-8 summit in Georgia next month that will attract top officials from some of America's closest allies, the Democratic National Convention in Boston in July and the Republican National Convention in August in New York.

The FBI and Homeland Security Department also are concerned about so-called soft targets such as shopping malls anywhere in the United States that offer a far less protected environment than a political convention hall.

U.S. authorities repeatedly have said al-Qaida is determined to mount an attack on U.S. soil, in part to announce to the world that it remains capable of doing so despite the money and effort that has gone into homeland security in the wake of the Sept. 11 attacks.

There also is concern terrorists might try to mount an attack to coincide with the November election. The political fallout from the March 11 train bombings in Spain taught al-Qaida that an attack timed to an election can have a major impact. Spain's former ruling party was ousted in the voting that followed the bombing, which killed 191 and injured more than 2,000.

The official did not say how many suspected al-Qaida or other terrorist operatives are believed in the country, whether they made their way into the United States recently or have been here for some time. The FBI has warned in the past that Islamic extremist groups may attempt to recruit non-Middle Easterners or women for attacks because they would be less likely to arouse suspicion.

Special security attention already is being focused to the nation's rail, subway and bus lines. The FBI last week sent out an intelligence bulletin to law enforcement agencies urging vigilance against suicide bombers, who have been used by terror groups worldwide to devastating effect but not so far in the United States.

Separately, Immigration and Customs Enforcement chief Michael Garcia told reporters Tuesday that some 2,300 of its agents are being deployed to assist in security for the high-profile events scheduled this summer in the United States. These include as many as 20 agents each day working with the Secret Service to protect the campaigns of President Bush and Sen. John Kerry, the Democratic presidential candidate.

Garcia said his agency also is working to "tighten the investigative system" to ensure that terrorists do not enter the United States by way of human smuggling operations or through the vast, largely unprotected border with Canada.

Overblown Fears About the Patriot Act

OVERBLOWN FEARS ABOUT THE PATRIOT ACT
By Jeff Jacoby
The Boston Globe

Sunday, May 23, 2004

The denunciations of the USA Patriot Act proceed apace. The American Civil Liberties Union reports that 313 cities and four states have passed resolutions opposing the law. In many quarters -- mostly on the left, but also in some hyperlibertarian precincts on the right -- it is taken for granted that the Patriot Act is an abomination that shreds civil liberties and throttles due process. The law's sternest critics warn that America is only steps away from the gulag. "We are closer to a totalitarian state than ever before," warns Joe Williams, a Californian running for Congress on the Peace and Freedom Party ticket, in a recent debate on the popular Front Page Magazine web site.

Strangely omitted from much of the anti-Patriot Act vehemence is any mention of 9/11. That is understandable: Ignore the context in which the law was enacted, and it becomes easier to demonize it as a freedom-menacing, privacy-stripping assault by Big Brother. But the Patriot Act wasn't passed in a vacuum. It came in the wake of a horrendous attack by foreign enemies who had been hiding within our borders. 9/11 awakened many Americans to the fact that we are at war with a fanatical enemy -- an enemy that will go on slaughtering civilians unless it is rooted out and destroyed.

But terrorists can't be rooted out unless investigators have the means to find them. And for years, federal agents were barred from using tools in counterterrorism work that were readily available to agents pursuing gangsters or drug dealers. Nor could investigators hunting terrorists swap potentially useful information with criminal investigators -- an intelligence "wall" that helps explain the government's failure to expose the 9/11 plot before it was carried out.

The Patriot Act was designed, among other things, to plug those gaping holes. The wisdom of doing so is suggested by the fact that Al Qaeda has not managed to pull off another attack on US soil. The fears some expressed when the law was first enacted -- that it would trigger a wave of repression, that domestic dissenters would be silenced -- turned out to be groundless. If anything, the Patriot Act should be more popular today than when it was passed by a nearly unanimous Congress in 2001.

At the grassroots, polls suggest that the law does, in fact, retain broad support. In a February survey for CNN and USA Today, for example, Gallup found that 64 percent of respondents thought the Patriot Act either gets it right or doesn't go far enough in adjusting civil liberties to the war on terrorism. Only 26 percent said it goes too far.

Another clue to the law's still-widespread approval is that John Kerry no longer denounces it as fiercely as he used to.

In December, when the Iowa caucuses were still weeks away, Kerry condemned the Patriot Act in blistering speeches. "At this very moment," he said in Iowa City, "an FBI agent could be rifling through every website you've ever visited, and you would never know it. . . . Officers could be entering your house while you are gone -- rifling through your possessions -- and leaving without ever letting you know they had been there." These days the Kerry campaign makes a point of saying that the Democratic candidate "stands by his vote for the Patriot Act" and "even wants to strengthen some aspects of it."

But where mainstream America sees a reasonable response to terror, others see jackbooted fascism.

Take Section 215 of the Patriot Act, one of the law's most controversial. It allows investigators to obtain records and other "tangible things" in the course of a terrorism investigation. This, the ACLU informs us, means that "the FBI could spy on a person because they don't like the books she reads, or because they don't like the web sites she visits. They could spy on her because she wrote a letter to the editor that criticized government policy."

There's just one problem with that scenario: It isn't true.

To begin with, the FBI cannot request any documents or records without first getting judicial permission. That permission must come in the form of an order from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court -- a federal court specializing in counterterrorism and international intelligence that was created by Congress during the Carter administration. No judge on that court is going to authorize government agents to spy on a citizen merely because of his reading or web-surfing habits. Why not? Because the law forbids it. Which law? Why, the Patriot Act.

"An investigation conducted under this section," Section 215 commands, "shall . . . not be conducted of a United States person solely upon the basis of activities protected by the First Amendment." In case that isn't clear enough, Section 215 says it twice. And for added protection, it directs the attorney general to tell Congress every six months exactly how many court orders have been requested, and how many of those requests have been granted.

What is true of Section 215 is true of the Patriot Act generally: On close inspection, the criticis' sound and fury tends to end up signifying nothing. In the 2-1/2 years since 9/11, Congress has undoubtedly made mistakes. The Patriot Act wasn't one of them.

(Jeff Jacoby is a columnist for The Boston Globe.)

NAACP "Embarassed" by the Truth

Cosby speaks the truth, and the racist NAACP is "embarassed"? He's right. I mean, come on! Have you heard some young black people talk? Just try to 'ax' them a question and listen to how they talk- they WON'T make it in the real world by saying "you is," which I have heard a million times, almost always from young blacks in particular. There is a problem with black youth. The crime rate in this particular group is higher, there are more problems in general with this group, and many of them do talk like they've never been educated...these are facts. Facts aren't racist. Cosby is exactly right, and if people would fix these problems, instead of pretending they don't exist, these problems would probably go away!

Cosby's Comments Spark Controversy

Comedian Bill Cosby embarrassed the National Association For Advancement Of Colored People (NAACP) at a gala on Monday - by attacking lower class African-Americans. The legendary star was speaking in Washington DC to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the Brown vs. Board of Education ruling - which eradicated segregated schooling in America - but shocked organizers by using the platform to unfavorably compare sixties civil rights activists with today's youth. He said, "These people marched and were hit in the face with rocks to get an education, and now we've got these knuckleheads walking around. The lower economic people are not holding up their end in this deal. These people are not parenting. They are buying things for kids - $500 sneakers for what? I can't even talk the way these people talk, 'Why you ain't,' 'Where you is' ... You can't be a doctor with that kind of crap coming out of your mouth!" Cosby then added his thoughts that petty criminals who are shot dead should not be a source of sorrow. He explained, "These are not political criminals. These are people going around stealing Coca-Cola. People getting shot in the back of the head over a piece of pound cake and then we run out and we are outraged, saying, 'The cops shouldn't have shot him.' What the hell was he doing with the pound cake in his hand?"

