Haven't been watching the news today, so I only just learned of this:
Ronald Wilson Reagan, the 40th president of the United States, died today at his home in California. He was 93 years old and had been suffering from Alzheimer's disease.I have already talked at length in the past about the enormous debt of gratitude that we all owe the Gipper, so I won't go too much into detail here. Besides, words fail me at this time.Reagan turned the disclosure of his disease as an opportunity to make a final address to the nation, expressing in an open letter to the American people the same patriotic fervor that had catapulted him into the presidency.
"When the Lord calls me home, whenever that may be, I will leave with the greatest love for this country of ours and eternal optimism for its future," Reagan wrote at the time. "I know that for America there will always be a bright dawn ahead."
I grew up in a Europe under the shadow of the Evil Empire, a Europe where the possibility of invasion and death at the hands of Communism was a part of life, so much so that most of us didn't even think about it.
This threat was removed with the collapse of the Soviet Union, a collapse that Ronald Reagan, more than anybody else in history, was responsible for bringing about. He brought it about because he knew right from wrong and he wasn't afraid to stand up and say so. And, much more importantly, he wasn't in the least bit afraid of following words up with action.
He often talked about that shining city upon a hill, and he made it shine more than ever, turning it into a true beacon for frightened and oppressed people all over the world. He made it shine to the point where its bright glare burned out Evil, like a vampire turns to dust in the bright rays of the Sun.
He said what he meant and he meant what he said, and Evil trembled because of it.
His moral clarity and the strength of his vision is an example to us all, and example that we must follow, because we owe it to that truly great man and his legacy.
Today, we mourn the passing of one of America's greatest sons, we celebrate everything he did for us and the world, and we send our condolences to his family, along with our thanks.
G-d Bless You and Yours, Gipper, as He blessed all of us with you, and G-d Bless the United States of America.
Feb. 6th, 1911 - June 5th, 2004
And, with this, we conclude our posting for this day. We have nothing more to say.
See you tomorrow.
(Link thanks to LC Aelfheld)
Whatever happened to "millions for defense, not one cent for tribute?"
According to this, our "fearless" Administration seems to have forgotten all about it while throwing taxpayers' money all over our enemies:
CAIRO (Reuters) - The United States on Thursday signed an agreement to give Egypt $300 million to compensate it for "regional unrest" stemming from last year's war in Iraq.Do I smell a Foggy Bottom Rat here?The agreement was signed by U.S. Ambassador to Egypt David Welch and Egyptian Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Faiza Abu el-Naga in the presence of Prime Minister Atef Obeid, a statement from the U.S. embassy in Cairo said.
"This grant was part of the assistance package voted by the American Congress last year to help countries who were affected by regional unrest and the war," Welch said, according to an embassy transcript of his remarks at the signing ceremony.
Have you stripey-panted dimwits lost your everfriggin' minds?
"Here. We know that the Islamofascist murderers that you've been hiding for decades and have done NOTHING to get rid of are terribly upset that we're defending ourselves, so here's some money if you promise not to hurt us, pretty please with sugar on top?"
Ever heard of this before: "If you tax something, you get less of it, if you subsidize it, you get more?"
Either you haven't, in which case you're dumber than a sack full of moldy scabs and have no business being in charge of a lemonade stand, much less the safety of the United States, or you HAVE, in which case we can only take it to mean that you want more terrrorism, odd though it may seem to anybody sane.
Welch said the grant also rewards Egypt for promised and realized reforms in the trade, fiscal and monetary policy.Would that be on top of the $2 billion/year that we already pay the crazed beards in return for pretty much nothing at all?Abu el-Naga told reporters at the signing the two countries were close to a further agreement whereby the United States will provide Egypt with $2 billion in loan guarantees.
Oh yes, we know... "It's to keep the Egyptians from attacking our ally Israel."
All very nice, but how's this for an alternative way of achieving that noble goal: "Here's how it's going to be. You morons mind your own business and leave your neighbors the fuck alone and we'll leave you alone in return. Lift a hand against our allies, on the other hand, and you disappear in a giant glowing ball of radioactivity. Thatisall."
Paying them to keep a threat in check only encourages them to keep the threat alive. After all, if they were to crack down on terrorism in their shitty little countries, they'd no longer be a threat and we'd no longer have any reason to pay them protection money, right?
