Tom Foley Fails The Voters Of Connecticut

Americans have a lot to be thankful for on this day.

On a macro level, the November elections halted this mad rush toward socialism (although there are rumblings about executive orders that could circumvent the will of the people).

We have to wonder how many more seats could have been won in Congress without fraud committed by ACORN wannabes and union operatives with the complicity of government officials? In a way, it's almost like an occupying army comes in and steals close elections. U.S. Department of Justice whistleblowers have testified that the agency won't enforce the section of the Voting Rights Act that requires states to remove deceased voters from the rolls or othewise lift a finger to combat ballot fraud.

For a technologically advanced, industrialized nation, the U.S. has incredibly lax registration and voting procedures that are ripe with fraud, including allowing illegal aliens to vote. One of the first orders of business for the new Congress should be to tighten procedures for voter registration and absentee ballots and to require photo ID in elections in all 50 states.

Back in September during primary season, Maryland resident Rory Cooper addressed this issue on NationalReviewOnline:

Maryland is one of 23 states that maintain the most minimal standards for voter identification, only requiring that you show ID (photo not required) when you register, and never again after that. This allows anyone who knows your full name and polling location to vote in your place with no recourse. ..

Liberals led by the ACLU, the League of Women Voters, and the NAACP contend that voter-ID requirements are designed to suppress minority and Democratic votes, but that has been proven wrong time and time again. ..

A Rasmussen poll in August 2010 found that a full 82 percent of Americans believe all voters should show photo ID before they are allowed to vote, representing a majority in every single demographic group. ..

In ruling after ruling, strict voter-ID laws have been found to be constitutional and not in violation of the Voting Rights Act. Yet that doesn’t stop liberal activist groups from spending countless court hours and taxpayer resources working towards an end goal that invites voter fraud. ..

The point here is not that people should be denied their right to vote. Quite the opposite: Legal and registered citizens should not be denied their right to have their votes fully count by illegal ballots cast mere feet away. ..

It’s time for all 50 states to have commonsense voter-ID laws that require photo identification every time you vote. It is the only way to protect the integrity and security of this sacred obligation for millions of legally registered Americans. Please, will someone check my ID?

Connecticut is fortunately on of those states in which photo ID is required. This didn't stop the Democrats from apparently stealing the governor's election in some shady activity in the city of Bridgeport, aided by an inept office of the secretary of the state. The events in Bridgeport were dirty and chaotic.

Lackluster candidate Tom Foley, who allegedly lost the election by some 6,000 votes out of about one million cast, had a solemn obligation to the voters to contest the election and get to the bottom of the vote fraud. Instead, after a few days of saber rattling, he threw in the towel, and let the voters down.

Jim Vicevich summarizes on RadioViceonline:

 So let’s see. In Bridgeport we have poll workers on tape mixing official ballots with sample ballots, voters allowed to vote who were not registered, registered voters receiving multiple ballots and what does Foley say? “So the election Tuesday, although very close, was a conclusive victory for Dan Malloy, and this result should not be questioned.” And how does Mr Foley know that the irregularities were not willfull?

...[Foely] was a rich guy looking for another title and clearly out for himself. A guy who wanted to play Governor, not be Governor. It was never about the people of this state, or the fiscal emergency facing Connecticut, it was about him, a throwback to the original elitist RINOs that we will continue to purge from the party.

Pajamas Media had a report of vote fraud in neighboring Massachusetts that was likely replicated throughout the country on November 2.

Addedendum: In the midst of all this outrage from liberals about "Tea Party" votes being responsible for Bristol Palin's ascendancy on Dancing With The Stars, the HillBuzz blog quips that Palin supporters were just doing what Democrats do in real elections!

The Reagan Diaries

We've been reading The Reagan Dairies, President Reagan's fascinating daily account of his eight years in office (the complete set will be released later). Reagan comes across a fundamentally decent, fully engaged statesman who always put his country first. As editor Douglas Brinkley explains, "his uncomplicated and humble notations are on display in these pages: genuine, thoughtful, and caring."

What also is evident in the entries is how the shamelessly slanted media tried to undermine his initiatives at every turn. For example, reflecting on the press conference afte the Tower Commission report on the Iran-Contra controversy was issued in February 1987, President Reagan notes that "Press obviously was seeking answers that would let them keep on their distortions and this lynch party."

A few interesting entries from 1983:

April 5:

I had an unsatisfactory meeting with Repub. Sens. on the budget committee. They are determined we must cut defense spending & increase domestic in order to get a budget passed. I'm opposed. We have rabbits where we need Tigers.

July 18:

Announced today in Florida that Henry Kissinger will be chairman of the Commission on Central Am. One of the press yelled a Q. at me that Sen. Dodd says commission is a ploy to get around Cong. I wonder really which side Dodd is on. He comes down against the U.S. on almost every issue.

July 24:

...Could almost forget too the block of Congressman who are determined to stop our aid to Central Am. & our own defense buildup. It's hard for me to believe this is just partisan politics. Whenever it is us versus the Soviets or Cubans they always come down on the wrong side.

In February 1982, the president talked about screening the film Inchon:

It is a brutal but gripping picture about the Korean War and for once we're the good guys and the Communists are the villains. The producer was Japanese or Korean which probably explains the preceding sentence.

NetFlix says the film was produced by the Moonies but we put it in our queue anyway.

Happy Constitution Day

Instant Classic: Susana Martinez Refutes Attack Ad

Chris Christie is not the only Republican politician on the opposite side from teacher's union bosses. Democrat operatives tried to smear Susana Martinez, the GOP's gubernatorial candidate in New Mexico, with false charges about education policy, but as you can see is this brilliant Martinez response, it completely backfired on them.

Another Chris Christie Video Goes Viral

Chris Christie, the New Jersey governor, is one of the few politicians who really represents the ordinary taxpayer for once. Millions of workers in the private sector (assuming they still have jobs) have had to kick in more and more for their health insurance benefits, while public sector pay and perks have gone through the roof. Christie asked the greedy teacher's union leadership to agree to make a small sacrifice to help with the huge state budget deficit and they basically went nuts. Here is Christie's latest encounter with a teacher:



Related stories:
America's Governor, Chris Christie
France's Government Employees: "Fonctionnaires" are Dysfunctional

The Department of Injustice

It wasn't enough to sue the state of Arizona for enforcing immigration law under SB 1070; the hyper-partisan U.S. Department of Justice has now filed what appears to be a suspiciously timed lawsuit against Sheriff Joe Arpaio, "America's Sheriff." The currently misnamed Justice Department is more interested in suing those who seek to uphold the law rather than protecting the American people. The pathetically politicized agency also won't lift a finger to prevent or prosecute vote fraud. The Power Line blog puts it in perspective:

In Washington, there are probably 10 or 20 faux "scandals" for every real scandal. One of the real scandals these days is the way in which Barack Obama and Eric Holder have politicized the Department of Justice. The Democrats criticized the Bush administration for politicizing DOJ, but that was sheer fabrication. It didn't happen. Immediately upon taking office, however, Obama and Holder embarked on a program of partisan law enforcement the likes of which this country may never have seen before.