Super Size This

This guy who made the movie Super Size Me is full of it. I saw him on Tv the other day talking about how his film is about the fast food industry in general and not particulary McDonald's...the host points out that he eats nothing but McDonald's food and the name of the film is SUPER SIZE ME for crying out loud, how can you say it's not about McDonald's in particular? It's not, he promises. Yeah right.

This idea is absurd. Do you know anyone that eats nothing but fast food everyday? I sure don't, and I've never heard of anyone doing so. Do you see many people eating 5, 000 calories a day, every day? I don't either. Do you see anyone who eats and crams food into their mouths until they're sick and even past that point? I don't either. So, this film is outrageous, in that- even the most obscene fast food eaters don't seem to go to these extremes...and golly gosh, I eat fast food all the time and I haven't ballooned, I haven't had any health problems...I, like every other normal human, eat a variety of things including fast food.

Blaming the fast food places, which is what Spurlock does in his film, is ridiculous. Fast food companies have never in my life forced me to eat at their place, nor have they ever rammed food into my mouth. Any of you ever been force-fed by McDonald's? I didn't think so...

Of course a diet of nothing but fast food isn't healthy, and you're going to put some fat on, and you're going to gain some weight. GASP! What a revelation! We don't need a fast food preacher telling us the dangers of not eating healthy, and we surely don't need someone who goes overboard and makes a film about it, then starts a campaign to fight fast food. The people that eat fast food- they are the ONLY ones responsible for their situations. Just as a drug addict is the only one responsible for being addicted to crack. This guy's whole premise is a joke.

More on the film here-
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4917189/

Absurd Censoring of Music Videos

Oh wow...I think censoring videos has taken a big step up. I just watched that video for that song Shy Guy, from the Bad Boys soundtrack (will smith and martin lawrence are in the video), and I noticed that in every scene from the movie on the video where there was a gun, it was blurred out...it had the mosaic thing going on. That's just absurd. We have to protect the little kiddies from seeing cops with guns now?! It looked ridiculous- you just see the cops holding something in their hands that is all blocked out. That makes it look worse than what it really is!! This country is so silly when it comes to this sort of thing. Dead bodies on the news is okay, certain words are okay to say, etc. = but we have to block out a cop holding a gun?! That doesn't protect ANYONE from ANYTHING!

Sky-High Gas Prices? Not Really

SKY-HIGH GAS PRICES? NOT REALLY
By Jeff Jacoby
The Boston Globe

Thursday, May 20, 2004

The average price of gasoline in the United States is currently $2.03 a gallon. Is that (a) an all-time high, or (b) more or less where the price of gasoline has stood for the last 50 years?

The correct answer is (b). Gasoline today is no more expensive today than it has been for most of the postwar period, and it is considerably cheaper than it was in the late 1970s and early 1980s.

What's that, you say? You've been driving for years and you know for a fact that you never before had to pay $2 for a gallon of gasoline? You can recall gas stations charging less than 50 cents a gallon back in 1970? Don't worry, there's nothing wrong with your memory. But the fact remains: The cost of gasoline today isn't toppling any records.

If you find that hard to believe, you're in good company. The lead item on John Kerry's campaign website, for example, declares that "gasoline prices are setting new records" and assails the Bush administration for having "done almost nothing to get gas prices under control." Meanwhile, a sizable swath of the press has been reporting for weeks that gasoline prices are going through the roof. A sampling:

"The retail price of gasoline hit an all-time high Tuesday" (Associated Press) . . . "As summer driving season approaches, gasoline prices are setting record after record" (CBS News) . . . "The surge has . . sent gasoline prices to record highs" (Financial Times) . . . "Pump prices [have been] hitting record highs every week since early March" (Washington Post) . . . "Gas prices hit a new high this week" (National Public Radio) . . . "U.S. gasoline prices -- already at record highs for weeks -- appear headed into uncharted territory this summer" (Washington Times).

But all these stories leave out something essential: inflation. Comparing today's prices with those of yesteryear is a meaningless exercise unless the prices are given in constant, or "real," dollars. And in real dollars, gas prices today are -- well, normal.

Sure, the $2.03 being charged at the pump today *seems* high. But in actual financial terms, it's a lot less onerous than the $1.25 a gallon motorists were paying in 1980 -- a whopping $2.80 when translated into 2004 dollars. (Adjusted the other way, today's $2.03 pump price is equal to less than 90 cents in 1980 dollars.) When it comes to historical price comparisons, nominal dollar amounts signify little. It is the inflation-adjusted price that tells you whether the true cost of a product has increased, decreased, or stayed the same.

There's also the question of affordability. Adjusted for inflation, gasoline prices today are roughly where they were in the 1950s -- but per-capita real income then was no more than half of what it is today. Which means that for a typical driver 50 years ago, gasoline was really twice as expensive -- in terms of the bite it took out of his budget -- as it is now. Only in the shallow sense of nominal pump price is gasoline today "setting record after record." In reality, it is much cheaper than it used to be.

That is especially true over the very long term. In his 2000 book *It's Getting Better All The Time,* economist Stephen Moore noted that while US energy prices fluctuate all the time, the trend for the past century has been toward ever-greater affordability. Adjusted for wage growth, the price of oil was about five times cheaper than it was in 1900, Moore wrote, and roughly the same price as it was in 1950 -- and that was true notwithstanding the vast amount of oil and gasoline that Americans have consumed. How can gas and oil be getting more affordable when we consume so much of it? The secret, Moore says, is innovation and technology:

"Before the 1950s it was almost unthinkable that oil could be drilled and extracted from the bottom of the sea. In 1965, one of the first offshore oil rigs drilled oil from 600 feet deep off the coast of California. By the late 1980s, the record for offshore oil drilling reached 10,000 feet. It has been precisely this kind of innovation that has confounded the doomsayers who in the 1960s and 1970s predicted global oil shortages and even depletion."

None of this is to deny that gasoline prices have been climbing lately. Economic growth around the world is pushing up demand for fuel, which in turn is tugging the price of crude oil upward. More expensive crude naturally results in more expensive gasoline.

But those higher prices will, as always, spur energy companies to increase production and resupply dealers as quickly as possible. And as the higher supply enters the market, prices will begin to fall.

If I were to guess, I'd say the current hyperventilating about "record-high" gasoline prices will be forgotten by the end of June. Enjoy the experience of $2-and-up gasoline while you can; it won't be long before the eternal interplay of supply and demand sends prices southward once again.

(Jeff Jacoby is a columnist for The Boston Globe.)

Mocking Christians the Ongoing Hollywood Trend

Falwell Confidential

Date: May 14, 2004
From: Jerry Falwell

MOCKING CHRISTIANS THE ONGOING HOLLYWOOD TREND

A new film is coming under criticism from a Christian film and television
organization because it mocks Christianity and depicts those who follow
Christ as foolish and irrational.

According to Ted Baehr, founder of the Christian Film & Television
Commission ministry, the film "Saved," which will be released on May 28,
purposely ridicules Christians. I watched the movie trailer for this film
today and was saddened to see that the Christian characters are portrayed as
virtual nitwits.

In one scene a girl argues that Jesus is "of course" a white man. Another
Christian character, I have learned, comes to believe that she should not
remain chaste, thinking that God has led her to have sex with a homosexual
student in order to convert him. Mandy Moore and Macaulay Culkin star
in the United Artists release that is being advertised as a dark teen
comedy.

"'Saved' is a hateful, politically correct movie," Dr. Baehr warned. "It
is being heavily marketed to the community it mocks to lead Christian youth
astray and make them resent their own faith."

