Just How Close?

The news about the Saudi Arabian government's successful stoppage of a massive terrorist attack on it's oil refinery infrastructure received about thirty seconds of press here in the United States. Far less than the daily badgering President Bush gets every day by miserable opportunists like Keith Olbermann. I find it fascinating because it tells me more about our realities every day here in the United States and I'm quite concerned.

There is little doubt in my mind that no matter how anything plays out in the Middle East over the next generation, George Bush will receive all the blame and zero credit. The gutless, self preservation motivated behavior of the vast majority of our public officials will make sure of this as will the far left dominated media. It's a given, a no brainier.

What is far more concerning to me is that most of the country appears to be revering to a pre-911 mindset while "the bad guys" are not. The near successful attack in Saudi Arabia proves this. If successful the effects on our economy and our national interests could have been catastrophic. The fact that the reality of such a near miss merits as much attention as any other sound bite confirms my worst fear. It is going to take the loss of an American city before the far left loons wake up and realize this is not about Parisian politics and not about bringing down a Bush or Cheney. An Obama can preach all the good faith he likes but for those who would actually set off a nuclear device at Grand Central it will not matter.

I live in New York City and I love my life here but not a day goes by that I don't realize I'm playing Russian Roulette by living here and it's starting to scare the hell out of me.

Saudi's Stop Massive Attack, For Now

Saudis Round Up 172, Citing Plot Against Oil Rigs

By MICHAEL SLACKMAN
Published: April 28, 2007
RIYADH, Saudi Arabia, April 27 — Saudi security officials said Friday that they had broken up a vast terrorist ring, arresting 172 men who planned to blow up oil installations, attack public officials and military posts, and storm a prison to free terrorist suspects.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/28/world/middleeast/28saudi.html?em&ex=1177992000&en=4dbae03cebd6d21e&ei=5087%0A

Victor Davis Hanson on "The Truth"

Iraq, and the Truth We Dare Not Speak
We must win American hearts and minds.
By Victor Davis Hanson

Not long ago I talked to a right-wing hardnosed fellow in a conservative central California town about the need to stay and finish the task of stabilizing the democracy in Iraq and rectifying the disastrous aftermath of 1991. He wasn’t buying. Instead he kept ranting about the war in the ‘more rubble, less trouble’ vein. And his anger wasn’t only over our costs in lives and treasure. So I finally asked him exactly why the venom over Iraq. He shouted, “I don’t like them sons of bitches over there — any of ’em.” His was a sort of echo of Bismarck’s oft-quoted “The whole of the Balkans is not worth the bones of a single Pomeranian grenadier.”

http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=MTljYjgzNmRjOWY4ZjljZDJhODcxODhkNjhjZTExMTU=

All Aboard on The Nuclear Express ... All the other Assorted Nuts are Following the Mullahs .. What will Nancy Do Now ?

Now what? President Bush, warts and all can only do so much. Now let's see how the rest of the world will deal with this.

Eye on Iran, Rivals Pursuing Nuclear Power

By WILLIAM J. BROAD and DAVID E. SANGER
Published: April 15, 2007

Two years ago, the leaders of Saudi Arabia told international atomic regulators that they could foresee no need for the kingdom to develop nuclear power. Today, they are scrambling to hire atomic contractors, buy nuclear hardware and build support for a regional system of reactors.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/15/world/middleeast/15sunnis.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin

BBC Reports on Opposition March in Putinland ...

Let's watch Putin style democracy. See protestors get beaten and placed in prison.

Russian opposition in fresh rally

Hundreds of anti-Kremlin demonstrators have held a rally in St Petersburg, a day after a protest in Moscow ended in scuffles and arrests.The participants gathered at a square in the city centre, but were encircled by a similar number of riot police and prevented from marching.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/6556739.stm

Al Ahram - Blame Isreal .. What else is new?

