VIDEO: Ron Paul Slams Israel, Alleges Gaza a Concentration Camp

I remember this video from when it first went viral. But it's especially relevant now.

See Israel Matzav, "Video: Ron Paul calls Gaza a concentration camp and Operation Cast Lead a massacre."

BONUS: At Yid With Lid, "EXCLUSIVE: Former Staffer Eric Dondero Responds To Ron Paul's "I Don't Believe in 9/11 Conspiracies" Claim."

America's Iron Lady

Michele Bachmann's going big in Iowa.

At CNN, "‘Iron Lady’ goes back up on Iowa TV." (At Memeorandum.)

Maybe this will help.

The Financial Times reports that 41 percent of Iowa caucus-goers are still undecided. See, "Final Iowa polls show fragmented field."

Holocaust Images in Ultra-Orthodox Protest Anger Israeli Leaders

The video's from a couple of days ago.

And at this morning's New York Times, "Israeli Protest’s Invocation of Holocaust Is Condemned":

JERUSALEM — With public fury over some ultra-Orthodox groups mounting, Israeli leaders on Sunday denounced ultra-Orthodox protesters who took to the streets of Jerusalem on Saturday night and put young boys on display wearing yellow stars and striped prison camp uniforms reminiscent of the Holocaust.

Organizers of the demonstration said they had been protesting what they called growing incitement against their community, with Israeli and foreign news media now focusing on ultra-Orthodox zealots who have been increasingly encroaching on the public sphere, enforcing gender segregation and the exclusion of women and girls in accordance with their strict interpretation of religious modesty rules.

One Israeli television program recently reported how an 8-year-old girl, the daughter of American immigrants who are observant modern Orthodox Jews, had become terrified of walking to school in the city of Beit Shemesh after ultra-Orthodox men spit on her, insulted her and called her a prostitute because her modest dress did not conform exactly to their more rigorous dress code.

Tensions were further fueled by the arrest of an ultra-Orthodox man here last week on a charge of sexual harassment after he verbally abused a female Israeli soldier who had refused to move to the back of a public bus. An organizer of Saturday’s protest in the ultra-Orthodox Mea Shearim neighborhood told Israeli television that the actions of the authorities were like a “spiritual holocaust.”

But mainstream Israeli leaders expressed outrage over the provocative use of Holocaust imagery, saying it insulted the memory of victims of the Nazis.

See also Astute Bloggers, "CHIEF RABBI: ULTRA-ORTHODOX CANNOT FORCE THEIR VIEWS ON OTHERS."

Hope in the Heartland

From Robert Stacy McCain, at The American Spectator:

JOHNSTON, Iowa -- Rick Santorum made a bold prediction here Friday night: The Pittsburgh Steelers will go all the way to the Super Bowl for a rematch with the Green Bay Packers.

The former Pennsylvania senator was enjoying a rare moment of relaxation on the campaign trail here in Iowa, where voters will gather Tuesday night to cast the first real votes that count toward the 2012 Republican presidential nomination. Santorum was wearing a University of Iowa Hawkeyes cap at the Okoboji Grille, where he gathered with supporters to watch the Hawkeyes play the Oklahoma Sooners in the Insight Bowl. When he arrived at the restaurant in Johnston, a suburb of Des Moines, Santorum was swarmed by reporters, photographers, and TV cameramen who have swooped down on his campaign in the past week as polls began indicating that he was surging ahead in the pack of GOP candidates.

Most of the reporters had left the restaurant (and the Hawkeyes were well on their way to a 31-14 loss to the Sooners) by the time I had the chance to ask Santorum about his beloved Steelers. "We will beat the Browns this week," he said, sitting in front of a half-finished platter of nachos. "My prediction is, both the Patriots will lose to the Bills and the Ravens will lose to the Bengals and we will be the Number One seed in the AFC playoffs."

But while the underdog-turned-contender was willing to risk prognosticating the NFL all the way to the Super Bowl, he has remained hesitant to predict how he'll finish in Tuesday's caucuses. Santorum obviously wants to exceed expectations, but the poll numbers and media buzz surrounding his campaign are making it hard to suppress those expectations. Sunday morning's Des Moines Register carried a big front-page headline: "Romney, Paul lead; Santorum closes in," with two subheads, "Poll shows three-way race with two days to go," and "Late spurt 'another stunning turn.'" The latter subhead was a partial quote from Republican strategist David Polyansky, who told the Register's Jennifer Jacobs, "Few saw this bombshell coming. In an already unpredictable race this is another stunning turn of political fortune."

Continue reading.

Also, at The Other McCain, "Rick Santorum Talks Steelers Football," and "Don’t Underestimate Rick Santorum’s Campaign Strength in New Hampshire."

RELATED: At New York Times, "A Time to Vote, and, for Many, to Settle."

The Crisis of Governability in the Industrial Democracies

From Charles Kupchan, at Foreign Affairs, "The Democratic Malaise: Globalization and the Threat to the West":

Globalization has expanded aggregate wealth and enabled developing countries to achieve unprecedented prosperity. The proliferation of investment, trade, and communication networks has deepened interdependence and its potentially pacifying effects and has helped pry open nondemocratic states and foster popular uprisings. But at the same time, globalization and the digital economy on which it depends are the main source of the West’s current crisis of governability. Deindustrialization and outsourcing, global trade and fiscal imbalances, excess capital and credit and asset bubbles -- these consequences of globalization are imposing hardships and insecurity not experienced for generations. The distress stemming from the economic crisis that began in 2008 is particularly acute, but the underlying problems began much earlier. For the better part of two decades, middle-class wages in the world’s leading democracies have been stagnant, and economic inequality has been rising sharply as globalization has handsomely rewarded its winners but left its many losers behind.

These trends are not temporary byproducts of the business cycle, nor are they due primarily to insufficient regulation of the financial sector, tax cuts amid expensive wars, or other errant policies. Stagnant wages and rising inequality are, as the economic analysts Daniel Alpert, Robert Hockett, and Nouriel Roubini recently argued in their study “The Way Forward,” a consequence of the integration of billions of low-wage workers into the global economy and increases in productivity stemming from the application of information technology to the manufacturing sector. These developments have pushed global capacity far higher than demand, exacting a heavy toll on workers in the high-wage economies of the industrialized West. The resulting dislocation and disaffection among Western electorates have been magnified by globalization’s intensification of transnational threats, such as international crime, terrorism, unwanted immigration, and environmental degradation. Adding to this nasty mix is the information revolution; the Internet and the profusion of mass media appear to be fueling ideological polarization more than they are cultivating deliberative debate.

Voters confronted with economic duress, social dislocation, and political division look to their elected representatives for help. But just as globalization is stimulating this pressing demand for responsive governance, it is also ensuring that its provision is in desperately short supply. For three main reasons, governments in the industrialized West have entered a period of pronounced ineffectiveness.

First, globalization has made many of the traditional policy tools used by liberal democracies much blunter instruments. Washington has regularly turned to fiscal and monetary policy to modulate economic performance. But in the midst of global competition and unprecedented debt, the U.S. economy seems all but immune to injections of stimulus spending or the Federal Reserve’s latest moves on interest rates. The scope and speed of commercial and financial flows mean that decisions and developments elsewhere -- Beijing’s intransigence on the value of the yuan, Europe’s sluggish response to its financial crisis, the actions of investors and ratings agencies, an increase in the quality of Hyundai’s latest models -- outweigh decisions taken in Washington. Europe’s democracies long relied on monetary policy to adjust to fluctuations in national economic performance. But they gave up that option when they joined the eurozone. Japan over the last two decades has tried one stimulus strategy after another, but to no avail. In a globalized world, democracies simply have less control over outcomes than they used to.