"The one character who tries to preach the Gospel in the movie," he stated,
"is actually the villain."

Dr. Baehr, publisher of MOVIEGUIDE (www.movieguide.org), formulated this
scenario: "Imagine if this movie were set in an Orthodox Jewish school with
faithful Jewish children cast as the villains and a Christian girl shows how
legalistic the Jewish girls are. Or, what if it were set in an Islamic
school with faithful Muslims cast as the villains and a Christian or Jewish
Girl exposes how legalistic the Muslims are? The outcry in the press would
be tremendous! Not to mention the righteous outcry from Jews or Muslims!"

But this is modern-day America and Hollywood frequently takes on a singular
and hostile temperament in regard to Christians. It is the equivalent of
reckless racial profiling that endangers people solely because of their skin
color. In the same way, when Christians are habitually illustrated as
hate-mongers and religious tyrants the end result can only bring about
trouble for believers.

Many in the film community were up in arms about potential violence against
Jews prior to the release of Mel Gibson's "The Passion of the Christ."
Those false alarms never came to be; but it is troubling that those who were
concerned about potential violence as the result of one film do not have
similar apprehensions regarding the anthology of movies that habitually
depict Christians as cruel ogres.

Films like "Saved" wouldn't be so alarming if Hollywood had a semblance of
balance in its treatment of Christianity. But in today's Hollywood, there
are rarely positive depictions of Christians. I admit that there are a few
crazies in the Christian community, but Hollywood chooses to falsely depict
us all as Fred Phelps-types who hate homosexuals and indignantly push our
beliefs on others.

Two years ago, Michael Medved, writing in USA Today and commenting on the
film "Frailty" (about a man convinced that God has instructed him to murder
several strangers), noted how some respected movie critics used the film to
condemn what one of them termed the "intolerant fundamentalist faith."

In the article, Mr. Medved said there was a "prevailing Hollywood bias
against intense religiosity." Several years ago, he scrutinized Hollywood's
obsession with portraying prostitutes in a positive light. The connection
here is that Christians - who hold to the absolute truth of the Bible - are
seen as adversaries of the situational ethics that have come to define
Hollywood. Instead of addressing their own moral ambivalence, Hollywood
leaders instead assault those who choose to walk with Jesus Christ.

It's a childish tactic, but I insist that it is also very dangerous.

Don Feder, in "A Jewish Conservative Looks at Pagan America," wrote,
"Christians are the only group Hollywood can offend with impunity, the only
creed it actually goes out of its way to insult. Clerics, from
fundamentalist preachers to Catholic monks, are routinely represented as
hypocrites, hucksters, sadists, and lechers. The tenets of Christianity are
regularly held up to ridicule."

Given the fact that "The Passion of the Christ" was so popular (as of May
11, according to Box Office Mojo it had made $368,205,546) one would think
that Hollywood would put its collective biases against Christians on hold in
order to enlist more Christian moviegoers. But I fear that the hatred
against Christianity has so invaded the Hollywood culture that insiders
cannot see past their predispositions against us. The end result is that we
can expect more movies like "Saved" to bitterly revile those who love the
Christ of the Bible.

And they say Christians are the ones who are intolerant and divisive.

Whiny Asian Group and Wow- Hussein DID Have Chemical Weapons!

Golly gee. A shell with sarin gas was found in Iraq- it didn't explode, but some were poisoned slightly when the chemicals mixed to form the deadly gas. Hussein promised all chemical weapons and the chemicals used in them were destroyed. After 17 resolutions, sanctions, 12 years...it's now clear (as it always was!) that he never lived up to the demands of the international community.

I wonder how liberals and peace hippies will spin these developments. The stockpile that most likely got shipped off to Syria before the start of the war will pop up again (the recent Jordanian terrorist plot included lots of chem weapons that almost surely came from Iraq), and it will most definitely fall into the hands of terrorists eventually. When these chemical attacks kill tens of thousands in the U.S., I wonder what the peace hippies will say then? Will they still bash the Bush administration, likening him to Hitler? Will they still claim that there was this big war for oil? I doubt it. True to form, they'll probably spin this in a manner that blames Bush for not doing enough to make sure Hussein had no WMD.

And, on another note...

It's pansies like these that take the joy out of life sometimes.
http://www.asianmediawatch.com/home.html

Wah, wah, wah, wah, wah. They urge NBC to pick up two series that include asian actors- these series might be terrible, but hey- they have some asian guy, so bring it on! They want to ban the show Bonzai, which I think is horrible, but they say it stereotypes asians. Get over it! Asians are IN IT! They CHOSE to be in it! They demand apologizes, "sensitivity training" (a big fucking joke!), etc. for details magazine staff members because of a column they did.

One of the NBC shows they want picked up (simply because it has asian characters as good guy characters is Hawaii. Some cop show set in...you guessed it, Hawaii. They mention one cast member Aya Sumika (clearly asian!), yet this girl's work includes a show called Pieces of Ass where she does some speaking thing with another girl who talks about the white male's "obsession with colored pussy" and how it's now "acceptable to dip your finger in the chocolate." Great asian role model, I'd say! It wasn't the asian girl who said the lines above, as I pointed out, but she's part of the same "skit," and in the same vulgar show- so it's just as bad. This asian media watchdog group seems to be a little confused.

These people are a bunch of whinebags who have too much time on their hands. People like this make me sick, because they demand everything be the way they say it should be, and if it's not- be ready for complaints, demands for punishment, apologies, etc.

Support for Traditional Marriage Grows

Support for Traditional Marriage Grows

On the same day the Massachusetts courts will invalidate the state's marriage laws to include same-sex "marriage," a pro-family group plans to release new data that showing support is growing among Americans for a marriage amendment that would establish marriage as a union between one man and one woman.

Members of the Alliance for Marriage, including the Rev. Walter Fauntroy, the Washington, D.C., coordinator for the March on Washington for Martin Luther King Jr., will be joined by African-American groups from Boston to release new Wirthlin Worldwide data showing majority support for AFM's marriage amendment across all racial and political lines.

"Most Americans believe that gays and lesbians have a right to live as they choose. But they don't believe they have a right to redefine marriage for our entire society," said Matt Daniels, president of the Alliance for Marriage. "Americans want our laws to send a positive message to children about marriage, family and their future."

Legal experts predict Monday's court ruling will generate a wave of lawsuits designed to overturn marriage laws nationwide.

The Boston Bar Association has publicly called for "federal constitutional claims" to be brought against all state and federal marriage laws in the aftermath of the decision.

"The constitutional problem created by almost a decade of activist lawsuits to destroy our marriage laws demands a constitutional fix," Daniels said. "AFM's marriage amendment has been introduced with bipartisan sponsorship in two successive sessions of Congress in order to protect the common sense view of marriage shared by the vast majority of Americans of every race, color and creed.

"AFM's Federal Marriage Amendment will protect marriage while leaving all issues of benefits to the democratic process in the states," he added. "AFM believes this centrist approach embodied in our amendment offers hope of a democratic solution to the debate that will be forced on America as a result of Monday's court decision."

Meanwhile, the American Center for Law and Justice, which specializes in constitutional law, testified Thursday before a congressional panel in support of House Joint Resolution 56, the Federal Marriage Amendment, which specifies marriage as a union between one man and one woman.

ACLJ chief counsel Jay Sekulow testified before the House Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution that the federal marriage amendment was "essential" and told the Subcommittee that more than 230,000 Americans already had signed a petition in support of the amendment.

"Marriage is our most vital institution, and it is essential that Congress pass the federal marriage amendment to allow, once and for all, the states to decide through the democratic process whether marriage will remain the union of one man and one woman, as it has for hundreds of years," said Sekulow.

