The Incredible Shrinking Colin Powell Pt II: The Bolton Wars

Colin Powell continues to cement his reputation for deviousness and making the political personal with his backdoor attempts to scuttle John Bolton's nomination to the UN ambassador post:

Former secretary of state Colin L. Powell is emerging as a behind-the-scenes player in the battle over John R. Bolton's nomination as ambassador to the United Nations, privately telling at least two key Republican lawmakers that Bolton is a smart but very problematic government official, according to Republican sources.

Powell spoke in recent days with Sens. Lincoln D. Chafee (R.I.) and Chuck Hagel (Neb.), two of three GOP senators on the Foreign Relations Committee who have raised concerns about Bolton's confirmation, the sources said. Powell did not advise the senators to oppose Bolton, but offered a frank assessment of the nominee as a man who was challenging to work with on personnel and policy matters, according to two people familiar with the conversations.


During a speech in Washington on Social Security, President Bush urged the Senate to "put aside politics" and confirm John R. Bolton as U.N. ambassador.

"General Powell has returned calls from senators who wanted to discuss specific questions that have been raised," said Margaret Cifrino, a Powell spokeswoman. "He has not reached out to senators," and considers the discussions private.

A spokesman for Chafee confirmed that at least two conversations took place. Bolton served under Powell as his undersecretary of state for arms control, and the two were known to have serious clashes.

Powell's tenure as secretary of state was often marked by friction with the White House on a range of foreign policy issues, disagreements that both sides worked to keep from surfacing. It is not Powell's style to weigh in strongly against a former colleague, but rather to direct people to what he sees as flaws and potential problems, former associates say. Powell's views are highly influential with many Republicans and Democrats on Capitol Hill.

Those who know Powell best said two recent events provide insight into his thinking. Powell did not sign a letter from seven other former U.S. secretaries of state or defense supporting Bolton, and his former chief of staff, Lawrence B. Wilkerson, recently told the New York Times that Bolton would be an "abysmal ambassador."

"On two occasions, he has let it be known that the Bolton nomination is a bad one, to put it mildly," a Democratic congressional aide said. "It would be great to have Powell on the record speaking for himself, but he's unlikely to do it."

Why not just call Powell's machinations what they are---cowardly backstabbing. It's been his hallmark in his career as the most political military man in modern memory, surpassing even Wes Clark. That Americans' views of Powell are so distorted compared to the reality of his medicocre performance as Joint Chiefs Chairman, as SecState, and every other high-profile role he's held is a testament to his ability to use MSM lapdogs and other politicos to advance himself. Most are simply too infatuated with the idea of Colin Powell to clearly see the small, petty man he has become---egotistical, vainglorious, brittle, and vengeful.

National Review sees the light:

How does it happen that the story of Colin Powell's reservations about John Bolton shows up today simultaneously on the front pages of the Washington Post and the New York Times, just in time to fuel anti-Bolton talk on the Sunday chat shows? Because Powell and those around him are masters of the strategic leak. Friday morning's stories aren't technically news because it was clear that this is what was happening from the beginning: namely, that the long-running policy disputes between Bolton and Powell and his deputy Richard Armitage were simply being played out in a new forum, the battle over Bolton's nomination to be ambassador to the U.N.


This offers an opportunity for Bolton defenders to try to get the debate back where it belongs, on the substantive merits of his nomination rather than the sideshow disputes over whether he has occasionally spoken sharply to people and the 11-year-old off-the-wall allegation of abuse by the founder of the Dallas chapter of “Mothers Opposing Bush.” Bolton has been nominated not to “serve” the United Nations, as liberals have it, but to serve the president of the United States and the goals of his foreign policy there. He is such a superb choice partly because there is as little chance of him being captured by the U.N. bureaucracy as there was of him being captured by the State Department bureaucracy. We would expect and hope that at the end of Bolton's tenure at the U.N. he will have earned just as much enmity from recalcitrant bureaucrats at Turtle Bay as he did at Foggy Bottom.

This was at the root of Bolton's dispute with Powell. Since he has no strong philosophical moorings himself, Powell quickly became the servant of the permanent State Department establishment, for whom Bush's post-9/11 reorienting of U.S. foreign policy was discomfiting at best. Bolton was not just a believer in Bush's foreign policy, but regarded it as his professional duty to represent it in a building where he knew it wouldn't make him popular. Yes, this occasionally meant clashes with bureaucratic underlings. This was sometimes necessary — it is President Bush's appointees who are supposed to be setting the direction of the U.S. government, not bureaucrats with their own agendas. But it mostly meant that Bolton was routinely disagreeing with Powell and Armitage, who are now bent on exacting their revenge in a campaign marked by Powell's trademark underhanded style.

The Washington Post delicately described that style today thusly: "It is not Powell's style to weigh in strongly against a former colleague, but rather to direct people to what he sees as flaws and potential problems, former associates say."

So Powell talks down Bolton to Republican senators and assents to his former chief of staff viciously attacking Bolton in the press. President Bush shouldn't allow this to stand. John Bolton is being attacked precisely because he is a Bush loyalist. The battle over his nomination is a proxy for what has been the essential nugget of so many of the internal fights over Bush foreign policy — whether the president gets to set its direction or not. It is time for Bush to stop making general complaints about “politics” playing a role in the nomination fight and instead call Democrats on what is their real objection to Bolton: that he will be too aggressive in representing the U.S. at the United Nations and in challenging the corrupt and ineffectual status quo at the world body. That will create a debate that Bolton's defenders can win. Bolton was a Bush loyalist; now Bush must be a Bolton loyalist.

Powell is well on his way to becoming the GOP's Jimmy Carter---a virulently anti-American, spiteful, and stunted disgrace to the American character. How long before he starts churning out bad poetry and fig-leaf charitable work?

The Incredible Shrinking Colin Powell Pt I

Nice To Know Somebody Takes the War on Terror Seriously

Victor Davis Hanson has a must-read column on how to fight and win this war.

I Suppose They Could Have Made Him "Dookie Monster"

The uber-sensifascists at PBS have decided that Cookie Monster is too un-P.C., sparking Jonah Goldberg's righteous indignation:

But not according to the well-meaning social engineers of PBS. After three decades, they’ve announced he’s not a Cookie Monster at all. In the interests of teaching kids not to be gluttons, CTW has transformed Cookie Monster into just another monster who happens to like cookies. His trademark song, “C is for Cookie” has been changed to “A Cookie Is a Sometimes Food.” And this is a complete and total reversal of Cookie Monster’s ontology, his telos, his raison d’etre, his essential Cookie-Monster-ness.

If the Cookie Monster is no longer a cookie monster, what is he? Why didn’t they just name him “Phil: The Monster Who Sometimes Likes to Eat a Cookie”? Conceptually, this is no different than the idiot animal rights types who want their dogs and cats to be vegans, too. Cookie Monster cannot help being a Cookie Monster any more than your tabby can stop liking fish. It is their nature to do so. Why not just declare that Big Bird is now an elm tree? If the ineffable, inexorable, immutable nature of Cookie Monster’s cookie-eating can be erased for some good cause, why should Big Bird’s birdness be safe?