I like Kupchan, but he errs badly here:

In the United States, partisan confron­t­ation is paralyzing the political system. The underlying cause is the poor state of the U.S. economy. Since 2008, many Americans have lost their houses, jobs, and retirement savings. And these setbacks come on the heels of back-to-back decades of stagnation in middle-class wages. Over the past ten years, the average household income in the United States has fallen by over ten percent. In the meantime, income inequality has been steadily rising, making the United States the most unequal country in the industrialized world. The primary source of the declining fortunes of the American worker is global competition; jobs have been heading overseas. In addition, many of the most competitive companies in the digital economy do not have long coattails. Facebook’s estimated value is around $70 billion, and it employs roughly 2,000 workers; compare this with General Motors, which is valued at $35 billion and has 77,000 employees in the United States and 208,000 worldwide. The wealth of the United States’ cutting-edge companies is not trickling down to the middle class.

These harsh economic realities are helping revive ideological and partisan cleavages long muted by the nation’s rising economic fortunes. During the decades after World War II, a broadly shared prosperity pulled Democrats and Republicans toward the political center. But today, Capitol Hill is largely devoid of both centrists and bipartisanship; Democrats campaign for more stimulus, relief for the unemployed, and taxes on the rich, whereas Republicans clamor for radical cuts in the size and cost of government. Expediting the hollowing out of the center are partisan redistricting, a media environment that provokes more than it informs, and a broken campaign finance system that has been captured by special interests.

The resulting polarization is tying the country in knots. President Barack Obama realized as much, which is why he entered office promising to be a “postpartisan” president. But the failure of Obama’s best efforts to revive the economy and restore bipartisan cooperation has exposed the systemic nature of the nation’s economic and political dysfunction. His $787 billion stimulus package, passed without the support of a single House Republican, was unable to resuscitate an economy plagued by debt, a deficit of middle-class jobs, and the global slowdown. Since the Republicans gained control of the House in 2010, partisan confrontation has stood in the way of progress on nearly every issue. Bills to promote economic growth either fail to pass or are so watered down that they have little impact. Immigration reform and legislation to curb global warming are not even on the table.

Ineffective governance, combined with daily doses of partisan bile, has pushed public approval of Congress to historic lows. Spreading frustration has spawned the Occupy Wall Street movement -- the first sustained bout of public protests since the Vietnam War. The electorate’s discontent only deepens the challenges of governance, as vulnerable politicians cater to the narrow interests of the party base and the nation’s political system loses what little wind it has in its sails.

Kupchan relies less on his globalization variable in the American case than he does on rising inequality and partisanship. And you'd have to code "protests" by leftward or rightward orientation for Occupy Wall Street to be "the first sustained bout of public protests since the Vietnam War." Actually, by that logic it was the tea parties that were the first sustained protests since Vietnam, but if you code "public protests" only as left-wing, one can forget about the tea parties --- a protest movement that dominated all of 2009 and is widely considered to have formed the grassroots constituency driving the GOP to the House majority in the 2010 elections.

Beyond that, I agree there's a crisis of governability in the industrial democracies. I just don't think Kupchan's focusing on the most important causes. The unsustainability of the European social welfare state model is probably a more important factor in the political turmoil in Europe in 2011. Globalization is important as well, no doubt, but the EU nations can only blame themselves for digging the kinds of debt holes in which they found themselves unable to climb out. Kupchan just barely touches on this, and he blames the economic crisis more so than the ultimately flawed social welfare commitments. Governments like Greece and Italy fell not just from economic and social crisis but because leaders lacked independence from EU institutions, which have enforced continued commitments to a continental bargain whose fundamental failures are finally being revealed.

And for the wider systemic challenge facing the Western democracies, Kupchan suggests more statism and accommodation to globalization --- the same variable he posits as the number one factor causing the decline of industrial competitiveness and economic dynamism. In other words, Kupchan's recycling failed theories of a sort of globalist Keynesian bargain: "state-led investment" in the domestic economies and "progressive populism" in the political systems of these states. It sounds fancy. But that's the kind of thing that got these nations into trouble in the first place.

Ranger Margaret Anderson Fatally Shot at Mount Rainier National Park

She was just 34 year-old.

At Los Angeles Times, "Ranger fatally shot in Mt. Rainier National Park."

Eyewitnesses Report Snipers Killing Protesters in Syria

At Telegraph UK, "Arab League monitor: I saw snipers with my own eyes."

Also, "Syrian activists dying to tell their story", and "Arab League's own parliament calls for end of Syrian peace mission."

Kyra Sedgwick Looks Smokin' Hot in Bikini in Hawaii

And Kevin Bacon looks great as well.

Good for them.

At London's Daily Mail, "The couple that work out together... Kevin Bacon, 53, and Kyra Sedgwick, 46, flaunt their super toned bodies on beach vacation."

Will the Animosity Against Israelis Ever End?

An excellent essay, from Professor Michael Curtis, at American Thinker:

The principle [of universal jurisdiction] seems eminently reasonable on the premise that such crimes are so serious that they should be prosecuted everywhere. It provided the rationale for the trial of Adolf Eichmann in Jerusalem in 1962. The Israeli court held that the crimes committed by Eichmann, one of the major Nazi figures responsible for the Holocaust, not only bore an international character but also that their widespread harmful effects shook the international community to its very foundation.  It held that the state of Israel was therefore entitled to try and to punish him.

The principle seems equally reasonable as embodying the rule of law that perpetrators of serious violations of human rights should not use foreign countries as a haven to escape punishment. Thus, international tribunals, since the Nuremberg trials, have examined actions by individuals in the former Yugoslavia in 1993 and Rwanda in 1994. The Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, 1999, declared that the most serious crimes of concern to the international community as a whole must not go unpunished. Effective prosecution would be ensured by action at the national level and by enhancing international cooperation.

Desirable though the use of the principle has been on some occasions, the essential problem is that it has also been abused for political purposes. The chief targets have been Israelis. In 2003, Ariel Sharon, Israeli minister of defense during the civil war in Lebanon when Christian Maronites killed 800 Palestinians in a camp in Beirut, was accused of war crimes in a court in Brussels. Two Israeli military figures, Doron Almog in September 2005 and Moshe Ya'alon in October 2009, could not visit Britain for fear of being charged with war crimes.  In September 2009, an arrest of Ehud Barak, then defense minister, was only prevented in Britain because the British Foreign Office said he had diplomatic immunity. Several other Israeli generals or former generals have decided not to visit European countries because of the fear of being arrested for war crimes. Among them were General Yohannan Locker, military secretary to prime minister Netanyahu, and General Aviv Kochavi, head of Israel's Intelligence Corps.  While some attempts have also been made to issue warrants against other individuals such as Henry Kissinger and Bo Xilai, Chinese trade minister, most warrants have been against Israelis.

Center for American Progress Accused of Anti-Semitism

Well, there's a surprise for you!

At Big Government, "Democrats’ ‘Brain Trust’ Hit by Antisemitism Accusations." And following the links there leads to the Jerusalem Post, "NGOs slam ‘anti-Semitic’ US think tank comments."

And see earlier, at Legal Insurrection, "Intolerant anti-Israel left still not tolerant."

Colorblind Racism?

Hey, getting 2012 off to a great upside-down start.

At Psychology Today, "Colorblind Ideology is a Form of Racism":

Racial issues are often uncomfortable to discuss and rife with stress and controversy. Many ideas have been advanced to address this sore spot in the American psyche. Currently, the most pervasive approach is known as colorblindness. Colorblindness is the racial ideology that posits the best way to end discrimination is by treating individuals as equally as possible, without regard to race, culture, or ethnicity.

At its face value, colorblindness seems like a good thing — really taking MLK seriously on his call to judge people on the content of their character rather than the color of their skin. It focuses on commonalities between people, such as their shared humanity.

However, colorblindness alone is not sufficient to heal racial wounds on a national or personal level. It is only a half-measure that in the end operates as a form of racism.