And it gets worse:

Illegal immigrants who get pulled over by police for traffic-related offenses will be set free if a proposed change in Immigration and Customs Enforcement policy is approved. [Fox News]

Sgt. Joe Friday is having none of it:

News Executive Admits Massive Left-Wing Bias, Finally

It seems to be an article of faith among the mainstream (a.k.a dinosaur) media to never admit its palpable liberal bias. The stubborn tilt to the left is, in part, why many newspapers and magazines have reached the brink of bankruptcy and traditional news networks have seen their market share evaporate. ABC News just recently announced massive staff cutbacks, for example. It's also why Fox News, despite its real and/or imagined faults, has been a ratings juggernaut.

So this candor from the head of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is long overdue, although the admission may be an attempt to get on the good side of the Conservative coalition that is governing the U.K. under David Cameron. The BBC is funded by an annual license fee that is collected from every British household.

BBC Director General Mark Thompson has admitted the corporation was guilty of a 'massive' Left-wing bias in the past.

The TV chief also admitted there had been a 'struggle' to achieve impartiality and that staff were ' mystified' by the early years of Margaret Thatcher's government.

But he claimed there was now 'much less overt tribalism' among the current crop of young journalists, and said in recent times the corporation was a 'broader church'.

...But he said he was optimistic about a good settlement in forthcoming licence fee discussions with the Coalition. [DailyMail]

On this side of the pond in a related story, the Washington Examiner recently revealed some interesting information about the "massive" political donations of network news employees:

Senior executives, on-air personalities, producers, reporters, editors, writers and other self-identifying employees of ABC, CBS and NBC contributed more than $1 million to Democratic candidates and campaign committees in 2008, according to an analysis by The Examiner of data compiled by the Center for Responsive Politics.

The Democratic total of $1,020,816 was given by 1,160 employees of the three major broadcast television networks, with an average contribution of $880.

Something to think about when someone claims the three networks or even CNN plays it down the middle.

Why Isn't Anyone Asking About Palestinian Rights In Arab Countries?

As we have noted previously, the gullible media and the international community seems to be oblivious to the treatment of Palestinians in countries other than Israel. We know also that the premise that global terrorism will magically go away upon the implementation of a "two-state solution" is absurd. Yet, the shrill, irrational demands on Israel to make unilateral territorial and other concessions in the so-called "peace process" never ends. The dictatorships and thugocracies in the U.N. seem only concerned with make-believe human rights violations by the Jewish state, the only functioning Middle East democracy. The idea that global terrorism will magically go away upon the implementation of a "two-state solution"

In last August, the Wall Street Journal shed further light on this issue in connection with a recently enacted law in Lebanon granting limited rights to Palestinian refugees:

Last week, Lebanon's parliament amended a clause in a 1946 law that had been used to bar the 400,000 Palestinians living in the country from taking any but the most menial jobs. "I was born in Lebanon and I have never known Palestine," the AP quoted one 45-year-old Palestinian who works as a cab driver. "We want to live like Lebanese. We are human beings and we need civil rights."

The dirty little secret of the Arab world is that it has consistently treated Palestinians living in its midst with contempt and often violence. In 1970, Jordan expelled thousands of Palestinian militants after Yasser Arafat attempted a coup against King Hussein. In 1991, Kuwait expelled some 400,000 Palestinians working in the country as punishment for Arafat's support for Saddam Hussein in the first Gulf War.

For six decades, Palestinians have been forced by Arab governments to live in often squalid conditions so that they could serve as propaganda tools against Israel, even as millions of refugees elsewhere have been repatriated and absorbed by their host countries. This month's vote still falls short of giving Palestinian Lebanese the rights they deserve, including citizenship. But it's a reminder of the cynicism of so much Arab pro-Palestinian propaganda, and the credulity of those who fall for it.

Related postings:
The International Community and Terrorism: An Inconvenient Truth
Helen Thomas, Racist
Christmas in Bethlehem...But For How Much Longer?

Happy Labor Day

The Washington Post points out that Labor Day "honors the social and economic contributions that the American worker has made to the growth health and prosperity of the country." It also adds that the labor movement won much better working conditions for adults and children. Today, however, organized labor has become a utterly corrupt, job-killing ATM machine for the Democrats, particularly the public sector unions that use their political clout to bleed the taxpayer dry.

A Labor Day New York Post editorial explains these concerns about Big Labor:

But the holiday -- once meant to extol an honorable movement, affirm worker solidarity and celebrate gains won through collective bargaining -- is an ideal time to look at what has become of the labor movement in recent years.

Union-driven pensions, health-care programs, overtime and other work rules have nearly bankrupted industries (Detroit), threatened the fiscal integrity of state governments (California, New Jersey, New York) and wreaked havoc on entire nations (Greece).

...Meanwhile, public-employee pension costs strangle state and local budgets -- and when taxes go up to pay the bill, private-sector businesses fold or flee, taking jobs with them.

Happy Labor Day!

Obama Administration Tries Stealth Amnesty

The vast majority of Americans regardless of demographic group want the border secured and existing immigration laws enforced before considering any proposed reforms to the process. So in response, the administration is apparently going the way of backdoor amnesty for illegal aliens, those who are supposedly fit into the so-called "noncriminal" category, according to the Houston Chronicle:

The Department of Homeland Security is systematically reviewing thousands of pending immigration cases and moving to dismiss those filed against suspected illegal immigrants who have no serious criminal records, according to several sources familiar with the efforts. Culling the immigration court system dockets of noncriminals started in earnest in Houston about a month ago and has stunned local immigration attorneys, who have reported coming to court anticipating clients' deportations only to learn that the government was dismissing their cases.