Sesame Street and its defenders say they are just trying to do their bit in the war against child obesity. That’s nice. But at what price? The whole point of the Cookie Monster character was to have a character who was silly because he ate so much. If Cookie Monster were a Greek god, he’d be the god of gluttony. Wouldn’t it have been more honest and simply better to implore kids not to be too much like the Cookie Monster rather than make the Cookie Monster like everyone else? We all understand we shouldn’t be like Oscar the Grouch.

Who says that making Cookie Monster into moderate eater will improve kids' behavior anyway? Indeed, for years, Cookie Monster has devoured not only cookies, but things which merely look like cookies, including plates, Frisbees, and the moon. If Cookie Monster is so influential, why haven’t I heard more about kids going to the hospital after trying to eat plates?

Imagine if in the name of combating homophobia, the producers declared Bert and Ernie were gay. They’re not brothers and they live together, so it wouldn’t require much rewriting. The Christian Right would go batty, but not necessarily for the right reason. Even before complaints about homosexuality enter into it, it would be outrageous to “sexualize” the characters at all.

But why is it that sexuality and race are the only topics that set off our natural revulsion of social engineering? Indeed, all of the fretting and foaming about gays in children’s programming — Spongebob Square Pants, Tinky-Winky, etc — is that it tends to crowd out the larger philosophical issues of moral relativism in the popular culture. The social engineering on display in the negation of Cookie Monster’s identity is no less sweeping than it would be if they declared Grover a transsexual.

In fact, that’s what makes this decision so hypocritical. Sesame Street normally drenches kids with “be true to yourself” pap and identity politics. In one episode, Elmo and Whoopi Goldberg (no relation) have a long talk about how they’d never want to give up, respectively, their skin or fur color because that would be changing who they are. Well, the hue of Elmo’s fur is less essential to his identity than Cookie Monster’s gluttony is to his. Rosita, the Hispanic Muppet, is often told not to be ashamed of her accent because that’s just a part of who she is. Maybe they should ditch it, in the name of good diction. Heck, maybe the kids in wheelchairs should get up and walk next season because we’re all in favor of kids being able to walk.

First they gave Oscar's spotlight to the noxious Elmo and his fembot Zoe. Then they destroyed Snuffy by making him visible to every Sesame Streeter (instead of only being seen by Big Bird). Now they've gutted the character concept of Cookie Monster.

What next? Have The Count turn out to be a mere Boris Karloff fan instead of a vampire? Put Oscar in a homeless shelter and give him anger management training so he becomes Oscar the Occasionally Grumpy? Give Grover Ritalin?

My kids are only going to watch the retro Sesame Street from the 70s where the cast actually lived in the inner city and Oprah was serving up 31 flavors working at Baskin Robbins instead of turning an entire generation of Americans into weak little sissies who can't bear a fake furry puppet with a man's arm thrust up his hinder pigging out on cookies.

Get a grip.

This Is What's Important

Allow me to get some things off my chest. Don't worry, this won't take long... Well, maybe it will, but I promise I won't ramble... Well... Nevermind.

In all my sadness, seeking, ranting and raving about the sad state of the institutional American church, I have been forced to recognize some things. I feel very strongly that this crystallization has not come about by my own effort. There are too many coincidences colluding. This is something that was never within a tiny modicum of my control; even in the dark and shaky places; even in the places wobbly and strange.

What has pushed me to vent this realization? (Other than my innate urge to emote all over someone when I'm worked up.) I trotted on over to T's house at worship naked and perused some things. Suddenly, it was all in focus.

And now... there are a few things I would like to say to the bloated, arrogant, complicated, institutionalized, communist church:

*WordGirl stepping up on to her soapbox and getting really -- REALLY -- choked up*
THIS IS WHAT MATTERS.
It's not about the f***ing money.
It's not about your f***ing programs.
It's not about how big a building we can build or how many butts we can get in seats every Sunday.
It's not about the damned parking lot or how many bake sales and raffles we have.
Because WE ARE NOT WARRIORS FOR CHRIST.
We are complacent, spoiled rotten children who are so self-focused we can't see how apostate we are.
We are lazy fat slobs who worry about F***ING FUNDRAISING EFFORTS for aerobics classes in our newly constructed gym, NOT whether someone is going to burn it down.
Our children live in safety and we worry about their college educations, NOT if they are going to be gang raped by tribal thugs.
We worry about a second car.
A summer vacation.
NOT whether we will live to see the sun.
And barrels and barrels of food are rotting in our church hallways because it makes us feel better to see the collection bins full.

How much money does it takes to feed the Burmese Karen?
How many have lost babies, husbands, wives, and homes?
How many still live with joy and peace knowing their Savior and depending on their Faith in the face of basic survival?

And you want to lay a guilt trip on me for not giving more to your precious building fund?
May God have mercy on your soul.

Thank God we are so blessed. Thank God our children are safe, well educated, fed and clean. Get on your knees and thank Him that you didn't have to look down the barrel of a gun this morning. Thank Him that you have a building to meet in, handouts to Xerox, and Bibles to read. Thank Him for the Karen of Burma. Thank Him for the martyrs, the teachers, the persecuted and the scarred. They made your building possible. Not the financial consultants on committee. Not the Power Point presentations. Not the flyers, emails, videos, or commitment forms.

Help them. Only then can you help yourselves.

More Senate Racism from the Democrats

Sonorous John of the Magic Hat channels fellow Senator and ex-Klansman Robert Byrd, who famously filibustered civil rights legislation in the 60s:

I can tell you what I do believe though. When you have got tens of thousands of innocent souls perished in Darfur, when 11 million children are without health insurance, when our colossal debt subjects our economic future to the whims of Asian bankers, no on can tell me that faith demands all of a sudden that you put the Senate into a position where it is going to pull itself apart over the question of a few judges. No one with those priorities has a right to use faith to intimidate anyone of us.

Gotta love the reference to those nefarious "Asian bankers". Might any of them be the Khmer Rouge to whom Kerry claimed he ran guns to on the night he received his Magic Hat?

If Kerry's faith and that of his Lefty colleagues is so rock-solid, then how could anyone use faith to intimidate them?

As for Darfur, perhaps Kerry would like to support John Bolton's nomination to UN ambassador in order to reform the body, which has done precisely nothing to stop the Darfur genocide.

Somehow I doubt his faith impels him to do anything to keep African tribal minorities from being slaughtered---after all, they might one day become "African bankers".

(HT: The Blogfather)

10,000!

MoltenThought hit a milestone today---10,000 visits, reached in just over 90 days.

Thanks for reading, thanks for commenting, and thanks for supporting blogs.

Hillary Clinton Breaking the Law for Cash? Surely You're Joking

Time to break out those cookies.