The U.S. Congress in April 2003 passed a spending bill to provide nearly $80 billion to help finance the war in Iraq, including about $8 billion in aid for key allies such as Turkey, Jordan, Egypt and Israel....only one of which is actually an ally, but don't let that get in the way of a good story, Roto-Reuters™.
The original legislation said President Bush "should take into consideration budgetary and economic reforms undertaken by Egypt" in providing the assistance.And they worked out? Please enlighten us, because we sure as someplace nasty, hot and smelly haven't heard about it, and you'd think that actual reforms in one of those Islamist cesspools would be a big story, wouldn't you?A U.S. official in Washington said it took more than a year to release the $300 million to Egypt because the reforms took time to work out.
So here we are, paying protection money to our enemies, money that go into G-d only knows what, but we've got a few pretty good ideas.
Fucking unbelievable.
I got this link thanks to LC TomP, but I have to add that he wasn't the first to alert me to it. I first heard about this the latest Spanish fuckup from LC Victor Bueno, a seriously pissed off LC from Spain who has been seething with righteous anger ever since the Moonbat Brigades decided to dishonor his country by surrendering to bin Liner's Turbans. The reason I didn't post about it then was simple: At the time I couldn't find an English source, and I have a deep aversion to failing to provide a source when I post.
But now the fix is in, I just wanted to make sure that the real credit for breaking it to me goes to LC Victor:
2 June 2004We swear that we're not making this up.MADRID – The Spanish prime minister has been dragged into an embarrassing political row after the Defence Minister handed back a medal he was given for his role in withdrawing troops from Iraq, it emerged Wednesday.
José Bono sent a letter to the prime minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero saying he would give back the Cross of Military Merit, according to sources close to the minister.
The move comes after Bono was heavily criticised when he was given the award last week.
It was awarded by Zapatero for Bono's "merits" as a minister, including his role in the withdrawal of Spanish troops from Iraq.
Surrender and retreat and you get a medal for bravery. Looks to us like the Spaniards have been letting more than their fair share of frenchmen across the border over the years.
But Opposition political figures said Bono should not have received the award only six weeks after taking over as Defence Minister."The Spanish Order of the Retreat with White Flag and Soiled Underwear", we suppose.Zapatero granted the award to all those who helped in the withdrawal of Spanish troops from Iraq.
Thankfully, PM Yellowbelly's latest didn't go unnoticed by the sane members of the Spanish Parliament, and his Surrender-Monkey-in-Chief had to hand back his unjust rewards.
Priceless, just priceless.
LC Andi sends us this link about the scourge of the pop-up and how seemingly nothing can stop them. Every time somebody comes up with a new piece of blocking software, the buggers plastering our screens with ads for home refinancing and trips to Cancun find a way around it.
The article expresses hope, however, that the upcoming XP service pack with updates for IE will shoot the bottom out of the pop-up market with its new pop-up blocking code built right in to the browser.
Sure. And the scratching noises coming from the seat of my Imperial Pants are the sounds of monkeys trying to get out. Yes, it'll help for a while, but let's reflect for a moment upon the success rate of Micro$loth's previous attempts at coming up with the Endlösung for any given problem:
...
So glad you agree. You can stop laughing now.
LC Andi has a comment on what the only REAL solution to the problem would be and is absolutely right: It's quite simple, really. The reason we have those pesky little things is that people buy the stuff advertised in them. Ergo, if you stop clicking on the damn things, you instantly become part of the solution rather than the problem.
Of course, we all also know that that isn't going to work either, because for every one of you never clicking on a pop-up ever again, there are at least 455 mouthbreathing Idiotarians who just HAVE to try placing the crosshairs on the monkey or prove their superior intellect by letting the ad know that they're aware of the fact that Orlando Bloom starred as Legolas in Lord of the Rings, in spite of the fact that anybody with an IQ above the number of Fuckface's testicles knows that it doesn't matter where the fuck you click, you're going to end up on the same page anyway.
Pop-ups are there to stay and they're there for the same reason that you still receive junk mail delivered to your door advertising crap that even an anencephalic aardvark would too smart to throw money after: There are one HECK of a lot of anencephalic aardvarks out there.
What's scary is that those rodents vote (and vote several times in Dhimmicrat districts), but I digress...
