GUNS IN THE NATION'S CAPITAL

RESIDENTS IN ONE of the District's most violence-ridden neighborhoods are mostly indifferent to the prospect that handguns could legally return to the city after a 32-year ban. After al, the city is perennially one of the most dangerous in the nation.

"It doesn't seem like it was doing anything anyway," said Norman Day, who lives on Orren Street Northeast in Trinidad. "People can bring [guns] in from anywhere. You can't put up checkpoints everywhere. It probably won't make any difference. If anything, it might save the District some money by not hauling off anybody with a gun."

Many residents in the Ward 5 neighborhood in Northeast—the site of one of the most violent crime sprees in recent city history—have been hardened to the frequent violence and responses by the Metropolitan Police Department.

Others saw the ban as the last remaining barrier between occasional violence and all-out chaos.

"That's the worst thing they could ever do," Daphne Potter said at the corner of Oates and Staples streets Northeast. "Most of that shootings come from the young kids. I hate to see what's gonna happen now."

Earlier in the day, gun advocates rejoiced outside of the Supreme Court building.

"I'm very pleased with the decision, but at the same time, I am a bit suspicious of the possible restrictions that could come down," said Craig Burgers, 25, a Michigan native now living in Arlington. "You shouldn't have to check your rights to enter the District. I have my gun in my house and I mostly use it for target practice but would definitely use it if someone tried to break in."

Ariel Sarousi, a 25-year-old gun owner who moved to Falls Church from his home in Boston a year ago, pointed out that the District has a much higher crime rate than Northern Virginia, which has no such ban.

"You can easily dispute the idea that the ban on guns has decreased crime in the District," he said. Mr. Sarousi said he is much more likely to consider moving into the District now that he is allowed to bring his gun with him.

Well, one thing is a proven fact DC's gun ban for the past 30 yrs has none nothing to stop the violent nature of DC's citizens. Guns by themselves are not the problem—the culture and violent nature of the people that live in DC are the problem. Change the culture and the violence will subside.

Americans can keep guns at home for self-defense, the Supreme Court ruled Thursday in the justices' first-ever pronouncement on the meaning of gun rights under the Second Amendment.

The court's 5-4 ruling struck down the District of Columbia's ban on handguns. The decision went further than even the Bush administration wanted, but probably leaves most federal firearms restrictions intact.

District of Columbia Mayor Adrian Fenty responded with a plan to require residents of the nation's capital to register their handguns. "More handguns in the District of Columbia will only lead to more handgun violence," Fenty said.

The court had not conclusively interpreted the Second Amendment since its ratification in 1791. The amendment reads: "A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed."

The basic issue for the justices was whether the amendment protects an individual's right to own guns no matter what, or whether that right is somehow tied to service in a state militia.

Writing for the majority, Justice Antonin Scalia said that an individual right to bear arms is supported by "the historical narrative" both before and after the Second Amendment was adopted.

The Constitution does not permit "the absolute prohibition of handguns held and used for self-defense in the home," Scalia said. The court also struck down Washington's requirement that firearms be equipped with trigger locks or kept disassembled, but left intact the licensing of guns.

Scalia noted that the handgun is Americans' preferred weapon of self-defense in part because "it can be pointed at a burglar with one hand while the other hand dials the police."

Scalia's opinion dealt almost exclusively with self-defense in the home, acknowledging only briefly in his lengthy historical analysis that early Americans also valued gun rights because of hunting.

The brevity of Scalia's treatment of gun ownership for hunting and sports-shooting is explained by the case before the court. The Washington law at issue, like many gun control laws around the country, concerns heavily populated areas, not hunting grounds.

In a dissent he summarized from the bench, Justice John Paul Stevens wrote that the majority "would have us believe that over 200 years ago, the Framers made a choice to limit the tools available to elected officials wishing to regulate civilian uses of weapons."

He said such evidence "is nowhere to be found."

Justice Stephen Breyer wrote a separate dissent in which he said, "In my view, there simply is no untouchable constitutional right guaranteed by the Second Amendment to keep loaded handguns in the house in crime-ridden urban areas."