If Cokie Stands Against Us, Who Wouldn't Stand For Us?

Not that the MSM's biased or anything:

Amid the reactions to the elevation of Joseph Ratzinger to the papacy, there have been some doozies. My favorite came from a furious Ms. Cokie Roberts on Tuesday's night's Nightline. She must have been venting something fierce all evening, because Ted Koppel, none too pleased himself, introduced her with these words: "Cokie Roberts, you, you were, I gather, able to contain your enthusiasm, when you heard the news."

Whereupon Cokie shot back with this. (And if looks could kill, Nightline would have lost its entire viewership, such as it is.)

"Well, this, this choice is really something that is different from how Americans approach a lot of things. It's Cardinal Ratzinger who wrote the letter "Dominus Iesus," about [how] other religions are -- deficient. And, and he said, in that letter, he said that, that, "relativistic theories which seek to justify religious pluralism are bad." Well, now, the problem with that is this country is based on religious pluralism. He has written a letter on, on women and feminism that was very disturbing to many women, myself included. Where he essentially, after Pope John Paul II had apologized to women for the sexism in the Church, this letter went back and essentially said that feminism was the, the source of divorce, that it was the source of problems in, in marriage. When, you know, without ever talking about the many problems that, that happen in marriages where women are the victims. So, there are a lot of areas here where American Catholics will look at this papacy and not recognize it."

Sure, Cokie, the real issue with Catholicism is they're just not into killing babies enough to suit you and your limousine liberal jet-set urban divas.

But then again, Benedict XVI has moral authority and credibility and you're just a pinch-faced virago whose Roledex shrinks like the glaciers over time.

When Filibusters Were Evil

No surprise---it was when Democrats were in the Senate majority, as Bob Novak recalls:

Usually, however, liberals were aligned against the filibuster, the bulwark preventing civil rights legislation until 1957. During Clinton's presidency, Senate Democratic leader Thomas Daschle and Sen. Edward M. Kennedy repeatedly demanded up-or-down majority votes on judicial nominations. Once Bush was elected, they crafted a filibuster strategy to block judicial nominees.

Through my reporting career on Capitol Hill, filibuster advocates did not utter the dreaded f-word (with Southern segregationists referring to it as ''extended debate''). ''Filibuster'' was talked about by foes, such as Democratic Sen. Patrick Leahy on June 18, 1998: ''I have stated over and over again on this floor that I would . . . object and fight against any filibuster on a judge.''

Liberals now praise the filibuster by name. Leahy, the Judiciary Committee's ranking Democrat, on April 6 declared: ''Eliminating the filibuster by the nuclear option would violate and destroy the Constitution's design of the Senate as an effective check on the executive.''

Frist reiterated Tuesday that his plans refer only to nominations: ''I will not act in any way to impact the rights of colleagues when it comes to legislation.'' Robert Byrd observed no such boundaries when he was majority leader.

How times change when one's party can't cheat effectively enough to win elections anymore.

How Ratzinger Became Benedict

The inside story is beginning to come out.

The GOP Senate: Profiles in Cowardice

Can you stomach more on the Bolton nomination debacle?

Then here it is:

Lugar has badly misplayed the Bolton nomination process, from initially voicing doubts about Bolton -- for which the White House took him to the woodshed -- to the Tuesday televised debacle that gave Democrats an opportunity to pound away on Bolton. Republican leadership staff was miffed that Lugar was apparently aware of the Democrats' ammunition against Bolton, but chose not to share it with them prior to the Tuesday committee meeting, this, after Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist had cleared the decks for a committee vote.

"It isn't clear that any of the material the Democrats are throwing around has a lot of traction, but even if it doesn't the damage is done," says a Republican staffer on another Senate committee. "But if Foreign Relations Democratic staff is anything like mine, then Bolton probably can't survive three weeks of what surely will be daily leaks against his character. There has to be some push back, and Lugar and Hagel clearly aren't capable of doing that."

On Wednesday morning, White House congressional liaisons attempted to reach out to Ohio Republican Sen. George Voinovich, who had previously met with Bolton privately and had told White House and State Department handlers that he was supportive of the nomination. But Voinovich wouldn't make himself available, a bad sign.

And I Thought Relativism Was the Name of the Hillbilly Band in "Deliverance"

In Hugh Hewitt's excellent presentation of Cardinal Ratzinger's final homily before ascending to the Throne of St. Peter, we find out what relativism truly is:

How many winds of doctrine we have known in recent decades, how many ideological currents, how many ways of thinking. . . . The small boat of thought of many Christians has often been tossed about by these waves--thrown from one extreme to the other: from Marxism to liberalism, even to libertinism; from collectivism to radical individualism; from atheism to a vague religious mysticism; from agnosticism to syncretism, and so forth. Every day new sects are created and what Saint Paul says about human trickery comes true, with cunning which tries to draw those into error (cf Eph 4, 14). Having a clear faith, based on the Creed of the Church, is often labeled today as a fundamentalism. Whereas, relativism, which is letting oneself be tossed and "swept along by every wind of teaching," looks like the only attitude (acceptable) to today's standards. We are moving towards a dictatorship of relativism which does not recognize anything as for certain and which has as its highest goal one's own ego and one's own desires.

However, we have a different goal: the Son of God, true man. He is the measure of true humanism. Being an "Adult" means having a faith which does not follow the waves of today's fashions or the latest novelties. A faith which is deeply rooted in friendship with Christ is adult and mature. It is this friendship which opens us up to all that is good and gives us the knowledge to judge true from false, and deceit from truth. We must become mature in this adult faith; we must guide the flock of Christ to this faith. And it is this faith--only faith--which creates unity and takes form in love. On this theme, Saint Paul offers us some beautiful words--in contrast to the continual ups and downs of those were are like infants, tossed about by the waves: (he says) make truth in love, as the basic formula of Christian existence. In Christ, truth and love coincide. To the extent that we draw near to Christ, in our own life, truth and love merge. Love without truth would be blind; truth without love would be like "a resounding gong or a clashing cymbal" (1 Cor 13,1).

Faith is not a fad. This is something the MSM will never comprehend---it is quite simply beyond their ken.

A Terrorist Without Money Is Like A Democrat Without A Majority

They can still hurt you, but not anywhere near as badly, as Andrew McCarthy (our go-to guy in the war against the culture of death) notes in his Senate testimony.

All It Took Was A Terrorist Complicit in the Murder of 2,977 New Yorkers for The Times To Become Anti-Court-Ordered Death

Andy McCarthy in The Corner:

It was only a month ago, during the Terri Schiavo controversy, that the New York Times, dubiously assuming Terri was in fact in a persistent vegetative state, was editorializing about how sensible it was for the Florida courts to have accepted the "testimony of her husband that [Terri] would have chosen to die rather than live indefinitely in such condition."

