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fter four years of investigation into the assassination of Lebanon president Rafik Harari and 23 others in a vicious car bomb attack in Beirut, the U.N. has botched it, and is empty-handed, having accomplished nothing more than strengthening Hezbollah’s – and Syria’s – hand.

The WashTimes reports this a.m. that for Lebanese generals with ties to Syria who have been in jail awaiting prosecution were released because there was not enough evidence to move forward.

Why the change?  One key witness decided not to retract an earlier statement incriminating the generals.  Gee, I wonder why.  What a Mickey Mouse investigation.

The turn of events came in the final weeks of a hard-fought election campaign pitting Hariri’s son, Saud, againt a Hezbollah candidate.  Hezbollah has been campaigning against the detention of the generals and the UN investigation, so expect them to get a boost from the action.

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esterday was a nice day. I drove with a Santa Margarita Water District board member and a Laguna Woods city council member from OC, across LA and into Kern County, to the beautiful, 97,000-acre Wind Wolves Preserve* for a meeting of the Southern California Water Committee. Unusual in today’s dreary SoCal water world, the meeting was productive. Plus, the conversations coming and going were terrific – and I went about 12 hours without news reports.

But when I got home, Incredible Wife was depressed. The difficult slog of being the CFO of a small biz in these times? Sort of, but more.

“You wouldn’t believe the things I’ve seen on TV today,” she said after listening to my report on my day, which cheered her up a bit.

“Geithner wants more control, so he can shut down a business if he thinks it’s a drag on the economy. The U.N. wants to take control of our economy. I don’t see the point of keeping on fighting against the economy if it’s going to be like this.”

That’s a bit worse than the usual recession worries about cash flow, eh?  As I got caught up on the news, the positiveness of my day diminished, and within an hour or so, I was ready to be mad as he** and not take it anymore, so I went on line to buy some “Don’t Tread on Me” stickers for our cars.

I found some beautiful ones – 6″ X 4″ with the orignal artwork of the extended rattler on a yellow background – at Gadson & Culpepper, and ordered up 10 of them. We don’t have 10 cars; it’s just that “DOTM” evangelism is in order.

This morning, I got this email back from the purveyor of said stickers:

Thank you very much for your order.

Please give us a  little extra time on your order this March and early April. Everyone seems to have the DTOM spirit and we will get everything to you as soon as we can.

So I have to wait, but is this good news or what? All across the country, people are typing “Don’t Tread on Me” into their browsers in search of a way to express their feelings, and they’re finding this site, and no doubt dozens of others that offer up this particular brand of rebelliousness.    Gadson & Culpepper probably isn’t feeling the recession as much as other companies because they’ve tapped the root of a broad and spreading frustration and anger.

This morning on my way into the office (yes, it’s a recession so Saturday is a work day), I was listening to “Wait, Wait … Don’t Tell Me,” NPR’s weekly quiz show.  The caller was asked to guess what the most popular question was during Obama’s on-line Q&A session last week. The hosts mentioned that the Q&A was a part of a week of appearances by Obamarx, including “A prime-time press conference, Jay Leno and Home Shopping Network,” then it went something like this:

“Something about the economy?” guessed the caller.

“No, it was the one about his position on marijuana,” said one  host.

There was some patter about pot, then one of the hosts said, “Maybe the financial stimulus plan would make more sense on pot.”

The joke got a solid round of applause – on NPR! – as did the Home Shopping Network jab.  Things are not all peaches and cream for Rahmbama, folks.

* The Wind Wolves Preserve runs from the prairie-like grasslands at the southern edge of the San Joaquin Valley floor to the peaks of the Tehachapi range.  It gets its name from the wave-like movement of tall prairie grass in the wind … wind wolves.  A very cool word picture, until you imagine yourself in the 1800s, on your Conestoga wagon, surrounded by miles of tall grass filled with all nature of beasts and think for a moment that every ripple of wind through the grass could indeed have been a wolf. And that one … and that one … a pack of wolves all around you.