Joining Scalia were Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Samuel Alito, Anthony Kennedy and Clarence Thomas. The other dissenters were Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and David Souter.

Gun rights supporters hailed the decision. "I consider this the opening salvo in a step-by-step process of providing relief for law-abiding Americans everywhere that have been deprived of this freedom," said Wayne LaPierre, executive vice president of the National Rifle Association.

The NRA will file lawsuits in San Francisco, Chicago and several of its suburbs challenging handgun restrictions there based on Thursday's outcome.

Chicago mayor Richard Daley said he didn't know how the high court ruling would affect the city, but said that the ruling was "a very frightening decision." He predicted an end to Chicago's handgun ban would spark new violence and force the city to raise taxes to pay for new police.

Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., a leading gun control advocate in Congress, criticized the ruling. "I believe the people of this great country will be less safe because of it," she said.

The capital's gun law was among the nation's strictest. Dick Anthony Heller, 66, an armed security guard, sued the District after it rejected his application to keep a handgun at his Capitol Hill home a short distance from the Supreme Court.

"I'm thrilled I am now able to defend myself and my household in my home," Heller said shortly after the opinion was announced.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia ruled in Heller's favor and struck down Washington's handgun ban, saying the Constitution guarantees Americans the right to own guns and that a total prohibition on handguns is not compatible with that right.

The issue caused a split within the Bush administration. Vice President Dick Cheney supported the appeals court ruling, but others in the administration feared it could lead to the undoing of other gun regulations, including a federal law restricting sales of machine guns. Other laws keep felons from buying guns and provide for an instant background check.

Thursday's decision was embraced by the president, said White House press secretary Dana Perino. "This has been the administration's long-held view," Perino said. "The president is also pleased that the court concluded that the D.C. firearm laws violate that right."

White House reaction was restrained. "We're pleased that the Supreme Court affirmed that the Second Amendment protects the right of Americans to keep and bear arms," White House spokesman Tony Fratto said.

Scalia said nothing in Thursday's ruling should "cast doubt on long-standing prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons or the mentally ill, or laws forbidding the carrying of firearms in sensitive places such as schools and government buildings."

The law adopted by Washington's city council in 1976 bars residents from owning handguns unless they had one before the law took effect. Shotguns and rifles may be kept in homes, if they are registered, kept unloaded and either disassembled or equipped with trigger locks.

NO BREAK ON FUEL COSTS FOR MILITARY

WASHINGTON (AP) - Military units fighting in Iraq and elsewhere will see another hike in fuel costs next week. The cost increase will be the second time the Defense Department has had to raise rates in the middle of the budget year because of soaring oil prices.

On July 1, the cost for refined fuel will jump from $127.68 a barrel to $170.94. That is an astounding 34 percent jump in just six months and more than double what was being paid on behalf of the troops three years ago.

The new costs translate to about $4.07 a gallon for jet fuel and $4.70 a gallon for diesel.

A Pentagon spokesman said the price increase is needed to cover an anticipated $1.2 billion rise in fuel costs in the next three months. He said it will not affect ongoing military operations, but could affect daily support activities

This is simply outrageous, lacking what left of Western military intelligence. The US needs to leave Iraq, bill the Saudis for protection and the Iraqis for reconstruction, or both. This continued "white hat" approach is pernicious failure.

ON SHEEP, WOLVES, AND SHEEPDOGS

From the book, On Combat By Lt. Col (ret) Dave Grossman, US Army Ranger, Former West Point Psychology Professor Reprinted with permission.

HONOR NEVER GROWS OLD, and honor rejoices the heart of age. It does so because honor is, finally, about defending those noble and worthy things that deserve defending, even if it comes at a high cost. In our time, that may mean social disapproval, public scorn, hardship, persecution, or as always, even death itself. The question remains: What is worth defending? What is worth dying for? What is worth living for?

William J. Bennett—in a lecture to the United State's Naval Academy November 24, 1997:

One Vietnam veteran, an old retired colonel, once said this to me: “Most of the people in our society are sheep. They are kind, gentle, productive creatures who can only hurt one another by accident.”