So learn to live with them, keep getting new free pop-up blocking downloads (and please, for the love of G-D don't tell me that you've ever paid for one), and keep sending the companies making them loving emails. 50,000 emails with the words "piss off, weasel" can be sent off really quickly from a single computer, if you know how to do it. Not that I'd ever suggest doing such a thing.
Oh, and one word of advice to websites out there: One of the adorable fads making its rounds is the pop-up that shows up on your screen when you leave a site, asking you to rate the site before you leave.
Here's a hint: I don't care if your site was the next best thing to sliced ham, if you do that to me, I'll be happy to INVENT new ways of giving you the lowest grade imaginable to man. You want me to leave a grade? Fine, I have no problem with that and I'm happy to do so, but leave it on your main fucking site and keep it from bouncing around on my screen when I haven't asked for it.
Just so you know.
So Bush went to Rome and the Pope wasn't pleased:
ROME - Pope John Paul II reminded President Bush on Friday of the Vatican's opposition to the war in Iraq and said the world has been troubled by recent "deplorable events," an apparent reference to the abuse of Iraqi prisoners by U.S. troops.So noted.
As you might note in return, we weren't none too pleased either. As a matter of fact, we started proceedings against those pervs half a year ago. Not that you'd have known if you get your news from the "media" (and Heaven help you if you do), since Gunga Dan and his chirping chimps couldn't seem to get all too worked up about it until the Polaroids were in.
Of course, we'd be so much more stung by His Holiness' remarks if it wasn't for that little thing about choir boys and "What Went On Behind the Altar", combined with the frantic efforts by the RC church to cover it up and keep the child molesting freaks in business with access to fresh boy meat by playing musical molesters with the clergy.
Oh, and it doesn't help when we hear this about Cardinal Law(less), the kingpin behind the clerical child prostitution ring, and how he has gotten his Big Break by helping his underlings play hide the sausage with little boys:
BOSTON — Cardinal Bernard Law was appointed by the pope on Thursday to a ceremonial but highly visible post in Rome, outraging many in the archdiocese Law left in disgrace at the height of the clergy sex abuse scandal.Nice going, Popie, nice going.Law, 72, will have the title of archpriest of St. Mary Major Basilica, a post often given to retired prelates.
Trying to set up a kiddie porn ring in the Vatican and looking for experienced help, perhaps?
Ever heard the saying about not looking for splinters in other people's eyes while ignoring the huge friggin' beam of giant redwood sticking out of your own eyesocket?
Perhaps it's just time for the doddering old fool in the funny hat to sit down and shut up?
[UPDATE: LC Joe Lurker suggests that I might have fallen into a media trap by reading what they interpreted the Pope to say, as opposed to what he actually did say. Re-reading the first paragraph quoted above, It is very clear to me that Joe is right. The only reference to Abu Ghraib is from the "journalist", much in the same way that they keep inserting it into anything else they can think of.
Examples: "Tomorrow will be hot and dry, much like the conditions at the Abu Ghraib prison when the abuses took place", or "the pitcher had to be withdrawn from the game due to an injured elbow causing him serious pain, something that must have reminded him of the abuses of prisoners at Abu Ghraib that he'd seen on the news."
The Pope may have been talking about Abu Ghraib, but he might also have been talking about pretty much anything else in that region or, which is more likely, everything at once.
I hate it when I trip over a journalistic trap like that, but there's no denying that I did.
Sorry about that, John Paul, my bad.
It doesn't change my outrage over his appointment of Cardinal Law(less), a sick, twisted bastard that should be preparing for an eternity in Hell right now by having his intestines pulled out of his nutsack, rather than packing his bags for a generously paid prestigious position in Rome. Nor does it change my view that the Pope, because of this coverup and subsequent rewarding of criminals, has very little moral high ground to stand on when he decides to lecture us on the evils of war and how we're wrong to be in one.
But fair is fair, and criticizing the Pope or anybody else for something that they didn't say isn't.]
...and this time in a quite obvious and overt fashion (link thanks to LC TomP)
June 3, 2004So let's get this clear: The media, thanks to their allied terrorist contacts, get tipped off about an attack and, instead of warning our forces, show up at the scene hoping to get some juicy pictures of our soldiers being torn to shreds?
Release Number: 04-06-09FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
COALITION SOLDIERS QUESTION NEWS MEDIA FOLLOWING ROADSIDE BOMB
MOSUL, Iraq - Coalition soldiers questioned two news media cameramen and a reporter after a roadside bomb exploded near a Coalition convoy two kilometers north of Mosul June 3.