Nah.

For some reason I think MLK wouldn't be down with that.

I like this one better: "The way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race."

New Year's Day Rule 5 Extra

Well, give it up for William Teach and his smokin' Happy New Year's post, "If All You See…is another year of mankind polluting the world with CO2, destroying the Mother Gaia, you might just be a Warmist."

And more great blogging at Astute Bloggers, "2012'S FIRST GUARANTEED NOT HALAL: ASDIS RAN." And at Eye of Polyphemus, "Top 5 of 2011 #1 - Kaley Cuoco."

Earlier from Rio Norte Line, "Rule 5 – My Favorite Bond Girls – Denise Richards." And El Opinador Compulsivo, "Proof of God's Existence: Selma Hayek."

Plus some holiday leftovers from Teresamerica, "Midweek Rule 5 - Santa Babes and more..." Yum! Also at Bob Belvedere's "Rule 5 Christmas Countdown: 23 December 2011 A.D."

Plus, at Guns and Bikinis, "Russian Babe," and at Theo's, "Bedtime Totty..."

BONUS: At Randy's Roundtable, "Rule 5 Top 5." And from Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World, "Friday Night Pinup."

Israeli Defense Forces: 2011 Year in Review

From the IDF:

Arson Hunt Intensifies in Los Angeles

At Los Angeles Times, "LAPD: Keep lights on tonight as arson hunt intensifies," and "LAPD wants to question man in arson fires probe." The suspect can be seen at this video clip.

There's more at the New York Times as well, "Cars Set on Fire, and Los Angeles Set on Edge."

UPDATE: From the Los Angeles Times, "Photos show 'person of interest' in Los Angeles fires."

Occupy Wall Street: Jew-Hating Anti-American Recap 2011

A killer video:

Plus, at New York Post, "Columbia offers ‘Occupy 101’," and Weasel Zippers, "Virginia Elementary School Indoctrinating Third-Graders With Occupy Sing-Along: “They Want More Money, They’re The 1%. . . I’m Happy To Be Part Of The 99%”…"

And at New York Times, "Surging Back Into Zuccotti Park, Protesters Are Cleared by Police," and Gateway Pundit, "Obama-Endorsed #Occupy Criminals Start Off New Year By Stabbing Cop."

More from Marathon Pundit, "Occupy Occtrocities: New Year's Day Edition."

See also JammieWearingFool, "Police Clear Out Honolulu Obamaville, Protesters Now Occupying the Sidewalk," and "Occupy Oakland Now Sitting in Trees or Something."

PREVIOUSLY: "Hate-Blogger Walter James Casper III and Progressive Evil: Denial of Israel-Hatred Enables Exterminationist Anti-Semitism."

BONUS: At Blazing Cat Fur, "Mark Steyn: Puncture the cocoon of denial."

Focus on Electability as Caucuses Near

At New York Times, "In Final Days in Iowa, Focus on Who Can Defeat Obama":

DES MOINES — Rick Santorum and Ron Paul defended themselves on Sunday against claims that they could not win in November as a new poll suggested that they were now the primary threat to Mitt Romney for the Republican presidential nomination, with two days left before the Iowa caucuses.

Appearing on several Sunday news programs, Mr. Paul waved aside the findings of a poll by The Des Moines Register that suggested nearly a third of Iowa voters believed he would be the least able of the candidates to defeat President Obama.

“Maybe it’s not true,” Mr. Paul, a congressman from Texas, said on CNN’s “State of the Union” program. “I’ve been pretty electable. I was elected 12 times once people got to know me in my own Congressional district. So I think that might be more propaganda than anything else.”

On the CBS News program “Face the Nation,” Mr. Paul’s son, Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky, criticized Mr. Santorum as a “big-government type of moderate” who will not fare well as people learn more about his record.

“A lot of people don’t know that because he hasn’t surged to the top yet, so he hasn’t had much scrutiny,” Senator Paul said. “When he has the scrutiny, I think he’s going to have some of the same problems that some of the other fair-weather conservatives have had.”

Mr. Santorum, whose support tripled in the latest Register poll, predicted that his campaign would emerge from Iowa with “a big jump” because voters wanted someone who could defeat the president in the fall.

“The people of Iowa, the more they look, the more they are going to see the person who is exactly the right person,” Mr. Santorum said on the NBC News program “Meet the Press.” He said that if he could finish higher in caucuses than Representative Michele Bachmann of Minnesota and Gov. Rick Perry of Texas, “we’d be in good shape, and we’re moving towards that right now.”

Candidates Reach the Finish Line in Iowa

At Des Moines Register, "Romney leads Paul in new Des Moines Register Iowa Poll; Santorum surges." (At Memeorandum.)

And at The Other McCain, "SANTORUM SURGE SUNDAY: Final Poll Makes Front-Page News in Des Moines."

Blogging in 2012

I will mark six years of blogging in April 2012. I have to laugh a little when I check out some of my earliest efforts. I'm a much better blogger now, but I'm motivated by the same concerns that got me started. Here's something I wrote at my very first blog post:

No other single topic or object of analysis in my entire career as a political scientist has worried me as has contemporary anti-Americanism. I have learned about the complex nature of the radical left in this country, and its ties to, for example, transnational movements to deligitimize the nation-state and the principle of national sovereignty, the world's anti-globalization forces, and pro-Palestian organizations bent on the destruction of Israel.

It was the radical left's treasonous attacks on the war in Iraq that first got me to writing. I started American Power in October of 2007 when I finally pinned down my central ideological orientation: I'm neoconservative, but by now more reflective of that persuasion and more sophisticated in its elucidation. Unlike some who're characterized as "national greatness" types (or ridiculed that way, in fact), I'm animated by the tea party movement and my goals aren't so much as to radically shrink government but as to promote a politics of balanced budgets, entitlement reform, and continued support for a robust defense --- a "constitutional conservatism." These goals can't be achieved with the Democrats in power, obviously. And while we may get Mitt Romney as the GOP nominee, any of the mainstream Republicans would be an enormous improvement over the current administration. (Ron Paul is not mainstream and I'd abstain next November rather that vote for him if he somehow secured the nomination.)

I'll also continue to shine a spotlight on the global neo-communist left. I've learned a lot about the left over this past six years --- indeed, I'm a changed man. Probably the strangest thing to me is what I frequently refer to as our upside down politics of moral bankruptcy at home and abroad. This is one reason why my support for Israel will continue more consistently than ever before. Progressives hold Israel in the cross-hairs for death as an independent state. And when called out on it they'll spew the most vicious historical lies --- the kind of lies that would make the Nazis proud. Support for Israel rests at the center of the defense of Western civilization. I often remind myself that Israel defends itself just fine and that the Jewish state is not going out of business any time soon. And that's true. But Israel's enemies are working harder than ever before to push the Jews to the sea and this administration is doing its damnedest to bring about that reality. This situation brings even some of our most stalwart defenders of decency in the world to despair that we've crossed a threshold of appeasement and social decay, and this failure threatens the peace and stability of the West.

I'm not personally pessimistic about the survival of right and decency in the United States. But things will depend on winning the upcoming election and driving the Democrats from power. As I've noted many times, today's Democrat Party is no longer the party of Truman and Kennedy. It's a progressive-socialist party that touts nearly 100 Castroite members in Congress. And the political culture is increasingly infected with the cancer of progressivism and political correctness. It will take a lot to turn back the tide against these freaks, but the new social media --- and the Democats' overreach itself --- is empowering new armies of the righteous to take this country back.