This is true. Remember, the murder rate is six per 100,000 per year, and the aggravated assault rate is four per 1,000 per year. What this means is that the vast majority of Americans are not inclined to hurt one another.

Some estimates say that two million Americans are victims of violent crimes every year, a tragic, staggering number, perhaps an all-time record rate of violent crime. But there are almost 300 million Americans, which means that the odds of being a victim of violent crime is considerably less than one in a hundred on any given year. Furthermore, since many violent crimes are committed by repeat offenders, the actual number of violent citizens is considerably less than two million.

Thus there is a paradox, and we must grasp both ends of the situation: We may well be in the most violent times in history, but violence is still remarkably rare. This is because most citizens are kind, decent people who are not capable of hurting each other, except by accident or under extreme provocation. They are sheep.

I mean nothing negative by calling them sheep. To me, it is like the pretty, blue robin’s egg. Inside it is soft and gooey but someday it will grow into something wonderful. But the egg cannot survive without its hard blue shell.

Police officers, soldiers, and other warriors are like that shell, and someday the civilization they protect will grow into something wonderful. For now, though, they need warriors to protect them from the predators.

“Then there are the wolves,” the old war veteran said, “and the wolves feed on the sheep without mercy.” Do you believe there are wolves out there who will feed on the flock without mercy? You better believe it. There are evil men in this world and they are capable of evil deeds. The moment you forget that or pretend it is not so, you become a sheep. There is no safety in denial.

“Then there are sheepdogs,” he went on, “and I’m a sheepdog. I live to protect the flock and confront the wolf.”

If you have no capacity for violence then you are a healthy productive citizen, a sheep. If you have a capacity for violence and no empathy for your fellow citizens, then you have defined an aggressive sociopath, a wolf.

But what if you have a capacity for violence, and a deep love for your fellow citizens? What do you have then? A sheepdog, a warrior, someone who is walking the hero’s path. Someone who can walk into the heart of darkness, into the universal human phobia, and walk out unscathed

Let me expand on this old soldier’s excellent model of the sheep, wolves, and sheepdogs. We know that the sheep live in denial that is what makes them sheep. They do not want to believe that there is evil in the world. They can accept the fact that fires can happen, which is why they want fire extinguishers, fire sprinklers, fire alarms and fire exits throughout their kids’ schools.

But many of them are outraged at the idea of putting an armed police officer in their kid’s school. Our children are thousands of times more likely to be killed or seriously injured by school violence than fire, but the sheep’s only response to the possibility of violence is denial. The idea of someone coming to kill or harm their child is just too hard, and so they chose the path of denial.

The sheep generally do not like the sheepdog. He looks a lot like the wolf.

He has fangs and the capacity for violence. The difference, though, is that the sheepdog must not, cannot and will not ever harm the sheep. Any sheep dog that intentionally harms the lowliest little lamb will be punished and removed. The world cannot work any other way, at least not in a representative democracy or a republic such as ours.

Still, the sheepdog disturbs the sheep. He is a constant reminder that there are wolves in the land. They would prefer that he didn’t tell them where to go, or give them traffic tickets, or stand at the ready in our airports, in camouflage fatigues, holding an M-16. The sheep would much rather have the sheepdog cash in his fangs, spray paint himself white, and go, “Baa” until the wolf shows up. Then the entire flock tries desperately to hide behind one lonely sheepdog.

The students, the victims, at Columbine High School were big, tough high school students, and under ordinary circumstances they would not have had the time of day for a police officer. They were not bad kids; they just had nothing to say to a cop. When the school was under attack, however, and SWAT teams were clearing the rooms and hallways, the officers had to physically peel those clinging, sobbing kids off of them. This is how the little lambs feel about their sheepdog when the wolf is at the door.

Look at what happened after September 11, 2001 when the wolf pounded hard on the door. Remember how America, more than ever before, felt differently about their law enforcement officers and military personnel? Remember how many times you heard the word hero?

Understand that there is nothing morally superior about being a sheepdog; it is just what you choose to be. Also understand that a sheepdog is a funny critter: He is always sniffing around out on the perimeter, checking the breeze, barking at things that go bump in the night, and yearning for a righteous battle. That is, the young sheepdogs yearn for a righteous battle.