"With Massachusetts set to issue same-sex marriage licenses in just a matter of days, it is clear that attempts to change marriage by judicial edict not only skirt the democratic process and shred the rule of law, but also exclude the people from this fundamental debate and decision, and embolden local officials to determine for themselves which laws they will and will not enforce," he said.

"The time has come for passage of the amendment," Sekulow added.

In its testimony, the ACLJ said the amendment did not result in an unpredictable or sudden change in the status of law in this country. The ACLJ argues that the amendment "serves to resolve the uncertainties that have been artificially interjected into what would otherwise be fairly described as an entirely and clearly settled question of law."

"Same-sex marriage will not simply undermine traditional marriage, it will transform our society and the nature and reach of government. That transformation will lead to more, not less, government growth and social chaos," the testimony states.

"The Federal Marriage Amendment will insure such a profound and elemental change does not occur without the opportunity of the people and society to exercise the democratic model and vote through their elected state houses," the testimony continues.

"Traditional marriages, in which one man and one woman create a lasting community, transmit the values and contributions of the past to establish the promise of the future," the testimony concludes.

Eleanor Clift- Make EVERYTHING Partisan

THIS is what's wrong with the left in America today. That idiot, Eleanor Clift writes in Newsweek that John Kerry should use the prison scandal for political gain. Silly, in that, who in their right mind would pin any of this on the President...or Rumsfeld, for that matter? To make this a political issue is playing right into the hands of the enemy. This is a disgusting display of the liberal beating to death a story that wasn't as big as they wanted it to be. It's not good, sure, but for Clift to say this is the biggest thing to come out of the war is absurd.

Clift is using partisan politics to divide the nation and to harm the nation's image in the arab world. She should be ashamed of herself, but when you have ideas like this and you write them for a piece in Newsweek, shame probably doesn't come so easily. This hateful tone seems to be coming out of the left nonstop...I don't see the same putrid nonsense coming from the right. Hmmm.

The Fight Against Gay Marriage REALLY Starts Tomorrow

As you might know, tomorrow (actually an hour ago, since it started at midnight), this country radically changes. Gay marriage will be legal in the state of Massachusetts. The Supreme Court in that state have written the law themselves, which is, of course, not their role, nor anywhere close to it. They have overstepped their boundaries by going against the will of the people- the majority of Americans do not support gay marriage...yet, that court decided it would take the law into its own hands and push their liberal agenda on all of us.

The fight will get intense now, I'm sure. After Americans see gay couples changing the very basic foundation of our society (marriage, a man and a woman), they will be pissed. We will not accept this, and hopefully it goes further than banning gay marriage with a Constitutional Amendment, but we actually change the way our legal system works. Many judges are not elected- they are appointed, and many of them have these jobs for life- which means they are not held accountable for their actions. You can impeach some judges, but it's nearly impossible. Hopefully, this decision will make Americans angry, and we'll change the way the entire system works.

Hopefully, Americans will not stand for this. Courts can not change thousands of years of tradition just like that. They cannot go against the will of the people and overstep their boundaries. Sign the federal marriage amendment petition here. Fight this...don't let these people with their extreme agendas radically change the very definition of marriage.
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THE END OF THE GAY-MARRIAGE DEBATE?
By Jeff Jacoby
The Boston Globe

Sunday, May 16, 2004

This is the week that same-sex marriage comes to Massachusetts, and thus to the United States. The fundamental building block of civilization is about to undergo a radical change -- a change not only unsupported by a clear consensus, but opposed by a majority of American adults. How did this happen? How did we reach the point of jettisoning the most basic presumption of our most basic social institution? The joining of gay and lesbian couples in marriage may turn out to be the most consequential development of our lifetimes. How did we get here?

The answer to that question has several parts.

At the most obvious level, the legalization of same-sex marriage is the doing of four justices of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court. Chief Justice Margaret Marshall and three of her colleagues ruled in the Goodridge case last November that limiting marriage to opposite-sex couples infringes the freedom and equality protected by the Massachusetts Constitution. The job of the judiciary is to interpret the law, but this was no mere interpretation. It was a wholesale rewriting of the law to make it say and mean things it had never said or meant before.

In effect, Goodridge was a constitutional amendment dictated from the bench. It was something the Massachusetts Constitution expressly forbids: an exercise by the judiciary of legislative and executive power. So brazen an encroachment should have set off alarm bells. Massachusetts judges are unelected and unaccountable and always, therefore, a potential antidemocratic threat. When they overstep their bounds, they should be strenuously opposed.

But far from resisting the court's order, much of the political establishment and virtually all of the media embraced it. And that, too, is part of the reason why the timeless meaning of marriage -- the union of a man and a woman -- is now to be discarded in Massachusetts.

For whatever the public might think of same-sex marriage -- even in liberal Massachusetts, polls show a very divided populace -- the Goodridge judges knew they would have the support of the cultural elites, for whom individual autonomy and the pursuit of happiness often seem to be the highest social values. In the allegedly "progressive" mindset, which dominates what you read in the paper and see on TV, social traditions exist to be challenged, family structure is infinitely flexible, and the mainstreaming of homosexuality is something only haters or fanatics could oppose.

No surprise, then, that the media depiction of the same-sex marriage controversy has been strikingly one-sided. The views of those who favor it are often and prominently featured; their appeals to justice and compassion are repeatedly quoted, echoed, and expanded on. There has been a shower of celebratory coverage centered on the wedding plans of gays and lesbians, and upbeat descriptions of all sorts of related matters, from the marketing of wedding dresses for lesbians to the first Bride's magazine article on same-sex ceremonies.

But there is rarely an admiring story about those who take a stand against throwing out the ancient definition of marriage. Rarely does the coverage suggest that they might have an argument worth listening to or an insight worth considering. Rarely do the feared negative consequences of same-sex marriage get more than a fraction of the attention paid to its anticipated benefits. Hard to miss is the attitude that those who favor same-sex marriage are enlightened, while those who don't are bigots.

But still another part of the answer to "How did we get here?" is that those who defend the traditional definition of marriage have been woefully ineffective in making their case.

Preaching to the converted has its uses, and both sides engage in it, but gay and lesbian advocates didn't move the cause of homosexual marriage from the outlandish fringe to the liberal mainstream by speaking only to those who already agreed with them. They made their case in terms that the unconvinced could understand too, and framed their radical proposal as an issue of civil rights and family love. Those are appealing arguments -- especially if they are repeated often and infrequently rebutted. With so few leaders on the other side making an equally articulate case, it's not surprising that same-sex marriage advanced so far so fast.

Those of us who think this week's revolution is a terrible mistake need to do a much better job of explaining that the core question is not "Why shouldn't any couple in love be able to marry?" but something more essential: "What is marriage for?" We need to convey that the fundamental purpose of marriage is not to put a seal of approval on adult relationships but to unite men and women so that any children they may create or adopt will have a mom and a dad. Marriage expresses a public judgment that every child *deserves* a mom and a dad. Same-sex marriage, by contrast, says that the sexual and emotional desires of adults count for more than the needs of children. Which message do we want the next generation to receive?

The marriage debate doesn't end this week. Indeed, it may only now be starting in earnest. As Massachusetts goes, so goes the nation? That may depend on whether those who understand what marriage is for, and why its central meaning has endured for millennia, can finally find the words to explain themselves to their countrymen.

(Jeff Jacoby is a columnist for The Boston Globe.)

Friday Afternoon

So...Friday my brother came in my room and asked if I wanted to go with him to get his truck looked at, because the speedomoter wasn't working, and they had fixed his brakes, so maybe they screwed it up. Before we went to drop his truck off, we went to Best Buy, because he wanted to see about getting a best buy card or finding a surround sound system or a dvd player, since his isn't working right.

