This being a family blog, I won’t spell it out, but it’s a common enough expression from the Bronx. Consider a euphemism, “FUBARED for starters.” Or, courtesy of Battlestar Galactica, “Frakked for starters.” What is frakked for starters? The Islamic holy day Eid ul-Adha.
The subject comes up because it turns [...]
Archive for December, 2006
F***** for starters
Posted in Uncategorized on December 31, 2006 | Leave a Comment »
Feel safer?
Posted in Iraq on December 30, 2006 | 1 Comment »
The evil dictator whose crimes against humanity caused us to invade the historical fiction that is called “Iraq” has now been put down like the dog he was. There’s a lot of blather about “milestones” and “closure” and “justice being done.” All true, to a certain extent.
Then, Iraq being a nation of [...]
Lions, tigers, and Mormons, oh my!
Posted in Mormonism, Politics on December 28, 2006 | 1 Comment »
The cover story of the current issue of The New Republic is titled “A Mormon in the White House?” The article is a detailed and, as is usual for TNR, an in-depth review of the history of the Latter Day Saints and key elements of Mormon Theology.
All of this, of course, is in [...]
"I will be with the merciful God"
Posted in Iraq on December 27, 2006 | Leave a Comment »
Thus wrote Saddam Hussein, in an epistle penned when he was convicted in November. According to this story in the Toronto Globe and Mail, Hussein
called on Iraqis not to hate the U.S.-led forces that invaded Iraq in 2003 in a farewell letter posted on a Web site Wednesday, a day after an appeals court [...]
"I am Cyrus!"
Posted in Christianity, Israel on December 26, 2006 | 1 Comment »
Israel and the Jews have always had lots of enemies and likely always will. But there are also some rather excellent friends of both the modern state of Israel and the Jewish people. And they are to be found among Protestant Christians.
No, not the sniveling peace-at-any price, Israel-is-evil so-called mainline denominations such as [...]
this shall be a sign unto you
Posted in Christianity on December 24, 2006 | Leave a Comment »
From the Gospel of Luke, chapter 2 (KJV):
1And it came to pass in those days, that there went out a decree from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be taxed.
2(And this taxing was first made when Cyrenius was governor of Syria.)
3And all went to be taxed, every one into his [...]
Just shut up, Rowan
Posted in Christianity, Idiotarians, anti-Semitism on December 23, 2006 | Leave a Comment »
The Anglican Communion is doddering on its last legs, at least in the Northern Hemisphere. Here in America, the Episcopal Church is losing members and parishes due to its steady leftward drift. In England, the putative home of the Anglican Communion, they can rent out most churches for Sunday bazaars for the few [...]
“reminiscent of Nazi crackdowns on Jews”
Posted in Immigration on December 22, 2006 | Leave a Comment »
The recent raids to catch illegal immigrants may or may not have been over the top, but some of the objections to them certainly are. Consider that a coalition of open-borders-zero-enforcement hispanics have opined that these raids are “reminiscent of Nazi crackdowns on Jews.”
This according to this story in the Washington Post:
U.S. Hispanic groups and [...]
Heart of a rabbit?
Posted in Iraq on December 21, 2006 | Leave a Comment »
Among certain primitive people, the eating of one’s prey is thought to provide the eater with some attribute of the animal that is eaten. The Aztecs may have taken this a step too far, when they ate body parts of their human sacrifices, but, hey, I’m ok, they’re ok, it’s all good. [...]
The Road to Baghdad
Posted in Iraq, Israel on December 20, 2006 | Leave a Comment »
No, not one of those Bob Hope movies. Rather, one of the givens, a nugget of received wisdom for the multinational crowd: settling the Israeli-Palestinian mess is central to peace elsewhere in the region. The by-now trite phrase is that “the road to peace in [fill in the blank] runs through Jerusalem.”
This is, usually, code [...]