Or are they just wind wolves?  Brrrr.

Feel free to make the easy analogy to being surrounded by Obamarxists.

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h, the U.N. – always good for a lesson in how to really take a chomp out of the hand that feeds you.  Here’s the latest, comments from the esteemed president of the U.N. General Assembly, Miguel d’Escoto Brockmann, representing that pillar of democracy and human rights, Nicaragua:

The outspoken president of the UN General Assembly on Tuesday accused the United States of demonizing Iran’s president and criticized the International Criminal Court for issuing an arrest warrant for Sudan’s leader for war crimes in Darfur.

Miguel d’Escoto Brockmann, a Roman Catholic priest from Nicaragua with openly leftist views, also reiterated that the more he thinks about the conditions that Israel imposes on the Palestinians, the more he tends “to think about apartheid.” …

“I don’t think anyone can doubt that in our part of the world … [President Mahmoud] Ahmadinejad has been demonized,” he said. “The United States has been in the business of the demonization of people forever and the canonization of the worst of dictators.” …

D’Escoto called the International Criminal Court’s arrest warrant for Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir for war crimes and crimes against humanity “unfortunate” and “lamentable” because the African Union and the Arab League had asked the Security Council to delay the warrant for a year to pursue peace efforts in Darfur. (JPOST)

When I was a teen – 40 years ago – I saw my first “Get the U.S. out of the U.N.” sign and thought it a quaint symbol of Neaderthal thinking by rednecks.  Who could not like the U.N., producer of those nice UNESCO Christmas cards? Funny how that Neaderthal redneck has gotten smarter and smarter as the years went by.

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Petraeus + Iowa = Excited Speculation

Update: This turned out to be a bad joke by Michael Goldfarb of The Weekly Standard. He deserves a blogsopheric flogging – here are the facts.

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uried at the very bottom of a Weekly Standard article about Gen. David Petraeus accepting an invitation to speak at Princton – more on that in a moment – was this enticing little add-on:

“THE WEEKLY STANDARD has learned that General Petraeus is planning on delivering the commencement address at the University of Iowa in 2010. Hmmm.”

Hmmm indeed.  That’s a little less than two years before the Iowa caucuses and it could be a meaningless coincidence, but Petraeus teaches his troops to consider the meaning of seemingly meaningless coincidences.

First, he affirmed Princeton’s request in just a few a few minutes, indicating that the general suddenly has an eagerness not just to be seen in public, but to be seen in a swirl of media attention.  You and the general both know that Princeton’s academics will fall all over themselves to see who can be the most obnoxious, unappreciative, seditious voice at that event, assuring Petraeus of plenty of coverage as he responds from far above the fray.

Second, why Iowa?  He has no known ties to the state, having been raised a few miles away from West Point, where he went upon graduation from high school.  Could it be that the slog to the White House starts in Iowa, typically in the spring a couple years before the election?

If the Obama camp is schooled in counterintelligence, the information before them would make them start planning for a presidential run by Petraeus.  What a race that would be! Son of an immigrant vs. son of an immigrant.  Patriot vs. promiser.  Protector vs. poser. Continue Reading »

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irst the good news: The International Criminal Court, created by the U.N.’s Rome Statute in 1998, has ordered the arrest of Sudanese bloodsucking scumbag President Omar Hassan al-Bashir on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity (murder, extermination, forcible transfer, torture, rape, attacks against civilians and pillaging), all for Sudan’s inhuman behavior against Christians and others in Darfur.

Well, yay. That’s a pretty impressive work performance for a U.N.-related agency, given that they’ve only been at it for seven months.

Now the bad news: No one has the authority or (I’m sure) the will to pick up al-Bashir and drop him on the court’s doorstep in The Hague. Under law, Sudan is supposed to arrest its president, but let’s not kid ourselves, shall we?

Now the ridiculus news: The ICC did not bring charges of genocide against al-Bashir because (NYT here):

The question of genocide in Darfur has been divisive, and was so among the judges, who said two to one that the prosecutor had not provided sufficient evidence of the government’s intent, the key issue in determining genocide.