Now comes today's interesting report from the Times's Eric Lichtblau about Zacarias Moussaoui's apparent intention to plead guilty to participation in the 9/11 conspiracy. Such a plea could result in imposition of the death penalty. Upon noting that, in a letter to the court, Moussaoui has "asked to be sentenced to death," Lichtblau speculates: “One question likely to be raised by defense lawyers is whether Mr. Moussaoui's desire to be executed is, by itself, evidence that he may be mentally unfit.”

The Times, as ever, sports all the trendy, progressive pieties. It is in euthanasia’s “right to die” vanguard, but it is revolted by the death penalty, even for mass murderers.

So, follow the logic: Expression of the supposed choice to die, if purportedly made by an innocent but inconvenient person, based on “proof” of the most suspect nature, must at all costs be deferred to on the theory that it is a personal and thoughtful decision. To the contrary, expression of the choice to die by a guilty terrorist, proved indisputably in an unambiguous written assertion by the person himself, is actually evidence that the person is “mentally unfit” on the theory that, well, who in his right mind would make such a personal choice to die?

Got it?

Delusions of Simplicity

"I must increase, you must decrease."
Jesus? Is that You? I can't see You through this fog... Why are You wearing a staff administration pin?

"I will destroy the Temple and in three days, restore it."
Okay... I'll go get my checkbook. *Sigh* Didn't we just restore the Temple? I guess I can take out another loan...

"Come to me, all who are weary and I will give you rest. For I am gentle and lowly. My burden is easy and my yoke is light."
What time does that start? Okay, then. I'll have to come straight from work. I know serving at this location is more important than my private ministry. I know, I know -- the care I give to my family and friends doesn't count. And neither do the contributions I give to other Christian organizations. I know, I know -- the ministry I have outside this place can't be tallied on the bulletin board at the end of the year. I'm filling out my financial comittment form tonight. Right, I know. You need to know in advance so you can allocate funds.

*smirk*

Matthew 20:14-16
14 Take your pay and go. I want to give the man who was hired last the same as I gave you. 15 Don't I have the right to do what I want with my own money? Or are you envious because I am generous?’
16 “So the last will be first, and the first will be last.”

John 6:27-30:
27 Do not work for food that spoils, but for food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you. On him God the Father has placed his seal of approval.”
28 Then they asked him, “What must we do to do the works God requires?”
29 Jesus answered, “The work of God is this: to believe in the one he has sent.”

Beechnut Chew

Jane Fonda -- unforgiven:

KANSAS CITY, Mo. — A man spit tobacco juice into the face of actress Jane Fonda after waiting in line to have her sign her new book, police said.
The man ran off but was quickly caught by police Tuesday night and charged with disorderly conduct.
Fonda has been on tour and doing interviews to promote her just-published memoir, "My Life So Far." The thrice-married, two-time Academy Award winner covers a wide array of topics, including her 1972 visit to Hanoi to protest the Vietnam War, during which she was photographed on a North Vietnamese anti-aircraft gun. She has apologized for that photo, but not for opposing the war.
Capt. Rich Lockhart of the Kansas City Police Department said that although Fonda did not want to press charges against Michael A. Smith, 54, of Kansas City, he was arrested on a municipal charge of disorderly conduct after off-duty officers caught him just outside Unity Temple, where Fonda was signing books.
Smith, a Vietnam veteran, told The Kansas City Star on Wednesday that Fonda was a "traitor" and that her protests against the war were unforgivable. He said he normally does not chew tobacco but did so Tuesday solely to spit juice on the actress.
"I consider it a debt of honor," he told The Star for a story on its Web site, www.kansascity.com. "She spit in our faces for 37 years. It was absolutely worth it. There are a lot of veterans who would love to do what I did."

Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't this the same Jane Fonda that laughed and beamed with the enemy a la victory celebration? Isn't she implicated in taking notes, Social Security numbers, and messages from American POWs and turning them over to the enemy?

She says her life has completely turned around since she became a Christian, but recently after that lifechanging event, went on to star in "The Vagina Monologues."

You be the judge.

UPDATE:
Information from my illustrious colleague, (who pointed me to snopes) has set me straight:

TRUE: During a 1972 trip to North Vietnam, Jane Fonda propagandized on behalf of the North Vietnamese government, declared that American POWs were being treated humanely and condemned U.S. soldiers as "war criminals" and later denounced them as liars for claiming they had been tortured.
FALSE: Jane Fonda handed over to their captors the slips of paper POWs pressed upon her.
TRUE: In 1999, Jane Fonda was profiled in ABC's A Celebration: 100 Years of Great Women.

It's All Downhill from "Jump Street"

The Onion brings the funny.

Don't Hate the Pontiff, Hate the Papal Encyclical

The MSM continues to contribute to its well-earned reputation as a roomful of baboons trying to copulate when it comes to coverage of the new pope.

Look, the man's not a politician, even if he did get elected. If it were the Dalai Lama we were discussing, do you really think the press would evince such sneering condescension toward the man?

Air America Deader Than The Muskrat Pelt On Sam Donaldson's Head, Says Me

Paraphrasing this fine LA Times article.

Network News Deader Than The Muskrat Pelt On My Head, Says Sam Donaldson

Well, okay, I paraphrased a bit:

Former ABC News reporter/anchor Sam Donaldson is ready to say the last rites for network news because it will soon lose its dominant position as Americans' primary source of news. "I think it's dead. Sorry," he said during a breakfast panel Tuesday at the National Association of Broadcasters' convention in Las Vegas. "The monster anchors are through."

The REAL Nuclear Option

Does Zarqawi have a nuke?

Recurrent intelligence reports say al Qaeda terrorist Abu Musab Zarqawi has obtained a nuclear device or is preparing a radiological explosive -- or dirty bomb -- for an attack, according to U.S. officials, who also say analysts are unable to gauge the reliability of the information's sources.

The classified reports have been distributed to U.S. intelligence agencies for several consecutive months and say Zarqawi, al Qaeda's leader in Iraq, has stored the nuclear device or dirty bomb in Afghanistan, said officials familiar with the intelligence.

If anyone other than Bill Gertz was reporting this, I'd think it was wild speculation.

Let's pray that the intelligence turns out to be false.

So THAT'S Why They Hate Pope Benedict XVI

Love the headline here: "New pope intervened against Kerry in US 2004 election campaign":

German Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, the Vatican theologian who was elected Pope Benedict XVI, intervened in the 2004 US election campaign ordering bishops to deny communion to abortion rights supporters including presidential candidate John Kerry.

In a June 2004 letter to US bishops enunciating principles of worthiness for communion recipients, Ratzinger specified that strong and open supporters of abortion should be denied the Catholic sacrament, for being guilty of a "grave sin."

He specifically mentioned "the case of a Catholic politician consistently campaigning and voting for permissive abortion and euthanasia laws," a reference widely understood to mean Democratic candidate Kerry, a Catholic who has defended abortion rights.

The letter said a priest confronted with such a person seeking communion "must refuse to distribute it."