Al-Ahram Weekly, Eqypt
April 12, 2007

America as proxy

Whereas Israel has appeared in the past as the US's main proxy in the Middle East, now it apears the relation has reversed, writes Ramzy Baroud*

Conflicts in the Middle East are often orchestrated from afar, using proxies -- the least risky method to fight and win a war. Despite its geopolitical fragmentation, the Middle East is loosely united insofar as any major event in any given locale can subsequently be felt throughout the region. Thus Lebanon, for example, has been a stage for proxy wars for decades. And it is not just Israel and the United States that have laboured to penetrate and further fragment Lebanese society. The intelligence services of various Arab countries, as well as Iran, have used Lebanon as a hub for their invariable interests, the outcome of any conflict -- be it internal or external -- directly affecting the image and political positioning of this or that country.

http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2007/840/re52.htm

Mark Steyn on English Anti-Semitism

Wednesday, April 11, 2007
By Mark Steyn, SteynonLine

English antisemitism [Mark Steyn]

I've been brooding on Derb's aside about English antisemitism. I would agree with him that historically it's by far the mildest and most harmless, and I never understand fellows who comb through, say, the works of John Buchan and alight triumphantly on a passing reference to a hooked nose as evidence that middle England was slavering to open up an Auschwitz in the Home Counties.

http://corner.nationalreview.com/post/?q=NWFkMTRkMTFiN2Q4ZWRlZmMyNDIwZGFmOTA0OGU2MzI=

Al Jazeera Reports on freedom Putin Style !

Kasparov held in Moscow protest

Police in Moscow have detained Garry Kasparov, the Russian opposition leader, along with at least 170 other activists, ahead of a banned anti-Kremlin protest.

Thousands of riot police closed off the centre of the capital on Saturday, as authorities tried to stop opponents of Vladimir Putin, the Russian president, from taking to the streets.

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/BE9266B0-031B-409E-A684-769CAC429619.htm

David Horowitz on Distorted Realties ...

From David Horowitz,
The Jerusalem Post, April, 12, 2007

"The Hour [Resurrection] will not take place until the Muslims fight the Jews and the Muslims kill them, and the rock and the tree will say: Oh, Muslim, servant of Allah, there is a Jew behind me, kill him!'" -- Hamas spokesman, Dr. Ismail Radwan, Palestinian Authority TV, March 30, 2007:

Maybe it's the fact that I'm a Jew that I take the determination of Hamas to kill me personally; or that I find it morally repellent that the Speaker of the House should pay a friendly call on the dictator of Damascus who hosts, protects and arms these genocidal jihadis, but I do. I find it equally depressing that my fellow Jews who fund the Democratic Party (an estimated 80% of its donations no less), and my fellow Americans who are not Jews and vote Democratic but do not wish Jews like me dead, are not burning up the phone lines, and crashing the Internet with howls of protest over their Party's collusion with our contemporary Hitlers. Because that is what they are. They are not "Hitlers" in the sense that Cindy Sheehan thinks George Bush is Hitler as a metaphor of her hatred for her country. They are Hitlers in the sense that they are Hitlers. They want Jews dead. They are preparing the next war to see that the Jews are dead. And they will not rest until they complete the final solution or until they are stopped.

American defenders of the Nazi Axis which includes Hezbollah and Iran -- are located squarely on the left side of the political spectrum. The movement to stop America from stopping Iran has already begun. The voices of this fifth column include Cindy Sheehan, Rosie O'Donnell, Medea Benjamin, and their "anti-war" comrades at MoveOn.org. It would be a mistake to regard these individuals as marginal. They are the same crowd that brought us the war against the war in Iraq.

Krauthammer on Democrats and Iraq

April 13, 2007 12:00 AM

Turning the Corner in Iraq
Democrats are ignoring real progress.