Proving genocide in court is a high hurdle because it is not about the magnitude of the atrocities. Genocide requires proof that an accused had “specific intent” to “destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group as such” on the basis of their identity.

Looks like genocide, hurts like genocide, bleeds like genocide, rots corpses by the thousands like genocide, but gee, we just can’t really bring ourselves to call it genocide. Perhaps the Court may wish to reconsider and ask itself this question: How many Muslims did al-Bashir’s forces kill? Even one?

Get ready for the spectacle of one of your typical Islamic demonstrations now, with Sudanese Muslims rallying in support of their leader and Sharia, and against international law and decency.  Why, it’s already begun …

Thousands of Sudanese gathered in central Khartoum within minutes of the court’s announcement, waving Sudanese flags and posters showing the President’s face to demonstrate their support for him and denounce the court’s decision. The government in Khartoum vowed to ignore the court’s ruling.

“The court is only one mechanism of neo-colonialist policy used by the West against free and independent countries,” said Sudanese presidential advisor Mustafa Osman Ismail, according to Reuters.

Blah, blah, blah.  Get over it, Mustafa.  The U.S. was a colony and we’ve done pretty well for ourselves.

Then let’s see if the arrest warrant has any effect whatsoever on al-Bashir - or even if it stands up in the face of united Islamic defense of jihadocide in the U.N.:

The Security Council can postpone action against Mr. Bashir and even stop a trial. But on the eve of the ruling, the council remained largely divided over how to react. Sudan’s supporters, including the African Union and Arab League, called again Tuesday for the council to invoke Article 16 of the statute creating the court which allows it to suspend any indictment. But France, Britain or the United States would likely use its veto to block such a move. 

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Who’s To Blame For Mexico Drug Wars? Us!

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iberals’ knees are still jerking. It’s not enough that they blame America for the jihadists’ war on the West and for persistent poverty in post-colonial countries (not even our colonies, mind you!) but now it’s our fault that 6,000 Mexicans have died in the last year in the Mexican drug wars. So says LA Times columnist Tim Rutten:

America’s political decisions to treat drug addiction as a crime rather than a public health problem, and to legalize AK-47s but not pot, fuel an incipient civil war in Mexico. …

Mexico’s drug war could escalate into widespread civil strife with incalculable consequences for the U.S. — and, particularly, the Southwest. And we’re kidding ourselves if we insist that this is a problem that can be wholly solved south of the border, or quarantined there if events spiral out of control. It’s impossible to know how close either the United States or Mexico is to God, but geographically, culturally and economically, they’ve never been closer to one another.

If Americans really are concerned about the horrific toll inflicted by Mexico’s narco-gangsters, we need to ask some tough questions about our own cultural and political delusions.

The “close to God” reference is a reference to the corrupt Mexican dictator Porfirio Diaz, who famously said Mexico suffered because it was located “so far from God and so near the United States,” and Rutten foolishly chooses to believe the blood-soaked despot than rational thought.

Canada is located just as close to the U.S. as Mexico, yet we don’t see poverty, corruption, a human flood across our border or drug wars on the northern fronteir – so why to we have to assume the mantle of guilt.  The same drug and gun laws exist in Detroit and Minneapolis as exist in San Diego and El Paso.

Does Rutten really think that if we legalized pot tomorrow and banned whatever guns he wants stripped from law-abiding citizens that the violence in Mexico would stop?  Of course not.  But neither does he care. Like other liberals, he is only interested in using whatever excuse he can come up with to recast America in his vision. Continue Reading »

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he folks who brought you oil-for-food and the post-tsunami aid debacle in Southeast Asia are looking at various G8 stimulus programs and practically drowning from their salivating.

A new U.N. report, World Economic Situation and Prospects 2009, worries that a global economic meltdown will impact people who recently left Third World farms for globalization-sparked jobs in cities – jobs that are disappearing as consumers worldwide hunker down.