I wasn't going to go with him, but I did, and it wasn't so bad. We went to Best Buy, I looked around at the dvd's- mainly tv on dvd and horror movies...looked at some of the tv tuner cards they have- they have the ati pro for $99, and it's good for what I want one for. I'll probably buy it in a cpl weeks, because I really want to record TV shows on VHS and onto DVD as well. Then again, the new system has a 120 GB hard drive, so I can store some on that itself.

Anyhow, we went to Midas and they said it would be an hour or two, so we walked down to the pet shop and looked around...I was looking at the rabbits and the hamsters and stuff...cute things. They had a bunch of ferrets too. In this big glass encased corner of the room.

We left after about 20 mins and he said he wanted to get something to eat, and we should go across the street to Arby's. I said sure, but decided why don't we go to Rafferty's, which is my favorite restaurant. He said yes, and we went there...it was slow at the time of day, so we sat at a booth in the bar. I ordered the jackson hole filet (filet mignon, not fish!), a loaded baked potato, and the house salad with house dressing, which is bacon and honey mustard...and a bowl of potato soup that had shredded cheese and bacon bits in the middle of it. Great place to eat. Good service as well, especially since we were the only ones in the bar area.

Next, we went to get his truck...then went to circuit city so he could try to get a card there. He didn't try to get a card at best buy, because they said you had to have a credit card to apply, which is odd if you ask me. I looked around at DVD's and CD's...and checked our the speakers and receivers. I bought a ZENITH hi-fi VCR for $50...should have waited and gotten the panasonic for $60. because it's one model higher than the VCR I bought in December, and I've had no problems with it. I noticed the JVC has tracking problems that I don't have on my tapes with the Panasonic. I just needed a second hi-fi VCR to edit stuff, to put tv shows on the same tapes and in order. Stuff like that...it should work fine for it. It's got some decent features- like it shows the title of whatever you have taped on the screen when you hit enter...it also shows how much tape is left at any point in the tape- same as the Panasonic. The tracking bugs me, as I mentioned...it's auto digital tracking, but it never works, and you have to do it yourself...and even when you fix it, it still has a little fuzz at the bottom of the screen, which is bearable but annoying to say the least.

Anyhow...

They sent me an E-Mail notice on the PC I ordered, and tracking numbers for UPS...tho, it says it arrived in Indianaplois May 15 at 8AM and that's the end of it...maybe UPS doesn't ship anything on Sundays? Then again, why did they not ship it to Evansville if they had all day Saturday? No clue. I'm impatient as it is. Want to get it all set up, see what speaker package I can find for cheap, and a tv tuner card, and then I'm done. I got paid this week, but I already have a cpl hundred saved- the PC was $544, so that set me back a bit. I'm probably going to open up a savings account here soon. Better than having it in an envelope at home on my desk.

Well, I finished John Stossel's book, Give Me a Break, and I picked up a few others at the library yesterday. Got the Texas Chainsaw Massacre Companion, since I'm a fan of those movies...also picked up Kenneth Timmerman's book called Preachers of Hate: Islam and the War on America. Looks to be pretty interesting. Stossel's book was really good. The guy is smart...tho, I don't agree that drugs should be legalized and that homosexuality is perfectly normal as he does. I disagree with some of his other views, but overall he's got the right idea about limited government, and a reform of the legal system with fewer regulations on business, and making it harder to sue, since lawsuits bring about such harm to the public in general.

I'm at work right now (LOTS of work to do, as you can see), so I guess I will be shutting up now, getting me a root beer from the machine, and coming back up and reading some of this book by Timmerman.

Oh, by the way...pick up the Chapelle's Show DVD. It's hilarious and the commentary on 4 of the episodes (4 or 5 episodes, I forget) is really funny too

Diddy Breaks Up Band, Crack Money Dries Up

I just read the tv guide e mail newsletter, and it seems that puffy, p diddy, whatever the hack calls himself now, broke up his little band he made on that MTV show.

I guess Sara here can always become a stripper, since she's already done a half naked magazine layout. She's actually sorta pretty...too bad she talks like she's never had a day of education in her life.

Hilarious Dems

Hilarious democrats!

They even blame Bush for higher college tuition! What's he going to be blamed for next, I wonder?

Odd how they make a few claims that Bush is so bad, yet they provide zero evidence to support any of it. You'd think if you ran a site to get young people to vote against Bush, you'd support your reasoning! Heck, why waste your time with the facts?

At least they're honest and show at the bottom they are run by a democratic group in Arizona. They'll admit they base their reasoning on the party ticket and not objective fact finding. That's always refreshing.

Hollywood Buffoons, UK Media's Anti-Israel View, and Kerry Nonsense

Stars of Troy don't realize nobody cares what they think of current events. Saffron Burrows (if anyone actually knows who she is- I do, but that's only because I like the movie, Hotel de Love) talks about how war is futile, and compares the events in the film, Troy to Tony Blair and George Bush (because, in her mind, no other world leaders ever, EVER get involved in military action.) It's the casual bashing of the US and sometimes the UK that most people are tired of. These same stars don't care speak constantly of arab dictatorships or despots like those who control North Korea, China, and other asian nations. They don't speak out constantly about the brutal nature of many of Africa's leaders. Why? Because it's so chic to bash the good guys. Don't ask me why most celebs have it backward, but they do, and this is further proof of that.

They seem to not realize that sometimes war IS inevitable. Unless they have some magic plan to oust brutal thugs like Hussein and his fellow madmen, then military action will always be on the table, and it will always have to be an option to be used. War isn't pretty, no one said it was, but are these people so naive that they think it fixes nothing?

The article I linked above is just a small taste of the sensibilities of many in Hollywood...if you read it, you'll see the comments by Burrows, and it veers off that topic entirely.

The Guardian, which the above story comes from, shows its anti-Israel stance again by using this headline: "Israel takes bloody revenge in Gaza for killing of soldiers" This is a blatant hit piece on the nation of Israel, in that they go on and on about how Israeli forces "left a trail of destruction in the Zeitoun neighbourhood of Gaza City." Golly- you'd think from that line that they just went in and decided to massacre some innocent people. If there's one thing that we all should know- there are very few innocent "palestinians," since many of them support terrorism outright- the polls show as much, time and time again. They seem to not care about the fact that the palestinian terrorists and the tens of thousands of terrorist supporters are the bad guys here, not the democratic nation of Israel who is on the DEFENSE here. It's okay- most stories I see in the Guardian follow this same sort of thinking. They, like Hollywood, seem to always get it backwards as well.

Finally...John Kerry is still using the Iraqi prison story as a political tool. He, like many other fools, is blaming President Bush and his administration...I guess in Kerry's mind everything that happens that is in anyway negative is President Bush's fault, no matter how big or how small the negative events might be. If an Iraqi stumps his toe, it's Bush's fault.

Kerry also seems to be confused as to the history of the past few years. He states:

So, in Kerry's head, not kowtowing to the United Nations is "arrogant" and it's "not in the interest of our troops." So, we should kiss the proverbial asses of the security council, nations who almost surely were involved in illegal oil shipments with Iraq...nations who said they would veto ANY resolution the US came up with no matter WHAT was in it...nations that signed off on 1441 that called for "Serious consequences," then refused to put actions behind those words. Kerry must have also forgotten (oh, how shocking) that he, himself, voted in support of going to war with Iraq (no, wait, I'm sorry- he voted to "threaten" war- because, we all know there are so many votes in Congress that "threaten" military action. His decades in the Senate must have left him confused as to how things work.)