By Charles Krauthammer

By the day, the debate at home about Iraq becomes increasingly disconnected from the realities of the actual war on the ground. The Democrats in Congress are so consumed with negotiating among their factions the most clever linguistic device to legislatively ensure the failure of the administration’s current military strategy—while not appearing to do so—that they speak almost not at all about the first visible results of that strategy.

http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=MWE3Mjc0YWRjNzdiOTY3MzZkNWRhYWNiNGZjOGExYzE=

Victor Hanson on How The West Might Self-Destruct ...

Victor Davis Hanson writes about a western world where partisan politics does not supercede national agenda. He clearly spells out how political agendas are counter productive to national policy once they cross certain lines and uses today's political climate as the example.

April 13, 2007
The Post-west
A civilization that has become just a dream.
by Victor Davis Hanson
National Review Online

I recently had a dream that British marines fought back, like their forefathers of old, against criminals and pirates. When taken captive, they proved defiant in their silence. When released, they talked to the tabloids with restraint and dignity, and accepted no recompense.

http://victorhanson.com/articles/hanson041307.html

Don Imus and America ... What it says ....

Is there anything more hypercritical than Keith Olbermann, smug, obnoxious and a daily hate monger, the hero of the Left, sitting down for the past few nights quizically asking how a man like Don Imus could survive spewing hatred for so long? Maybe Olbermann, pushing 50, can get the answer from the his additmately first serious relationship in his life, the 23 year old collage collage student he lives with. (This is Keith Olbermann's perspective on reality) ...

Man oh man does the entire Imus circus nausate me. It goes without saying that he is and has always been a nasty man. For decades he hs been saying rude, tasteless things on the air about all types of people. No one or nothing was off limts. His audience always knew this, the guests who came on to sell themselves knew this, the networks who employed him always knw this and the corporate sponsers who endorsed him always knew this. There are no surprises in this weeks comments nor were they the "worst" that ever came out of his mouth.

What I find so distatseful is the hypocrasy surrounding his firing. All of a sudden everyone gets a concosious. Complete hukster opportunists like Sharpton and Jackson find a crusade to revive careers as sagging as their jowels. The media, which daily searches out morbid curiorsity driven train wrecks to feed their ultra competitive livelyhoods is actually covering his downfall while passing judgement. It's all such a farce and the worst of American culture.

I personally couldn't care less if Imus never shows his hideous face in public again or never addresses a public audience. He has always been a repulsive creature from my perspective. I just don't like how all the creatures that have crawled out from under rocks are standing on platforms to take advantage of it for personal gain. Let's see Sharpton, Jackson and all the community leaders from the African American community actualy attack the language now deemed ordinary from the rap world and the violent, rudderless culture it has spawned.

My hat is off to the Rutgers team who have handled this event with class ... at least so far ... hopefully there will not be any book or movie deals announced anytime soon ...

Asa-El: Arab Progress Threatens Elites; It's That Simple

In a dead on accurate article, The Jerusalem Post's Amotz Asa-El spells out the truth of why even today, with all that is wrong in the Arab world and how it effects the rest of us, the Arab leaders continue to focus on Israel. It's simple, rather than focus on why they are behind, they deflect blame. Progress threatens their authority and it's that simple. Always has been.

Apr. 5, 2007 12:49 Updated Apr. 8, 2007 15:56
Middle Israel: The business of the Arab League
By AMOTZ ASA-EL, The Jersulem Post

Watching the Arab League's leaders in their gathering last week in Riyadh, one had to consider the contrast between them and their counterparts from the European Union.

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?apage=1&cid=1173879253307&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull

U.K. Schools Drop Teaching Holocaust History

IN a sign of our times, signifying the eventual collapse of a weak, pacifying Europe, schools in the U.K. have decided to drop the Holocaust from it's history lessons to elementary students to avoid upsetting their ever growing Muslim population. Same old story, sacrifice the Jews ... a small footnote but very worth noting since Londonistan will be over 50% Muslim within a few decades.

Without a balance determined to maintain an integrated western mindset, the U.K. will ultimately lose itself as the population shifts. Non-integration and a lack of tolerance generated from proper perspective will result in dire consequences. Will they still be blaming George Bush then? Just remember, they have been warned.