And on a personal level, 2011 was a considerable challenge as a blogger. I beat back not one but two attacks that might have broken lesser writers. First were the attacks at my workplace by Scott Eric Kaufman and Carl Salonen. There is nothing more despicable than the kind of lies mounted by progressive demons as this. It's shocking, really, the extent that people will go to destroy their political enemies. But I rest soundly every day knowing that it's the truth that sustains me and that progressives can't take me down no matter how hard they try. And believe me, they try and will continue to try because the left does not tolerate deviations from the accepted narrative, especially from a political scientist working from behind the lines of academic totalitarianism. I drive the left f-king crazy. And I don't plan on stopping any time soon. The second challenge was the damned Righthaven lawsuit, which I beat by simply refusing to capitulate to those assholes. As I said at the time, it was scary as hell being served, but Righthaven is a bully and a troll and they're going down in a gloriously epic defeat.

So, thanks to all my readers. I have a few core readers and supporters who've become my friends, and I have a large number of readers and linkers among fellow conservative bloggers. And I continue to hear from new readers from time to time with words of good cheer and support. It all sustains me and I'll be plugging away throughout 2012.

Happy New Year!

New York's Times Square Rings In the New Year!

I watched Dick Clark's New Year's Rockin' Eve with Ryan Seacrest at Times Square.

Check out this huge photo-report at London's Daily Mail, "America welcomes 2012! One million revellers party night away in Times Square as world celebrates new year in spectacular style."

RELATED: At New York Times, "The Year Ahead (We Expect)."

EXTRA: At Telegraph UK, "Britain celebrates New Year 2012," and Sydney Morning Herald, "A new dawn, a new year and a time to dream (big or small)."

Russell Brand Wanted Katy Perry to Settle Down

At Mirror UK, "Russell Brand wants to divorce Katy Perry over her partying and because he wants kids."

Also at London's Daily Mail, "Russell Brand and Katy Perry split after 'she put fame ahead of children'."

Bachmann Calls 'Occupy' Protesters 'Obama's Advance Team'

You gotta love Bachmann.

At MSNBC:

URBANDALE, Iowa – During remarks to supporters inside her campaign headquarters Saturday, Michele Bachmann linked President Barack Obama to a large protest that had been unfolding outside the building only minutes before.

"You may have seen all over Des Moines the Barack Obama re-election advance team is already out there in the various parking lots of all of the campaigns," Bachmann told about 70 volunteers.

"This tells you that he is nervous," she continued.  "He doesn't want me on the stage. I want you to know, I'm not nervous. I'm fearless."

The rhetoric signifies a heightened effort to paint Obama as out of touch, something the campaign acknowledges is an element of Bachmann's closing argument to voters three days before the Jan. 3 caucuses.

And more coverage at Robert Stacy McCain's, "‘Occupy’ Protesters at Bachmann HQ: Proof That Gardasil Causes Retardation?"

Iran Films U.S. Aircraft Carrier

At Telegraph UK, "Strait of Hormuz standoff: Iran films US aircraft carrier."

Iran claimed to have taken surveillance footage of a US aircraft carrier near the Strait of Hormuz as both countries raised the stakes in their standoff over the key oil route.

The commander of Iran's navy said the reconnaissance mission was proof that his fleet had "control over the moves by foreign forces" but it was unclear what intelligence could be derived from the grainy video, which was played triumphantly on state television.

Admiral Habibollah Sayyari's statement came as Iranian ships, helicopters and submarines continued a 10-day war game exercise designed to give credibility to the country's threat to close the Strait and choke off the world's oil supplies if the West moves ahead with sanctions.

The drill is underway in international waters near the Strait and only a few hundred miles from America's Bahrain-based Fifth Fleet. The US Navy has vowed to prevent any closure of the channel, through which 15 million barrels of oil pass every day.

Also at Washington Post, "Iranian commander backs away from threat to close Strait of Hormuz, strategic oil route."

Margaret Thatcher and the Jews

From Charles C. Johnson, at The Tablet, "Thatcher and the Jews":

When asked about her most meaningful accomplishment, Margaret Thatcher, now embodied by Meryl Streep in the biopic Iron Lady, did not typically mention serving in the British government, defeating the Argentine invasion of the Falkans, taming runaway inflation, or toppling the Soviet Union. The woman who reshaped British politics and served as prime minister from 1979 to 1990 often said that her greatest accomplishment was helping save a young Austrian girl from the Nazis.

In 1938, Edith Muhlbauer, a 17-year-old Jewish girl, wrote to Muriel Roberts, Edith’s pen pal and the future prime minister’s older sister, asking if the Roberts family might help her escape Hitler’s Austria. The Nazis had begun rounding up the first of Vienna’s Jews after the Anschluss, and Edith and her family worried she might be next. Alfred Roberts, Margaret and Muriel’s father, was a small-town grocer; the family had neither the time nor the money to take Edith in. So Margaret, then 12, and Muriel, 17, set about raising funds and persuading the local Rotary club to help.

Edith stayed with more than a dozen Rotary families, including the Robertses, for the next two years, until she could move to join relatives in South America. Edith bunked in Margaret’s room, and she left an impression. “She was 17, tall, beautiful, evidently from a well-to-do family,” Thatcher later wrote in her memoir. But most important, “[s]he told us what it was like to live as a Jew under an anti-Semitic regime. One thing Edith reported particularly stuck in my mind: The Jews, she said, were being made to scrub the streets.” For Thatcher, who believed in meaningful work, this was as much a waste as it was an outrage. Had the Roberts family not intervened, Edith recalled years later, “I would have stayed in Vienna and they would have killed me.” Thatcher never forgot the lesson: “Never hesitate to do whatever you can, for you may save a life,” she told audiences in 1995 after Edith had been located, alive and well, in Brazil.

Continue reading.

Israel 2012!

Via Theo Spark:

Happy New Year From Victoria's Secret Angels

Well, the first post of the year, in style:

And see also Bob Belvedere, "Rule 5 Saturday," and The Daley Gator, "DaleyGator DaleyBabe Only one woman is beautiful enough to celebrate 1,000,000 hits!."

And more at American Perspective, "Alessandra Ambrosio - Rule 5," and Maggie's Notebook, "Rule 5 Saturday Night: Yesica Toscanini."

Plus, at Proof Positive, "Friday Night Babe: Melissa Adams!", and at Randy's Rountable, "Thursday Nite Tart: Heather Jo Hughes."

And even more at Reaganite, "Miss Albania 2011 is Xhesika Berberi."

BONUS: At Guns and Bikinis, "Swedish Babes, " and Theo Spark, "Saturday Totties..."

EXTRA: At Pirate's Cove, "If All You See...is a world flooded because government wouldn’t take action on (other) people, you might just be a Warmist."

Police, Firefighters Brace for Arson on New Year's Eve

At Los Angeles Times, "Police brace for more L.A. arson fires on New Year's Eve," and "L.A. Fire Department asks public's help to crack arson rampage."

And CNN has a report: "35 Southern California fires rock cities."

These are really horrendous, vicious attacks. The arsonists are torching cars as the "matchsticks" to set buildings ablaze. I'll be watching this story into the evening.

UPDATE: This could be the beginning of a new rash of arsons, "Firefighters respond to carport fire in Hollywood." And there's a report at the New York Times, "For Second Night, Vehicles Are Set Ablaze in Los Angeles Area."

10:35pm: At LAT, "Hundreds of police, firefighters battle renewed L.A. arson."

Leftists May Boost Ron Paul in Iowa

Well, no surprise there. Ron Paul's a progressive.

At Los Angeles Times, "Iowa's GOP caucuses may see some Democratic defectors":

 Adding an unpredictable element to the presidential contest in Iowa, some disaffected Democratic voters are planning to switch sides and cast Republican ballots in Tuesday's caucuses.

Caucus rules limit participation to registered party members. But anyone who shows up at a Republican caucus — including Democrats, independents and libertarians — can join the GOP or switch their party affiliation on the spot.