Fairfax Phobics
Posted in Christianity, Culture on December 20, 2006 | 1 Comment »
In case anyone missed this, the fracturing of the Episcopal Church is well underway. The basics, from an only slightly snarky piece in the Washington Times:
Eight Episcopal congregations in Virginia announced Sunday that they had sundered their ties to the Episcopal Church. Another followed yesterday. Two of them were among the most historic churches [...]
Saying Goodbye
Posted in Arabs, Iraq on December 18, 2006 | Leave a Comment »
I was listening to the news on the radio, and heard about some sort of interactive video game that provides training to some of our troops on cultural sensitivities in Iraq. The one example that was mentioned was that it is somehow considered insulting to an Iraqi to say “goodbye.”
Well, poor little sensitive Iraqis. [...]
“wall of the mind”
Posted in Arabs, Iraq on December 18, 2006 | Leave a Comment »
The quotation is from a book review by Newt Gingrich that appears in the forthcoming issue of the Weekly Standard. Pretty classy outfit, the Standard, to have a former speaker of the House of Representatives write a book review, was my first thought.
The book is by a former secretary of defense, Bill Cohen, who writes [...]
Black like me
Posted in America, Politics, race on December 17, 2006 | 1 Comment »
There is an interesting take on Barack Hussein Obama’s blackness in an article at the Los Angeles Times online: “Is Obama the new ‘black’?”. The answer appears to be “yes” and “no.”
Obama is “black” under the old and new-again “one-drop” theory: any African ancestry, and, yep, you’re “black.” Even [...]
a symptom, not the malady
Posted in Arabs. Israel on December 15, 2006 | Leave a Comment »
Victor Davis Hanson has a piece at NRO that ought to be read by all of our policy-makers and pundits. Especially any of those who think that James Saudi Baker’s Iraq Study Group has shed light on the path to peace in the Middle East. VDH’s article is titled “Israel Did it! — [...]
Words fail
Posted in Iran, anti-Semitism on December 14, 2006 | Leave a Comment »
There is an astonishing picture from the Holocaust-denial conferance taking place in Tehran in today’s WaPo. The picture shows an orthodox rabbi embracing Iranian anti-Semite-in-Chief Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, and the accompanying story is dismaying. To say the least.
The short version? Some ultra-Orthodox Jews, believe that the modern state of Israel is an abomination unto the Lord, [...]
Faces of the Fathers
Posted in Culture, Judaism on December 13, 2006 | Leave a Comment »
Just happened to watch Thunder Heart, with Val Kilmer as a part-Sioux FBI agent, Ray Levoi, who is sent on assignment to the Rez. Levoi is portrayed as essentially non-Indian, having been raised as a white man, and holding the quintessential white man’s job, FBI agent. Watching Ray Levoi’s struggles with his Indian identidy, I [...]
“the Zionist regime soon be wiped out”
Posted in Iran, Israel, anti-Semitism on December 12, 2006 | Leave a Comment »
Thought experiment: What do you suppose might happen if the prime minister of Israel (or the defense minister, or foreign minister, or, virtually any member of the government) announced that “the Arab regime of —- will soon be wiped out”? Assuming that the person making the announcement wasn’t whisked off straightaway to a mental asylum, [...]
Chickens, roosting, and schadenfreude
Posted in Arabs, Israel, Terrorism on December 11, 2006 | Leave a Comment »
“Palestinian Gunmen Kill Three Children of Senior Palestinian Intelligence Officer in Drive-By Shooting” is the headline in this New York Sun story. The basics:
Gunmen killed the three young sons of a Palestinian security officer targeted twice before for assassination by Hamas, riddling the car taking them to school with more than 60 bullets – and [...]
The un-macaca
Posted in Politics on December 11, 2006 | Leave a Comment »
The Washington Post probably did more to defeat George Allen than did his opponent, Senator-elect Jim Webb. Allen’s by now infamous use of a previously unknown epithet, macaca, was set upon by the Post, and, to a lesser extent, other mainstream media outlets.