Kerry, like Hollywood and the liberal British media, has it all backwards as well. Don't worry tho, in a week he'll change his entire stance.

Berg Family Confuses Good with Evil

Don't you guys think Nick Berg's parents are dishonoring his memory with their statements blaming President Bush and Rumsfeld for their son's death? He was a staunch supporter of Bush and the war in Iraq, according to every report I've seen. No reasonable person can say Bush and Rumsfeld were responsible for the acts of terrorist- yet, this family goes on and on about how that is, indeed, the case.

I don't care how distraught you are, blaming anyone besides the thugs who killed him is just shameful. Maybe the family should also be reminded that their son did go to Iraq voluntarily, knowing he would be in a very dangerous situation. Not saying that he is to blame, but come on...you can't make idiotic statements like this.

Berg Died for Bush, Rumsfeld 'Sins' - Father

Reuters
Thursday, May 13, 2004; 10:30 PM

By Jon Hurdle

PHILADELPHIA (Reuters) - The father of Nick Berg, the American beheaded in Iraq, directly blamed President Bush and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld on Thursday for his son's death.

"My son died for the sins of George Bush and Donald Rumsfeld. This administration did this," Berg said in an interview with radio station KYW-AM two days after a video showing the execution of his son was shown on an Islamist Web site.

In the interview from outside his home in West Chester, Pennsylvania, a seething Michael Berg also said his 26-year-old son, a civilian contractor, probably would have felt positive, even about his executioners, until the last minute.

"I am sure that he only saw the good in his captors until the last second of his life," Berg said. "They did not know what they were doing. They killed their best friend."

Asked to respond to Berg's comments about the president, White House spokesman Scott McClellan said, "The Berg family is going through a very difficult period and they remain in our thoughts and prayers."

Meanwhile, Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry, the presumptive Democratic nominee to challenge Bush in the November election, said he had spoken to Michael Berg to express sympathy. "I know as a father how I would feel if it were one of my daughters or stepsons. I think every American is pained by what is going on."

Asked if Bush had also called Nicholas Berg's family, McClellan said he had not but pointed to the president's public expressions of condolence to the family.

Michael Berg's criticism came amid finger-pointing between Berg's family, U.S. military officials and Iraqi police over the young businessman's imprisonment before his execution.

Berg rejected U.S. government claims that his son had never been held by American authorities in Iraq. The Iraqi police chief in the city of Mosul has also contradicted statements by the U.S.-led coalition concerning the younger Berg's detention.

'FBI CAME TO MY HOUSE'

"I have a written statement from the State Department in Baghdad ... saying that my son was being held by the military," Berg said. "I can also assure you that the FBI came to my house on March 31 and told me that the FBI had him in Mosul in an Iraqi prison."

CBS reported on Thursday that Berg was questioned by FBI agents who discovered he had been interviewed before because a computer password he used in college had turned up in the possession of accused Sept. 11 conspirator Zaccarias Moussaoui.

It said the FBI had concluded there was nothing sinister in that. The FBI had no comment on the report.

Dan Senor, spokesman for the Coalition Provisional Authority, said this week that Nick Berg was arrested in Mosul by Iraqi police on March 24 and released on April 6 and was visited by the FBI three times during his detention.

Brig.-Gen. Mark Kimmitt, the top U.S. military spokesman in Iraq, said American military police had seen Berg during his detention to make sure he was being fed and treated properly.

Berg returned to Baghdad from Mosul in April and went missing on April 9, during a chaotic period when dozens of foreigners were snatched by guerrillas west of the capital.

His body was discovered by a road near Baghdad and the video of his decapitation was posted on the Internet.

Berg had been in Baghdad from late December to Feb. 1 and returned to Iraq in March. He did not find work and planned to return home at the end of March, according to his parents.

Berg's communications to his parents stopped on March 24 and he told them later he was jailed by Iraqi officials after being picked up at a checkpoint in Mosul.

On April 5, the Bergs filed a lawsuit against the U.S. government, naming Rumsfeld and alleging their son was being held illegally by the U.S. military in Iraq. The next day, he was released. (additional reporting by Maher al-Thanoon and Caren Bohan)

The Images We See, and Those We Don't

THE IMAGES WE SEE -- AND THOSE WE DON'T
By Jeff Jacoby
The Boston Globe

Thursday, May 13, 2004

The death of Nicholas Berg is a horror. It is a bitter, brutal reminder of why we are at war -- something that much of America's political and media elite, in their binge of outrage and apology over the Abu Ghraib abuses, have lately seemed all too willing to forget.

I don't for a moment minimize the awfulness of what some American soldiers did to their Iraqi captives in that prison. Their offenses may have fallen far short of the savagery that Abu Ghraib was notorious for under Saddam Hussein, but in their cruelty and urge to humiliate, and in the sadistic glee with which they posed for those obscene photographs, they reek of the depravity we went to Iraq to uproot. As one who believes that this war was necessary above all on moral grounds, I'm sickened by what they did.

But I'm sickened as well by the relish with which this scandal is being exploited by those who think the defeat of the Bush administration is an end that justifies just about any means. I'm sickened by the recklessness of the media, which relentlessly flogged the graphic images from Abu Ghraib, giving them an in-your-face prominence that couldn't help but exaggerate their impact. And I'm sickened by the thought of how much damage this feeding frenzy may have done to the war effort.

We do remember the war effort, don't we? Surely we haven't forgotten the jetliners smashing into the Twin Towers and Pentagon, and 3,000 innocents dying in a single morning. Or the monstrous Saddam, who filled mass graves to bursting, invaded two neighboring countries, and avidly sought weapons of mass destruction. Or the reason why 130,000 US soldiers are on the line in Iraq: because establishing a democratic beachhead in the Middle East is critical to cutting off the terrorists' oxygen -- the backing of dictatorial regimes.

My sense is that the public *hasn't*lost sight of any of this. But for weeks now, a goodly swath of the chattering class has been treating the war as little more than a rhetorical backdrop against which to score political points or increase market share.

Newsweek's Eleanor Clift, for instance, reacted to the Abu Ghraib revelations with a column urging the Democratic presidential candidate to milk the moment for all it was worth. "If ever there was a moment for John Kerry to come out swinging, this is it," she wrote. "It is the biggest story of the war, and he is essentially silent." There are many thoughtful things one might say about Abu Ghraib, but only someone eager for the US campaign in Iraq to fail and George W. Bush to be defeated could possibly describe it as "the biggest story of the war."

In any case, the Kerry campaign has hardly been silent on the prison scandal. It is using it as a fundraising hook, sending out mass e-mails urging supporters to petition for Donald Rumsfeld's resignation -- and to donate money to the Kerry campaign.

Poor Nick Berg. The anybody-but-Bush crowd isn't going to rush to publicize his terrible fate with anything like the zeal it brought to the abused-prisoners story. CBS and the New Yorker couldn't resist the temptation to shove the Abu Ghraib photos into the public domain -- and the rest of the media then made sure the world saw them over and over and over. But when it comes to video and stills of Al Qaeda murderers severing Berg's head with a knife and brandishing it in triumph for the camera, the Fourth Estate is suddenly squeamish.

As I write on Wednesday afternoon, the CBS News web site continues to offer a complete "photo essay" of naked Iraqi men being humiliated by Americans in a variety of poses. But the video of Berg's beheading, CBS says, "is too gruesome to show." No other network and no newspaper that I have seen shows the gory pictures, either.

What exactly is the governing rule here? That incendiary images sure to enrage our enemies and get more Americans killed should be published, while images that show the world just how evil those enemies really are should be suppressed? Offensive and shocking pictures that undermine the war effort should be played up, but offensive and shocking pictures that remind us why we're at war in the first place shouldn't get played at all?