Growth in world gross product (WGP) is expected to slow to 1.0 per cent in 2009, a sharp deceleration from the rate of 2.5 per cent estimated for 2008 and well below the more robust pace in previous years. While most developed economies are expected to be in a deep recession, a vast majority of developing countries is experiencing a sharp reversal in the robust growth registered in the period of 2002-2007, indicating a significant setback in the progress made in poverty reduction for many developing countries over the past few years.

The report blames the U.S. for the global crises, saying that anyone should have seen the credit crisis and housing meltdown coming – but not noting that the U.N. was a happy participant in the boom years, gleefully taking money from the U.S. without warning us that maybe we should be stashing more away.  Once blame is placed, it looks for a global solution:

Furthermore, to ensure suffi cient stimulus at the global level, it will be desirable to coordinate the fiscal stimulus packages internationally. In a strongly integrated world economy, fi scal stimulus in one country tends to be less eff ective because of high import leakage eff ects. By coordinating fi scal stimulus internationally, the positive multiplier eff ects can be amplifi ed through international economic linkages, thereby providing greater stimuli to both the global economy and the economies of individual countries.

So it’s not enough that the U.S. spend a trillion or so on an effort (however flawed) to stimulate it’s own economy.  There’s no provision here for the “rising tide lifts all boats” theory of the global economy, no recognition that a healthier U.S. economy would put people back to work from  Botswana to Borneo.

No, what’s needed is to come to the bosom of the U.N., and create global stimulus packages so all the world can share in the deteriorating wealth of the West.

Come to think of it, as badly as the Congress botched the stimulus package, maybe even so corrupt and inefficient a group as the U.N. could do better …

One last note:  I do not at all wish to make light of the suffering that will happen to the folks at the bottom of the economic ladder when the folks at the top of the ladder are hurting.  Call me a broken letter, but I believe the free market is the best way to ensure they’re back on their feet quickly – and seeing Rahmbama/Pelosi/Reid at work only reassures me all the more of the superiority of the free market approach.

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he UN is not the least bit happy with Israel. [Note from editor: Isn't that a bit too obvious for a first sentence, Laer?] This time, the UN is castigating the Israelis for getting in the way of its aid shipments, as detailed in this UN news release:

The number of trucks allowed by Israel to enter Gaza daily to deliver much-needed relief supplies remains insufficient, the United Nations reported today.

Further, the Office of the UN Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process (UNSCO) and the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said that only a limited array of items are being permitted to enter through the crossings.

Those scurrilous Israelis!  But wait … before the electrons dried on this UN release, BBC reported that Banki and his Boys might just be growling at the wrong enemy:

Hamas policemen have seized thousands of blankets and food parcels that were meant to be distributed to Palestinian civilians in Gaza, UN officials say.

A UN spokesman said policemen raided a UN warehouse on Tuesday after officials refused to hand over the aid to a Hamas-controlled ministry.

The UN said it was the first time its aid had been confiscated by Hamas.

It condemned the action and demanded the goods be immediately returned. There has been no comment by Hamas.

UN spokesman Christopher Gunness said Hamas police took 3,500 blankets and over 400 food parcels.

Too funny; too true.  The UN had barely stopped crying over the deaths of some of these Hamas “policemen” during the Israeli offensive, as if they were keepers of the peace, not Hamas enforcers, and now their surviving brothers in thuggery steal the UN’s blankets and food parcels!

It’s indicative of the UN approach to the Palestine issue, which can be summarized as entrenched, implacable anti-Israelism (and somewhat more subtly, anti-Zionism and antisemitism).  Here’s that UN news release’s summary of the current war:

According to the Palestinian Ministry of Health, the military operation – launched by Israel with the stated aim of ending Hamas rocket attacks – killed 1,380 Palestinians, of whom 431 are children and 112 are women.

UNICEF stressed that children, who had nowhere to hide, were severely psychologically affected by the conflict. As a result, child protection – including mine-risk education, psychosocial support and recreational opportunities to create a sense of normalcy – must be a priority in Gaza, it said.