Rep. Ron Paul, in a tight race for first place in Iowa with Mitt Romney, is perhaps the most likely to benefit from Democratic crossovers. His campaign is distributing information sheets advising Iowans that they can register Republican "for a day" on caucus night, then switch their registration back afterward if they want.

"It's easy. You can register on your way in the door," David Fischer, co-chairman of Paul's Iowa organization, told voters Thursday at a campaign stop in Atlantic.

Yeah, and a few Iowa occupiers might go out and caucus for Ron Paul.

Freakin' losers.

Hate-Blogger Walter James Casper III and Progressive Evil: Denial of Israel-Hatred Enables Exterminationist Anti-Semitism

Okay, here's a year-end review on my deranged stalker, racist hate-blogger Walter James Casper III --- with a special focus on Repsac3's endorsement of elminationist Jew-hatred and anti-Israel demonization. I've been spotlighting Casper's support for Occupy Wall Street as a window to pure evil and diabolical opposition to truth and justice in the world. Casper is the epitome of hate-addled progressive ideology, where up is down and wrong is right. And I know the coverage on this has been a bit much, and I apologize, but it's important to expose the program of someone who has made it his life's goal to destroy his ideological opponents. And it's especially important to expose the deception, for racist Walter James Casper is most dangerous in his campaign of lies and subversion.

Racist Walter James Casper III has written a series of whiny butthurt posts weaselly attempting to deny his endorsement of the hate. Recall, of course, the fact that Walter James Casper endorsed Occupy Wall Street in a Twitter exhortation, "Occupy wherever you are."

Yet as we all know, the evidence of Occupy Wall Street's hatred of Israel and the Jews is everywhere. Jonathan Neumann wrote a devastating indictment at Commentary, which left racist Walter James Casper in a fit of apoplexy and rage. See: "Occupy Wall Street and the Jews."

Readers can Google Casper's Jew-hating stalker blog at "American Nihilist." In response to being pinned down like an Nazi camp guard, Walter James Casper writes:

According to ... Donald Douglas, it's irrelevant that one has never spoken ill of Jewish people. All it takes to be a Jew-hating anti-Semite is to endorse a movement at which a few individuals -- either members of the general public, or in a few cases, longer term activists -- have said some pretty horrible things about Jews. Your own words and actions are not what matter; if one member of your group says or does something shameful, every member of your group is responsible for those shameful words or deeds.

I have to shake my head at this, for the denial here is by definition a clinical condition. But to reiterate, Walter James Casper is lying. To keep up a wicked facade holding that Occupy is some wonderful movement full of hope and beauty, racist Walter James Casper must spew lies about how it's just a "few individuals" who are fomenting hate. But truth is difficult to face when your whole ideological program is based on hatred, demonization, intimidation, and harassment. Towards the conclusion of his Commentary essay, after laying out example after example of vile Jew hatred within the Occupy program, Jonathan Neumann writes:

These do not begin to exhaust the extent or foulness of the sentiments toward Jews and Israel that emanated from the Occupy protests—sentiments so extreme as to compel even Michael Lerner, editor of the left-wing magazine Tikkun, to share his ‘‘distress at the hatred toward Israel and/or toward Jews’’ on display in Oakland.

Racist Walter James Casper cannot argue away the facts, so he denies them. This tendency is in fact a clinical pathology, as Dr. Pat Santy has indicated:

Denial can make otherwise intelligent individuals/groups/nations behave in a stupid or clueless manner, because they are too threatened by the Truth and are unable to process what is perfectly apparent to everyone. People who live in this Wonderful World go through their daily lives secure in the knowledge that their self-image is protected against any information, feelings, or awareness that might make them have to change their view of the world. Nothing--and I mean NOTHING--not facts, not observable behavior; not the use of reason or logic; or their own senses will make an individual in denial reevaluate that world view. All events will simply be reinterpreted to fit into the belief system of that world -- no matter how ridiculous, how distorted, or how psychotic that reinterpretation appears to others. Consistency, common sense, reality, and objective truth are unimportant and are easily discarded--as long as the world view remains intact.

It is, of course, "perfectly apparent to everyone" that Occupy Wall Street pushes a program predicated on hatred of Jews. And so for the epic hate merchant Walter James Caspser, he must distort reality to shoehorn into a deranged and hateful ideological belief system, progressivism.

Last night I posted on the comment boards from the Occupy Wall Street homepage: "Occupy Wall Street: 'F**k Israel'." As is often the case, the administrators post a disclaimer that such views are "not official" --- and one can see why. When your core constituency exhibits a fanatical hatred of Israel you'd want to post as many disclaimers as possible. But those who were on hand in Zuccotti documented the hate for all to see, and to deny this hate is to evince a clinical refusal to denounce evil. Here's Urban Infidel, who covered Occupy Wall Street on the ground in New York City:

I went back to Zucotti Square yesterday because David Crosby and Graham Nash were going to perform and since I had the afternoon free I figured I'd head down to check out the absurd scenery. I missed the show but found something else: the Left's total hatred of Israel and probably Jews. Now, it's never been a secret but to see it openly and unchecked on full display was disturbing.

And it should be disturbing. That kind of rampant hatred is unnatural. But Walter James Casper is down with it. He endorsed it and when called out he's twisted himself into pretzels of lies and distortions to avoid his responsibility.

Photo-journalist El Marco traveled to New York in November and published an epic report. Included is coverage of the progressive Jew hatred documented by Urban Infidel and so many others. Here's El Marco's description of what's going on at the picture below:

A gay, Jewish civil servant, on left, reacts in horror to the comments of this sign-carrying radical Israel-hating non-Jewish Jew. The man with the sign supports Hamas and other Jewicidal groups, and I also photographed him surrounded by muslim men and women who were delighted by his anti-Israel exhortations.

I can already hear racist Repsac's desperate bleats of denial. But the truth hurts. And we fight the left's lies because they facilitate extreminationism.

To continue, here's the statement from the Simon Wiesenthal Center, "The “Occupy Movement” Must Repudiate the Anti-Semites in Their Ranks":

With a big and sustained boost from the Media, the Occupy Wall Street Movement has gone global. Beyond Los Angeles’ sustained presence outside of City Hall, the anger and angst is being heard in over a hundred cities, with protesters as far away as Italy and Japan adding their disaffected voices.

Unfortunately, the hateful fringe of the Movement is now also coast-to-coast, though you might not know it from the mainstream media. Today’s hate propaganda from the New York protests has gone viral. This includes placards identifying “Wall Street Jews” as “Hitler’s Bankers,” and angry shouts of “Kill/Screw Google Jews.” According to anecdotal evidence, the conspiracy banter that the 9/11 attacks were a U.S. government and/or Israeli plot is also popular among some protestors....

For almost 200 years, blaming the world’s economic woes on the Rothschilds or Wall Street or Jewish bankers has been “the socialism of fools”—and mother’s milk of every demagogue from Hitler to Henry Ford to the Internet bloggers who still insist that Goldman Sachs’s secret Zionist high-command cunningly engineered the 2008 global financial collapse. Of course, toxic hate is not the motivator of most protestors, many of whom are suffering from orsincerely concerned about real economic hardship. Yet history shows the danger of lunatic fringe ideas spreading from the periphery to the center of a tumultuous movement. And it’s not just anti-Semitism. Americans on all sides of the economic/political divide should be concerned about a New York Magazine poll showing that 34 percent of protestors already consider the U.S. government as bad as Al Qaeda.

The Tea Party, when it emerged in 2009, also attracted its own extremist fringe, as a hyper-vigilant national media was correct to quickly expose. Some of the Tea Party fringe equated Obama with Hitler and claimed that the first African American president was a Manchurian candidate with a phony birth certificate. Yet the Tea Party Movement eventually produced grassroots leaders who denounced such nonsense and repeatedly disavowed racism and racists. Though not everyone was convinced by the Tea Party’s disavowals of prejudice, millions of decent Americans who weren’t bigots voted in the 2010 elections to support the complaints and goals of the movement.