Yes, Virginia, there really is a gaping media double standard. News organizations will shield your tender eyes from the sight of a Berg or a Daniel Pearl being decapitated or of Sept. 11 victims jumping to their deaths, or of the mangled bodies on the USS Cole, or of Fallujans joyfully mutilating the remains of four lynched US civilians. But they will make sure you don't miss the odious behavior of Americans or American allies, no matter how atypical that misbehavior may be, or how determined the US military is to uproot and punish it.

We are at war with a vicious enemy, and propaganda in wartime is a weapon whose consequences can be deadly. Nick Berg lost his life because the Abu Ghraib pictures were turned into a worldwide media event. Yes, those who did it were sheltered by the First Amendment. That makes their actions not better, but worse.

(Jeff Jacoby is a columnist for The Boston Globe.)

Media's Creepy Obsession with Prison Abuse Overshadows Real Terror

Great political cartoon that totally shows the sickness of much of the media's fascination with the prison abuse issues, yet letting that overshadow acts that are, clearly, much worse. I, like many people, am sick of seeing story after story about what happened in an Iraqi prison. I am tired of hearing how bad America is to let this happen, and how this has fuled the fire of some sick, cowardly men and women in the middle east, who have always hated us, and will always hate us no matter WHAT we do, be our actions good or bad. These are monsters we're dealing with, not scholars who can deal with issues and make reasonable choices. The media has to wake up and realize we're in a war against animals...and they need to stop taking the animals' side.

Stupidity from the Left, Kerry Nonsense, and More

Those on the left refuse to act reasonable and they can't stop making EVERYTHING a political issue.

A couple examples:

Air America host calls for Bush "hit"

Carville, always the idiot, attacks soldiers (while in Canada)

There is, of course, Michael Moore and buffoons like him- he's actually taken serious by some major figures in the left...which is a joke itself. The numerous hit books out there that are nothing but attack pieces against the right. You don't see the same sort of thing from the right, which makes sense- they seem to have some sense.

Kerry is calling for the removal of Rumsfeld, which is absurd- a man from Washington is now getting blamed for the actions of a handful of soldiers. During the start of the Iraq war, when that idiot threw grenades into an area, killing his fellow soldiers- I guess Rumsfeld was responsible for that too? Kerry and Rangel, and others who have too much time on their hands need to STOP making this a political issue. It is not, and what they're saying and doing is dangerous- and it's putting our troops in danger.

The family of Nick Berg, beheaded by Iraqi terrorists are blaming President Bush- claiming their son was in US custody in Iraq, thus holding up his return home...and the white house is to blame for his capture and murder. These people are disgusting to blame anyone but the terrorists who killed their son, and they're dishonoring his memory by attacking ones who do not need to be attacked. Berg wasn't forced into going into a dangerous country, knowing he was risking his life...and the president was in no way responsible for his death. To the family, I say- shut up, grow up, and think before you utter anymore stupidity. Your son's memory is being tainted by you fools.

To the media outside the family's house in Pennsylvania- GO AWAY. It's digusting that you idiots are sitting outside, yelling out questions to the family members when they try to check their mail, go to the grocery store, etc. It's disgusting that you people are there to begin with. Leave them alone, stay away from their house.

Idiots abound, as you can see...it's a scary world in that we share it with a bunch of morons.

Prayer is Still Important for Our Nation

Falwell Confidential

Date: May 5, 2004
From: Jerry Falwell

PRAYER IS STILL IMPORTANT FOR OUR NATION

If groups like the American Atheists and Americans United for the Separation
of Church and State had their way, American presidents would not be free to
proclaim National Days of Prayer for our nation.

"Declarations that Americans should pray, worship a god, or even read a
particular spiritual text like the Bible, clearly endorse religious belief
and have a sectarian character. They divide, rather than unify, Americans,"
the American Atheist website said this week.

Thankfully, such groups remain in the minority (for now) and our nation will
continue in the tradition of honoring God this May 6. This tradition goes
all the way back to 1775, and the First Continental Congress which called
for a National Day of Prayer. That call to prayer secured for all time
the fact that America was to be reliant on God. That is an undeniable fact
of history. In 1952, Congress established the National Day of Prayer as an
annual event by a joint resolution, with President Harry S Truman signing it
into law.

President Bush is preserving the legacy of his predecessors, declaring
Thursday as the National Day of Prayer. In his proclamation, President Bush
noted that, in his first Inaugural Address, President George Washington
"prayed that the Almighty would preserve the freedom of all Americans."

"All," in this case, includes the American Atheists. What members of these
groups fail to grasp is that our nation's spiritual pursuits do nothing to
discount the beliefs of others. American Atheists remain free to their
non-belief while the rest of the nation pauses for one day to publicly
contemplate the blessings of God on our nation.

America's presidents have routinely issued prayer proclamations that express
the nation's dependency on Almighty God. Like it or not, our nation's
religious heritage served as the groundwork for this land of the free.

Sure, some scoff at our tradition of national prayer, but I believe it is
important because it compels all Americans to at least momentarily recognize
that this nation has an ongoing practice of reverence and dependence on the
Almighty.

President Bush beautifully stated, "Prayer is an opportunity to praise God
for His mighty works, His gift of freedom, His mercy, and His boundless
love. Through prayer, we recognize the limits of earthly power and
acknowledge the sovereignty of God. According to Scripture, 'the Lord is
near to all who call upon Him. ... He also will hear their cry, and save
them.' Prayer leads to humility and a grateful heart, and it turns our
minds to the needs of others."

Similarly, President Abraham Lincoln, on March 30, 1863, signed a
Proclamation Appointing a National Fast Day. It read, in part: "And whereas
it is the duty of nations as well as of men, to own their dependence upon
the overruling power of God, to confess their sins and transgressions, in
humble sorrow, yet with assured hope that genuine repentance will lead to
mercy and pardon; and to recognize the sublime truth, announced in the Holy
Scriptures and proven by all history, that those nations only are blessed
whose God is the Lord."

On May 6, 1982, President Ronald Reagan said, "Our Pledge of Allegiance
states that we are 'one nation under God,' and our currency bears the motto,
'In God We Trust.' The morality and values such faith implies are deeply
embedded in our national character. Our country embraces those principles
by design, and we abandon them at our peril. Yet in recent years,
well-meaning Americans in the name of freedom have taken freedom away. For
the sake of religious tolerance, they've forbidden religious practice in the
classrooms. The law of this land has effectively removed prayer from our
classrooms. How can we hope to retain our freedom through the generations
if we fail to teach our young that our liberty springs from an abiding faith
in our Creator?"

What remarkable words from an equally remarkable man! These words should
inspire us to fight to regain our rights of public religious expression that
our Founders secured for us.

Meanwhile, as we prepare to participate in the National Day of Prayer, may
we remember the words of President Dwight D. Eisenhower, who said, "Without
God there could be no American form of government nor an American way of
life. Recognition of the Supreme Being is the ... most basic expression of
Americanism."

That's America in a nutshell.

Dissent Stinks if It Exploits the Pain of GIs

Dissent Stinks if It Exploits the Pain of GIs

'Nightline' was within bounds, but the rabidly partisan 'Doonesbury' crosses the line.

By Bill O'Reilly
Arousing passions to promote or protest war is not a difficult thing to do. Joseph Goebbels, the minister of propaganda for the Third Reich, was able to convince millions of Germans that Poland actually attacked the Fatherland. All Goebbels had to do was fake a few pictures of dead German soldiers at the Polish border and the Panzers were off to the races.

