Sorry I haven't responded about this yet. I have an email into Pajamas Media about the problem and am awaiting their suggestion about a fix.

Posted by: Ace at 12:40 PM | Comments (31)
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I thought The Big H was the one line of comparative apologism a liberal wouldn't dare cross. Stalin? No big deal; they all kind of think Stalin is just the victim of bad right-wing press anyway.

But The Big H himself? Hitler? Surely no liberal would cross that, let us say, Maginot Line of moral equivalency in order to take a shot even at The Devil Bush.

I was wrong: A former Seinfeld writer -- and, it seems, a Jew to boot -- writes that at least Hitler meant well in attempting to kill every single one of his correligionists, but Bush of course is without such, um, lofty?, motives.

I got this from Allah, who weighs in.

I'm not really sure what to say about these people anymore. I was shocked when they began speaking well of Osama bin Ladin; now they're lauding the Simon Pure (racial stock) motives of Adolf Hitler.

Let me weigh in with a Hitler-like proposal, which surely this Nazi apologist will applaud the idealistic motives behind: Some people are too stupid to be allowed to corrupt society with their idiocy and their degernate genes, and should be sterilized or better yet "eliminated" at earliest opportunity. This moron really is too stupid to be permitted to exist. Suffer not a moron to live, as the Bible instructs us.

Heh, my motives are pure. I'm just trying to elevate the average IQ and moral sense of the population by culling some of the very lowest of the low-hanging fruitcakes.

Posted by: Ace at 12:19 PM | Comments (79)
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Although the tenureships of the first two "public editors" were marked by an awful lot of see-no-bias apologism, at least on occasion they really knocked the Times for bias, dishonesty, and incompetent reportage.

It seems the Times has learned its lesson, and has instituted the perfect stooge to shill for them.

Clark Hoyt has now pubished three columns about the Times' behavior, and in each instance, has given the Times a perfect bill of reportial health. Before his tenure was even official, he felt the need to get off to a good running apologist start and claim that the NYT was essentially right to bury the JFK Airport bomb plot on page 30 of the Metro (B) section, though he does offer the mildest constructive criticism imaginable:

My own view is that The Times story was very well reported and written. It quickly made clear that the accused men were a long way from action and that despite the apocalyptic comments of the U.S. attorney, their ability to carry out an attack on the airport was very much open to question.

"But instead of being a reason to put the story inside, I think this was a compelling reason to keep it on Page 1. This reporting put the story in an appropriate perspective, far calmer than the dayÂ’s television coverage. Giving the story subdued play on the front page -- toward the bottom, with a single-column headline -- would have told readers that The Times knew what they were concerned about, that there was something real here, but that it wasnÂ’t anywhere near happening and there was no need for alarm."

In other words, he agrees with the NYT's decision to bury the story -- he just wanted to see it given the burial treatment on page 1, where the burial would have gotten more attention and better combated the supposed sensationalism of just about every other news outlet in the nation. (Note that in his piece, the editor who made this decision admits that he was influenced by Keith Olbermann style "I question the timing/political manipulation of terror busts and threats" fantasias," which Hoyt passes on without comment.

Hoyt of course followed up this apologism with a piece claiming that those who found the NYT highly manipulative in running a photo of a toothless hick as the face of opposition to the immigration bill to actually be the guilty parties, for making such terrible, terrible judgments about a man's looks. ("The Ugly Thing Wasn't His Face," Hoyt scolded NYT critics in his headline.)

And now of course the hat-trick of defending the NTY's decision to let a terrorist Hamas shill propagandize on its opinion pages. He feels there's enough information on other pages of the NYT to balance this enemy terrorist propaganda. Strangely enough, though, he finds an editorial about the hazards of a vegan diet to be unbalanced because no contrary point of view ran right next to it.

Shockingly, then, he finds the NYT to be biased... against lifestyle choices and fads favored by the left, but not at all biased in favor of Hamas.

Hoyt is the perfect stooge for the Times. He is, to steal from Lenin, a Useful Mediocrity. He is a man whose capability of advancing on his own merits is quite limited; he is, then, a man who would be especially grateful to those who choose him to become a member of an elite institution. He can never be indvidually elite; but he can become elite through his association with an elite group.