A footnote to the letter also condemned any Catholic who votes specifically for a candidate because the candidate holds a pro-abortion position. Such a voter "would be guilty of formal cooperation in evil, and so unworthy to present himself for holy communion," the letter read.

Of course, "Catholic politician consistently campaigning and voting for permissive abortion and euthenasia laws" applies to a whole bunch of Democrats, not just Sonorous John of the Magic Hat. If Ted Kennedy ever showed his rummy nose in church between campaigns, one presumes he'd be denied communion as well, if only to keep lighting from striking the altar and endangering the altar boys.

The real news in this story is that somebody in the Catholic Church actually stood up for keeping communion holy.

Eat Another Ho-Ho

...'cause the CDC said being overweight's only the SEVENTH leading cause of death in America:

Being overweight is nowhere near as big a killer as the government thought, ranking No. 7 instead of No. 2 among the nation's leading preventable causes of death, according to a startling new calculation from the CDC.

I'm washing down my third tub of Crisco with a bottle of Wesson Oil as we speak.

A Little Wednesday Morning Pick-Me-Up

From the archives at Worship Naked, the Mistress T shares a story of Biblical proportions. (And you thought the zit on your nose was big.)

Check out:
the end times part I for the heads up, and then
the end times part II for the follow up.

Guaranteed to make you feel better about prom pimples.

Newsweek Hates Criticism of the Judiciary---When It's the GOP Doing the Criticizing, That Is

Andrew McCarthy hits another homer:

In reporting that political “vitriol” about the courts is “higher than ever,” I wonder if Rosenberg and her colleagues can point to anything said by Rep. Tom DeLay and the other conservatives they mention that comes remotely close in terms of “fervent judge-bashing” to the willful vitriol spewed by the senior senator from Massachusetts. And a number of judges were threatened or killed in the late 80s and early 90s. Should we, on Newsweek’s logic, inquire into whether there is some causal connection between those vile acts and Senator Kennedy’s bombast?

Conservatives are not besmirching judges, like Kennedy did to Bork. What conservatives and others who care about democratic self-determination are raising is the serious issue of whether the courts are changing the fundamental nature of our republic. People of good will need not agree that this is the case. But they all ought to be offended by the notion that the issue cannot even be discussed without raining down slanders which imply that criticizing judicial performance is akin to Wahhabi-style holy war.

And somehow I don't recall Newsweek and the rest of the media being this concerned about the damaging effects of public criticism on judicial independence after the Supreme Court decided Bush v. Gore.

No Style Points Here

George Neumayr on the Washington Post's curious spite for John Bolton's grooming and fashion style:

One of the Washington Post's tricks of concealed bias is the phrase, "critics say." Which translated means: we here at the Washington Post want to make an editorial point on the front page, but since that's not quite kosher professionally we'll find some "critics" or "experts" to make our point for us. Last Saturday's Post provided a classic example of this practice in a piece smearing the memory of Pope John Paul II: "Catholic dissidents Call for Openness; John Paul Silenced Many, Critics Say."

But whatever bias the Washington Post conceals in such practiced formulations on the front page percolates up more visibly through larger cracks in its other sections. In search of an outlet the paper's bias can usually flow through a large opening in the Post's Style section.

Sandy Berger's a lovable frump, while John Bolton's just not our sort of people, don't you see?

Who Is Benedict XVI?

A man quite misunderstood by the Hair Helmet Hamas, apparently:

Most of the commentators, however, even those who support him, are misinterpreting Ratzinger’s point. They are getting him wrong.

What Ratzinger defends is not dogmatism against relativism. What he defends is not absolutism against relativism. These are false alternatives.

What Ratzinger attacks as relativism is the regulative principle that all thought is and must remain subjective. What he defends against such relativism is the contrary regulative principle, namely, that each human subject must continue to inquire incessantly, and to bow to the evidence of fact and reason.

The fact that we each see things differently does not imply that there is no truth. It implies, rather, that each of us may have a portion of the truth, and that in this or that matter some of us may hold more (or less) truth than others. Therefore, since each of us has only part of all the truth we seek, we must work hard together to discern in all things wherein lies the truth, and wherein the error.

Ratzinger wishes to defend the imperative of seeking the truth in all things, the imperative to follow the evidence. This imperative applies to daily life, to science, and to faith. The great Jewish and Christian name for God is connected to this imperative — one of the Creator’s names is Truth. Other related names are Light, and Way. Humans are made seekers after truth.

My Papal Concession Speech

Friends, Romans, Catholics-

Lend me your ears.

The Holy Spirit, to paraphrase U2, moves in mysterious ways indeed.

Given the historical opportunity to think outside-the-box and make a truly stunning selection for pontiff, the College of Cardinals (Louisville?) elected one of their own, Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger, to succeed John Paul II. I myself would never suck up to the cardinal electors by having my middle name legally changed to their title, but to each their own.

No, I'm not bitter. I'm sure that the man who took on a papal name inspired by the actor who played Starbuck on "Battlestar Galactica" back in the 70s will do a fine job. After all, at 78 years young, he's no doubt had lots of practice wearing robes and waving at people. I'm sure he'l be a great Pope, and in any case, there are enough people around him all the time that he won't break any Vatican vases or anything.

I, on the other hand, would have been a different kind of Pope.

For one thing, I'm not Catholic. There's a big difference right there! Sure, John Paul II wasn't Catholic either, according to Christiane Amanpour, but I'm truly non-Catholic.

No doubt, those religious bigots in the Vatican held that little demographic fact against me in the balloting.

Why couldn't they look at the whole person?

I like to talk. That's good for a pontiff, isn't it? They talk all the time, sometimes even in foreign tongues. I can swear in Russian, Portuguese, French, Spanish, and British ("Bugger all!"), so that should have been a wash.

I like to wear hats. Most of what the Pope does involves a hat of some sort. I look good in a hat.

The Pope issues opinions. I have lots of those, and could make many more upon request.

The Pope wears robes. I'm told I look quite fetching in my robe, which I wear outdoors sometimes, just like the Pope. (Though I have to admit nobody throws flowers at me when I do---they just tend to yell a lot, sometimes in Russian, Portuguese, French, Spanish, and British).

Had the Cardinals seen fit to select me, a humble, obedient, non-Catholic servant of God, I would immediately have started shaking stuff up.

First, I would have selected a much more hip papal name---Pope John Paul George Ringo. Or maybe Pope Badass I. Something that would get people talking about the Church again, because you need buzz to put butts in pews these days.

Second, I would have changed the name of The Vatican to simply "The V". It's got an aura of mystery about it, doesn't it? "The V." Plus I liked that Marc Singer miniseries "V", and it would remind me of it.

Third, I'd make all the cardinals Red Sox. Live in the now. 'Nuff said.

Fourth, the host needs pepper. Or garlic. Something.

Fifth, mass is way too long. Maybe it's the name---"mass"---as in "massively long." I'd call it "min" and get you out of there in 20 minutes, or your offering back. And add a Drive-Thru. That way we can get more butts in seats too.