Imagine Iwo Jima in the age of the live shot. Or D-day in a time of instant satellite communication. "Saving Private Ryan" was bad enough, but what if you were watching that bloody French campaign unfold in real time — you would very likely have been emotionally devastated.

Fast-forward to the war on terror, which we actually did watch commence live when the second plane crashed into the World Trade Center.

Journalists who covered the event saw people jumping to their deaths from windows and unbelievable death and destruction.

Those horrific images galvanized the nation and led to a quick war in Afghanistan. But now 9/11 has begun to fade in the memories of many, and we are bogged down in a bloody struggle in Iraq.

Now there's a political struggle over how and where to wage the war on terror.

Enter the media, which are fully engaged in that struggle. The liberal journalists generally dislike the Iraq campaign, the conservative media generally support it, with the exception of isolationists like Pat Buchanan.

The ABC News program "Nightline" angered some Americans by broadcasting pictures of our military people killed in Iraq. I personally had no problem with it and, as usual, Ted Koppel played it with a neutral face.

Each individual was recognized for two seconds. Then they were gone. Just as they are from life.

The "Nightline" people put forth that the program was a tribute and, since I can't read minds, I will take them at their word. There is no antiwar record on "Nightline's" rap sheet. Koppel reported the war straight when he was embedded with invading U.S. troops last spring.

The same cannot be said for the "Doonesbury" political cartoonist Garry Trudeau, a committed leftist.

Just two months after the horror of 9/11, Trudeau drew a Doonesbury strip accusing President Bush of using the attack to further his political agenda. As a commentator, Trudeau has a perfect right to do this. But there is a line that all commentators should not cross.

That line is using someone's personal tragedy to advance a political agenda, and Trudeau is now doing that in his exposition of a fictional U.S. soldier who loses his leg in fighting in Iraq.

Trudeau does not support the Iraq war, and it is clear that he is attempting to engage the issue on an emotional level that is far more intense than intoning the names of soldiers killed in action. The ongoing suffering of a wounded soldier, even within the frame of a cartoon, carries a wallop.

Imagine if you lost a limb in the fight and believed in the cause. Would you want your ordeal used to further Trudeau's political views?

I have received letters from wounded soldiers and their families who are outraged by Trudeau's methods, and I agree with them.

"Doonesbury" makes political points all the time, albeit usually the same ones. But, right now, the U.S. is involved in an intense war on terror in which American soldiers are being killed and wounded daily.

Even if you disagree with the war, it is imperative that responsible people respect the military and do nothing to harm our soldiers.

A case can be made that Trudeau is attempting to sap the morale of Americans vis-à-vis Iraq by using a long-running, somewhat beloved cartoon character to create pathos. As an opinion cartoonist, Trudeau has a right to do this, but sometimes exercising a right can lead to a wrong.

Of course, a case can also be made that Trudeau simply wants to heighten awareness of what our soldiers are going through. If Trudeau had a history of independent thinking, I would be more inclined to give him the benefit of any doubt. But unlike "Nightline," Trudeau is a true believer of the liberal cause and a rabid anti-Bush partisan.

I believe in connecting dots, and these dots are too large to ignore.

Dissent in a time of war can be noble, but it also can be irresponsible.

Each of us in the media has the mandate to make sure we are not in the latter category. I believe "Nightline" did not cross the irresponsibility line, but Trudeau did.

Abandoning Gaza Will Not End Terrorism

ABANDONING GAZA WILL NOT END TERRORISM
By Jeff Jacoby
The Boston Globe

Thursday, May 6, 2004

Meirav, the 2-year-old, had been strapped into a car seat for safety. But car seats are no protection against bullets, and by the time rescue workers reached the Citroen station wagon, Meirav was dead of multiple gunshot wounds to the head. So was her 7-year-old sister, Roni. And Hadar, the 9-year-old. And Hila, 11. One by one, each had been shot at point-blank range.

In the driver's seat, their mother was dead too. Tali Hatuel, 34, was a social worker who was often called upon to comfort and assist victims of terrorism. Eight months pregnant with her first boy, she had been driving to Ashkelon on Sunday for an ultrasound exam. Then she and the girls had planned to join her husband David at an election precinct to urge voters to oppose the controversial Israeli referendum on unilaterally "disengaging" from the Gaza Strip.

But David never saw his wife and daughters alive again. He buried them Sunday evening, sobbing with grief and surrounded by thousands of mourners in Ashkelon's new cemetery. "You were my flowers," he wept. "I am all alone and there is no one left."

Not long after the slaughter of the Hatuel family, two terror groups -- Islamic Jihad and the Popular Resistance Committee -- proudly claimed responsibility in a call to the Associated Press. The official Voice of Palestine radio praised the quintuple murder as a "heroic" operation against "five settlers," not bothering to mention that the victims were an unarmed pregnant woman and four children.

The savagery of the attack was similarly downplayed by National Public Radio in its broadcast the next morning. Actually, reporter Julie McCarthy did more than minimize the horror of the massacre. She blamed the victims for "provoking" their own murder -- not by anything they did, but by their mere "presence" in the disputed territory.

"The settlers rallied support [against the referendum], saying Israel was withdrawing under fire," McCarthy reported, "but there was ample evidence yesterday to show that their continued presence in Gaza is provoking bloodshed. Israeli troops shot dead two Palestinian gunmen after the men ambushed a mother and her four small daughters outside the Gaza settlement of Gush Katif. The family was shot and killed on their way to the Israeli city of Ashkelon."

In NPR's warped moral calculus, Tali Hatuel and her children are in early graves not because Palestinian culture celebrates the mass-murder of Jews, but because Jews have no business living among Arabs. If McCarthy had been reporting from Birmingham in September 1963, would she have blamed the bombing of the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church on the provocative "presence" of the four black girls who died in the explosion?

The Hatuels opposed Ariel Sharon's proposed Gaza pullout because they understood that unilaterally surrendering land to Hamas and the PLO could only result in more terror and bloodshed, not less. If the past decade -- the era of the "land for peace" delusion -- has made anything clear, it is that the more Israel concedes to the Palestinians, the worse Palestinian terror becomes. Abandoning Gaza will not make the Arabs more peaceful. It will simply strengthen their conviction that Israelis can be defeated through terrorism, and make Gaza a more effective staging-area for violent attacks on Jews.

Notwithstanding the defeat of Sunday's referendum, Sharon says he still intends to go forward with his "disengagement" from Gaza. That presumably will mean the uprooting of some 8,000 Gazan Jews from the homes, farms, and schools they have built over the past quarter-century. The State Department and the United Nations will cheer the sight of Gaza being ethnically cleansed of its Jewish population -- being rendered *Judenrein,* as the Nazis used to say. But having approved Sharon's expulsion of Jews from territory largely occupied by Arabs, what will they say if he then proposes to expel Arabs from places whose majority is Jewish?

No: Arab-Israeli peace will not be won by dragging people, kicking and screaming, from their homes. Nor will it be won by giving land and statehood to the gangsters who run Hamas and Fatah. Abandoning the field to the terrorists will not make the terrorism stop.

The only workable recipe for lasting Middle East peace is the enormously difficult one of remaking Palestinian society from the bottom up. Of destroying its poisonous culture of violence, death-worship, and Jew-hatred. Of educating its people for democracy and tolerance. Of replacing its cruel and corrupt rulers with leaders genuinely committed to moderation.

Only when -- only if -- such a transformation takes place will the Palestinians be ready for statehood. To confer sovereignty on them now would be disastrous, a guarantee of violence for years to come. If there is one thing a regime that can call the execution of a mother and her four daughters "heroic" doesn't need, it is a reward.

(Jeff Jacoby is a columnist for The Boston Globe.)

Ted Rall: Ignorant, Cruel, and