So, like the poor kid who becomes eternally grateful to the rich-kid frat for allowing him to join, he is and will eternally be in the New York Times pocket. They gave him something precious he could never have acheived on his own -- national status -- and he will never forget that kindness they extended to him, and will be glad to repay his life-debt to them week after week.

Posted by: Ace at 12:00 PM | Comments (31)
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Via Instapundit, three good pieces on the Islamic world's renewed calls for the murder of Salman Rushdie, and the media's sudden lack of regard for the right of free expression uninhibited by murderous terror.

First Flemming Rose of the Jyllands-Posten, who knows something about angering the perpetually aggrieved:

Again: insult, blasphemy, respect for religion, those words are being repeated over and over again as justification for violent attacks and death threats. By the Iranian government, by the chairman of the Muslim Council of Britain, and by leading politicians and opinion makers in the West.

And they have made their way into the United NationÂ’s Human Rights Council, the highest ranking international body with the mission of protecting human rights. On March 30 it passed a scandalous resolution condoning state punishment of speech that governments deems as insulting for religion.

“The resolution is based in the expectation that it will compel the international community to acknowledge and address the disturbing phenomenon of the defamation of religions, especially Islam,” said Pakistan, speaking on behalf of the Organization of the Islamic Conference.

What does this mean? Well, it means that the UN is encouraging every dictatorship to pass laws that make criticism of Islam a crime. The UN Human Rights Council legitimizes the criminal persecution of sir Salman Rushdie for having insulted peopleÂ’s religious sensibilities. Beautiful, isnÂ’t it?

And the Labour Government in Britain was delivering ammunition to this kind of policy when back in 2006 it put a lot of effort into passing a law against religious hatred. It failed by one vote. Salman Rushdie fought this law. In an essay “Coming After Us” for the anthology “Free Expression Is No Offense” he wrote:

“I never thought of myself as a writer about religion until religion came after me… At that time it was often difficult to persuade people that the attack on The Satanic Verses was part of a broader, global assault on writers, artists, and fundamental freedoms. The aggressors in that matter, by which I mean the novel’s opponents, who threatened booksellers and publishers, falsified the contents of the text they disliked, and vilified its author, nevertheless presented themselves as the injured parties, and such was the desire to appease religious sentiment even then that in spite of the murder of a translator in Japan and the shooting of a publisher in Norway there was widespread acceptance of that topsy-turvy view.”

Roger Simon, who commissioned that article:

The partisanship of our society has struck us blind. Iraq, as everyone knows, has driven us apart. But looking back on it - it could not have been otherwise. We were doomed. In a society with a supposedly-free (though often reified) press, it becomes almost impossible to win an assymetrical war. The same prejudices that Russert describes in his Rushdie article are the ones that have seriously undermined the possibility of victory for democracy in Iraq. A media that could call obvious fascists and religious fascists "insurgents" (a term once reserved for Pancho Villa) in the interest of "objectivity" encouraged a specious atmosphere of moral equivalence to democracy from the start. Whether this was conscious or unconscious is beside the point. Whatever it was, our enemies, the enemies of the Enlightenment, seized on it for propaganda purposes and continue to do so. (Note that in the new Daniel Pearl movie, Pearl's beheading is not even shown - that was praised as tasteful by Roger Ebert.) And, as everyone knows, the playing field of assymetrical war is the media, far more than the battlefield. Only in the world of public opinion can we be defeated.

And liberal Tim Rutten who, unlike the NYT's new pliable shill of a public editor, isn't afraid to note media bias even when it is, supposedly, "in favor of his side." Maybe more liberals should wake up to the fact that endless apologism and shilling for radical Islamists isn't scoring points "for your team," unless you happen to think that Al Qaeda is actually on your team.

When news of [Rushdie's] knighthood spread last weekend, the flames of fanaticism rekindled. An Iranian group offered $150,000 to anyone who would murder the novelist. Effigies of the queen and the writer were burned in riots across Pakistan. That country's religious affairs minister initially said that conferring such an honor on Rushdie justified sending suicide bombers to Britain, then — under pressure — he modified his statement to say it would cause suicide bombers to travel there. Pakistan's national assembly unanimously condemned Rushdie's knighthood and said it reflected "contempt" for Islam and Muhammad. Various high-ranking Iranian clerics called for the writers' death and renewed their insistence that Khomeini's fatwa still is in force. Riots spread to India's Muslim communities.