The old sheepdogs are a little older and wiser, but they move to the sound of the guns when needed, right along with the young ones.

Here is how the sheep and the sheepdog think differently. The sheep pretend the wolf will never come, but the sheepdog lives for that day. After the attacks on September 11, 2001, most of the sheep, that is, most citizens in America said, “Thank God I wasn’t on one of those planes.” The sheepdogs, the warriors, said, “Dear God, I wish I could have been on one of those planes. Maybe I could have made a difference.” When you are truly transformed into a warrior and have truly invested yourself into warriorhood, you want to be there. You want to be able to make a difference.

There is nothing morally superior about the sheepdog, the warrior, but he does have one real advantage. Only one. And that is that he is able to survive and thrive in an environment that destroys 98 percent of the population.

There was research conducted a few years ago with individuals convicted of violent crimes. These cons were in prison for serious, predatory crimes of violence: assaults, murders and killing law enforcement officers. The vast majority said that they specifically targeted victims by body language:

Slumped walk, passive behavior and lack of awareness. They chose their victims like big cats do in Africa, when they select one out of the herd that is least able to protect itself.

Some people may be destined to be sheep and others might be genetically primed to be wolves or sheepdogs. But I believe that most people can choose which one they want to be, and I’m proud to say that more and more Americans are choosing to become sheepdogs.

Seven months after the attack on September 11, 2001, Todd Beamer was honored in his hometown of Cranbury, New Jersey. Todd, as you recall, was the man on Flight 93 over Pennsylvania who called on his cell phone to alert an operator from United Airlines about the hijacking. When he learned of the other three passenger planes that had been used as weapons, Todd dropped his phone and uttered the words, “Let’s roll,” which authorities believe was a signal to the other passengers to confront the terrorist hijackers. In one hour, a transformation occurred among the passengers—athletes, business people and parents*#151;from sheep to sheepdogs and together they fought the wolves, ultimately saving an unknown number of lives on the ground.

There is no safety for honest men except by believing all possible evil of evil men. - Edmund Burke

Here is the point I like to emphasize, especially to the thousands of police officers and soldiers I speak to each year. In nature the sheep, real sheep, are born as sheep. Sheepdogs are born that way, and so are wolves. They didn’t have a choice. But you are not a critter. As a human being, you can be whatever you want to be. It is a conscious, moral decision.

If you want to be a sheep, then you can be a sheep and that is okay, but you must understand the price you pay. When the wolf comes, you and your loved ones are going to die if there is not a sheepdog there to protect you. If you want to be a wolf, you can be one, but the sheepdogs are going to hunt you down and you will never have rest, safety, trust or love. But if you want to be a sheepdog and walk the warrior’s path, then you must make a conscious and moral decision every day to dedicate, equip and prepare yourself to thrive in that toxic, corrosive moment when the wolf comes knocking at the door.

For example, many officers carry their weapons in church. They are well concealed in ankle holsters, shoulder holsters or inside-the-belt holsters tucked into the small of their backs. Anytime you go to some form of religious service, there is a very good chance that a police officer in your congregation is carrying. You will never know if there is such an individual in your place of worship, until the wolf appears to massacre you and your loved ones.

I was training a group of police officers in Texas, and during the break, one officer asked his friend if he carried his weapon in church. The other cop replied, “I will never be caught without my gun in church.” I asked why he felt so strongly about this, and he told me about a cop he knew who was at a church massacre in Ft. Worth, Texas in 1999. In that incident, a mentally deranged individual came into the church and opened fire, gunning down fourteen people. He said that officer believed he could have saved every life that day if he had been carrying his gun. His own son was shot, and all he could do was throw himself on the boy’s body and wait to die.

That cop looked me in the eye and said, “Do you have any idea how hard it would be to live with yourself after that?”

Some individuals would be horrified if they knew this police officer was carrying a weapon in church. They might call him paranoid and would probably scorn him. Yet these same individuals would be enraged and would call for “heads to roll” if they found out that the airbags in their cars were defective, or that the fire extinguisher and fire sprinklers in their kids’ school did not work. They can accept the fact that fires and traffic accidents can happen and that there must be safeguards against them.

