November 30th 2008
Sunday Scan – 11/30/2008
A New Level Of Islamist Sub-Humanism
R
eports coming out of Mumbai confirm that Islamist terrorists are capable of sinking still lower in the sight of decent humanity, capable of even worse crimes against decency:
“Bombay has a long history of terror. I have seen bodies of riot victims, gang war and previous terror attacks like bomb blasts. But this was entirely different. It was shocking and disturbing,” a doctor said.
Asked what was different about the victims of the incident, another doctor said: “It was very strange. I have seen so many dead bodies in my life, and was yet traumatised. A bomb blast victim’s body might have been torn apart and could be a very disturbing sight. But the bodies of the victims in this attack bore such signs about the kind of violence of urban warfare that I am still unable to put my thoughts to words,” he said.
Asked specifically if he was talking of torture marks, he said: “It was apparent that most of the dead were tortured. What shocked me were the telltale signs showing clearly how the hostages were executed in cold blood,” one doctor said. (Source)
And what of the Jewish “hostages” that had the great misfortune of existing in a world in which Islamists exist?
The other doctor, who had also conducted the post-mortem of the victims, said: “Of all the bodies, the Israeli victims bore the maximum torture marks. It was clear that they were killed on the 26th itself. It was obvious that they were tied up and tortured before they were killed. It was so bad that I do not want to go over the details even in my head again,” he said.
This “religion of peace” has become such a scourge on the Earth that we really just can’t allow it to continue in its evil ways. Does Obama see this? Does he have the spine to confront evil? I believe it’s a yes on the first and will prove to be a no on the second.
So What’s Your Excuse, Rubin?
A
s Citigroup loses $20 billion last year and begs for a nice, rick suck on the taxpayers’ teat, its chairman and former Clinton treasury czar Richard Rubin – who’s hauled in $115 million in Citi paychecks plus options since 1999 – isn’t about to blame himself for any of his company’s ills. Here he is, trying to rebuild his reputation via WSJ:
Mr. Rubin said his pay was justified and that there were higher-paying opportunities available to him. “I bet there’s not a single year where I couldn’t have gone somewhere else and made more,” he said. He turned down his bonus last year, telling the board the money could be better spent elsewhere.
Asked if he had any regrets, Mr. Rubin said: “I guess that I don’t think of it quite that way,” adding that “if you look back from now, there’s an enormous amount that needs to be learned.”
No regrets, even though he signed off on greater risk-taking by Citi, even though since he joined in ’99, “the bank has lurched from crisis to crisis, first with regulatory authorities, then with investors who grumbled that the bank lacked a strong strategy and was bloated.” During all this, he wanted nothing more than to go fly fishing, act the big-wig with the bank’s clients and prospects, and haul in over $10 million a year.
Let’s hope this pendulum of greed and overpaid, failed gluttons has swung as far as it’s going to swing.
A Good Statement From A Questionable Source
T
he Muslim Public Affairs Council, which presents itself as a voice for moderate Muslims in America – a group we’re always listening for but seldom hearing – has issued a fine and decent statement on the Mumbai jihadist killings:
MPAC expresses its condolences to the Jewish community and the various other communities whose members were involved in the tragic series of terrorist attacks in recent days. MPAC has sent letters of condolences to the Indian embassy, and encourages people of all faiths and nationalities to stand together against those who seek to divide our communities.
The call-out to the Jewish community is particularly welcome, as it’s clear that the Chabad House Jewish Center raid had only one purpose – to kill Jews very deliberately and very publicly for no reason other than their faith. One wonders why, if MPAC was truly concerned about the Jews, the statement was headlined “MPAC Mourns Death of Mumbai Hostages.” What hostages?
It’s a clue that MPAC still has a way to go before it represents an American Muslim community that behaves like other American communities. Here’s another clue, and Atlas Shrugs passes them off as “Islamists in Political Clothing.”