U.K. SCHOOLS' SICKENING SILENCE
By BARRY RUBIN, The New York Post

April 8, 2007 -- AS a Middle East specialist, I daily see material from Arab and Islamic sources containing hair-raising threats against America, Israel and the West. But an item in a British newspaper may be the scariest sentence I ever read: A report by the U.K. Department for Education and Skills says that schools in England are dropping the Holocaust from history lessons to avoid offending Muslim pupils.

http://www.nypost.com/seven/04082007/postopinion/opedcolumnists/u_k__schools_sickening_silence_opedcolumnists_barry_rubin.htm

449 Quentin - By the Rivers of Babylon

BY THE RIVERS OF BABYLON
By 449 Quentin

It is Tuesday, March 13, 2007 and the editorial page of the New York Times are worried that the folks that rape and murder children are not getting treated fairly out there in the heartland.

Part of the problem is that the mega Liberals that write for The Times are an edgy lot and their nerves are frayed from the long commute they endure each day being bussed in from another planet. They do not understand that the vast majority of people that live on this planet would like to do far more than the laws allow to someone who rapes a child. Most of us understand that even if the child is lucky enough to survive that their life is forever shattered. The Times brimming with empathy for the predators writes the following. “When you consider the recent explosion of laws designed to keep sex offenders at bay-restricting where they can live and work, forcing them to the literal fringes of society, like some human form of toxic waste“.

Evidently treating these sub human monsters in this way offends the sensibilities of the good folks in the editorial room. What they don’t get is that almost everybody out there from coast to coast would like to see these predators dealt with a bit more harshly. But that is not the point.

America is not run to give the majority of it’s citizens anything but thankless toil. America is run by lawyers and lobbyists and wealthy power elites. The point is that these people , far removed from the citizenry, have so much power. They own and run the media. They get to promote who they want for the next election be it federal, state or local. If they want Hillary Clinton in, they will lob her fat softball questions if they want Rudy Giuliani out they will stick a microphone in front of his weasel of a son so that he can spout hatred for his father that he learned at his mother’s knee.

Their intention is to stick Rudy into the middle of a family feud that is ugly in private and downright horrible in public. Later they will devote a page or two in order to paint Dick Chaney as mean spirited. They are the ones who are mean spirited. But that doesn’t matter either. They are in control and cannot be stopped. They in the end will decide how we deal with a repeat offender who kidnaps a little girl, then tortures her for a couple of days and then buries her alive. They are concerned not with punishing him but in rehabilitating him and restoring him to freedom. For some perverse reason they feel his pain not the pain of his victims. It doesn’t matter that the people who do not write for the Times disagree.

All of the little people out there from sea to shining sea do not count. The guys and gals that drive the trucks, wash the dishes and get the kids off to school do not have a say in the matter. The privileged elites run the media show and the country. They rule even though they do not understand the simplicity of the interactions that occur at every level between good and evil. The moral compass that they live by is so out of whack that they can’t hear the moans of a terrified child or taste the bitter salt in her last tears as they flow down her innocent cheeks. None of that matters because they get to decide who holds power in America. They can take a political party that includes a murderer, an ex Klansman and a man who used the oval office to seduce a girl young enough to be his daughter and make that party pure as the driven snow. Their power is boundless. The wings that they have fashioned have let them soar beyond where mortals were meant to go. Soon the heat of the sun will work its will on those wings of hubris. Then the plunge into the cold watery depths will consume the America that they have fashioned in their image.

After that America will exist only in the pages of history. Pages stained with the tears of people who will salute the memory of Washington, Lincoln, Teddy and Franklin, as well as MacArthur and Patton. Those heroic men, along with the battles at Gettysburg, Iowa Jima and countless others will live on in myth and memory. Whispered from father to son around the amber glow of backwoods campfires.