Their only response to the wolf, though, is denial, and all too often their response to the sheepdog is scorn and disdain. But the sheepdog quietly asks himself, “Do you have any idea how hard it would be to live with yourself if your loved ones were attacked and killed and you had to stand there helplessly because you were unprepared for that day?”

It is denial that turns people into sheep. Sheep are psychologically destroyed by combat because their only defense is denial, which is counterproductive and destructive, resulting in fear, helplessness and horror when the wolf shows up.

Denial kills you twice. It kills you once, at your moment of truth when you are not physically prepared: you didn’t bring your gun, you didn’t train.

Your only defense was wishful thinking. Hope is not a strategy. Denial kills you a second time because even if you do physically survive, you are psychologically shattered by your fear, helplessness and horror at your moment of truth.

Gavin de Becker puts it like this in “Fear Less”, his superb post-9/11 book, which should be required reading for anyone trying to come to terms with our current world situation: “…denial can be seductive, but it has an insidious side effect. For all the peace of mind deniers think they get by saying it isn’t so, the fall they take when faced with new violence is all the more unsettling.”

Denial is a save-now-pay-later scheme, a contract written entirely in small print, for in the long run, the denying person knows the truth on some level. And so the warrior must strive to confront denial in all aspects of his life, and prepare himself for the day when evil comes.

If you are warrior who is legally authorized to carry a weapon and you step outside without that weapon, then you become a sheep, pretending that the bad man will not come today. No one can be “on” 24/7, for a lifetime.

Everyone needs down time. But if you are authorized to carry a weapon, and you walk outside without it, just take a deep breath, and say this to yourself…”Baa.”

This business of being a sheep or a sheep dog is not a yes-no dichotomy. It is not an all-or-nothing, either-or choice. It is a matter of degrees, a continuum. On one end is an abject, head-in-the-sand-sheep and on the other end is the ultimate warrior. Few people exist completely on one end or the other.

Most of us live somewhere in between. Since 9-11 almost everyone in America took a step up that continuum, away from denial. The sheep took a few steps toward accepting and appreciating their warriors and the warriors started taking their job more seriously. The degree to which you move up that continuum, away from sheephood and denial, is the degree to which you and your loved ones will survive, physically and psychologically at your moment of truth.

FAIRFAX COUNTY REVERSES POSITION

YOU HAVE HEARD IT OFTEN said that networking makes a difference. Well, that’s the minor epiphany that occurred with the Islamic Saudi Academy (ISA) protest last Tuesday. A coalition of like minded groups concerned about the onslaught of Cultural Jihad in America rose to the occasion. The result was push back against unrestrained Saudi Wahhabi hate doctrine in America.

The effort of the coalition caused the sudden reversal by the Fairfax (Virginia) County Board of Supervisors with the stunning statements by its Chairman, Gerry Connolly, running for the Congressional seat in the 11th District-Virginia. On a conference call today, members of the working party for the coalition that fielded last week’s stunning protest and media blitz talked about this. The consensus was that Chairman Connolly and the Fairfax Board of Supervisors got stung with a veritable hornet’s nest of adverse public opinion and phone calls.

Supporting the renewal of the lease for the Islamic Saudi Academy granted unanimously just a few weeks ago became a political liability, so they reversed their decision, 180 degrees. As we posted yesterday, Chairman Connolly threw it into the lap of the State Department regarding renewal of the lease to the ISA and verify what was in those hate texts cited by the USCIRF. All because, get this, “they couldn’t read Arabic” and determine, as the USCIRF report did, what was in those Wahhabi hate texts: incitement to commit violence and hatred of non-Muslims, us.

Pay particular attention to what Chairman Gene Connolly said at the May 19th hearing on the ‘good neighbor’ ISA versus what he said yesterday. Both he and the Fairfax Board of Supervisors look both ‘foolish and arrogant’. We’ll see if Connolly can pull this roasted chestnut out of the fire of public outrage and salvage his credibility for the Congressional campaign.