The Occupy Wall Streeters and LA’s City Hall crowd have won accolades for marrying new social network technology to bohemian garb. Its pungent invocation of 1960s hippiedom—”God Forbid We Have Sex ‘N Smoke Pot. They Want Us to Grab Guns ‘N Go to War!”—also strikes a nostalgic chord among some grey-haired pinstripers. But street theater is no substitute for the serious work of building a mass movement that can really change society for the good. America’s “Occupy Crowd” crowd likes to compare itself to Tahrir Square and the Arab Spring Movement that toppled a geriatric dictator. Alas, that Movement has largely collapsed—as Egypt slides toward political chaos or Islamic dictatorship—in part because young Egyptian protesters never learned how to move beyond demonstrating and tweeting to become a constructive social force.

If the Occupy Wall Streeters really want their movement to achieve mainstream credibility and clout, they should begin by policing their own ranks. Organizing the public sanitation in their own encampments is a start, but social and political civility must also prevail. The Occupy Movement’s leaders in LA as well as New York need to disown the purveyors of hate within their ranks. They must pull the plug on the bigots amongst them who view the slogan of fighting the detested “1 percent of fat cats” as their opportunity to mainstream the hatred of Jews.

Unfortunately, it's doubtful we'll ever see "policing the ranks." We won't see Occupy "pull the plug on the bigots" because the bigots are running the show. Yid With Lid wrote a magisterial essay in October, "The Anti-Semitic/Anti-Israel Origins of Occupy Wall Street Are Ignored by the Media." Take a few minutes to read the whole thing. It's a crushing investigation of the essential organizing hatred of Occupy Wall Street, and the essay concludes:

Over the past month there have been many comparisons between the Tea Party and the Occupy Wall Street Movement. Here is one comparison that the Mainstream Media will not make. The MSM worked very hard to brand the Tea Party Movement as Racist, but it wasn't. They are working just as hard to ignore the blatant Antisemitism and libelous demonization of Israel coming out of the Occupy Wall Street protests, and they are.

It is not just a few nuts within the Occupy Wall Street Movement who are bashing Israel and Jews, it is the leadership and founders, yet our President and the rest of the Democratic Party are practically tripping over their underwear in a rush to embrace these haters.

Yes, they are tipping over backward not only to "embrace these haters," but to deny that the hate is central to the movement. Ben Shapiro also wrote on this. See "The Anti-Semites of Occupy Wall Street." Like the Wiesenthal Center, Shapiro acknowledges the fringe elements, but indicates how anti-Jewish hatred is the animating ideological orientation of the global left:

Europe is a leftist continent – of that there can be little doubt.  Yet anti-Semitism runs rampant through it.  Socialist Spain leads the way in anti-Semitic polling, but countries like France and Austria aren’t far behind.  Britain’s anti-Israel policy is cover for anti-Semitism; Germany’s post-World War II history of stamping out anti-Semitism is beginning to fade into the past.  Crimes against Jews are up across Europe.

In the United States, the left is just as anti-Semitic, if less violent.  Their anti-Zionist rhetoric is certainly a cover for anti-Semitism, since Zionism stands merely for the principle that Jews deserve a state.  The left has no problem with anyone else having a state – Palestinian, Kurd, Tibetan.  When it comes to the Jews, however, they find it respectable to reject out of hand their right to a self-governing homeland.  Opposing specific policies of the Israeli government is not anti-Semitic.  Opposing Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state is.

The focus on Zionism at the OWS rallies is odd, to say the least.  Why should a foreign state located some 5700 miles from New York have any part in the discussion about America’s economy?  The answer is simple at root: the hard left still buys into the discredited notions of The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, in which Jews supposedly plotted the takeover of the world economy.  Zionism, in this twisted vision, is the wellspring of that control – Jerusalem is supposedly the capital of the Jew/banker conspiracy.  That sick notion pervades the rhetoric of the OWS rallies.  Says one OWS rallier in Los Angeles, “I think the Zionist Jews who are running these big banks and our Federal Reserve … need to be run out of this country.”  Says another in Chicago, “Israel is beginning to be seen as the criminal pariah state that it is.”

This nasty thought pattern unites both the nationalist and the internationalist hard left.  The nationalist hard left – i.e. neo-Nazis and white supremacist groups, as well as many nationalist groups in Europe – see Israel as a façade for a globalist Jewish regime seeking to bring “blood-sucking” capitalism to prominence.  The internationalist hard left – i.e. OWS and its ilk – see Israel as the last vestige of discredited nationalism, and Wall Street as its colonialist branch in the United States.

If OWS wants to be taken seriously as a movement, its members need to root out the anti-Semitism from their midst.  Then again, that rooting out process may not be possible because of how close the cancer of anti-Semitism is to the heart of the movement.  If that is the case, every responsible politician has the responsibility to disassociate from OWS.  Somehow, in the case of the Obama administration, that seems unlikely, no matter how outrageous the Jew-hatred gets at OWS.

I have highlighted in bold italics that key line just above. Anti-Semitism is at the "heart of the movement."

Occupy Wall Street has pledged for 2012 an "American Spring" to bring about a revolution in the United States. It goes without saying that the "cancer of anti-Semitism" that is at "the heart of the movement" will be everywhere in evidence as the next round of protests kick off.

So, I'll close with a link to Phyllis Chesler, "An Open Letter to the 'Good Liberal' Who Ignored Occupy Wall Street's Jew Hatred." Chesler is discussing how global Jew-hatred consitutues a threat to Western civilization. And she places Occupy Wall Street smack dab, front and center, at the forefront of that program of exterminationism.

And how will Walter James Casper respond?

He'll attack Phyllis Chesler as a "bigot". He'll attack her for making "generalizations" that amount to "bigotry.' Walter James Casper will attack Ben Shapiro as a "bigot" for pointing out that Jew-hatred is the heart of Occupy Wall Street. Walter James Casper will attack Rabbi Abraham Cooper and Dr. Harold Brackman of the Simon Wiesenthal Center as "bigots" for calling out Occupy Wall Street for its toxic anti-Jewish propaganda and hatred. Walter James Casper will attack Yid With Lid as a "bigot" for exposing the top leadership of Occupy Wall Street as a raving band of Jew-hating extremists. Walter James Casper will demonize El Marco and the Urban Infidel as "bigots" for their first hand reporting on the hate at Zuccotti Park. Walter James Casper will attack Dr. Pat Santy as a "bigoted" hack for highlighting the progressive pathology of hate-based ideological denialism. And Walter James Casper will attack Jonathan Neumann of Commentary as a "bigot" for writing an essay document a nationwide movement based on eliminationist anti-Semitism.

That's right.

Walter James Casper has written an entire post attacking people for highlighting the hate. Racist Repsac3 claims, for example, "As I've said before, these kind of sweeping generalizations about whole groups of people are what lead to stereotypes and bigotry." And he continues, "When one decides to believe -- and worse propagate ... the idea that seeing a statistically small number of _______ people acting a certain way means that MOST or ALL _______ people act that way, that's bigotry."

So, all of us speaking out against the hate are "bigots" It's not the Occupiers calling for the end of Israel who are "bigots." It's the people of good will, my friends and allies cited here at the post, who are the "bigots." So, see what I mean about up is down and wrong is right? Behold true evil. It's just plain evil. And I know, to repeat, it's astonishing that one can deny the hatred that's at base of an entire movement, and it's even more astonishing to attack people as "bigots" for bringing the truth to the light of day.

But I guess you have to see it to believe it. Folks can Google Walter James Casper's hate blog "American Nihilist." I'm not linking. I long ago stopped linking that vile hate dump and attack portal.