Friday, the Voice of America reported that Pakistani "lawmakers passed a second resolution calling on British Prime Minister Tony Blair to apologize 'to the Muslim world' " and that, "on Thursday, a hard-line Pakistani cleric awarded terrorist leader Osama bin Laden the religious title and honorific 'saifulla,' or sword of Islam, to protest Britain's decision."

If you're wondering why you haven't been able to follow all the columns and editorials in the American press denouncing all this homicidal nonsense, it's because there haven't been any. And, in that great silence, is a great scandal.

...

What masquerades as tolerance and cultural sensitivity among many U.S. journalists is really a kind of soft bigotry, an unspoken assumption that Muslim societies will naturally repress great writers and murder honest journalists, and that to insist otherwise is somehow intolerant or insensitive.

Lost in the self-righteous haze that masks this expedient sentiment is a critical point once made by the late American philosopher Richard Rorty, who was fond of pointing out that "some ideas, like some people, are just no damn good" and that no amount of faux tolerance or misplaced fellow feeling excuses the rest of us from our obligation to oppose such ideas and such people.

If Western and, particularly American, commentators refuse to speak up when their obligations are so clear, the fanatics will win and the terrible silence they so fervently desire will descend over vast stretches of our world — a silence in which the only permissible sounds are the prayers of the killers and the cries of their victims.

Instapundit makes this dark observation about the War That Dare Not Be Named:

Frankly, I think the best argument for electing a Democrat as President is that as long as a Republican is in office the media powers-that-be will refuse to condemn even the worst atrocities on the part of Islamists, for fear of helping the real enemy in the White House.

Although Roger Simon says he's not questioning anyone's patriotism, I can't see how the issue can be avoided when petty partisanship is being elevated far, far above real concern for American national security and the general welfare of the Enlightenment values we share.

Posted by: Ace at 11:47 AM | Comments (33)
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Kaus speculates that maybe these idiots just don't know how easy it will be to make damning political spots against them, given provisions in the bill permitting violent gang-members and repeat drunk-drivers to get amnesty.

So he suggests a preview -- amateurs creating such ads, now, about folks like Lindsay Graham, just so wobblers like Orin Hatch and Richard Burr can see what awaits them.

Actually, it's not really a preview, because so many effective political ads are aired exclusively on the Internet anyway.

Boston Irish tells me the Windows Movie Maker -- which he used to make his Snowman extravaganzas -- is not only free, it's already probably on your machine if you have Windows XP or Vista, and it's pretty easy to learn.

Incidentally, labor and some Hispanic groups have now announced their opposition to the comprehensive piece of shit.

The Hispanic groups oppose it because they find it unduly harsh and punitive -- a criticism which is not necessarily silly, even by enforcement-first standards. While allowing gang-members to obtain permanent visas, the bill includes some meaningless but annoying provisions -- like the "touchback" provision, requiring amnesty seekers to go back to their home countries for a few hours to apply -- which are supposed to be a sop to enforcement-firsters but actually have nothing at all to do with enforcement. Such provisions just make life difficult for those seeking amnesty, without delivering a lick of enforcement.

Bonus! Right now all eyes are on the Senate, but the House would have to vote on this if the Senate passes it. And House members, of course, are up for re-election every single election cycle. Perhaps Congressmen would like a preview of what awaits them...

Correction: Every single cycle, not every single year. Duh.

Posted by: Ace at 03:44 PM | Comments (65)
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Even more horrific is this one -- audio (synced to video) of Teddy Kenndy warbling out some anthem in Spanish to pander to a Spanish-speaking radio audience. Allah's in CYA I-don't-believe-it's-true mode, but it sure sounds exactly like Ted Kennedy.

"The Snowman" videos are below the fold.

more...

Posted by: Ace at 02:42 PM | Comments (13)
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Nuance.

He said this, utterly gratuitously, in a review of A Mighty Heart, about the murder of WSJ reporter Danny Pearl.

I rather thank Danny Pearl would still be with us if he had been doing a story on critics of the media, rather than their "ideological cousins" Al Qaeda.

Actually... The whole review is abominable, as Jules Crittendon notes.

Posted by: Ace at 02:25 PM | Comments (31)
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Their evidentiary presentation will include all Motley Crue videos from Home Sweet Home to Dr. Feelgood.