For a while back there in August and September of this year, [...]
"turds in a punch bowl"
Posted in Politics on December 10, 2006 | Leave a Comment »
This is the colorful description of Rudy Giuliani’s political problems, according to Richard Brookhiser’s piece in the New York Post. Those “turds” are Rudy’s moderate-to-liberal positions on things that matter to social conservatives: abortion, gays, and guns.
In simplest terms, Rudy is for the first two, and against the last. This [...]
Ornament envy?
Posted in Culture, Judaism on December 9, 2006 | 2 Comments »
Hanukkah begins next Friday, December 15. When I was growing up, Hannukah was treated as the minor holiday it is. Falling as it did close to Christmas, I do remember a certain sense of envy that my Christian neighbors got to enjoy such beautiful decorations. I especially loved the glittery Christmas tree ornaments that, for [...]
Supporting Socialism?
Posted in Politics on December 8, 2006 | Leave a Comment »
Human Events is a reliably conservative publication, online and dead tree versions, with some writers who constitute the “far” in “far-right.” That doesn’t mean they’re necessarily wrong about things, mind you.
Case in point is “Barack Obama Is Just Another Liberal”. This appears to be a true statement, and in hashing over what little [...]
Now tell us what you really think
Posted in Iraq, War and Peace on December 7, 2006 | Leave a Comment »
Two reactions to the Iraq Study Group report caught my eye this morning. Both appear like a big, purple bruise on an otherwise handsome face, but reading them reminds me that it is more important to be right than to be handsome. And that sometimes being right means getting banged up.
First, the New [...]
Pushing on a string
Posted in Iraq on December 6, 2006 | Leave a Comment »
A soggy, limp string at that. The string is the Iraqi government, if it can properly be called such. According to some, including the incoming Bloviator-in-Chief of the Senate Armed Services Committee, Carl Levin at yesterday’s Gates hearing, if we could just get the Iraqis to stand up and fight, all would be [...]
The Untied Nations
Posted in Israel, anti-Semitism on December 5, 2006 | Leave a Comment »
A banner day at the Untied (not a typo) Nations: six resolutions that could, with charity, be called anti-Israeli. What they are is Alice-down-the-rabbit-hole absurd, resolutions endorsed by 150 or so “nations,” many of which if not most have lower living standards than might be found in a public toilet in Tijuana.
The basic story of [...]
Swearing
Posted in Politics on December 3, 2006 | Leave a Comment »
Dennis Prager is all exercised about a newly-elected American Muslim’s plan to be sworn in using a Koran.
The Muslim in question is the left-wing Keith Ellison, (DFL-MN), who has denied past involvement with Islamic terrorists and their supporters. That’s all in his past, you see. Prager makes the point that all [...]
lack of grace
Posted in Politics on December 2, 2006 | Leave a Comment »
The he-said, he-said imbroglio between the president and senator-elect Jim Webb will have people come down on the partisan side they favor. Generally, with a few notable exceptions. One such is Peggy Noonan, whose article yesterday should be read by all who would judge our politicos.
Ms. Noonan’s thesis is that [...]
Do we really think they’ll stop?
Posted in Arabs, Israel, Terrorism on December 1, 2006 | Leave a Comment »
The usually sound Victor Davis Hanson, in his piece today at NRO, wrote:
Hamas and its rivals exist largely because of the occupied West Bank: force Israel back to its 1967 borders, and Palestinian grievances — and the violence — largely vanish, as the United States at last is freed from much of the old Pavlovian [...]
cut-and-walk
Posted in Arabs, Iraq, Terrorism on December 1, 2006 | Leave a Comment »
Interesting how the liberal establishment comes around. It’s become clear, even to the mandarins at the Gray Lady, that we can’t simply storm for the exits in Iraq, thereby leaving Iraqis to the tender mercies of thuggish Arab Sunnis and Islamofascist Shiites. Which is to say the majority of all Iraqis who are [...]