Again, my apologies for my extra attention on these matters. But it's warranted. Walter James Casper's blog is a key repository of progressive hate and it's a documented launchpad against good and decency in the world. I will continue to highlight the deeds of the criminal stalking hate-blogger Walter James Casper III. It needs to be done. And it will be done, for the good of decency and right.

FishBowlDC's Bizarre Obsession With Michelle Fields

Michelle Fields thanked me the other day for my review of her C-SPAN interview, and then FishBowl DC launched another attack on her, with some jibes for her supporters, including Yours Truly: "Another Day, Another Round of Sycophantic Love for Michelle Fields."

These people are not only freaks, but they don't understand the significance of new media. But see Dan Riehl's smackdown, "FishBowlDC’s Peter Ogburn’s Sexist Attacks On Michelle Fields."

Restore Our Future Attack Ads Harm Gingrich in Iowa

At New York Times, "Group’s Ads Rip at Gingrich as Romney Stands Clear":

DES MOINES — The attacks began three weeks ago and have not let up since: Television ad after television ad slamming Newt Gingrich for having “more baggage than the airlines,” for being fined by Congress for ethics violations, for his position on illegal immigration, even for admitting that he has made mistakes on the campaign trail.

Democrats and Republicans alike have singled out the $2.8 million-and-counting air deluge as the biggest factor in Mr. Gingrich’s precipitous drop in polls of Iowa voters and Mitt Romney’s corresponding rise, reshaping the critical first contest of the Republican primary season to Mr. Romney’s benefit.

The ads, which continue to blanket Iowa days before the caucuses here, were created and paid for by people with deep knowledge of the Romney campaign’s strategic thinking, close relationships with Mr. Romney’s most generous donors, and even research on what television viewers like and dislike most about Mr. Romney himself.

Yet neither Mr. Romney nor his staff has had to lift a finger or spend a dollar to make it happen. In a stark illustration of how last year’s landmark Supreme Court ruling on campaign finance has created powerful new channels for outside money to influence elections, the negative onslaught is the work of a group called Restore Our Future.

The most prominent of the “super PACs,” which can accept unlimited donations for purposes of supporting or attacking candidates, it operates independently of the Romney campaign but under the direction of former Romney aides who do not need to be told what the candidate needs.

Romney seems to really have the momentum. Ron Paul's still up in Iowa, but he won't go far after that. It's quite the opposite for Romney, of course. New Hampshire's voting January 10th and by that time some of the other candidates could be quitting the race.

Cal State University Okays Anti-Semitism

Bruce Kesler has published a piece at City Journal, "Cal State’s Chutzpah."

And here's the blog entry at Maggie's Farm, "Kesler in City Journal: Hypocritical CalState OKs Anti-Semitism."

Kesler hammers CSU's hypocrisy on Cal State Northridge Professor David Klein, a murderous anti-Israel eliminationist who maintains a hate site hosted on CSUN's server: "Boycott Israel Resource Page."

And here's Bruce at the essay:

Yet no one within the CSUN community has condemned Klein, and his webpage remains active—though it clearly violates university policies, which state that “use of computers, networks, and computing facilities for activities other than academic purposes or University business is not permitted.” The university also prohibits associating its name with boycotts and other politically motivated activity. CSUN further retains the right to remove “any defamatory, offensive, infringing, or illegal materials” from its website at any time.

RTWT.

I can guarantee you that if a conservative had done something like that and progressives complained, that web site would be down the memory hole faster than you can say Young & Hung.

Occupy Wall Street: 'F**k Israel'

A crushing follow-up to "Racist Walter James Casper III Doubles-Down on Endorsement of Revolutionary Anti-Semitic Occupy Wall Street."

Here's the Google link to search Occupy Wall Street's anti-Israel commentary. It turns out that some guy back in November posts "F**k Israel" at the OWS forums and it's still up, and he writes some sample hate commentary and concludes: "Now its been said, so trolls go away, OWS hates Israel and loves Palestine." And it's not like the admins don't delete threads. This anti-Semitic troofer post was taken down at the click through: "Forum Post: Dr. Alan Sabrosky: Israel behind 9/11 | OccupyWallSt.org."

I clicked over a dozen of those links and it's almost all vile anti-Jewish hatred, and that's the tip of the iceberg. These aren't some fringe kooks. This is the essential constituency of Occupy Wall Street. It's a movement of hate. I can hardly wait for "#Occupy AIPAC." They'll be all singing the Horst Wessel Song, for sure.

PREVIOUSLY: "Occupy Wall Street and the Jews."

Newt Gingrich Cries in Iowa

See Los Angeles Times, "Newt Gingrich tears up talking about his mother":

Reporting from Des Moines— With his presidential campaign drifting out of contention, Newt Gingrich veered from his typically brash, boastful personality on the campaign trail Friday, choking up in front of a group of moms when he recalled his mother, Kit, who died in 2003.

"I identify my mother with being happy, loving life, having a sense of joy in her friends," Gingrich said when moderator Frank Luntz asked him to recall a moment with his mom. At the end of her life, Gingrich said, his mother lived in a long-term care facility, which helped him understand and become interested in brain science.

He frequently tells voters here that he recently gave a lecture on brain science at the University of Iowa.

"She had bipolar disease and depression, and she gradually acquired some physical ailments, and that introduced me to the whole issue of quality long-term care … and that introduced me to the issue of Alzheimer's," said Gingrich, who chatted with the founder of a popular website for mothers at Java Joe's coffeehouse here.

See also, "Mitt Romney: 'I won't cry'."

Well, someone asked Romney if he was gonna cry, but see William Jacobson, "Hey, let’s make fun of Newt crying about his deceased mother." Also at Memeorandum.

Republicans Risk Throwing It All Away in 2012

I don't think so, but see The Economist, "The right Republican":

 IN JANUARY the battle to become the world’s most powerful person begins—with small groups of Iowans “caucusing” to choose a Republican nominee for the White House. It is a great opportunity for them. Barack Obama is clearly beatable. No president since Franklin Roosevelt has been re-elected with unemployment as high as it is now; Mr Obama’s approval rating, which tends to translate accurately into vote-share, is down in the mid-40s. Swing states like Florida, Ohio and even Pennsylvania look well within the Republicans’ grasp.

Yet recent polls show the president leading all his rivals: an average of two points ahead of Mitt Romney, eight points over Ron Paul and nine points over Newt Gingrich, according to RealClearPolitics.com. No doubt some rather flawed personalities play a part in that; but so does the notion that something has gone badly wrong with the party of Abraham Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt and Ronald Reagan. Rather than answering the call for a credible right-of-centre, pro-business party to provide independents, including this newspaper, with a choice in November, it is saddling its candidate with a set of ideas that are cranky, extreme and backward-looking.

That matters far beyond this election—and indeed America’s shores. Across the West nations are struggling to reform government. At their best the Republicans have combined a muscular foreign policy with sound economics, individualism and entrepreneurial pragmatism. It is in everybody’s interests that they become champions of such policies again. That is not impossible, but there is a lot of catching up to do.

I subscribed to The Economist when I was in graduate school. I always thought it was head and shoulders above the other newsweeklies. It's expensive, and I quit the magazine, but now I doubt I'd go back as a regular hard copy subscriber. The magazine's way more leftist than they used to be. But continue reading, in any case.

Brian Lilley: Occupy Wall Street 'Goal Was Always Socialism'

Sun TV's Brian Lilley corrects Jacqui Delaney, who repeats the initial criticism of #OWS as without a systematic program.

Lilley says, actually, "their goal was always socialism" (at about 2:50 minutes, via Blazing Cat Fur):

PREVIOUSLY: "Manifesto: Occupy for the Revolution."

Oops! Four Charged With Arson at Occupy Charlotte Flag Burning

Yeah, and one of those accused was the press spokesman for Occupy Charlotte:

CHARLOTTE, NC (WBTV) - Four protesters, including the spokesman of Occupy Charlotte, were charged after setting fire to two American flags early Friday near the Occupy camp in Center City, police said.