The media, who were at the scene prior to the attack, told soldiers at the scene they had received a tip to be at that location prior to the attack and they had witnessed the explosion.
There was minimal damage to a Coalition vehicle, a cracked windshield, and no serious injuries.
3rd Brigade, 2nd Infantry Division soldiers requested the media accompany them to a base camp in Mosul to answer questions as witnesses to the incident. The news media representatives left the base camp in the mid afternoon. [Emphasis mine - M.]
The fact that those traitorous pigs were allowed to leave without being wrapped in body bags is clear evidence that we still aren't fighting to win. They're not "reporters", they're ON THE OTHER FUCKING SIDE!
I'll be popping a cold one every time I hear of a member of the "media" being killed from now on, and I don't much care who does the killing.
Filthy swine.
It doesn't seem like Hanoi John Fuckface, self-admitted war criminal and buddy fucker, is getting much mileage out of his war record.
Go read it, all of it, then come back.
We won't be going anywhere in the meantime, nor will the extended entry below, and it deserves to be read in full.
Give us more, O Caesar! »
LC Phil, SFC USA (Ret.) isn't all too pleased with being called a Nazi either but, instead of just getting mad, he chooses the much better path of getting even, and generously offers us this labor of love of his, a picture of the GoreBot at the latest Nürnberg MoreOn.org Rally:
Yes, it does capture him rather well, doesn't it?
But we have to disagree. The two aren't alike.
Hitler was a better speaker.
Oh yes, it's that time of the week again. The toil and trouble of oppressing serfs is over and I can devote myself in full measure to scaring liberals with my Unsurpassed and Widely Renowned Evilness.
Sadly, it is also the beginning of the time of the week where nobody bothers to read blogs, but that won't stop me. Oh no, nothing will. For I am Evil, hear me roar!
But before we delve into a weekend full of wickedness, we'd like to announce to an unsuspecting world that LC & IB Steve H., at long last, has gotten his heinie in gear and published his book, which you can buy right here. OK, so it took almost as long to write and publish as the Holy Scriptures, but now it's here. So rejoice, dammit. Oh, and buy it too.
It's certainly the first cookbook that His Imperial Majesty will have ever bought, but don't let the genre put you off. Reading it is not likely to turn you into a metrosexual dweeb in an apron, creping your Suzettes until the cows come home or your wife tells you to knock it off and get the damned plumbing fixed already.
Sure, it's got recipes in there, wouldn't be much of a cookbook without them, would it, but they're not exactly the kind you'll find on the cover of the "Anorexic Weekly" that is ruining your appetite with pictures of scantily clad concentration camp inmates at the grocery store checkout line. Oh no, these are wholesome, tasty and extremely filling delicacies all. The kinds that would feed a division of Calista Flockharts (and what kind of brutally disgusting imagery is THAT? Now think "bikinis". Hah! I'm brutal!) for several weeks. And they've been sprinkled heavily with that inimitable Steve H writing style that we've all come to know and, presumably, love.
LC & IB Raging Dave also has some wares to peddle, in this case some delightfully offensive stickers that, at the very least, will serve as great conversation pieces. At least until a GFW asks "get WHAT?", at which point you may terminate the discussion at your earliest convenience with a quick demonstration. Just make sure to clean up the mess afterwards, please.
Oh, and as if that wasn't enough, we even have a brand new Imperial Blogger, LC & IB SuperBiff and his "One Man's Rage", which fit in so nicely with the Mark Steyn Fiskers' Brigades that you might almost think that he was auditioning for the part. Welcome aboard.
OK, enough being nice for now. On to the wickedness...
Bill Quick, one of my biggest inspirations when I first decided to jump into the fray and start annoying everybody, has an extremely interesting post that seems to tie the three together.
George Tenet, another incompetent fuckwit Klintoon appointee, has finally decided to leave the damn building. (Link thanks to LC Brian B)
WASHINGTON (AFP) - CIA director George Tenet resigned following mounting criticism over intelligence provided before the Iraq invasion and warnings before the September 11 attacks....not to mention complete and utter failure to act on other intelligence regarding Saddam's ties with al-Qa'eda and the "disappearing" of Saddam's WMDs, but who's counting?
Tenet fought back tears as he bid farewell to staff at the Central Intelligence Agency headquarters saying he was leaving to spend more time with his family.How touching. Now piss off.
