Amazin', but not in a good way.

Thanks to Adam.

But There Is Some Joy In Mudville East: 12 sacks against the Eagles. Osi Umenora (I'm not even bothering to look that up; you don't know how to spell it either) had six. Six, baby.

I'm not going to get all giddy about the Giants pounding on a badly-banged-up Westbrook-free Eagles team, but it did remind me of the glory days of New York Giants football, when one watched the offense almost as an obligation but got really excited when the other team had the ball.

It's odd how the media -- even the sports media, which really ought to know better -- simply misses out on rising stars. They're still pimping Jeremy Shockey, for example, based upon his rookie year where he showed "promise," and apparently unaware that that promise has amounted to an adequate but hardly spectacular tight end who drops an awful lot of balls and whose favorite play seems to be suffering a high ankle sprain.

On the pre-game show last night, they flashed Michael Strahan. But anyone who watches Giants football has known for years the Old Lion has been eclipsed by the Young Lion Umenora. Which isn't to knock Strahan; he's still very good. He's just always hurt and he's getting pretty old.

But man, when Strahan's healthy... Umenora shines. Strahan is still good enough that one can't forget about him and he often gets a double-team. Freeing up Umenora to do a "wide variety of damage," like Mickey said of Thunderlips.

Just watch him bullrush right through Justice as if that 300 pound lineman were a child to get his paws on McNabb. Glorious.

Posted by: Ace at 11:14 AM | Comments (24)
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Odd that our Democratic Party and MSM (but I repeat myself) are so insistent that political reconciliation is the only way the war can be won (or at least finished) and yet I only heard of this through Drew.

Iraqi vice-president and Sunni leader Tariq al-Hashemi has held talks with Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, Iraq's most senior Shia cleric.

The meeting came a day after Mr Hashemi published proposals that he said would help achieve reconciliation in Iraq.

The plan calls for the curbing of militias and an end to sectarianism.

...

Mr Hashemi said he had received the cleric's support, in general, for his proposals.

On Wednesday, Mr Hashemi launched what he called an Iraqi National Compact.

"The time has come to sit around the table and have a candid dialogue about key and sensitive matters," he said.

He proposed that the United Nations and the Arab League could act as guarantors of an agreement and monitor its progress.

The document calls for a blanket pardon for Iraqis who took up arms against the government and the US-led coalition in exchange for laying down their arms and joining the political process.

I like how the BBC ends the piece. Contrive a down note at all costs, lest people get the crazy idea progress is being made:

Meanwhile, the violence in Iraq appears to have intensified after a relatively quite period.

The US military has reported that 70 people have been killed in a series of attacks since Monday.

A one-week trend is trumpeted as a six-month trend is ignored. The only trends that count are spikes in violence.

I can't find the quote, but I believe George S. Patton warned about imagining the enemy as superhuman and inexhaustible. The media and left have long imagined that only America and her allies could tire, falter, and fail in this fight, while insisting -- either implicitly or quite explicitly -- that our enemies were all but Terminator-like in their undauntability and innumerability. Hydra-like, for each head we killed, two would grow back, magically.

And yet that does not appear to be the case. The Sunnis insurgents certainly seem as if they've grown tired of war, and the initial considerations of honor and absurd notions about reclaiming their state have given way to more pragmatic thinking. Even Moqtada al-Sadr's thug army seems less inclined to class directly with American forces.

War is painful and deadly. But the media's single-minded fixation on American pain and American death has obscured, to the point of invisibility, an important and quite-predictable fact: The war has been painful and deadly for our enemies as well.

As they say, wars are won through manpower, firepower, staying power, and willpower. The media and the left have been doing all they can to subvert the latter (while attempting to pass laws to restrict the first two as well). It never seems to have occurred to them that perhaps the enemy, too, may eventually flag in its staying power and willpower as well.

Or more likely it has, which makes it imperative to lose this war before the enemy surrenders.

Radio Tokyo Rose: I propose a full posthumous pardon for Tokyo Rose. At least we can say she was paid by an enemy state to which she had a familial connection to push this never-ending stream of propaganda on our troops and our nation. Our current RTR (Radio Tokyo Rose) media does this simply out of sense of "duty."

Bitch.

I like the bit where she gives away our troops' position and then chuckles, "Sorry, that's supposed to be a secret." Remind you of anyone?

Posted by: Ace at 10:42 AM | Comments (16)
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As opposed to the last few years, when either the supply was constrained or by the time they caught up, we were well into flu season.

Well, good. I'll do one again this year. I usually do, and haven't had the flu in over 10 years. Occasionally I'll get mild flu-like symptoms from the shot, but that hasn't happened to me for a few years.