Reflecting the feelings of the average American, the Heritage Foundation had this to say:

 Obama shows a pattern of refusing to enforce laws (or refusing to permit states like Arizona to enforce them).  When he dislikes our laws, Obama forces change by dictate rather than seeking legal change through the political process.  Congress gets bypassed. Those benefiting can claim a new category of legal immunity:  FBO’s–Favored By Obama. Selective enforcement is being taken to new extremes.  Furor would follow any straightforward official announcement that Obama is forgiving thousands from deportation, so the new amnesty policy is coming to light gradually, memo by memo and place by place.

In a related development, the Washington Post reports that the union representing ICE officers have issued a vote of no-confidence in ICE Director John Morton over his lackluster at best approach to enforcement.

Appeals Courts Issue Rulings on ACORN, Gay Marriage

Just when you lost all faith in the judicial system, two reasonable appeals court decisions surface. In the first, the Second Circuit upheld the ACORN funding ban:

A federal appeals court on Friday threw out a decision that had barred Congress from withholding funds from ACORN, the activist group driven to ruin by scandal and financial woes.

The ruling by the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals in Manhattan reversed a decision by a district court judge in Brooklyn that found Congress had violated the group's rights by punishing it without a trial.

Congress cut off ACORN's federal funding last year in response to allegations the group engaged in voter registration fraud and embezzlement and violated the tax-exempt status of some of its affiliates by engaging in partisan political activities. [AP]

Separately, the Ninth Circuit has put the trial court's Proposition 8 decision on hold while the appeal is pending. Even if you support same-sex marriage, courts often postpone enforcement of a ruling in high-profile cases during the appeal process. The Proposition 8 appeal is on a fast track, with arguments scheduled for December 6. There is also an issue of standing, i.e., which party has the legal right to appeal the judge's decision that overturned California's voter-approved same sex marriage ban:

But in what may become a crucial element in the case, the appeals court asked the ballot measure's lawyers to offer arguments on why they have the legal right to appeal when the state's top two officials, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and Attorney General Jerry Brown, refuse to defend the law and say it is unconstitutional. Gay rights lawyers and San Francisco city officials have argued in court papers that the Proposition 8 campaign does not have legal standing to appeal, and Walker himself questioned whether they do in his order last week. [Mercury News]

Meg Whitman, the Republican candidate, favors civil unions but not gay marriage. She also supported Proposition 8 but has yet to take a position on whether she would defend it as governor.

Union Fires Worker For In-House Unionizing

An amazing instance of bad faith, but apparently it's not the first time this has happened:

In a move of stunning hypocrisy, the United Federation of Teachers axed one of its longtime employees -- for trying to unionize the powerful labor organization's own workers, it was charged yesterday.

Jim Callaghan, a veteran writer for the teachers union, told The [New York] Post he was booted from his $100,000-a-year job just two months after he informed UFT President Michael Mulgrew that he was trying to unionize some of his co-workers. 

..."This is the exact antithesis of what they preach, and Michael Mulgrew is the biggest hypocrite out there," Callaghan fumed.

Meanwhile, Michelle Malkin has a great column about Craig Becker, the corrupt union lawyer installed as a recess appointment on the National Labor Relations Board.

Judicial Tyranny Coming Soon To A Court Near You

The U.S. is generally a live-and-let-live country in matters of personal behavior. No one really cares or should care what people do in their private lives (assuming no lawbreaking) as long as nobody is forced to do anything against their will. Knock yourself out, as long as no innocent person is harmed, is the prevailing ethos...as it should be.

Thwarting the will of the people when it comes to SB 1070 or other validly enacted laws, or seeking the imprimatur of the state for certain activities or lifestyles, is entirely different. Writing at RedState.com, Erick Erickson notes, among other things, that 39 states have already banned same-sex marriage

A majority of the American public and three-quarters of the American states have been overruled by one federal judge in San Francisco. To be fair, the ruling only affects Northern California. It will be appealed. The odds are, for now, that the judge will be overruled.

But again and again the political elites in this country think they know best. From the mosque at Ground Zero to gay marriage to Obamacare, the majority of the people and states are forced to deal with a minority that does not respect them and democratic and legal institutions that oppose them.

If a minority of political elites and liberals can impose their will and values on a majority sufficient enough to amend the constitution, it is time for the majority to respond with constitutional force.

In Thomas Jefferson’s words, “In questions of power then, let no more be heard of confidence in man, but bind him down from mischief by the chains of the constitution.”

Something to think about as members of both parties prepare to confirm yet another liberal elitist to the federal courts, this time to the Supreme Court.

Arizona Governor, American People, Want The Border Secured

It was disappointing but far from surprising that a Clinton-appointed liberal judge blocked key portions of SB 1070, the Arizona immigration law. That the 9th Circuit was unwilling to hear an expedited appeal, and therefore won't take up the case until November, is also disheartening. Only in an upside world would the federal government prefer to spend money on lawyers than in securing the border. But ultimately Arizona and the American people will prevail, although the statute may be headed toward a 5-4 Supreme Court decision sometime down the line.

We've previously referred to Chris Christie as America's governor, but perhaps that honor also belongs to Jan Brewer. The Arizona governor, who is running for re-election to be sure, might not come across as the most prepared politician during television interviews, but she's unwavering when it comes to protecting the border. She's already said that she will be "relentless" when it comes to the issue of illegal immigration. The vast majority of the American people logically want the border secured first before any legislative initiatives on immigration reform, so-called, should be considered. The media and the Obama administration (is there a difference?) are out of step with the American people.

Of Brewer, Sarah Palin said the following on Fox News Sunday:

She's going to do all that she can to continue down the litigation path to allow secure borders. Jan Brewer has the cojones that our president does not have to look out for all Americans, not just Arizonans, but all Americans, in this desire of ours to secure our borders and allow legal immigration to help build this country, as was the purpose of immigration laws.

Last month, Boston Herald columnist Joe Fitzgerald sounded a similar theme:

The Arizona governor knows what she believes and has the courage of her convictions, making her a breath of fresh air here in Massachusetts where public officials cower at incurring the wrath of a politically correct lunatic fringe.

In town this weekend for a meeting of the National Governors Association, Brewer’s sure to hear from malcontents enraged by her state’s crackdown on illegal immigration.

They’d have us believe it’s hateful to suggest new arrivals ought to comply with America’s expectations.

Learn our language? How insensitive. Apply for citizenship? How inhospitable. Obey our laws? How mean-spirited.

Please. We’re sicker than they are if we pay any attention to them.