That's not true. But they are suing for advising Tommy Lee to take part in various reality tv projects, making him seem buffoonish and incompetent and not at all metal.

Posted by: Ace at 02:18 PM | Comments (9)
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Mark Krikorian rounds 'em up, using the slogan I've pushed myself, "A Yes On Cloture Is A Yes On Amnesty."

Here are the wobblers. We need two thirds of them. That's not easy. As many of them actually believe they think they can get away with the for-cloture-against-the-bill-itself sham, it would be helpful if they were informed of no uncertain terms that we all understand what yes on cloture means.

It means yes on amnesty. That simple. And we will hang that around their necks until they're hounded out of office.

Bond (R-Mo.), Bingaman (D-N.M.), Burr (R-N.C.), Boxer (D-Calif.), Cochran (R-Miss.), Conrad (D-N.D.), Ensign (R-Nev.), Levin (D-Mich.), Gregg (R-N.H.), Nelson (D-Neb.), Hatch (R-Utah), Webb (D-Va.)

Don't ignore the Democrats-- they're more afraid of this bill than Republicans, who seem to subscribe to the WaPo's characterization of us as "uneducated" and "easily led."

Definitely don't ignore Burr, Hatch, and Cochran. What the hell are these idiots thinking? Do they think they're indespensible men in the Senate?

Contact information again: Here.

I'd do the three minutes work needed to put the relevant information up on the site, but I'm out the door to play poker and, possibly, be menaced by a paranoid psychopath with violent tendencies.

I've got to tell that story at some point.

If you haven't yet contacted your Senators -- or Senators who aren't really your own -- do so. Grassroots agitation really has borne fruit -- once pro-amnesty Senators have been whipsawed into alignment with public sentiment. They need to be abused of the notion that while polls show great opposition to this bill, most opponents don't really care that strongly aobut it and thus they can get away with rebuking their constitutents' desires.

I'm told they really do respond to letters and phone calls -- not respond individually, by and large, but they definitely get the message when enough citizens are agitated enough to give up their usual apathy to weigh in.

Posted by: Ace at 03:36 PM | Comments (38)
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Hyperinflation -- catch the fever!

John Edwards is said to be "impressed" with the plan, but wants "to consider it more." He worries that the plan could have the side-effect of actually increasing income disparity between the "Two Americas," separating the impoverished billionaires from the "fat-cat" quintillionaires.

Zimbabwe's inflation will rocket to 1.5m% before the end of the year, the US ambassador to Harare predicted yesterday, forecasting massive disruption and instability that will drive President Robert Mugabe from office.

In a telephone interview with the Guardian, Christopher Dell said prices were going up twice a day, sapping popular confidence in a government which is now "committing regime change on itself".

"I believe inflation will hit 1.5m% by the end of 2007, if not before," Mr Dell said. "I know that sounds stratospheric but, looking at the way things are going, I believe it is a modest forecast."

Zimbabwe's official inflation is 4,500% but independent economists and retailers say it is really above 11,000% and picking up speed. The black market rate for the Zimbabwean dollar has slumped, from Z$160,000 to the pound last week to more than Z$400,000. It collapsed further yesterday, tumbling to more than Z$300,000 to the dollar. The official rate is fixed at just Z$250. Mr Mugabe insists that the Zimbabwe currency must not be devalued.

"Prices are going up twice a day, in some cases doubling several times a week," said Mr Dell, who is approaching the end of his posting to Zimbabwe. "It destabilises everything. People have completely lost faith in the currency and that means they have lost faith in the government that issues it.

It's amusing that Zimbabwe's dishonest hacks lowball the rate of inflation, down to a mere 4,500%.

Here a Zimbabwean woman holds bread, and the pile of nearly worthless cash needed to buy it:

Incidentally, she's one of the grassroots opponents of comprehensive immigration reform. She says that illegal aliens have depressed Zimbabwean workers' wages from the robust growth of 17,000% p.a. down to a paltry 11,000% p.a., barely enough to keep pace with inflation.

Thanks to the always interesting Pajamas Media, which is like Drudge, except Pajamas Media covers bloggers from time to time instead of hailstorms and "FREAK" six-legged frogs.

Posted by: Ace at 02:50 PM | Comments (28)
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