Below is the News Release from the United American Committee of Virginia that pays recognition to what it and the other participants in this worthy endeavor did. They included the Washington-based Center for Security Policy, Stop the Madrassas and our own ACT for America Virginia and Maryland volunteers. The protest against ISA and the infamous Wahhabi hate texts was organized by Andrea and Jim Lafferty of the Traditional Values Coalition. Of course without the USCIRF ISA hate text report released on June 11th this stunning reversal of fortune would not have occurred. This was push back against Saudi Wahhabi cultural Jihad, big time.

—Jerry Gordon

FREE SPEECH AT ODDS WITH JIHADISTS

THE REGRESSIVE FORCES against free speech often note that free speech has its limits—for instance, one may not yell "fire!" in a crowded theatre.

Everyone knows the potential dangers—people getting trampled in a run for the exits, people mistaking doors to dead-end storerooms for exits, people running into narrow alleys with no access to the street. So is it *ever* permissable to cry "fire!" in a crowded theatre? Well, yes. It is not only permissible, it is imcumbant on any moral person to cry fire if the theatre is indeed on fire. Let's belabour the metaphor.

That's what the jihadists have done. They have set the theatre on fire. They are now at work on disabling the smoke detectors, smoke alarms, and sprinkler systems. They are now at work blocking the exits.

Most of the patrons are in line for tickets and popcorn, or they are already in their seats, eating junior mints and watching previews for "Kung Fu Panda" and "The Incredible Hulk" while they wait for the movie to begin.

A few patrons, though, have noticed smoke curling up from behind the screen and over by the consession stands. They are alarmed. As they try to warn the crowd of the danger, they are threatened by some of the arsonists who have stayed behind.

These are people like Geert Wilders and Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Brigitte Gabriel and Kurt Westergaard, Wahlid Shoebat and Mark Steyn. Some of these threats have already been carried out, against Pim Fortune and Theo van Gogh, and many others.

A few people in the crowd do actually notice this, and are rather alarmed and upset. But, hey, "The Love Guru" starts in a few minutes, and they paid good money to see the show.

This brilliant analysis of our depressing situation was found in the "always interesting" comments section of an article posted on Jihad Watch by a reader named Gravenimage. Well done! Amazingly a propos!

OUTSIDE THE CRUCIBLE

THE BUSINESS FACE of modern liberalism can be a scary place. My advise is to don't stare. Like the sun, it can damage your retina. George Moneo observes:

Liberals claim they are tolerant, compassionate and caring, but the exact opposite is quite often true. Tell me how anybody can trust a scientist who wants to put on trial those who disagree with him. Mind you, there is no empirical evidence to support the Incredible Flexible Theory™, just conjecture and computer models. But God help you if you disagree with Big "Science":

James Hansen, one of the world's leading climate scientists, will today call for the chief executives of large fossil fuel companies to be put on trial for high crimes against humanity and nature, accusing them of actively spreading doubt about global warming in the same way that tobacco companies blurred the links between smoking and cancer.

Jim, just leave us alone. Please.

WAR COVERAGE SHRINKS AS SUCCESS GROWS

HERE IS AN AMAZING STAT, a veritable sparkle in the eye of the beholder theory we call media bias. Unfortunately, no data from the right-leaning FOX News was included. From an article by Confederate Yankee:

Reality, however, does not have a leftward bias (neither does it have a rightward bias). Reality, like nature, seeks equilibrium... balance.

The reaction of the newsworks is simple when reality intrudes on the narrative: they dispute it, then they ignore it, and if they can no longer ignore it, they pretend that they never held a contrary position.

Presently, the falloff in news coverage in Iraq is the result of media attempting to ignore that the "quagmire in a failed state" narrative they've been promoting has been failing for over a year.

According to data compiled by Andrew Tyndall, a television consultant who monitors the three network evening newscasts, coverage of Iraq has been "massively scaled back this year." Almost halfway into 2008, the three newscasts have shown 181 weekday minutes of Iraq coverage, compared with 1,157 minutes for all of 2007. The "CBS Evening News" has devoted the fewest minutes to Iraq, 51, versus 55 minutes on ABC's "World News" and 74 minutes on "NBC Nightly News." (The average evening newscast is 22 minutes long.)