Fitzgerald's Herald colleague Howie Carr added the following:

It’s not about immigration. It’s about illegal immigration. You cannot have a society where one group is expected to obey the laws, play by the rules, pay taxes and speak a common language, and another group sneaking in and not asking, but demanding, to be given everything, for free, with no consequences whatsoever for any crimes they commit.

Last night on FNC, a focus group of Arizona voters, many of whom voted for Obama, spoke out on the situation in their state when it comes to illegal immigration:

"Whatever Works" Doesn't

[owing to other commitments, posts have been sparse lately, but we will attempt to get back on track.]

We recently watched the DVD of Woody Allen's 2009 film Whatever Works, starring Curb Your Enthusiasm star/creator Larry David. Curb has been a great show, so if the HBO series is considered a day job, David should keep it. David's embarrassing attempt to channel the neurotic Allen persona just appears as if he is reading lines without any real conviction. And what's with those shorts?

It's not just David's performance as the curmudgeon in chief, however, that is the issue; it is really the over-politicized and (if we can use this term) mean-spirited script itself, which apparently was written many years ago, but recently dusted off.

David, in a part that Allen likely would have played himself in his slightly younger days, is a repulsive brainiac professor who unbelievably hooks up with a beautiful young woman from Mississippi (Evan Rachel Wood). Her equally "unenlightened" parents arrive on the scene later in the film.

The main theme of the cliche-ridden film seems to be that conservative hicks from the south can only find true happiness if they give up their faith, family, and their guns and pursue a libertine/bohemian lifestyle ("whatever works") in New York City. While the the movie has a few (very few) funny lines, it's a poor substitute for Allen's classic comedies such as Annie Hall, Broadway Danny Rose, and Radio Days that were funny, touching, generally non-political, and sentimental all at the same time.

Stereotyping/demonizing people from the south may have been considered edgy in the 60s or 70s, but it's just comes across as oh so lame now. By the way, what about the millions of people who are happy in a Christian lifestyle; isn't that also a component of whatever works, too? Moreover, what about all so-called right wingers, many from the south, who served in the military and/or law enforcement to preserve the First Amendment freedoms that have allowed Allen to pursue a long career in the arts?

In earlier sequences in the movie, the script allows the red state folks to refute the Allen's/David's snobbery, so there could be an argument made that Allen is mocking both the phony New York intellectual and the ignorant red state hick. Based on the Allen's left-wing political pronouncements in many interviews, such as recently advocating an Obama dictatorship of all things, however, this seems unlikely.

BigHollywood.com's JohnNolte sums it up well:

Allen’s writing is shockingly lazy. The dialogue plays like something from a high school play with every on-the-nose scene stiffly performed as if over-rehearsed. The characters are worse; paper thin. Other than Rachel Wood, who summons more depth than the script deserves, the usually terrific Clarkson and Begley Jr. [parents] seem satisfied playing caricatures, which should come as no surprise. Hollywood bigots, never shy about granting terrorists, Nazis, rapists and child molesters some level of depth and dimension, refuse anything of the kind for us Wal-Mart shopping, Jesus-lovers.

Homeland Security Takes Back Seat To Politics

The third time was the charm. After two nominees had to drop out, the Transportation Security Administration has a new administrator. Former FBI Deputy Director John Pistole (interesting name for a someone in law enforcement, no?) was recently confirmed to head the agency. Unions have been pushing to get their hands on TSA employees regardless of how that would affect airport security, but Pistole has not yet taken an official position on collective bargaining for TSA officers.

In the meantime, according to FNC, many other key jobs in homeland security remain unfilled:

Vacancies in the United States' intelligence leadership, including the director of national intelligence and his chief deputies, are raising alarms over a potential "train wreck" of vulnerability, intelligence sources and others on Capitol Hill tell Fox News.

The goal of the national director is to maximize assets across the intelligence community. But the senior Republican on the House intelligence committee says that is not happening because the position, the nation’s top intelligence official, is now subordinate to the White House counterterrorism adviser John Brennan.

“The other DNIs have always been very, very professional. They've never been political. Under this administration, John Brennan has politicized intelligence. That's the danger here,” Rep. Pete Hoekstra of Michigan said, adding that Brennan is not subject to congressional oversight as a presidential appointee.

The job opened up when previous Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair was forced out last month after a series of apparent intelligence failures raised questions about the country's preparedness for detecting and stopping new terror plots.

If Hoekstra's allegations are valid, then the Justice Department isn't the only agency that has been politicized in opposition to the public interest.

Along these lines, a proponent of sanctuary city policies recently got a key job in the administration:

The widow of a Houston police officer killed by an illegal immigrant was "shocked" to learn that the city's former police chief has landed a top immigration job with the Obama administration, her lawyer told FoxNews.com on [June 25].

That's because Joslyn Johnson, whose husband, Rodney Johnson, was killed in 2006, is suing former Houston Police Chief Harold Hurtt for failing to enforce federal immigration laws. She claims her husband would be alive today if the city had bothered to check up on the gunman's immigration status.

Now that Hurtt is taking a job to oversee partnerships between federal and local officials with Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Johnson -- and other critics -- say they're concerned the official who resisted immigration enforcement in Houston will now be in charge of promoting it.

France's Government Employees: "Fonctionnaires" are Dysfunctional

In this weak economy, millions of private sector workers have been thrown out of work, or forced to accept pay and/or benefits cuts. In the meantime, public sector salaries are out of control, pushing the states and the federal government to the brink of bankruptcy. Why should taxpayer-supported government employees be immune from the "magic of the marketplace"?

When someone like New Jersey Governor Chris Christie seeks to rein in the bloated public sector bureaucracy, the unions and the media typically start throwing around scare tactics about reduced police safety services among other things. No one wants first responders to be taken off the grid; it's the jobs of do-nothing paper pushers that should come under scrutiny. For one thing, have you ever wondered about those "unessential" employees on the state payroll that are allowed to stay home following a snowstorm?

Here's an example from France via the London Telegraph in which a whistleblower puts the "dis" in dysfunctional:

A French civil servant who lifted the lid on the wastefulness of the country's state sector in a book describing a "five-hours-a-week" culture where people competed to take the longest coffee breaks has been suspended.

Zoé Shepard, her pen name, confirmed France's worst fears about its "fonctionnaires" – its 5.2 million civil servants – in a book recounting how they compete to see who will hover longest at the coffee machine, draw up sick notes to stay weeks away from the office or while away the day on Facebook.

In Absolument Dé-bor-dé (Absolutely Snowed Under), subtitled How to Make 35 hours Last a Month, nepotism is rife and taxpayer's money wasted, with one local civil servant even signing off his visit to a prostitute as "travel expenses".