President George W. Bush also insisted that the new blow to his administration"Blow?"
It's the best thing that has happened in years.
...as he seeks international support in Iraq and campaigns for re-election -- was for "personal reasons".In other words: He was offered to resign or get fired.
"He told me he was resigning for personal reasons. I told him I'm sorry he's leaving. He's done a superb job on behalf of the American people," said Bush.Well hooray. That makes one of us, Dubya.
Now how to get the stench out of his office?
Of course, as LC Brian B mentions in his email, it can't be long now until we have a feature length ad on CBS's 60 Minutes for Tenet's upcoming Bush-basher published, of course, by CBS's parent company Viacom.
Only question is: Will Tenet's ghost writer get cramps trying to get it finished before November 2nd?
(Link thanks to LC Chris)
By now it's no secret that Genocidal Activist Cunt in a Robe Phyllis Hamilton of San Francisco has overruled the Anti-Infanticide Act of 2003 and allowed murder to continue unabated.
Washington D.C. -- Christian Coalition of America condemns Federal Judge Phyllis Hamilton's ruling today overturning the partial-birth abortion ban passed by Congress and signed into law by President Bush in 2003. Clinton appointee Phyllis Hamilton's decision provided yet another example of out-of-control judicial tyranny. Judge Hamilton ruled that Planned Parenthood's 900 or so facilities and abortionists -- which kill over 600,000 unborn children every year, half of all abortions in America -- can resume partial-birth abortions. Her permanent injunction is not a national injunction covering other parties.Listen, we can argue about abortion in general and whereas I won't change my mind and you most likely won't change yours, we can still agree to disagree and continue to be friends, but when it comes to the practice of pulling an almost full-term baby halfway out of its mother, hammering scissors into its brains and sucking them out with a Hoover, there's no discussion as far as I'm concerned.
If you can accept that, then you and I have absolutely nothing to talk about ever again and I would appreciate it very much if you'd get the fuck off my planet, right now.
There is absolutely no difference between what Dr. Mengele presided over in the Nazi death camps and what "doctors" are doing when they perform a "partial birth abortion". It's premeditated murder, infanticide and just about as atrocious a deed as I can possibly imagine.
Don't even try to argue otherwise, because I won't be listening.
End of story.
Oh, and if you want to learn more about Hamilton, that murdering sow, then perhaps this will enlighten you:
Judge Phyllis Hamilton is the same judge who allowed a San Francisco-area school district to force school children into "becoming Muslims" for two weeks as part of their world history unit on Islam.Whatever happened to the prohibition against "establishing religion" in this country? Obviously "judge" Hamilton couldn't give two shits about that either, but then again: What would you expect from somebody who endorses cracking the skull of an infant and sucking its brains out?
No, don't get started on Christianity either. If I were to learn of a school forcing a student to "play Christian" against his will (unless it was a private Christian school, in which case I might want to know what the fuck the parents expected when they enrolled their tyke there), I'd be just as offended. I don't know why I have to keep repeating this, but it's freedom of religion, not freedom from religion.
May G-d have mercy upon her rotten soul, and may she receive none from anybody else.
...or did this poor idiot just miss the deadline for signing up? (Thanks for the link to LC Joe, who got it to us first)
The NASCAR NaziMmm... Alliteration. Idiotarian alliteration, no less. Much like watching a spastic pig in a ballerina outfit. You can't really decide if you should laugh or feel sorry for the tutu.
Bush is creating an un-American Americaby Jim Washburn
I am about to offend some of you by using the N word.Not to be rude or anything, but you already used it. In the headline, no less. And what's so offensive about NASCAR anyway?
Oh, you meant the other word.
No, Jimmeh, you won't offend anybody by using that word. You're a Moonbat, and Moonbats offend simply by the fact that they've been born. Not to mention the fact that you can't seem to get through your morning bong without having called somebody a Nazi. Be it the guy that screwed you by selling you bad weed, the landlord or the guy that nicked your welfare check while you were busy trying to find your last quaalude.
I know it is a word so laden with emotion and historical horror that it should not be used lightly....so you'll go right ahead and do so anyway. Inconsistency, another hallmark of the increasingly insane left.
But sometimes no other word gets the point across.Feel better now? Good. You have to be commended, though. You're already about to embark on your third paragraph and you've only used the word twice. That's pretty good for an Idiotarian.Nazi.