Incidentally, if you've had the flu, you know the difference between influenza and a bad cold.

There are the usual recommendations for high-risk groups to take the shot, you know the list, the elderly, young children, health care workers, pregnant women, immunocompromised individuals, those with kidney, lung or liver disease, and you crazy cats who indulge in unprotected sex with mountain lions.

Or cougars. Yeah, it was cougars.

Posted by: Dave In Texas at 10:04 AM | Comments (8)
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It's a Good War, to liberals and chin-strokers, because the US is doing absolutely nothing there to abate slaughter and tyranny. Which makes reporters and academics effectively our "front line" of defense -- which is how they want it. Their "defense" amounts for nothing, of course, and saves no lives and destroys no tyrant's bunkers, but they get to be the stars of this do-nothing immorality play, which is better than the non-college-educated morons in the US military who got stuck in Iraq getting to be the stars.

So we can all cluck, cluck about how horrible this all is and pretend that it matters a whit that we are collectively "horrified."

But it's a lie, because it doesn't matter how we feel about it. It's what we do about it that counts. And were Bush to announce airstrikes of opportunity on government forces tomorrow, the MSM and our very-concerned media and academic classes would suddenly find all of this not nearly as "horrifying" as they find it now.

Which isn't to say I advocate such an action (though neither do I oppose some low level of commitment to striking government troops and materiel and vehicles as targets may present themselves).

Just to note that for the left the proper way -- the only way -- to deal with brutal murderers and tyrants is to caterwaul about it and peacock-preen their pretty feathers of righteous indignation.

A Bit More: Compare the media's rather upfront branding of the insane Burmese regime as murderous with their solicitousness of Iran's madmen. The difference? There is a relatively low probability the US will intervene at all in Burma, whereas there's a somewhat higher likelihood that the US will bomb Iran. Thus it's "safe" to brand the Burmese murderers as vicious tyrants; the media can all take solace in the fact they're not contributing to belligerent action that might actually matter in the scheme of things. They can talk tough on Burma, without fear that their tough talk may impel tough action.

I think I see now why Allah was so down on the SNL Ahmadinejad spoofs. Because they minimize and trivialize the threat from Iran, and allow our bien pensents the opportunity to believe they've actually "struck a blow for liberty and dignity" by simply laughing at a buffoon. Having "done their bit" for a cause, the mass of Americans who would like to believe they're tough on tyranny but who are actually its greatest facilitators can sleep easy knowing they've advanced the cause of progressivism by chuckling along with some TV clowns.

Same deal with Jon Stewart. Oh, sure, he really zings some of the lunatics of the world's rogue regimes, and that's really all that's needed, isn't it? A few zingers, a few faked laughs. By our Mighty Mirthfulness shall we bring the tyrants to their knees, so long as doing so doesn't violate their national sovereignty. Or something.

Meanwhile the "bed-wetters" and "fear-mongers" who suggest that maybe we ought to actually do something about these bastards besides show our contempt are painted as the lunatics flip-side-of-the-coin equals in evil. So much easier to sit back and laugh, laugh, laugh at all the buffoonish thugs of the world than lower oneself to actually opposing them.

Incidentally, it strikes me as curious that the media has had relatively little to say about Ahmadinejad's frequent threats to nuke Israel but is only now takes (mocking, unserious) notice when they threaten gays. (Or more than threaten, of course, but the media and the smarties are too brave to note they're actually hanging gays. Safer to just euphemize it as "threaten.")

Not that we shouldn't be concerned about gays, of course. But once again we see the left's pecking order in the heirarchy of protected minorities. No big deal when Hizballah rains missiles onto Jewish cities, but claim there are no gays in Iran and it's on, baby.

And by "it's on, baby," they mean Iran has invited a terrible retribution of mockery upon it. Yeah, take it. Stings don't it, bitch?

Posted by: Ace at 10:03 AM | Comments (40)
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US Death Toll Drops, which is just a bad headline, since the death toll hasn't dropped (no one's yet been resurrected) but which manages to greatly downplay the success our troops are having:

US military losses in Iraq for September stood at 70 on Sunday, the lowest monthly figure since July last year, according to an AFP tally based on Pentagon figures.

The figure also marks the fourth consecutive drop in the monthly death toll following a high of 121 in May. June saw 93 deaths, July 82 and August 79. The monthly toll in July 2006 was 53.

Two US soldiers were killed on Saturday in separate incidents, pushing the overall toll of American losses since the March 2003 invasion to 3,801.