CBS News no longer stations a single full-time correspondent in Iraq, where some 150,000 United States troops are deployed.

I'm sure that psychologists have more precise terms to describe this collective behavior, but it comes down to this: the situation in Iraq is far better than the media have predicted it would be, and they aren't sure what to do. They don't want to report success, as success means having to explain why they've been wrong. They also morbidly hope—no doubt subconsciously—that things will once again turn worse, and vindicate their years of predicting doom and failure.

So coverage withers away. The war becomes a non-event, and thankfully, a Presidential campaign between a far left shape-shifter and an occasional Republican provides a welcome distraction.

The War in Iraq is plenty interesting to Americans. That has never faded in five years, and most would be heartened to hear what independent reporters have been indicating for months; that real progress has been made economically, diplomatically, and militarily.

But the newsworks don't want to admit they may have been wrong, and so their interests have now focused elsewhere. They don't want to undermine a political party that long ago made abandoning Iraq a key part of their party platform. They don't want to expose a shameful candidate who has made defeating his own military and abandoning a fledgling democracy his signature issue.

From their perspective, it is better to provide only the bad news, and when the bad news fails to live up to expectations, to ignore the uncomfortable.

THE CONCEPT OF AMERICA

“You can call it mysticism if you want to, but I have always believed that there was some divine plan that placed this great continent between two oceans to be sought out by those who were possessed of an abiding love of freedom and a special kind of courage.”

—Ronald Reagan

PROJECTING THE FINAL BLOW TO LIBERTY

AS WE PONDER the two rather "spotty" major candidates gearing down for the final leg in the 2008 race for the US presidency, let's reflect upon a few choice words written about the same time our own original thirteen states adopted their new constitution in 1787.

No stranger to serious ideas, Alexander Tyler, a Scottish history professor at the University of Edinburgh, had this to say about the fall of the Athenian Republic some 2,000 years earlier:

"A democracy is always temporary in nature; it simply cannot exist as a permanent form of government. A democracy will continue to exist up until the time that voters discover they can vote themselves generous gifts from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always vote for the candidates who promise the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that every democracy will finally collapse due to loose fiscal policy, which is always followed by a dictatorship [rarely benign]. The average age of the world's greatest civilizations from the beginning of history, has been about 200 years.

"During those 200 years, those nations always progressed through the following sequence:

1. From bondage to spiritual faith;
2. From spiritual faith to great courage;
3. From courage to liberty;
4. From liberty to abundance ;
5. From abundance to complacency;
6. From complacency to apathy;
7. From apathy to dependence;
8. From dependence back into bondage."

In other news, somewhat more to the point of this blog, given the pathetic and worrisome the lack of persuasive skills in navigating this country back to solid land exhibited by these two candidates, let's isolate the idea behind God's Crucible: Islam and the Making of Europe, 570-1215 by David Levering Lewis. This book, and similar books seems to suggest that we are quite unfortunate to be saddled with a "Eurocentric" culture and how severely "Islamic civilization" is being treated, unfairly and without just cause.

There are endless numbers of books detailing the dark side of European colonialism, some of them no doubt justified, yet comparatively few good books have been published on the victims of 1400 years of Islamic Jihad on several continents. The problem is that Islam gets too little criticism, not too much.

In contrast, we actually believe European culture is being slighted today. We now face a situation where the United Nations increasingly wants to ban "Islamophobia" across the world as hate speech, while books saying that Western civilization should have been wiped out are praised. Which civilization is actually being demonized here?

For much of its history, Europe has undeniably been a rather violent place, though this is not unique to Europe. We must question, however, whether Europeans are particularly "ethnocentric." After having spent a lot of time reading history from several continents, visiting other countries and talking to people from different cultures, the impression is that Europeans have, by and large, been less ethnocentric and a lot more willing to give credit to other cultures than is common elsewhere.