That’s right, I’m adding my voice to the other hysterical-seeming Americans who are likening the current White House administration to Germany’s grim men in gray.So noted. But we already knew you were a hysterical idiot, Jimmeh, so what's your point?
You know that I don’t like George W. Bush and his crew.You don't say?
I think he is the worst president in our nation’s history.Thankfully, nobody in the whole wide world worth giving a moment's attention to gives a thimbleful of rat's jizz what you think about anything.
As a matter of fact, it has yet to be proven that you and your kind think at all.
Maybe Andrew Johnson was worse, I don’t know, but he didn’t live in a time when his bad decisions could imperil our democracy and the stability of the world. Bush does.Hmmm... The first president after Lincoln was assassinated, presiding over a country bled white by the bloodiest war in her history, trying to put together the pieces while everything, including what would become of the Union and the formerly Confederate States, was very much up in the air.
And his "bad decisions couldn't imperil our democracy?"
Why don't you try to open a history book one day? Some of his bad decisions came damn close to doing just that. Not that we'd expect somebody as obviously oblivious to history as you to realize that you don't have the foggiest clue what you're talking about.
As to the stability of the rest of the world, I couldn't care less. We don't elect presidents to keep the rest of the world fat and happy, we elect them to make sure that our interests are served and served well. If that involves destabilizing the countries of those that wish us ill, then that's a feature, not a bug.
But a Nazi? Bush would have to go a ways to even begin approximating the horrors of Saddam Hussein, let alone Hitler.Good G-d. Quick, let go of that tenuous grasp on sanity! You just might end up making sense for a second or two!
But so many of what we could call "Nazi precursors" have been adopted by his administration that it warrants a hard look before the coming election, lest we all wake one day to the sound of goose-stepping.There. Safely back in the arms of raving lunacy. We thought we'd lost you there.
Governing in secrecy? Check.OK, LCs: Which one of you have been talking this time??? Haven't we told you time and time again that you shouldn't upset the serfs with tales of our Seeeekrit Illuminati KKKonspiracy Shadow Guvmint? If you don't stop spooking the retards like that, we're going to bloody well have to confiscate your decoder rings. Yes, and the funny hats too. We mean it this time, dammit!
Unbridled arrogance? Check.We're working on it, but the french keep upping the ante and raising the bar to where we can't hardly see it. And to think we took all the supplementary courses, extra credits and all, in Arrogance. For nothing, we tell you, NOTHING!
Damn frogs. Then again, they've had centuries to perfect it.
Putting ideology ahead of reality or the public interest? Check.Hey, the Hildebeest is one of yours. We don't want her, so quit trying to pawn her off like that. She's your bloody problem.
Acting as if the end justifies the means and that might makes right? Check and check.Yep. It IS pretty bad to think that blowing up three thousand civilians is justified by a desire to get the U.S. out of Saudi Arabia.
But might does actually make right. At least you don't see many of the ones without sufficient might ever being around for long enough to prove that they're right, kinda like now, where there are fewer and fewer Islamofascists with every day that goes by. They should've thought of that before they flew those planes into those office buildings, shouldn't they?
Nah, it's fun playing cowboys and Islamists. They make the most delightful piggy squeals when you squish them.
Acting as if big lies repeated often are better than the truth? Check.That would be the entire al-Q'erry campaign and MoreOn.org in a nutshell. Generously helped by the media, Fat Drunken Ted and the four nitwits of the donkocalypse, just to name a few.
Playing on people’s fears? Check.Dammit, he's on to us. We're really, really sorry about exaggerating the threat from terrorists. Heck, it's not like 3,000 civilians incinerated is all that big a deal, is it?
Besides, it takes away attention from the valuable and not at all fearmongering biannual statements from the Donks about how votes for Republicans mean burning black churches, family fathers with 67 children being laid off, social security being abolished 15 minutes after the inauguration (not that there's all that much left to confiscate, other than a few pieces of paper saying "IOU, Love, Billy Jeff")
Using diplomacy merely as a cynical tool to forward a war agenda? Check.Did he miss von Clausewitz? Not enough pictures, we suppose. And how is this worse than using diplomacy as a cynical tool to keep Saddam lining Kofi and Friends' pockets?
Showing a sociopathic disregard for the lives of others? Checkarooni.Yes, but enough about your friends in al-Qa'eda. We thought this was supposed to be about Bush.