A surge in US troop numbers saw an extra 28,500 personnel deployed from mid-February, mainly in Baghdad and the neighbouring province of Anbar, although commanders said most were not in combat positions until May.

US commanders say the strategy is starting to work and that levels of violence are dropping, allowing for a possible drawdown of the 160,000 or so troops now deployed.

"The trend is certainly in the right direction," US military spokesman Rear Admiral Mark Fox told a press conference in Baghdad.

"The surge unquestionably is what has been the catalyst that has created the opportunity to have more forces operating in more places at the same time and to deny Al-Qaeda and the extremists safe-haven and to take away sanctuaries."

Former Spook wrote:

Call it Spook's Inverse Law of Iraq War Reporting: if you don't see a spate of stories on U.S. casualties at the end of the month, then there must be some good news the MSM is ignoring.

I don't need Bob Munck coming in here telling me the MSM isn't "ignoring" this as a brief stub by AP picked up by few and largely buried isn't giving the story proper play. The MSM always trumpets the high numbers of deaths and extrapolates further carnage from there; if it's truly unbiased, it would also take this month's relative success and give it equal play. But of course it's not unbiased.

Gateway Pundit reports that all violent deaths in Iraq have also plummeted: less than half this month what they were last month, and a mere one-sixth the number of violent deaths suffered in November '06.

Thanks for most of this to Instapundit.

Oh, and Dan Riehl notes the leftist blogosphere and their varsity in the MSM is currently crowing about the last ten Americans killed in Iraq, neatly ignoring the 60 recent insurgents killed in clashes.

A six-to-one ratio of battle deaths -- as heartbreaking as each US death is -- would be considered rather bad for the enemy by any MSM that wasn't wildly cheering the insurgents.

Posted by: Ace at 09:51 AM | Comments (7)
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Meh. There was a video of the scene in question but Fox made them take it down. But the whole movie is apparently available for free on iTunes.

Thanks to AliceH.

Posted by: Ace at 08:54 AM | Comments (26)
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On appeasement and the "brave."

Problem of Leatherclad S&M Maniacs Divides Community

THE GREAT WESTERN Desert, Australia -- It's a tiny community, of just one hundred and fifty souls. The economic center of the town is a single oil well; the only other economic activities are subistence farming and light trade with far-flung outposts across the dangerous highways. The town has no name, and appears on no maps.

But for the past year, residents have been debating a problem: what is to be done about the growing threat from the rampaging, gay-looking, bare-assed S&M biker gangs that control the highways and occasionally surround the town?

Lord Humungus, spiritual leader of the savage roving sort-of gay biker-gangs. Called "The Ayatollah of Rock-n-Rollah," he is seen here delivering the daily prayers to his followers and exhorting them to "kill, kill, kill" all who stand in his way. He describes himself as being fundamentally "a man of peace."

more...

Posted by: Ace at 08:51 AM | Comments (18)
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The left blogosphere has been pushing this meme for a while -- that they're the "brave" for refusing to acknowledge the evil of global jihadism, whereas those concerned about it and in favor of action against it are "cowardly" and "bed-wetters" for being so "afraid."

According to a couple of opinion pieces, the MSM has now (surprise, surprise) adopted this idiotic idea as their own. Isn't it strange that the "centrist" or even "rightwing" MSM is forever picking up stories and memes from the far-left sinistrosphere?

Ron Rosenbaum:

The Best Thing Written About the Ahmadinejad Visit...

…was a column by Caroline Glick of The Jerusalem Post. She puts the visit and the inanely naive treatment of it—that it was about free speech or “fear” of Ahmadinejad, or fear of talking to our enemies—in its true context.

To me the visit was about the necessity to bear some kind of moral witness against the evil represented by Ahmadinejad, whatever pseudo-sophisticated arguments are used deny responsibility to him for his regimes crimes or to treat him as open to Reason.

The new meme tries to frame it as being about “fear” of Ahmadinejad. No it’s not about fear, it’s about moral disgust, revulsion. The fear can be seen, rather, in the posturing of those super brave boyz who accuse those who have the clarity to express moral disgust and rejection as “fearful”. When in fact it’s their fear—that their super-sophisitcated white boy, think tank subsidized, wonk mentality with all its nuances that is laughably impotent in the face of fundamentalist, theocratic fascist evil. [UPDATE: Not just boyz—the liberal propogators of the “fear of dialogue” meme are now on the same page as Peggy Noonan! And what’s equally laughable is their belief that their arguments, their rhetoric their desire above all for dialogue will make a differnce in a kumbaya way, to the victims of a theocratic Stasi-like state.