Americans will weep like the Children of Israel wept at the rivers of Babylon. Like the Israelites the Americans too will weep for lost glory. The stories, the names and the battles will live on in tear stained myth and legend. But no one will remember the names of the little men who wrote for the New York Times.

al-Sadr: Attack U.S. Troops....

Isn't it time someone puts a bullet in this stubby manipulator's head and stops the b.s. soap opera? Enough with this two faced troll. U.S lives are at stake.

Let's do exactly what Uncle Saddam, the Russians, the Chinese, the Iranians, the Pakistanis, the Syrians or anyone but the tea sipping, New York Times reading, culturally distorted, denial dripping, self-hating Western left would have done ages ago and end it.

By SAAD ABDUL KADIR, Associated Press Writer 41 minutes ago

BAGHDAD - The renegade cleric Muqtada al-Sadr urged Iraqi forces to stop cooperating with the United States and told his guerrilla fighters to concentrate their attacks on American troops rather than Iraqis, according to a statement issued Sunday.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070408/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq

Our World On Easter Sunday ...

Four Items defined this morning's Easter Sunday's media coverage and all make definitive statements ...

Fox News has spent the past two hours covering mass and The Pope addressing crowds in Rome.

MSNBC has not covered it for one minute. After a curt Happy Easter, they have spent all morning slamming President Bush. In other words, business as usual.

Think they are addressing different markets? We have reached an age where all the cable news stations are complete OP-ED vehicles. They no longer even cover the same stories.

No where to be seen or read anywhere was any blessing from the Muslim world to the Catholic wishing respectful gestures to the peoples and hopes for future peace.

The BBC is reporting the the 15 freshly released hostages are capitalizing on their new found fame by entering into book, film and television deals detailing their experiences. Keep in mind these are military personal who were serving at the time of the incident. Can't wait to see who gets cast as the villians playing Bush and Blair.

In today's New York Times David Brook writes of his disenchantment and disbelief from a recent experience attending a conference made up of American and Arab conservatives attempting to patch relations in the best of good faith. Brook's writes that every Arab speaker blamed the root of all that is wrong in the Arab world on Israel. Iraq, Iran, Lebanon, Afghanistan, poverty, overpopulation, fundamentalism, you name it. Blame the Jews.

Can we please sprint to an oil substitute and leave these losers to their own pathetic destinies? It's never going to change over there.

See this one for yourself.

A War of Narratives
By DAVID BROOKS
Published: April 8, 2007
On the Dead Sea, Jordan

I just attended a conference that was both illuminating and depressing. It was co-sponsored by the Center for Strategic Studies at the University of Jordan and the American Enterprise Institute, and the idea was to get Americans and moderate Arab reformers together to talk about Iraq, Iran, and any remaining prospects for democracy in the Middle East.

http://select.nytimes.com/2007/04/08/opinion/08brooksd.html

Victor Hanson On Iran: What's Really Up ?

Begging for a Bombing
What should we make of the Iranians’ behavior?
By Victor Davis Hanson

It’s probably a good rule to do the opposite of anything the Iranian theocracy wants. Apparently, this government is now doing its darnedest to be bombed. So, for the time being, we should not grant them this wish.

http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=MmVlNmI2MGE5NDUxMTc2YzAyZjI1NWQzNGY2OWFkNjc=

Fresh Off Al Jazeera Press: Pelosi with Assad

Here is the photo of the year. Nancy "Far Left" Pelosi meeting with Syrian President Assad despite the strong requests against such a move by the White House. The fact that this photo will completely undercut the prestige of the Commander-in-Chief during wartime across the world. It is a completely partisan move and one that will result in more American deaths.

Pelosi: Israel wants Syria talks
Al Jazeera News Online

Nancy Pelosi, the speaker of the US House of Representatives, has told Bashar al-Assad, the Syrian president, that Israel is ready for peace talks.