Sixth, I'd excommunicate John Kerry. No magic hats in the Body of Christ, thank you!

Seventh, I'd put monster truck tires on the Popemobile, and maybe one of those drag chutes like Batman used to have.

I like to think I would have been a good Pope, maybe the best, certainly the most humble. My goal would have been to be so outrageously righteous that even being humble I could sing my own praises, because I was that much better than even I said, you know?

But, in the end, I yield to the will of God, who through no fault of my own has decreed that the next Pope will be somebody who's been in the Catholic Church for a really long time, knows all this stuff about it, and worked his way up through the ranks over decades, yet somehow missed the part where you're supposed to call your opponent and let him know what a tough campaign he fought, even if you somehow talked God out of making him Pope, of which he would have been the best, all-time.

I won't challenge the vote. I won't ask for a recount. I won't claim that my supporters were intimidated by the red robes in the room or the incense or even a fear of Germans. I'm a Protestant, after all, not a Democrat.

I wish my opponent, Pope Benedict XVI, all the best and thank my vast legion of supporter for his time and effort on my behalf.

In the meantime, I understand Iraq's looking for a full-time President.....

Where Have All the Lefty Bomb-Throwers Gone?

Nowhere---they're still here:

What happened to the great threat from the organized and armed radical right? The so-called militias dissipated, as most of their members were regular guys who didn't want to be painted as terrorist sympathizers. There were militia members who really did want to copy McVeigh, and they slunk back into the darkness to avoid the glare of the TV lights. But they were a fraction of the militia movement, and they have remained mostly underground since, isolated by their own crackpot radicalism.

In the decade since the Oklahoma City bombing, the media have remained interested in the right-wing crazies, but have almost entirely ignored the left-wing ones -- those committing most of the terrorist acts inside the United States. Left-wing terrorist groups have been responsible for almost all of the recent domestic terrorism. The National Memorial Institute for the Prevention of Terrorism maintains a terrorism database. According to its files, as the Baltimore Sun reported on Sunday, fully 22 of the 25 terrorist attacks inside the United States since 2003 are believed to have been the work of environmental extremists.

This is not a recent development. Left-wing terrorists have always been the major terrorist threat in the United States. In the FBI's 1996 report on terrorism in the U.S., the bureau mentions both right-wing and left-wing terrorists, but notes: "Over the last three decades, leftist-oriented extremist groups posed the predominant domestic terrorist threat in the United States."

The report went on to state that the collapse of the Soviet Union and the bureau's success in breaking up some of those groups had reduced the threat. But within five years the assessment was different. In its official terrorism report for 2000/2001, the FBI singled out environmental radicals as a major source of domestic terrorism, but did not mention right-wing groups at all.

"During the past several years, the violence and destructive activities perpetrated by animal rights and environmental extremists in the United States and elsewhere have increased in frequency and intensity," the report stated.

Sure wish the MSM cared to report on left-wing terrorist groups instead of just funding them.

BREAKING NEWS: We've Got a Pope

12:05 EST... The smoke color is inconclusive, but the bells leave no doubt. There's a new Pope in town. Molten Thought will keep you posted on the developments.

UPDATE:
As many had speculated and hoped, Joseph Ratzinger has ascended to the highest office in the Catholic Church, in the shortest Conclave decision in remembered history. Announcing himself as "a simple worker in the Lord's vineyard", Ratzinger introduced himself to the throng of cheering people in St. Peters Square and then blessed them in traditional prayer. Ratzinger has chosen the title "Pope Benedict the XVI".

A close advisor to John Paul II, Ratzinger presided over his funeral and was a visible force in the interim since the late Pope's death. Known for his conservative stance on marriage, divorce, abortion, contraception, homosexuality, and theology, Ratzinger stands to continue the legacy John Paul II began.

We can only hope. The eyes of the world are watching Benedict XVI, and here at MoltenThought our prayers are with him, the church, and the world. May he be the man of God the church so desperately needs.

The Way of Christ Isn't Cash & Carry

Dear faculty and staff:

I am writing in regard to the enclosed devotional:

"Together: Why Money Matters

This week's key scripture: Mark 12:41-44

Profiles in Stewardship: J.Frankles Style

Marvin the Miser
Gives nothing at all;
Harry H. Happy
Makes giving a ball!

Mysterious Martha
Is very evasive;
Pastor Peter Paul
Can be so persuasive.

Bragging Beauregard
Tells about his donations;
But Crafty Cathy
Is more concerned about her creations.

Tithing Terry
Gives a Tenth, at least;
Little Larry
Gave a fifty-cent piece.

Arrogant Allen
Thinks things are just fine;
Prophet Pryor
Waits for a sign.

Hedonistic Harold
Gives what feels good;
Proper Penelope
Gives what she should.

Speedboat Sam
Needs to pay for his dock;
Second-hand Sonya
Puts her diamonds in hock.

Questioning Quigley
Wonders if it's enough;
Poker Polly
Just prefers to bluff.

This is serious business:
Good stewards, we should all be.
Trust in your heart and the Lord.
And remember, admission isn't always free.

Such poetry may be revealing as it speaks to who we are. Spend this day meditating upon the steward of God's resources you have become and ask what God is calling you to be."



I understand that we are in the midst of a great push towards the goals outlined in recent fundraising publications. As such, I also understand that leadership feels it necessary to "rally the troops" so to speak, to gain as much momentum in this campaign as possible. I too, would love to see the church operate without debt in order to engage in ministry that is unaffected by the pressures that debt inevitably brings.

However, I would like some clarification as to the sentiments of the above email -- especially the poem's last line. Let me say first and foremost that I am a generous and prayerful giver. I do not "tithe" in the strict sense, but give with my whole heart according to what the Lord has instructed me. These amounts (I am told by my tax returns) go above and beyond "tithing". Since I am called to use my talents wisely and carefully, I examine the entities to which I give, knowing that God wants me to further His kingdom with wisdom and forethought. I give joyfully, knowing that the Lord will bless each penny for the sake of His Son and His Bride. But nowhere in the Gospels have I read that entrance to the Kingdom comes at a fee.

I have not been attending this church for very long, yet I have given prayerfully. I have still not received peace about this fundraising campaign due to such sentiments as the ones contained above, among others. I admire and respect our Senior Pastor, Associate Pastors, teachers, workers and laymen. And I have truly felt at home the short while I have been attending. That is why I am concerned about these matters and request, with a heart of humility and understanding, to receive feedback from you.

Thanks so much for your attention and care.

This is what I have been faced with lately at church. They are in the midst of a fundraising campaign that seeks to pay off the mortgage on the existing property and build on considerable facilities to the ones already in place. The sanctuary is 12 years old. The educational and staff facilities are a little less than 9 years old.