Give us more, O Caesar! »
While publik skools dress our kids up in burquas and force them to read the Koran, Christians are forbidden to practice their religion in public (link thanks to LC & IB Tuning Spork).
RICHMOND, Virginia (AP) -- The Rev. Todd Pyle thought it was the perfect spot to baptize 12 new members of his church. The river was calm and shallow, and there was a shaded area offshore for people to stand."Oh look! It's a Christian! I'm SO offended!""It was a very serene place," he said. "It was special."
But officials at the Falmouth Waterfront Park, a public park just outside Fredericksburg, weren't pleased. They tried to break up the ceremony, claiming it might be offensive to nearby swimmers or other people using the park. Pyle was able to finish the baptism, but then he was asked to leave.
Looks to us like some of the Dhimmi officials of Fredericksburg need to go re-read their Constitution, paying particular attention to the bit about freedom of religion and the expression thereof. Or move to Riyadh, where they'd obviously feel more at home than in a free country.
The incident has outraged free-speech advocates.Sadly, it's all too common in what used to be the Land of the Free."These people are being discriminated against because of the content of their speech," said the Rev. Patrick Mahoney, who heads the Christian Defense Coalition. "It's one of the most egregious violations of the First Amendment I have ever seen."
Mahoney's group has threatened to file a lawsuit if the park refuses to allow future gatherings by religious groups, something for which the park admits it has no written policy.Just made it up on the spot, did they? Why are we not surprised?
Pyle said he chose to hold an outdoor baptism, still common in parts of the South, because his Cornerstone Baptist Church in Stafford lacks an indoor baptismal pool. He said few people seemed to notice the small congregation during the 30-minute ceremony May 23....only to discover that he was in Meccah all of a sudden.
That would sound so much better in the original German.
But park officials said religious groups seeking to perform a service in the park still need to apply for a permit or else gather under a shelter or inside.
"We don't want to tread on anybody's First Amendment or constitutional rights," said Brian Robinson, director of the Fredericksburg-Stafford Park Authority. "What we try to discourage is anything not formally permitted that just sort of occurs spontaneously."...thus treading on somebody's First Amendment rights. Oh, and would you care to explain to us the "or" you put in there? The Constitution and the Bill of Rights aren't the same document anymore? Did you go to publik skool, by any chance? You must have, since you somehow ended up in civil "service." That's where we tend to put people who can't count above ten without dropping trou and taking off their shoes.
"Can't haf zose spontaneous outbursts of peons exercizink zeir rights. Oh no, Mein Führer, zis vill not DO!"
John Whitehead, director of The Rutherford Institute, a Charlottesville, Virginia-based civil liberties organization, said that's a clear violation of the church members' constitutional rights.Not anymore, they aren't. At least not as long as the inmates are running the asylum."Could a church have a picnic in the park and sing hymns? Of course they could," he said. "Parks have been forums since time immemorial to do these types of things."
The American Civil Liberties Union of Virginia also said in a statement: "If the park rules allow people to wade and swim in the river, then they must allow baptisms in the river."You just KNOW that the city officials are fucked when even the ACLU is coming down on them like a ton of bricks.
Robinson said the park's board has formed a special committee to examine its policy and to put it in writing.Nothing like a bit of retroactive policy-writing, is there? Before you commence scribbling down your un-Constitutional drivel in crayon on a place mat from Denny's, you just might want to consider all the fun that can be had dragging you and your authoritarian censors into court, charged with violating the Constitution.
If the church applies for the proper permit, he said it's "certainly possible" they would be allowed to use the river for another baptism."Possible?"
Try "there's not a friggin' thing you little closet Nazis can do to stop them unless you want to be tarred, feathered and run out of town on a rail. Now suck it up or fuck the Hell off to a totalitarian society more to your liking, you stinking desk jockey shitsuckers!"
Meanwhile, Pyle said he will find another place to hold outdoor baptisms.Oh, don't you worry, Rev. Pyle. It's about time that those jackbooted pricks were dealt with, and we feel that that time is drawing nigh. So, by all means, don't bow your head to tyrants but continue to worship as the Constitution guarantees you a right to."We're disappointed," he said. "Every single person that was baptized thanked me afterward, saying [the river] made their experience more meaningful."
We'll deal with the algae in our gene pool in the meantime. It's about time we got the Clorox out anyway.
