Newt Gingrich Speaks Truth to Power

He may yet implode as a presidential candidate, but "good on you" (as they say in Australia, at least according to one movie we just watched) Newt Gingrich for some candor about the Israeli-Palestinian situation. Jerusalem Post columnist and Middle East expert Caroline Glick supports Gingrich's "invention" thesis:

His statement about the Palestinians was entirely accurate. At the end of 1920, the "Palestinian people" was artificially carved out of the Arab population of "Greater Syria." "Greater Syria" included present-day Syria, Lebanon, Israel, the Palestinian Authority and Jordan. That is, the Palestinian people were invented 91 years ago. Moreover, as Gingrich noted, the term "Palestinian people" only became widely accepted after 1977.

Ron Prosor, Israel's U.N. ambassador, recently stated the following:

“From 1948 until 1967, the West Bank was part of Jordan, and Gaza was part of Egypt.” Prosor stated. “The Arab world did not lift a finger to create a Palestinian state. And it sought Israel's annihilation when not a single settlement stood anywhere in the West Bank or Gaza.”

Despite recent anti-Israel remarks by Obama administration officials Howard Gutman and Leon Panetta, Obama vaingloriously praised himself (during yet another fundraiser) for protecting Israel's security. Given the actual track record, Charles Krauthammer says the president is delusional:

 

Prominent YouTube commentator and gadfly Pat Condell, apparently a former Israel basher (and an atheist) who has reversed course, discusses among other things in this video the "Palestinian public relations industry" otherwise known as the Western media:

Putting differing historical interpretations aside, lets say the two-state solution was implemented tomorrow. Does any reasonable person really believe that this would actually solve widespread Middle East turmoil?

At the End of the Day, It Gets Dark...

How about a New Year's resolution to give trite or way overused expressions (that particularly pop up in the political season but really all year round) a rest?

As an aside, can we also please get rid of uptalk (a.k.a."high rising terminal")? That is the annoying tendency for the speaker to end a declarative sentence as if it is question.

Getting back to the worn-out or stale phrases, while in general they sometimes fit the situation, more often they often just create noise or doubt.

In no particular order, here are some of the prime offenders in the media or periodically in ordinary discourse:

• "To be honest with you" "To tell you the truth" or "Honestly..." [big red flag--especially when the speaker is under oath]
• "Absolutely" [What's wrong with just "Yes"?]
• "Basically..."
• "Exactly right" [why is "exactly" necessary?]
• "At the end of the day..."
•  "It is what it is"
•  "singing Kumbaya"[this is NOT funny any more if it ever was]
• "That being said..." [zinger follows]
• "Throwing [someone] under the bus" [that bus is responsible for a huge body count]
• "Comfortable in his own skin"
• "Tax cuts for the rich"
• "He's a good character guy," "he's a class act" -- variant "He's a good clubhouse guy" [from sports--but no longer used to describe the same player after the inevitable DUI or domestic violence arrest occurs] 
• "Thanks for taking my call" [from talk radio, where the whole idea is to take calls]
• "How ya doin'" [this was old when The Sopranos was new]
• "Existential threat" [Please let us not hear this in the presidential debates ever again.]
• "I don't have a dog in the fight" 
• "I have your back" or "You have my back" 
• Sports fans who oddly use the word "we" to describe their favorite team even though they aren't employed by the team, have no family employed by the team, or own stock in the team. 
• "Beyond the pale" 
• "Politics ain't beanbag"
• "I'm not gonna lie"
• Starting a sentence with "I mean"

We may continue to add to this list "going forward"-- or is that now "moving forward"?

Please let us know your least favorites too!

Update: By coincidence, shortly after the above was posted, Marist College came out with its annual survey of the most annoying words or phrases in casual conversation based on a sample of about 1,000 adults. The Marist Poll results indicated that the top five most annoying words (in order) are:

• whatever
• like
• you know
• just sayin'
• seriously

Further update:At year-end, Lake Superior State University (Michigan) released its list of banished words for 2012 as follows:

• Amazing [yes, this overused word should have been on our list too]
• Baby Bump
• Shared Sacrifice
• Occupy
• Blowback
• Man Cave
• The New Normal
• Pet Parent [haven't heard this one in common use at all]
• Win the Future
• Trickeration
• Ginormous
• Thank you in advance

ACORN Vote Fraudsters Gearing Up For 2012

Speaking of vote fraud, this report by Matthew Vadum from The American Spectator is guaranteed to make your blood boil:

Leaders of the resurrected radical group ACORN are lobbying the Obama administration in what appears to be a concerted effort to game the electoral system to help Democrats, new evidence suggests.

At least five Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now leaders have visited the White House this year alone. One of those ACORN officials has been involved in vetting Department of Justice hires who may help to enforce the voter fraud-enabling National Voting Rights Act (NVRA), also known as the Motor-Voter law. The Department has come under fire for refusing to enforce Section 8, which requires states to remove the names of ineligible felons, the dead, and non-residents from voter rolls, while zealously enforcing Section 7, which requires states to register voters at welfare offices.

Vadum adds that the ACORN-afilliated Project Vote "have filed a rash of lawsuits recently in several states in an attempt to pressure state officials into backing off investigations into voter fraud allegations."

Bill Clinton signed the Motor-Voter legislation into law.

Read the whole article here.
 

Dude Signs Walker Recall Petitions 80 Times

More fraud in the Wisconsin gubernatorial recall: You're only supposed to sign once under state law of course, but this guy claims he put his signature on Scott Walker recall petitions about 80 times. It's all fair game to "cheat to get Scott Walker out of here," he says.




Democrats say they are "discouraging" this practice and are weeding out duplicate signatures.

Would you like to buy a bridge?

Defense Department: Ft. Hood Massacre was Workplace Violence

Remember when the Obama administration inexplicably renamed a terrorist attack as a man-caused disaster?

Well, believe it or not, U.S. military officials appear to have doubled down on political correctness by referring to the Ft. Hood massacre as merely "workplace violence."

Congressional leaders weren't pleased reports Fox News:

Sen. Susan Collins on Wednesday blasted the Defense Department for classifying the Fort Hood massacre as workplace violence and suggested political correctness is being placed above the security of the nation's Armed Forces at home.

During a joint session of the Senate and House Homeland Security Committee on Wednesday, the Maine Republican referenced a letter from the Defense Department depicting the Fort Hood shootings as workplace violence. She criticized the Obama administration for failing to identify the threat as radical Islam... The chairman of the Senate Homeland Security Committee, Connecticut independent Sen. Joe Lieberman, said the military has become a "direct target of violent Islamist extremism" within the United States.

The BlackFive military blog adds this comment about homegrown terrorism:

I really don’t know what more to say other than I agree with Senator Collins. What happened at Ft. Hood wasn’t a case of “workplace violence”, it was a case of a radicalized Islamist going on a murderous rampage because of his radicalization. It was also a total failure of leaders to recognize the threat and act on it well before it ended in the death of 13 at the Texas military installation.

If the Obama administration was in charge on December 7, 1941, what absurd terminology would they have dreamed up to describe the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor?

Added: Political correctness-bonus coverage:

Pearl Harbor 70th Anniversary Tribute

Life.com commemorates Pearl Harbor Day, December 7, "a date which will live in infamy," with these rare and heretofore unseen photographs.

And here is some newly discovered footage of the actual attack:

U.S. Rifles Diverted to Drug Traffickers

As if the Fast and Furious scandal wasn't bad enough, CBS News reports that the U.S. State Department gave a green light to "direct commercial sales" of weapons to Mexico even though many of these guns were falling into the hands of drug cartels.