The pattern that has become clear in the last month or so has been one of priority displacement. Announcements, prayers, sermons, songs, bulletins, mailouts, email "devotionals", and special events have all -- yes ALL -- been centered around this campaign. And the central message has been, "This is completely, 100% the rightest thing in the world to do, and if you don't support us, shame on you." The sentiments from the pulpit and mailings, et al, have been much of the same, ladled with syrupy emotion and gobs and gobs of guilt. It's enough to make you want to pull your hair out.

I just left a church that was less than above board with their financial dealings. How severe these dealings are remains to be seen. But when they do not publish their books, and use Scripture as means to threaten people into giving, that crosses the line from stewardship training to spiritual abuse. So you can see why I might be a little gun shy when it comes to this issue.

I personally think that each individual church should only be so big. There is a point where the facilities and congregation become unmanageable. I have seen this breed greed, corruption, broken relationships, hostility, and a general symptom of people losing touch with each other. The last church I was a member of controlled this with mafia -- everyone in charge had the same last name (in a congregation of 8,000). That's disgraceful.

I am for small units in just about everything I do -- small government, small townships, small schools and universities, small classes in those settings, small circles of friends, and on and on. So it bothers me when my church steps up (during worship time, when we should be praising our God) and tries to shame us into giving more money. Especially when the service I am sitting in is not only not full, but the classrooms aren't either. Couldn't they convince some of the people who come to later services to come to the early one? That would save some space, right? Couldn't they cut programs that aren't vital? Or move them to private homes instead? There must be a better way of doing this instead of the "bigger is always better" mentality that I have seen emerge.

Christ didn't carry anything with Him. Neither did the disciples. They were itinerate preachers who went and shared the Good News. True, churches that start up need money. That's it. And if my church decided it was too big to be as effective, I would be the first in line to support planting a new one in an outlying area. "No problem. Who do I make the check out to?"

I try to represent Christ the way I have been called to. But when clergy stands in front of me, I have to remember that they are not Him. He lives inside of me and keeps me on the right path. And that path isn't always going to agree with my church. I wish it did. It would make things a lot easier on me. But perhaps this is why I am where I am now. Christ is teaching me how to discern things, even when they go against the grain. He was, after all, the original troublemaker.

UPDATE:

From one of the Assistant Pastors at my church:

Thank you for writing with your concern. I edit the [devotionals] and confess I missed how the line, "admission isn't always free" might be read.

You are so right; entrance into the Kingdom of God does not come with a dollar sign attached. There is a cost to discipleship as the theologian, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, wrote in his book, "The Cost of Discipleship" but this line taken into context of the poem can easily mislead.

Salvation is free for the accepting. God's love can not be earned or bought. Any response is just that, a response to the free gift of His love.

The emphasis of the Campaign is on the spiritual relationship people have with God. As you continue to do, we want people to prayerfully approach their giving for it is
out of a right relationship with God that giving flows freely. While [the Campaign] speaks to the directions the church plans to use the dollars raised, it does not fully describe [the aspects] which invite people to focus on spiritual matters. Granted the line you mention unfortunately and sadly distracts from that.

I appreciate you helping me learn to spot potentially troubling areas. My desire and prayer is that these [devotionals] enable God to speak to some area of a person's spirit thus opening them to deepening their relationship to God.

Feel free to speak further with me about this and any other point of concern or interest..."

Looks like someone IS listening. It doesn't resolve the issue totally, but it's definitely a step in the right direction.

Need Another Reason to Support the Nuclear Option?

How about the Left's attempt to make this country unrecognizable as a bastion of liberty through abuse of the court system?

The left makes no secret of its intentions where the Constitution is concerned. It wants to change it, in ways that have nothing to do with what the document actually says. It wants the Constitution to enshrine its own policy preferences--thus freeing it from the tiresome necessity of winning elections. And how will the Constitution be changed? Through a constitutional convention, or a vote of two-thirds of the state legislatures? Of course not. The whole problem, from the liberal perspective, is that they can't get democratically elected bodies to enact their agenda. As one of the Yale conference participants said: "We don't have much choice other than to believe deeply in the courts--where else do we turn?" The new, improved Constitution will come about through judicial re-interpretation. It only awaits, perhaps, the election of the next Democratic president.

President Bush's ability to set the direction of the courts through the Constitutional power of judicial appointments matters. The Left gets it. Does Bill Frist?

No, Mr. Moussaoui, I Want You To Die

Well, this is good news:

Zacarias Moussaoui has notified the government that he intends to plead guilty to his alleged role in the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks and could enter the plea as early as this week if a judge finds him mentally competent, sources familiar with the case said yesterday.

Moussaoui's plan to plead guilty comes over his attorneys' objections and still has several obstacles -- including Moussaoui's own whim. The French citizen, the only person charged in the United States in the attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon, tried to plead guilty in 2002, claiming an intimate knowledge of the plane hijackings. But he rescinded his plea a week later. His mental state has been an issue in the case ever since, and U.S. District Judge Leonie M. Brinkema in Alexandria is scheduled to meet with Moussaoui this week to determine if he has the mental capacity to enter a plea now, the sources said.

Looks like the Hate America Left (aww, heck, that's better written "The Left") will have a new martyr soon.

This Just In---Kurtz Still Kurtz

Howie Kurtz, Mouth of Sauron, continues to amaze.

And the Pulitzer Goes To....Al Qaeda?

More on the Associated Press' odd photograph of a murder-in-progress in Iraq.

Every Man Should Marry (Twice)

Like gay marriage? Then you're sure to love polygamy.

Bratton No Panacea for the LAPD

Jack Dunphy is on the case:

But we expect such pandering from politicians, especially those facing the dismaying prospect of having to find honest work. More disappointing has been the performance of LAPD Chief William Bratton, who apparently left his spine in New York when he packed his bags and came west. It was Bratton’s willingness to lock horns with then-New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani that led to his dismissal as commissioner of the NYPD, but it was this confrontational style that inspired his cops and brought about the unprecedented drop in crime that occurred during his tenure there. It saddens me to say it, as I advocated his hiring and welcomed him as a savior when he arrived, but Bratton has abdicated his role as leader of the LAPD and squandered his once-considerable political capital in the service of a Hahn reelection campaign that is already all but doomed.

As NYPD commissioner, Bratton often took a tough stance in defending his officers involved in controversial incidents. Would that he would do so today. Recall the televised June arrest of Stanley Miller, a car thief who led police on an early morning, high-speed chase through South-Central Los Angeles and Compton. When an officer was shown striking Miller eleven times with a metal flashlight, Bratton’s reaction to the hue and cry that erupted was to move to ban the offending flashlights, this despite the fact that Miller was injured only slightly during the altercation. In this Bratton has transparently placed politics above the welfare of his cops. His stated rationale for moving to smaller, non-metallic flashlights showed a woeful indifference to the dangers officers face on the streets. Assaults on officers are far more common at night, when people are more likely to be drunk or high on drugs. In the time it will take an officer to secure his new, non-offensive, plastic flashlight, and draw his baton to ward off an assault, his attacker will have landed at least five punches, punches that might have been deflected with the flashlights most officers now carry.