Frankly put, Western nations are being destabilized as a direct result of mass immigration from more truly oppressive countries scattered across the entire world, including, and especially Muslim ones. Our current problem is that we are too open-minded and naive, not that we are "too racist."

This is still a flaw in the empire suffering from the latest wrinkle of noblesse oblige, but precisely the opposite of the spirit we are constantly being accused of having.

OBAMA'S MAN IN GITMO

IT'S FITTING THAT an ex-Muslim chaplain who once insisted there weren't any terrorists at Gitmo is a delegate for Barack Obama, who's itching to shut down Gitmo.

That Obama man is James "Yousef" Yee, a former Army Muslim chaplain charged with espionage while serving at Gitmo, who will represent Washington state for Obama at the Democratic National Convention, where he'll likely have a center-stage speaking role. The two are a perfect match. Obama promises to not only close Gitmo, but "reform" the USA Patriot Act. He apparently plans to take those steps in between tea parties with state sponsors of terror.

Since the Pentagon in 2004 dropped charges against him, Yee has become a poster boy of the anti-war movement. He's cashed in on his ignominy with a book claiming he was the target of "sheer bigotry" and was silenced for exposing "systemic" abuse of prisoners at Gitmo.

One of his biggest boosters in Washington is Rep. Keith Ellison, D-Minn., the Muslim convert who insisted on taking the oath of office on the Quran. Ellison is an Obama superdelegate who's been doing advance work for Obama's planned tea parties in the Middle East.

Last month, he told an Egyptian weekly that Yee's "case was dropped because there was no case to begin with."

Nice try. Here are the facts:

1. Yee was caught returning to the U.S. with maps of Gitmo prison facilities, among other classified materials, and was arrested at a U.S. airport.

2. He was charged with espionage, mishandling classified documents and lying to investigators.

3. He served hard time in a South Carolina stockade.

4. Two of his Muslim cronies at Gitmo were convicted of stealing or mishandling classified documents.

5. Far from being exonerated, the military dropped charges against him to protect national security.

Guantanamo commander Maj. Gen. Geoffrey Miller, who originally accused Yee of spying, explained that there were "national security concerns that would arise from the release of the evidence" if the case moved to trial.

There's no question that Yee, a captain who converted to Islam, was sympathetic to al-Qaida and Taliban captives at Gitmo. At times, in fact, he acted more like a defense attorney for the terrorists. He complained that guards subjected them to cruel "abuse" and "psychological torture."

Waterboarding? Electric shock? No, they committed the sadistic act of mishandling copies of the Quran that Yee had made sure each inmate received. He also saw to it that each copy of the Quran came with a surgical mask to cradle the Muslim holy book above ground to keep it safe and clean.

In addition, Yee convinced his superiors to provide the Muslim prisoners with prayer beads, prayer oils, prayer caps and up to half a dozen books on Islam from the library, which he stocked with some $26,000 worth of Arabic and English titles. Thanks to him, the terrorists have been able to brush up on their jihad as they await repatriation to Saudi Arabia, Yemen and Pakistan.

Read it all.

FUGITIVE AWARDED US DEFENSE CONTRACT

The US military has awarded an $80 million contract to a prominent Saudi financier who has been indicted by the US Justice Department. The contract to supply jet fuel to American bases in Afghanistan was awarded to the Attock Refinery Ltd, a Pakistani-based refinery owned by Gaith Pharaon. Pharaon is wanted in connection with his alleged role at the failed Bank of Credit and Commerce International (BCCI), and the CenTrust savings and loan scandal, which cost US tax payers $1.7 billion.

The Saudi businessman was also named in a 2002 French parliamentary report as having links to informal money transfer networks called hawala, known to be used by traders and terrorists, including Al Qaeda.

Interestingly, Pharaon was also an investor in President George W. Bush's first business venture, Arbusto Energy. A spokesman for the FBI said Pharaon was not wanted in connection with the French report, but confirmed he was still sought by the US Justice Department.

"Ghaith Pharaon is an FBI fugitive indicted in both the BCCI and CENTRUST case," said Richard Kolko, a spokesman for the FBI. "If anyone has information on his location, they are requested to contact the FBI or the US Embassy."