DOJ Whistleblower: Justice Department is Lawless

Is anyone really surprised that the Obama is presiding over the most politicized Justice Department in history? Consider the purely political lawsuit challenging the Arizona immigration law, dropping the Philadelphia voter intimidation case despite a default judgment against the perpetrators, and now allegations that the DOJ facilitates ACORN-like vote fraud according to whistleblower J. Christian Adams, a lawyer who worked in the agency's Voting Rights section:

In November 2009, the entire Voting Section was invited to a meeting with Deputy Assistant Attorney General Julie Fernandes, a political employee serving at the pleasure of the attorney general. The purpose of the meeting was to discuss Motor Voter enforcement decisions.

The room was packed with dozens of Voting Section employees when she made her announcement regarding the provisions related to voter list integrity:

We have no interest in enforcing this provision of the law. It has nothing to do with increasing turnout, and we are just not going to do it.

Jaws dropped around the room.

It is one thing to silently adopt a lawless policy of refusing to enforce a provision of federal law designed to bring integrity to elections. It is quite another to announce the lawlessness to a room full of people who have sworn an oath to fairly enforce the law.

Adams recently gave this interview on FNC following his testimony before the U.S. Civil Rights Commission:



Should the Republicans take control of Congress after the November, one of their first legislation actions should be to require photo ID in all 50 states to vote. This in addition to requiring full enforcement of Section 8 of the Motor Voter Law.

Blatant vote fraud is what the Democrats really mean by voter "outreach." That's how "Stuart Smalley," among others got elected to Congress. Democrats want every vote counted rather than every legal vote counted. Think of it as a form of community organizing...

Addendum: The lawyer (and now federal prosecutor) who represented the American Taliban is quarterbacking the DOJ's legal effort to block Arizona's immigration law. That speaks volumes about the administration's priorities, does it not?

Judge Martin Feldman, American Hero

He may be overturned or forced to recuse himself by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, but Louisiana federal judge Martin Feldman, a Reagan appointee, has joined Chris Christie and Harry Alford in In General Counsel's roster of American heroes for trying to prevent the Obama administration from totally destroying the economy of the states that border the Gulf of Mexico:

The Obama administration’s efforts to suspend deepwater oil drilling were dealt another setback in court on Thursday when the federal judge who struck down the administration’s six-month moratorium refused to delay the decision’s effects.

The Interior Department petitioned Judge Martin L.C. Feldman of the United States District Court in New Orleans to grant a stay of his decision, which lifted a ban on new drilling projects and on work on the 33 rigs already in place in the Gulf.

But Judge Feldman said he was denying the delay for the same reasons he gave for his June 22 decision: that the moratorium was doing “irreparable harm” to the businesses in the gulf that depend on drilling activity and that the government had not given sufficient basis for the moratorium.

The White House imposed the moratorium in May, about a month after a fatal explosion and fire on April 20 on the Deepwater Horizon rig, which left an undersea well spewing crude oil into the gulf. The moratorium, intended to give time for improvements in rig safety measures, was “blanket, generic, indeed punitive,” the judge ruled.

Update: On July 9, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit upheld Judge Feldman's ruling while the government's appeal is pending. The case before the Fifth Circuit is on the fast track for a late August hearing.

Supreme Court Upholds Second Amendment Gun Rights

If a Supreme Court nomination proceeding falls in the woods, and no one hears it, does it make a sound? With all that is going on in the news cycle, the Elena Kagan confirmation hearings have become almost an afterthought (the same thing occurred with the Sotomayor confirmation). The Democrats have the votes for confirmation, so it's pretty much just political theater.

When it comes to who gets appointed to lifetime positions in the federal judiciary, elections have consequences as the old chestnut goes. Absent the unforeseen, another liberal will unfortunately join the High Court. Democrats have a history of trashing the judicial nominations made by Republican presidents, but Senate Republicans don't play that same loathesome game.

In the meantime, you don't have to be a gun owner to applaud the Supreme Court's decision that upheld the Second Amendment rights of law-abiding U.S. citizens for what the Court called "the core lawful purpose of self-defense."

The Supreme Court ruled for the first time Monday that the Second Amendment provides all Americans a fundamental right to bear arms, a long-sought victory for gun rights advocates who have chafed at federal, state and local efforts to restrict gun ownership.

The court was considering a restrictive handgun law in Chicago and one of its suburbs that was similar to the District law that it ruled against in 2008. The 5 to 4 decision does not strike any other gun control measures currently in place, but it provides a legal basis for challenges across the country where gun owners think that government has been too restrictive. 

Writing for the 5-4 majority in McDonald v. Chicago, Justice Alito ruled that the Second Amendment "is fully applicable to the States."

Two years ago, in District of Columbia v. Heller, 554 U. S. ___ (2008), we held that the Second Amendment protects the right to keep and bear arms for the purpose of self-defense, and we struck down a District of Columbia law that banned the possession of handguns in the home.The city of Chicago (City) and the village of Oak Park, a Chicago suburb, have laws that are similar to the District of Columbia’s, but Chicago and Oak Park argue that their laws are constitutional because the Second Amendment has no application to the States. We have previously held that most of the provisions of the Bill of Rights apply with full force to both the Federal Government and the States...

Our decision in Heller points unmistakably to the answer. Self-defense is a basic right, recognized by many legal systems from ancient times to the present day, and in Heller, we held that individual self-defense is “the central component” of the Second Amendment right...

In sum, it is clear that the Framers and ratifiers of the Fourteenth Amendment counted the right to keep and bear arms among those fundamental rights necessary to our system of ordered liberty.

Plainclothes Dutch Officers Try to Curb Anti-Semitic Street Violence

Undercover cops will try to thwart anti-Semitic violence in the Netherlands. Helen Thomas said that the Jews should "go home." Which--given the situation in the Netherlands and elsewhere in Europe--leads to the logical question: What happens if they are already home?

Paul Belien explains in Hudson New York:

"Decoy Jew" is a new phrase in the Netherlands. Jews are no longer safe in major Dutch cities such as Amsterdam. Since 1999, Jewish organizations in the Netherlands have been complaining that Jews who walking the Dutch streets wearing skullcaps risk verbal and physical attacks by young Muslims. Being insulted, spat at or attacked are some of the risks associated with being recognizable as a Jew in contemporary Western Europe.