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/56BAC1B2-08B7-4823-A515-1DD386216FCA.htm

Pelosi "Poster Girl for the Fundamentalists"

Remember this moment as the one where the Democrats took their new found majority and turned it to crap. See beaming Nancy greeted with sweets by the kind Syrians. They are laughing in her face in caves from Afghanistan to the Sudan.

She is a national disgrace and it will haunt her and her party for decades to come.

Pelosi tours Damascus, rebuffing criticism
Sweets, carpets and diplomacy on speaker’s agenda; White House protests

DAMASCUS, Syria - House Speaker Nancy Pelosi toured Damascus on Tuesday, the highest-ranking American politician to visit Syria since relations began to deteriorate four years ago. President Bush criticized the trip, saying it sends mixed signals to President Bashar Assad.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17930075/

Ralph Peters, New York Post: Where's Winston?

WHERE'S WINSTON?
IT'S IRAN 15, BRITS 0 IN THE GULF
Ralph Peters, The New York Post

April 3, 2007 -- THE greatest shock from the Middle East this year hasn't been terrorist ruthlessness or the latest Iranian tantrum. It's that members of Britain's Royal Marines wimped out in a matter of days and acquiesced in propaganda broadcasts for their captors.

http://www.nypost.com/seven/04032007/postopinion/opedcolumnists/wheres_winston__opedcolumnists_ralph_peters.htm

Victor Davis Hanson: Beyond Iraq ...

Victor Davis Hanson offers lucid insight to the future steps that may be taken by the United States regarding Iraq.

April 2, 2007
Beyond Iraq
by Victor Davis Hanson
Tribune Media Services

The threat from radical Islamic terrorists will not vanish when President Bush leaves office, or if funds for the Iraq war are cut off in 2008.

http://victorhanson.com/articles/hanson040207.html

Chicago Sun-Times: Steyn Sets Britian Straight ...

Steyn sets record straight ... Britain like America tries to rectify world issues that directly effect them through pseudo-institutions that mean absolutely nothing when push comes to shove ... pathetic but true ... who in the E.U. will stand by Britain if this gets hairy? No one. I hear nothing out of France by the way, do you? What will the U.N. do ? Absolutely nothing.

All just another example of how these institutions are simply vehicles for the weaker nations to try and handcuff the stronger under a veil of civilization. These are supposed to be the governing bodies that have final say over our national best interest? Always try and give it a shot I saw. However, when push comes to shove, we all must do what is in our country's best interest.

Taking of hostages by Iran is not Britain's finest hour
April 1, 2007

BY MARK STEYN Sun-Times Columnist
Twenty-seven years ago, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was a student in Tehran and is said (by a former Iranian president, for one) to be among those in the U.S. embassy who seized and held American citizens hostage for more than a year.

http://www.suntimes.com/news/steyn/321825,CST-EDT-steyn01.article

MSNBC: Hillary Breaks all previous fundraising efforts...

It's getting scary. Hillary Clinton is raising more money faster than any presidential candidate in history. In today's primaries, that's 2/3rds of the battle won. Can you imagine ???

Hillary Clinton breaks fundraising record
Democratic presidential hopeful raises $26 million in first 3 months of 2007

WASHINGTON - Shattering previous records, Democrat Hillary Rodham Clinton collected $26 million for her presidential campaign during the first three months of the year and transferred an additional $10 million from her Senate fundraising account, aides said Sunday.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17900938/

MSNBC : Tehran Students Protest; Here We Go Again?

Maybe it's me but the past two weeks feel like deja vu all over again (Yogi).

Once again we see the huge chasm between cultures. Once again hostages are taken at a convenient time. Once again hostages are paraded in front of the world's media offering tailored statements at gunpoint. Now once again we hear Iranian student protesters are massing and marching ...

I believe the Mullah's and the Revolutionary Guard realize their backs are up against the wall and are doing all they can to call the West's bluffs. They want to see if anyone other than George Bush has the nerve to call their bluff. If the international community had any integrity it would unite around Britain and demand the release of the hostages. However, something is missing this Sunday. I see no rallies, no marches, nothing from the West standing up to this strategically selected action. Instead in the U.S. talking heads focus on Gonzales and other worthless, partisan crap that will go no where.