Are they aware of how student dissidents are beaten and tortured in Terhan? Only in the abstract, I imagine. I suggest they read this harrowing account of an Iranian student hunted down, beaten and tortured, that was just published in LondonÂ’s Observer.

Read it? Now tell me the best response: protest or “dialogue”? I wonder if that Iranian student was grateful for the super, super brave bloggers who boasted of their courageous lack of “fear” of dialogue with the representative of a theocratic fascist regime.

And the Carolyn Glick piece he's so high on:

During his visit to New York this week, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad attacked every basic assumption upon which Western civilization is predicated. Ahmadinejad offered up his attacks while extolling his vision of Islamic global domination.

Refusing to note his existential challenge to the Free World, the Western media concentrated their coverage of his trip on his statements regarding specific Western policy goals. His rejection of the UN Security Council's authority to take action against Iran's illicit nuclear weapons program; his championing of the Palestinian cause and Israel's destruction; his denials of Iranian support for terrorism, and his attacks against the US were widely reported. So too, his insistence that Iranian women enjoy full rights and that there are no homosexuals in Iran received banner headlines.

Ahmadinejad gave two major addresses this week - at Columbia University and at the UN General Assembly. He devoted both to putting forward his vision for global Islamic domination. And while the Western media sought hidden meanings and signals for peaceful intentions in his words, the fact is that on both occasions, Ahmadinejad made absolutely clear that his vision of Islamic domination cannot coexist in any manner with Western civilization. Consequently, Ahmadinejad's statements were not negotiating stances. They were the direct consequence of the world view he propounds. As such, they are non-negotiable.

...

Perhaps the central reason that Ahmadinejad's message, and the hundreds of thousands of voices echoing his call throughout the world, are so dangerous is because the Free World is making precious little effort to assert its own message. Indeed, rather than contend forthrightly with the challenge that men like Ahmadinejad and Osama bin Laden pose to the West, the West searches for ways to either co-opt their message by seeking out points of agreement or to show that really, the Islamic imperialists have nothing to fear from the West.

...

The thing of it is that aside from blind narcissism, there is a reason that the West ignores the dangers facing it. The Western media ignored Ahmadinejad's message, just as it has insistently ignored the messages of bin Laden and Fatah throughout the years, because Westerners have a hard time believing that anyone would want to abide by the Islamic world view which denies mankind's desire for freedom.

But no matter how ugly an ideology is, in the absence of real competition it gains adherents and power. The only way to ensure that jihadists' demonic views are defeated is by stridently defending and upholding the fundamental principles on which the Free World is based. And the West hasn't even begun to take up this challenge.

We need a rewrite.

"When they came for the communists, I was silent, because I was so badass that I wasn't afraid of them coming for the communists;

When they came for the socialists, I was silent, because I wasn't a bed-wetter like some other pansies getting all freaked out about Hitler;

When they came for the trade unionists, I did not protest, because I eat lightning and crap thunder;

When they came for the Jews, I did not protest, because I am not "fearful" like silly conservative faggots;

When they came for me, there was no one left to protest on my behalf. But then again, I didn't need anyone. I'm a tough, strong Brave Boy who fears nothing except calling evil by its proper name."

-- The MSM (with an assist from Glenn Greenwald)

Thanks to CJ.

Posted by: Ace at 08:05 AM | Comments (19)
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The Sun Sentinel ( Ft. Lauderdale paper) gives us this lengthy piece speaking of troughs, shear, and other various and sundry reasons why the hurricanes aren't forming. The problem is -- global warming isn't cited in this piece at all.

I have a confession to make -- I'm tight with global warming. He calls me all the time, usually looking to borrow money, score dope, or steal my tools, but he does at least remember phone number and confide in me about his personal issues.

Articles like this, completely shunning him, get him down. This is a serious mental health issue. The dopey idiot was near suicidal the last time he called looking to score some prozac and speed and borrow a pistol for some unspecified reason. I helped him out with the prozac and crank, but the pistol, no way.

Experts Predicted a Severe Hurricane Season This Year[Gabe]:

Back in May we were warned that this year could be in the top one-third of worst seasons ever. I especially like this examination of the climate forecasters' error rate:

The CSU forecast team has been making seasonal hurricane forecasts since 1984. If one grades their late May forecasts based on predictions of a below average, average, or above average season, they have done pretty well over the past eight seasons. Seven of their past eight forecasts have been correct. Their only failure occurred last year, when they called for a very active season, and it was a normal year with 10 named storms, 5 hurricanes, and 2 intense hurricanes.

Incidentally, why did they grade the CSU team on only the past 8 seasons if they've been making forecasts since 1984?

Posted by: Purple Avenger at 05:46 AM | Comments (26)
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