Last week, a television broadcast showed how three Jews with skullcaps, two adolescents and an adult, were harassed within thirty minutes of being out in the streets of Amsterdam. Young Muslims spat at them, mocked them, shouted insults and made Nazi salutes. "Dirty Jew, go back to your own country," a group of Moroccan youths shouted at a young indigenous Dutch Jew...

In an effort to arrest the culprits who terrorize Jews, the Amsterdam authorities have ordered police officers to walk the streets disguised as Jews. The Dutch police already disguise officers as "decoy prostitutes, decoy gays and decoy grannies" to deter muggings and attacks on prostitutes, homosexuals and the elderly. Apparently sending out the decoys has helped reduce street crime....

The deployment of "decoy Jews", however, is being criticized by leftist parties such as the Dutch Greens. Evelien van Roemburg, an Amsterdam counselor of the Green Left Party, says that using a decoy by the police amounts to provoking a crime, which is itself a criminal offence under Dutch law.

Belien says that Jews are in particular bailing on the city of Antwerp, which has (or had) a large Jewish community, for Israel, America, or the U.K.

What is more offensive--anti-Semitic criminals or the leftists that for some weird reason feel the need to pander to them? And how long would the Socialists or the Greens last under a totalitarian theocracy?

Top Chef Serves Up Some Propaganda

Bravo Network's hit reality show Top Chef, starring culinary judges Padma Lakshmi and Tom Colicchio (and based in D.C. this time around) usually provides fun, entertaining, and apolitical content. But last night's unusually boring installment came garnished with some political propaganda revolving around "underfunded" public school cafeterias and efforts to encourage students to eat more healthy fare.

What Jonah Goldberg writes at NationalReviewOnline is almost exactly what was going through our mind during the episode:

But Holy Crisco Batman, the agitproppy sermonizing of the whole thing was infuriating: The crocodile tears, the quivering lips, the personal testimonials about how passionate the chefs are about the issue, the righteousness about our poor underfunded schools. But what was worse was the ignorance and innumeracy. Watching the show, you'd have no idea that DC public schools are among the best funded in the country ($25,000 or so per pupil – on par with DC’s most expensive private schools). The problem is they are among the worst run...If kids are getting bad meals in DC public schools it's not because they're being starved for resources it's because the teacher's unions and bloated bureaucrats running the schools are, quite literally, stealing food from the mouths of poor children.

According to Top Chef, schools get a mere two dollars and change per student per meal. So the contestants were given 2 bucks and change per student to cook a nutritious meal for fifty kids...Here's the problem. No one bothered to mention the fact that the schools buy in bulk at the wholesale level...But they kept using this low per-student amount to make it sound like the only reason public schools don’t serve more nutritious food is because school cafeteria’s are underfunded. And they may be underfunded, but the fault doesn’t lie with American taxpayers whose consciousness needs to be raised. They pay more than enough already. The fault lies with incompetent bureaucrats, greedy unions and cowardly politicians.

As Goldberg adds, no one watches Top Chef for political grandstanding. Just the opposite. The intense competition among the "cheftestants" is supposed to provide an escape from all that. And this is only the second episode of the program's D.C.-based seventh season. We may wind up with a case of indigestion.

Court Rejects Free-Speech Challenge To Anti-Terror Law

Guess which recently appointed "moderate" was on of the dissenting justices in this case?

The Supreme Court on Monday upheld a law that makes it a crime to provide "material support" to designated foreign terrorist groups, even when the support involves training or advice on humanitarian activities.

The 6-3 decision marked the first time the high court had looked at restrictions on free speech in U.S. anti-terrorism policy since the 9/11 attacks. Monday's decision strengthens the hand of government to block any form of support, no matter how peaceful or seemingly benign, to foreign terrorist groups.

The majority emphasized that it was endorsing restrictions on coordinated work with foreign terrorist groups but not on any independent work a humanitarian organization might do on its own.

It is a federal crime to knowingly provide material support or resources to an entity designated by the U.S. State Department as a foreign terrorist organization. Real-world question: What kind of rational, responsible group or individual would render "peaceful or seemingly benign" help to a terrorist group in the first place?

In Holder v. Humanitarian Law Project, Chief Justice Roberts writing for the majority (which included retiring Justice Stevens) explained that...

Such support frees up other resources within the organization that may be put to violent ends. It also importantly helps lend legitimacy to foreign terrorist groups—legitimacy that makes it easier for those groups to persist, to recruit members, and to raise funds—all of which facilitate more terrorist attacks...Providing foreign terrorist groups with material support in any form also furthers terrorism by straining theUnited States’ relationships with its allies and undermining cooperative efforts between nations to prevent terrorist attacks...

The Preamble to the Constitution proclaims that the people of the United States ordained and established that charter of government in part to “provide for the common defence.” As Madison explained, “[s]ecurity against foreign danger is . . . an avowed and essential object of the American Union...” We hold that, in regulating the particular forms of support that plaintiffs seek to provide to foreign terrorist organizations, Congress has pursued that objective consistent with the limitations of the First and Fifth Amendments.

Shakedown At The Border?

What's the best use of Justice Department resources when you have a border overrun by drug gangs, human traffickers, potential terrorists, and other violent criminals? Well, it is to sue the state of Arizona, of course, over SB 1070, even though the Arizona law is a mirror image of federal immigration law.

In the meantime, RedState.com broke the story that per U.S. Senator Jon Kyl, Obama is using border security as a bargaining chip to get comprehensive, so called, immigration reform through the Congress. Sen. Kyl says the administration is holding its constitutional duty to secure the border "hostage" for political reasons. The idea that this administration would politicize national security as if it's merely another shakedown, another Chicago-style deal like the "cornhusker kickback" or the "Louisiana purchase," speaks for itself. Here's the video featuring Sen. Kyl at a town hall meeting:The White House has denied the senator's claim, but Kyl, who has no reputation for grandstanding, isn't backing down.

Weekend At Barry's

The irony: The White House criticizes BP's lame CEO for attending a yacht race while Obama heads to--where else--the golf course.

Canada Free Press columnist Judi McLeod has an interesting take:

Is the soon to be 49-year-old President Barack Obama himself a victim of the Leftwing’s Public School Emasculation of the Schoolboy? How about British Petroleum chief honcho, Tony Hayward, 57?

Both Peter Pan boy types display little sympathy for those left to live lives in disaster zones.

We all know how it takes months for Obama to tear himself away from shooting hoops and playing golf in times when tragedy strikes...

The left’s emasculation of the entity known as the schoolboy was in full swing when Obama and Hayward went to school.