Charlotte-Mecklenburg police weren't sure earlier if the four men who set fire to two flags were associated with the Occupy Charlotte movement.

But, WBTV has learned that one of the men is the media spokesman for the Occupy group and has been the contact person listed on press releases from Occupy Charlotte.

These idiots basically destroyed their encampment. See: "Occupy Charlotte turmoil after 4 accused of burning U.S. flag." There's video at the link featuring an additional organizer, who's freakin' at the public relations nightmare. Because, you know, these four were no doubt just fringe transients who came out of nowhere.

#OccupyFail.

Also at Ironic Surrealism, "American Flag Burning #OccupyCharlotte Protesters Arrested For Arson."

PREVIOUSLY: "Oops! Las Vegas Occupy Hoists Palestinian Flag — Racist Water James Casper III Hardest Hit!"

Bare Naked Islam is Back Up

See Atlas Shrugs, "BARE NAKED ISLAM IS BACK ...FOR NOW," and Instapundit, "A WORDPRESS / BARENAKED ISLAM UPDATE..."

And at BNI, "Bare Naked Islam is back……sort of."

Plus, "Thanks, Meghan, the more you Muslim apologists trash LOWE’S, the more business they get from real Americans. Keep it up!"

Katrina vanden Heuvel is the added bonus. Oh, the horrible bigotry! (Scroll forward to 2:00 minutes.)

Radical Leftist Norman Lear Claims American Dream is 'Born Again' in Occupy Wall Street

I'd swear this guy's off his rocker, but he's a radical extremist, so no surprise.

At Los Angeles Times, "Norman Lear on fighting the good fight" (at Memeorandum):

I was recently shown a picture from one of the Occupy protests taking place across the country. It featured a young woman surrounded by police. She was the only protester in the picture, but she didn't seem intimidated. All by herself, up against the police barricade, she held a handwritten sign saying simply "I am a born again American."

I've never met this woman, but I think I know exactly what she's feeling.

I had my first "born again American" moment 30 years ago, when I was moved to outrage and action by a group of hate-preaching televangelists who were trying to claim sole ownership of patriotism, faith and flag for the far right. One of them asked his viewing congregation to pray for the removal of a Supreme Court justice.

I did what I knew how to do and produced a 60-second TV spot. It featured a factory worker whose family members, all Christians, held an array of political beliefs. He didn't believe that anyone, not even a minister, had a right to judge whether people were good or bad Christians based on their political views. "That's not the American way," he wound up saying. I ran it on local TV, and it was picked up by the networks. People For the American Way grew out of the overwhelming response to that ad.

One of the most encouraging things to happen in 2011 was the birth of the Occupy Wall Street movement, which is giving the entire country the chance for a "born again American" moment. In calling attention to the country's widening chasm between rich and poor, the Occupiers have unleashed decades of pent-up patriotic outrage against the systematic violation of our nation's core principles by the "say good-bye to the middle class" alliance of the neocons, theocons and corporate America.

Jeez, a true believer --- in an extremist anti-America, Jew-hating movement.

The New Editor comments on Lear's op-ed, indicating that, "Frankly, not much in Lear's piece is all that new or interesting, except perhaps for the continued hypocrisy and demagoguery."

Word.

And it turns out that Lear was the chief organizer for the pro-terror anti-war front group United For Peace and Justice, whose  former chairman was Leslie Cagan, "a committed communist who aligns her politics with those of the longtime Cuban dictator Fidel Castro."

Wow, what an awesome endorsement for Occupy Wall Street!

The guy's a freak and Occupy's an abomination.

PHOTO CREDIT: Wikimedia Commons.

Sixty-Three Years and Counting: Israeli Defense Forces Wish You a Happy New Year

I love this video.

Via Legal Insurrection, "New Year’s Greetings from the IDF."

I was joking to William at LI that the IDF video was also a Rule 5 for the gals and guys. And that reminded me that Dana Pico's launching a babe blogging initiative: "Our venture into Rule 5 blogging."

'Tis the Season to Be Jolly

LATMA.tv, via Atlas Shrugs, and it's a riot:

Michele Bachmann's Damage Control

Actually, I believe her. Her top staffer went for the payout, but with the way things are shaken out for her in Iowa, people had a lot of incentive to jump ship. And politicos lie about stuff, so what can you do?

At Washington Post, "Michele Bachmann's Campaign Flameout":

DES MOINES — The rise and fall of Rep. Michele Bachmann (Minn.) may well stand as an allegory of the most turbulent GOP presidential primary in memory, one whose latest turn has been bitter and bizarre.

With just days to go before the Iowa caucuses, where a poor finish would almost certainly mean the end of Bachmann’s presidential hopes, the candidate who only months ago led the field here is being all but counted out.

A CNN/Time poll released Wednesday showed her running last among the six serious contenders in Iowa, garnering support from only 9 percent of likely caucusgoers surveyed.

Her story line went from poignant to poisonous on Wednesday night. Bachmann’s own Iowa chairman, state Sen. Kent Sorenson — who just hours earlier had appeared with her at a campaign event — suddenly turned up onstage at a rally for Rep. Ron Paul (Tex.) and announced that he was ditching her.

She fired back with an accusation that Sorenson “personally told me he was offered a large sum of money to go to work for the Paul campaign.”

Then came another twist: Wes Enos, Bachmann’s political director, contradicted his candidate, saying in a statement that Sorenson’s switch “was in no way financially motivated.”

Sorenson issued a statement saying that he “was never offered money from the Ron Paul campaign or anyone associated with them and certainly would never accept any.”

That Bachmann’s once-promising endeavor should end up in such a surreal place speaks to the larger forces that have defined the primary contest.

More at that top link.

Also at Des Moines Register, "Bachmann reasserts that defector was paid."

And more at Memeorandum.

Girl Scouts Get Lesson in Media Bias

At Fox News:

And at Wizbang, "The co-opting of the Girl Scouts can now be considered complete."

Los Angeles Times Covers Organizing for America's 'Baloney' Map to Reelection

And they even quote campaign manager Jim Messina with the "bullsh*t" billion dollars line.

See: "Team Obama lays out electoral map strategy."

And click through for the video: "Obama for America Official Says 'Billion Dollar Campaign' is Baloney."

Mark Steyn Talks to Ambassador John Bolton on Hannity's Show

Via Blazing Cat Fur:

Occupy Wherever You Are! NYPD Arrests 50 Protesters Attempting to Seize Church Lot for New Encampment

The video's at the Occupy Wall Street page: "Take Back the Commons!"

And see The Blaze, "'Occupy Clergy' Lead Invasion of Church-Owned Land to Kick Off Re-Occupation."

Notice at both the video and at The Blaze, Occupy protesters are outfitted with Arafat-style keffiyehs, freakin' terrorist asshats.

It's all about "occupying wherever you are," at home and internationally. See: "Occupy Wall Street Embodies the Soul-Crushing Stagnation of the Status Quo." And: "Racist Walter James Casper III Doubles-Down on Endorsement of Revolutionary Anti-Semitic Occupy Wall Street."

Murderous bastards.

Third World Socialists Cheer Occupy Wall Street

There's more of that global communist solidarity we've been talkin' about.

At Weasel Zippers, "Occupy Wall Street Gets Big “Up Twinkles” From Third World Socialist Revolutionaries…"

PREVIOUSLY: "Occupy Wall Street Embodies the Soul-Crushing Stagnation of the Status Quo," and "Racist Walter James Casper III Doubles-Down on Endorsement of Revolutionary Anti-Semitic Occupy Wall Street."


PHOTO CREDIT: Looking at the Left, "Zuccotti Utopia: Portraits of The New Revolutionaries."