A Fine Pardon
T
he Bush-hating Greenies will howl about this, but I think it’s just wonderful:
Leslie Owen Collier was surrounded by cattle at a livestock auction when his cell phone rang. It was the White House.
Twelve years after pleading guilty to federal charges in the deaths of three bald eagles, Collier learned his name was cleared: He was pardoned by President George W. Bush.
“I guess I was humbled is the best way to say it – I never thought it would happen,” Collier, 50, said in a phone interview this week. “It was emotional. I almost came to tears, really.” (AP)
Wonkette greeted the news with, “Well, this is rich,” and she wasn’t making a cute play on Marc Rich, the infamous Clinton pardonee. She dismissed Collier as someone who “poisoned balled eagles,” feeding off the same AP item I saw, which took time to describe Collier’s offense:
The 1995 incident that changed the life of the farmer from the Charleston area of southeastern Missouri began when he noticed an increasing number of wild turkeys, which were believed to have died away. “I got it in my head that if I eliminated some of the coyotes it would give the turkeys a jump-start,” on their comeback, Collier said.
So he put out hamburger meat laced with the pesticide Furadan in an effort to kill the coyotes. It worked; seven coyotes died.
The problem occurred when the eagles fed on the coyotes’ carcasses. They died, too. So did a red-tailed hawk and a great horned owl, among other animals.
So Wonkette, as is her wont, goes to the sensational and misleading, failing to point out that all this guy was trying to do was help bring back wild turkeys. A well deserved pardon from a president who’s much more truthful than Wonkette would want you to believe.
Says WSJ of the Bush pardons:
But a closer look at some of the newly pardoned shows many of them are church-going, blue-collar workers from rural areas (and ardent Bush supporters) who had little trouble finding jobs after their convictions. There is another common thread: the important role firearms once played in their lives.
Something Nutty About Acorns
W
here are all the acorns? From Nova Scotia to Virginia, reports WaPo, squirrels are going nutty with hunger because the familiar fall-time blanket of acorns just isn’t there. Said botanist Rod Simmons:
“I’m used to seeing so many acorns around and out in the field, it’s something I just didn’t believe,” he said. “But this is not just not a good year for oaks. It’s a zero year. There’s zero production. I’ve never seen anything like this before.”
Of course, some are quick to turn Gorish in the even of any aberration of the natural scheme of things:
Garris started calling nurseries. “I was worried they’d think I was crazy. But they said I wasn’t the only one calling who was concerned about it,” she said. “This is the first time I can remember in my lifetime not seeing any acorns drop in the fall and I’m 53. You have to wonder, is it global warming? Is it environmental? It makes you wonder what’s going on.”
Let’s cross global warming off the list, shall we? Does anyone remember the summer of 2008 being particularly warm? I can’t find compiled data for the year yet, but the anecdotal evidence I recall is that this was more like a summer that never came than one that fulfilled Al’s fantasies.
What there was in 2008 was a very, very wet spring – the third wettest month on record since 1871. Rain could wash away the pollen necessary for acorn production before it has the chance to fertilize. Seems logical. Now what do we hear about global warming and rainfall? Admittedly it’s a mixed bag – drier here, wetter there, but mostly wetter. As for the East Coast, NASA recently touted a new, scarier global warming model which predicted higher temps by correcting an “error” in earlier models:
The global model simulated rainfall too frequently, so that its surface temperatures were not appropriately sensitive to interannual changes in Pacific sea surface temperatures. “Since the weather prediction model simulated the frequency and timing of summer precipitation more reliably than the global model, its daily high temperature predictions for the future are also believed to be more accurate,” added co-author Leonard Druyan, NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies and Columbia University.
So can we say that if it’s wetter than usual, maybe the older, cooler model is better, and better explains the dearth of acorns?
Posted in Climate change, Economic Policy, Global warming, Islamism | 1 Comment » | |
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December 1st, 2008 at 8:21 am
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