Metrosexuals and pantywaists who graduated this system are long on poetic double speak, short on decisive action...

Why Is The FCC Trying To Regulate The Internet?

Even well-meaning people sometimes put too much faith in government oversight. While the private sector can be corrupt, government bureaucracy combines corruption with incompetence. In an attempt to circumvent the courts, the Federal Communications Commission launched a rulemaking that would ultimately allow it to regulate Internet service providers as if they were public utilities. Despite all the high-minded political rhetoric from the supporters of so-called "Net neutrality," the end game, unfortunately, is control over content, a clear violation of the First Amendment. As noted on HotAir.com, "Only a government that fears open-source communication would see the Internet as a failing enterprise in need of top-down government control."

The American Spectator sums up this latest power grab as follows:

Under the Obama Administration's plan, the FCC would be able to enforce so-called "net neutrality" rules, allowing the federal government to set how broadband and Internet Service Providers (ISPs) manage the networks. By bringing broadband and the Internet under FCC regulatory oversight, the FCC would also be able to impose policies related to speech or online business models.

Reason.tv released this video in opposition to the FCC's initiative:



And Americans for Prosperity came out with this video:

"Obama Snoozed, Oil Oozed"

We've blogged previously about the huge media double standard when it comes to Bush vs. Obama, but Boston Herald columnist and talk show host Howie Carr really nails it in today's edition:

...Criticizing Bush - the highest form of patriotism. Criticizing Obama - hate speech. Who caused Bush’s problems? - Bush. Who causes Obama’s problems? - Bush.

...Bush playing a rare round of golf - complete video coverage, showing his utter indifference to the suffering of the American people.

Obama playing one of his endless rounds of golf - only still photos allowed, yet another glowing indication of our dashing president’s youth and physical fitness.

...Bush tapping the phones of foreign terrorists with congressional authority - fascism. Obama’s continuing attempts to rein in free speech on the Internet - good public policy.

...Popular Bush-era rhyme - Bush lied, people died. New rhyme - Obama snoozed, oil oozed.

 Related posts:
Media Bias and The Sounds of Silence--And Crickets
Part II: Media Bias and The Sounds of Silence--And Crickets

Socialized Medicine: It is What it Is

As the entire right-of-center blogosphere has repeatedly warned, government intervention into the healthcare insurance system (with all its faults) will only make things far worse. Just look at the decrepit nature of the British national health service. The Washington Post notes that while Obama repeatedly insisted that Americans who like their current coverage would be able to keep it, this is apparently untrue even under the administrations own estimates. Investor's Business Daily explains:

Internal administration documents reveal that up to 51% of employers may have to relinquish their current health care coverage because of ObamaCare.

Small firms will be even likelier to lose existing plans.

The "midrange estimate is that 66% of small employer plans and 45% of large employer plans will relinquish their grandfathered status by the end of 2013," according to the document.

In the worst-case scenario, 69% of employers — 80% of smaller firms — would lose that status, exposing them to far more provisions under the new health law. ..

Draft copies of the document were reportedly leaked to House Republicans during the week and began circulating Friday morning. Rep. Bill Posey, R-Fla., posted it on his Web site Friday afternoon...

In a statement, Posey said the document showed that the arguments in favor of ObamaCare were a "bait and switch."

The White House plans to spend $125 million on a propaganda campaign to convince properly skeptical Americans about the alleged benefits of heathcare reform, so called, "amid growing signs Democrats are failing to get political traction on the issue."

Justice Department Lacks WMD Preparation

The Obama Justice Department is unprepared for just about everything except politicizing the war on terror, so this New York Times report should come as no surprise:

The Justice Department’s inspector general has concluded that the department is not fully prepared to respond to a terrorist attack involving an unconventional weapon.

In a report issued on Tuesday, the inspector general said that none of the law enforcement agencies within the department, other than the Federal Bureau of Investigation, had operational response plans in place to deal with such an attack.

The report determined that other than F.B.I. specialists, the department’s staff receives little training on how to respond to a biological, chemical, nuclear or radiological attack; that there is no central oversight plan in place for such a crisis; and that the management of the department’s plan is “uncoordinated and fragmented.”

Saudis Green Light Bombing Raid On Iran's Nuclear Facilities

One of the most under-reported stories is that the nations in the Middle East don't want Iran to get nukes either. For various reasons, these countries view Iran as a regional menace. Since this doesn't fit the media's simplistic narrative, it gets ignored, however. If Israel winds up taking unilateral military action--something which would ignite a huge international crisis--many countries would bitterly denounce Israel publicly while applauding privately. And if this story from the Times of London is accurate, Saudi Arabia is on board:

Saudi Arabia has conducted tests to stand down its air defences to enable Israeli jets to make a bombing raid on Iran’s nuclear facilities, The Times can reveal.

In the week that the UN Security Council imposed a new round of sanctions on Tehran, defence sources in the Gulf say that Riyadh has agreed to allow Israel to use a narrow corridor of its airspace in the north of the country to shorten the distance for a bombing run on Iran

 To ensure the Israeli bombers pass unmolested, Riyadh has carried out tests to make certain its own jets are not scrambled and missile defence systems not activated. Once the Israelis are through, the kingdom’s air defences will return to full alert.

We're hoping  somehow, some way, that this situation can be resolved peacefully, but given the international community's fecklessness when it comes imposing real sanctions on Iran, sadly it seems unlikely.

FBI has the Goods on ACORN Vote Fraud

We've often wondered about kind of algorithms need to be used to take vote fraud into consideration when polling organizations giv election predictions. After all, with corrupt organization like ACORN doing their bidding, phantom voting is big part of the Democrats' "get out the vote" effort. That's why they fight tough and nail (using absurd, made-up reasons) against laws that would simply require a photo ID to cast a ballot.

Via The Daily Caller, evidence has apparently come to light about ACORN vote fraud in St. Louis:

The radical activist group ACORN “works” for the Democratic Party and deliberately promotes election fraud, ACORN employees told FBI investigators, according to an FBI document dump Wednesday.

The documents obtained by Judicial Watch, a watchdog group, are FBI investigators’ reports related to the 2007 investigation and arrest of eight St. Louis, Mo., workers from ACORN’s Project Vote affiliate for violation of election laws. All eight employees involved in the scandal later pleaded guilty to voter registration fraud...

One employee told the FBI that ACORN headquarters is “wkg [working] for the Democratic Party.”

According to one report, an ACORN employee said the purpose of “[f]raudulent cards” was “[t]o cause confusion on election day to keep polls open longer,” “[t]o allow people who can’t vote to vote,” and “[t]o allow to vote multiple times.”