One might note that it's the LA gangs which are out of control, not the LAPD, but then everyone knows that, except for Hahn and Bratton.

Does Frist Have The Bomb?

Scrappleface says no.

And I Predict 80 Percent Will Turn Out To Be Dirty Limericks

The wisdom of the ancients recovered:

Thousands of previously illegible manuscripts containing work by some of the greats of classical literature are being read for the first time using technology which experts believe will unlock the secrets of the ancient world.

Among treasures already discovered by a team from Oxford University are previously unseen writings by classical giants including Sophocles, Euripides and Hesiod. Invisible under ordinary light, the faded ink comes clearly into view when placed under infra-red light, using techniques developed from satellite imaging.

The Oxford documents form part of the great papyrus hoard salvaged from an ancient rubbish dump in the Graeco-Egyptian town of Oxyrhynchus more than a century ago. The thousands of remaining documents, which will be analysed over the next decade, are expected to include works by Ovid and Aeschylus, plus a series of Christian gospels which have been lost for up to 2,000 years.

The Odyssey of Flight 685

It's part of the routine for air travel since 9/11. Fifteen minutes after KLM Flight 685 took off from Amsterdam for Mexico City on April 8, Mexican authorities forwarded the names of all the passengers to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. The reason: the flight was scheduled to pass through U.S. airspace after making a long swing over Canada. The information was then passed on to the U.S. National Targeting Center, based at a secret address in the Virginia suburbs of Washington, D.C. That's when the routine became extraordinary: by the time the Boeing 747 had finished its three-hour crossing of the Atlantic, Homeland Security screeners were on high alert. The names of two Saudi passengers aboard the KLM flight had begun producing "hits" on the screening center's lists of 70,000 suspect foreigners.

One of these hits—from an FBI database of terror suspects known as TIPOFF—smacked investigators right between the eyes. The two Saudis, the database reported, were brothers and pilots who had attended the same Arizona flight school as 9/11 hijacker Hani Hanjour. Soon the multiplicity of U.S. terror databases started pumping out similar hits. Fearing that Flight 685 might be a 9/11-style plot in the making, U.S. authorities refused the plane overflight rights, and Canada rejected a request to land. Much to the chagrin of its 278 passengers, the KLM jet made an exhausting odyssey back to Amsterdam.

I don't care if the Dutch were inconvenienced. It would be a major blow to al Qaeda if our "allies" would make it impossible for known terrorists to take commercial flights. Why don't they? Because they're weak and pathetic.

Al Qaeda may not be plotting to ram a jumbo jet into The Hague, but you can rest assured if they could take a couple hundred weak-kneed Dutchmen with them when they hit a nice juicy American target they wouldn't care.

It would be nice if the sissy little bureaucrats in Amsterdam cared more for the safety of their own citizens than Wahabbist terrorists do.

Goin' Nuculer?

Bob Novak says Frist has the votes. But does he have the stones?

Republican leaders count only two or three GOP senators who will vote against the efforts to end, by a straight majority vote, filibusters on confirmation of judicial nominations.

Senators Olympia Snowe of Maine and Lincoln Chafee of Rhode Island will not support this move, and they are likely to be joined by Sen. John McCain of Arizona. That would mean 52 senators would go along with the parliamentary maneuver attempting to end filibusters on judges. Only 50 are needed.

The only Democrat who might possibly join this effort is Sen. Ben Nelson of Nebraska. But Bush will not press him to break party discipline if his help is unnecessary.

If Frist gets beaten by Harry Reid, mild-mannered sidekick to the dumbest House Democrat in a generation, Nancy Pelosi, he's done.

The New York Times Works Up A Lather Over Ratzinger

They must think he's the next Pope:

There was never doubt that Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, the Vatican's hard-line defender of the faith, would have a strong hand in selecting the next pope. But in the days of prayer and politics before the conclave, which begins on Monday, he has emerged as perhaps the surprise central figure: the man who could become the 265th pope, choose him or be the one other cardinals knock from the running.

Any talk of who will become the next pope is guesswork, echoes from cardinals and their staffs sworn to silence about one of the world's most elite and secretive gatherings.

But one bit of wisdom has emerged in the Italian press as conventional: that Cardinal Ratzinger, a German close to John Paul II, has up to 50 votes among the 115 elector cardinals, or at least that is the strength his supporters claim.

It would be nice if major media organs would send somebody to cover these major religious events who would leave their Bolshevik politics and perpetual sneer at home.

The vote for Pope is not a political act, it's a religious one. The cardinals are doing their level best to pick the man who God wishes to run the Catholic Church at this time. It is quite a different enterprise than that undertaken by the New York City Democrat political machine to pick their next corrupt and mobbed-up city official.

It would be nice if The Times recognized that, but they somehow hold out hope the cardinals will pick John Kerry. After all, he's already got a Magic Hat.

My, How Tumultuous A Police State Can Be

I've said it before, I'll say it again: this has NOTHING to do with Japanese textbooks and everything to do with Japan's naval strength and performance in tsunami relief:

Shouting "Japanese invaders must die," thousands protested in eastern China against Japan's wartime past on Saturday, hurling rocks and bottles at Tokyo's consulate in Shanghai and burning Japanese flags.

But with thousands of paramilitary police on the streets of Beijing and students warned against protests, authorities headed off a repeat of last weekend's violent demonstrations in the capital, which Japan's foreign minister is to visit on Sunday.

There was also calm in the southern city of Guangzhou and Chongqing in the southwest, where thousands marched last weekend.

China has been accused of tacitly encouraging the unrest, which started in Guangdong and Sichuan provinces early this month, spread to Beijing last week and, now, to Tianjin, Shanghai and Hangzhou on the east coast.

Chinese are protesting against school textbooks they say whitewash Japan's wartime atrocities in China, against Tokyo's bid for a permanent seat on the U.N. Security Council, and on other disputes.

In the third weekend of violent protests against Japan, thousands marched on the Japanese consulate in Shanghai, smashing its windows with rocks, pelting it with paint bombs and attacking Japanese restaurants along the way.

One banner read "Face Up to History." Another warned: "The anti-Japan war is not over yet."

Protesters overturned a Japanese car and scrawled the slogan "Boycott Japan" on its side. Japan's Kyodo news agency said two Japanese were injured when they were surrounded by a group of Chinese.

Hundreds of paramilitary police in full riot gear stood by and appealed for order on loud hailers. Isolated scuffles broke out and about a dozen protesters were dragged away.

But there were moments of relative calm during which protesters and police alike bought lattes at a nearby coffee shop. The demonstration broke up in the early evening.

Despotisms run on prestige and fear. Internal unrest within China, in addition to the horrible blow Beijing's prestige took when she managed to do less than nothing in terms of tsunami disaster relief, mandates that an external regional power be agitated against. Usually, the Chinese regime chooses Taiwan. This time, they chose the Japanese.

The real story lies in why. The MSM simply don't care.