It's pretty sad out there. The only good that will come of it is that the left will self-destruct as they always do and clear the way for Bush to go out on a high and Giuliani to come in and kick some serious ass.

Iranian students target U.K. Embassy
About 200 students throw rocks, fire crackers; Britain weighs new dialogue
MSNBC Reports from Associated Press

TEHRAN, Iran - About 200 students threw rocks and firecrackers at the British Embassy on Sunday, calling for the expulsion of the country’s ambassador because of the standoff over Iran’s capture of 15 British sailors and marines.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17896952/

Arab News Reports Abdullah to Ahmmadinejad, Be Careful !

In a reported dialogue between King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia and Iranian President Ahmadinejad, the Iranian president was warned not to provoke the U.S. and that he was not aware of what he was getting himself into. Smart words from a long surviving self-survivor to a fanatical spokesman looking at short survival.

Take Heed, King Advises Iran
Arab News

JEDDAH, 1 April 2007 — Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah told Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad during their talks in Riyadh on March 4 that he should not underestimate the US military threat to Iran, according to Newsweek.
The magazine quoted Foreign Minister Saud Al-Faisal as saying in an interview that the king said Tehran should take the threat of a possible US military strike on Iran over its nuclear enrichment program seriously.

http://www.arabnews.com/?page=1&section=0&article=94422&d=1&m=4&y=2007

New York Post reports on Anti-Extremeist Alliances ...

An interesting article from today's New York Post detailing other alliances forming in today's Middle East bent on standing up to the fanatics and counting on continued U.S. support. Maybe Nancy P. should read this before she poses for a photo op with Assad that will be posted in every cave in Pakistan and Afghanistan.

BETRAYED
HOW MIDEAST PROGRESSIVES FEEL ABOUT THEIR WESTERN 'COMRADES'
By Amir Taheri, New York Post

April 1, 2007 -- WHILE elements of the Left in the United States and Europe are calling on Western democracies to abandon Afghanistan and Iraq to the Taliban and al Qaeda and surrender to the Khomeinists in Iran, new alliances are emerging against the jihadists in the region. In much of the Middle East, most notably Afghanistan and Iraq, the Left is part of these new alliances.

http://www.nypost.com/seven/04012007/postopinion/opedcolumnists/betrayed_opedcolumnists_amir_taheri.htm

New York Times Kristof reports on Pakistan and Taliban

In a shocking, sobering article Nicholas Kristof of The New York Times reports direct statements made by Afghanistan President placing direct blame for the re-emergence of the Taliban in his country on Pakistan's direct involvement and political motives.

The Hand Behind the Taliban
By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF
Published: April 1, 2007
KABUL, Afghanistan

The Taliban is on the resurgence, again ruling a swath of southern Afghanistan, and President Hamid Karzai is sure of the reason: Pakistan.

In an interview in his office, Mr. Karzai was scathing in his accusations of official Pakistani duplicity. For starters, he accused the Pakistani intelligence agencies of sheltering Mullah Muhammad Omar, the Taliban leader, in the Pakistani city of Quetta.

http://select.nytimes.com/2007/04/01/opinion/01kristof.html

BBC News Reports Bush "Attacks" Iran ...

BBC News reports that American President George Bush has sharply criticized Iran over their kidnapping of 15 British soldiers and gave his unwavering U.S. support to the British. The sad thing is more will be mad that he stood up than pleased. Maybe the Brits are really ready to become a Muslim suburb, only showing true nationalism while getting drunk at soccer games. Hopefully not.

Bush attacks Iran over captives
BBC News, 04/01/07

President George W Bush has condemned Iran's "inexcusable behaviour" after its capture of 15 Royal Navy personnel.

The US leader added that he would "strongly support" the British government over the crisis.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/6514567.stm