The organization is in the process of re-branding in many states which is not good news for anyone who believe in fair elections.

The International Community and Terrorism: An Inconvenient Truth

Thanks to videos widely disseminated over the Internet, every fair-minded person now knows what really went on between Israeli soldiers and the so-called peace activists aboard the Gaza freedom flotilla. But for anyone who tuned in late, Mona Charen on NationalReviewOnline provides some essential background information:

The effort to destroy the Jewish state has many fronts. One front is in Iran, where the maniacal regime that has repeatedly promised to “wipe Israel off the map” marches inexorably toward a nuclear bomb. Another is in Gaza, from which Hamas has lobbed 10,000 missiles into Israeli cities. Yet another front, the most insidious, is comprised of the propaganda arm of the Palestinian movement. And this front thrives for only one reason — the complicity of the world press and the so-called “international community.”

Fact: Israel imposed a blockade of Gaza to prevent weapons from reaching the radical Islamic regime there that continues to make war on Israeli civilians. Egypt too has blockaded the strip, hoping to choke off weapons to Hamas, which it views as a threat.

Fact: Humanitarian relief is delivered to Gaza from Israel on a daily basis. During the first three months of this year, 94,500 tons of supplies were transferred to Gaza from Israel, including 48,000 tons of food products; 40,000 tons of wheat; 2,760 tons of rice; 1,987 tons of clothes and footwear; and 553 tons of milk powder and baby food for the strip’s 1.5 million inhabitants. Representatives of international aid groups and the United Nations move freely to and from the Gaza Strip.

Fact: Upon learning of the intentions of the Gaza flotilla, the Israeli government asked the organizers to deliver their humanitarian aid first to an Israeli port where it would be inspected (for weapons) before being forwarded to Gaza. The organizers refused. “There are two possible happy endings,” a Muslim activist on board explained, “either we will reach Gaza or we will achieve martyrdom.”

Fact: The flotilla ignored multiple instructions from Israeli navy ships to change course and follow them to the Israeli port of Ashdod...

Fact: The flotilla’s participants included the IHH, a “humanitarian relief fund” based in Turkey that has close ties to Hamas and to global jihadi groups in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Chechnya, and elsewhere, and which has also organized relief to anti-U.S. Islamic radicals in Fallujah, Iraq. A French intelligence report suggests that IHH has provided documents to terrorists, permitting them to pose as relief workers...

Fact: When Israeli commandos rappelled down ropes to the deck of the Mavi Marmara, they were assaulted and beaten with metal poles and baseball bats by the Palestinians on board.

On PajamasMedia, Phyllis Chesler writes the following:

...Yes, I am talking about how our world well has been poisoned by brazen, crazy lies about Israel and about the Israeli Defense Forces. These lies come at us day after day, week after week, year after year, and they do not stop coming. The world is saying, as if in one voice: Jews, Israelis: Stop. Do not defend yourselves. You are defending a state that is not supposed to exist; its extermination or dissolution will alone bring peace to the Middle East, peace between America and the Muslim world, prosperity and the end of civil, tribal, and ethnic wars everywhere....

What an irony. Jews were ceaselessly persecuted when we did not have a state of our own. Today, the continued persecution of Jews everywhere is being justified on the basis of how much “trouble” Israel causes the world...

We now do understand that the passengers on board one ship, the Mavi Marmara, came to fight, to kill, and to die. Some were definitely Turkish mercenaries, hired to do the Turkish prime minister’s bidding—or perhaps Iran’s bidding. Many had ties to known terrorist organizations. We also know that there were important tactical, practical, and life-saving reasons that the IDF stopped the boat while it was still in international waters. And we know that IDF soldiers rappelled onto the boat with paintball guns on their backs, expecting as little resistance as was met on all the other boats. Yes, perhaps Israeli Naval Intelligence failed to factor in the possibility that this boatload was “loaded for bear,” that the IDF soldiers would be met with a fierce battle at sea. Why, and whether this is really so, remains an open question, an open wound, really. But we also know that no Israeli soldier died, or was successfully kidnapped. And we know that only nine of the six hundred or more flotilla passengers were killed.

Chelser's piece also contains what is supposedly a grisly first-hand account from an Israeli commando.

High-profile lawyer (and super liberal) Alan Dershowitz calls out the United Nations for its strange obsession with Israel while turning a blind eye to real atrocities committed around the world:

 There is only one answer - because Israel has long been singled out for public scrutiny and opprobrium by the United Nations in particular and the international community in general.

This is not to say that Israel has always been blameless. It foolishly took the bait and allowed itself to be provoked into overreacting to a well planned provocation by so-called "humanitarians," who love only those who hate the Jewish state. The best proof that the flotilla had little to do with providing humanitarian aid to the people of Gaza and everything to do with breaking Israel's entirely lawful military blockade of a terrorist enclave, is Hamas' refusal to accept the food and medicine that Israel removed from the captured boats. The leaders of the flotilla admitted that their object was the same as Hamas' - not to provide humanitarian assistance to Gaza but rather to break the military blockade that is designed to keep rockets and other anti-personnel weapons from the hands of Hamas terrorists.

Israel should have been smarter in its efforts to enforce its blockade, but it did nothing illegal - and what it did do certainly doesn't warrant being singled out for the stigma of an international investigation.  

If the United Nations is to get into the business of ordering and conducting international investigations, it must establish neutral and objective criteria for when such an investigation is warranted. These criteria must be equally applicable to all nations, and not merely to the Jewish nation.

Primary among the criteria must be "the worst first." Under that rule, investigations must be conducted in the order of the seriousness of the offense, not the unpopularity of the offender...

The second neutral criteria should be the capacity of the accused nation to investigate itself and to be subjected to domestic scrutiny and criticism. Here too Israel fares must better than most. It has an activist Supreme Court, a free and aggressive press and a responsive political system. It doesn't need dictatorial tyrannies telling it how to defend its citizens.

For international law to have any credibility, it must be applied neutrally, objectively and fairly to all nations. Singling out Israel for special scrutiny and investigation, while far more serious offenders and offenses are ignored, is incompatible with the rule of law.

If Helen Thomas and her friends get their way, and Israel (the only functioning democracy in the Middle East where every citizen regardless of ethnicity or religion/non-religion enjoys individual rights) becomes ethnically cleansed, would all the turmoil and instability in the region instantly get resolved? Our gullible and lazy news media seems to think so.