Hmmm.  No mention of the safety of Israeli children under the hail of Hamas rockets.  No mention of Hamas missile batteries in residential neighborhoods and weapons stockpiles in the basements of apartment buildings.  And definitely no mention of Hamas military forces firing from UN facilities crowded with Palestinian children.

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he news reports this morning drip with barely masked contempt for Israel; how dare those Jews shell the UN compound in Gaza?

Israeli forces shelled the United Nations headquarters in the Gaza Strip on Thursday, setting fire to the compound filled with hundreds of refugees as U.N. chief Ban Ki-moon was in the area on a mission to end Israel’s devastating offensive against the territory’s Hamas rulers. (AP)

Israeli forces shelled areas deep inside Gaza City on Thursday, hitting the headquarters of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency and injuring at least three people in the compound, according to witnesses and United Nations officials.

A spokesman for the agency, Christopher Gunness, said that hundreds of Palestinians were sheltering in the compound at the time of the shelling and that there were five fully laden fuel vehicles at the site. (NYT)

Israel shelled the United Nations headquarters in the Gaza Strip on Thursday, engulfing the compound and the main warehouse in fire and destroying thousands of pounds of food and humanitarian supplies intended for Palestinian refugees. (ABC News)

The headquarters of the UN refugee agency was on fire today after coming under attack as Israeli forces pushed deeper into Gaza City, unleashing the heaviest shelling of densely packed neighbourhoods since the military operation began nearly three weeks ago. (UK Guardian)

The media are covering for Hamas by starting with the assumption that the UN is neutral in this matter and is not either actively or passively providing support and shelter to Hamas fighters.  To believe that, one has to ignore Hamas’ bragging about its use of human shields.  If Hamas is willing to kill its own children to manufacture press outrage, why wouldn’t they use the UN for the same purpose?

When confronted with a united anti-Israel front in the western media, I turn to the Israeli media for a different perspective.  And true to form, the Israeli media are reporting on the incident with the same accuracy as the IDF’s radar-guided bombs:

Gunshots and an anti-tank missile were fired at IDF troops near the UN compound that was attacked by the IDF on Thursday, senior defense official told The Jerusalem Post.

Accordng to the officials, the IDF responded by firing artillery shells at the location of the gunmen and that the shells caused damage to the UN installations. (JPost)

Outgoing Prime Minister Ehud Olmert told United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon on Thursday that Israeli troops shelled the UN headquarters in Gaza after coming under fire from Palestinian militants within the building.

Olmert described the incident as “very sad and I am sorry about this.”

“We don’t want this event to happen again,” he told Ban, “and I don’t know if you know but Hamas attacked from within the UNRWA compound during the humanitarian cease-fire.”(Haaretz)

The AP story on the incident (linked above) described the Israeli apology without referencing the report that Hamas had been firing from the UN compound shortly before it was hit:

Ban expressed “outrage” over the bombing. He said Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak told him there had been a “grave mistake” and promised to pay extra attention to protecting U.N. installations.

Banki should know by now that the grave mistake is giving cover to Hamas fighters, and that any extra attention that should be paid should be to making sure Hamas isn’t coopting UN buildings, ambulances, schools and other facilties.  If there’s one message in Israel’s offense it is that Hamas has no cover, and the human shield or UN shield defense won’t fly.  Call first to warn them, then do what has to be done to erradicate the Hamas blight.

By now, the media’s response to incidents like this should be first to verify the facts regarding the incident – what building was hit, how many casualties – and then immediately inquire about Hamas activities at the target at the time of the attack.  This is not rocket science; it’s not even Qassam science.

In all the talk of proportionality and disproportionality, we should address proportional outrage.  The world should be offended that Hamas would put the UN mission in jeopardy by firing from it, that the UN allowed its mission to be used by Hamas for such purposes, and only then in a distant third, that Israel responded by bombing the compound.  But we have a disproportionate response from the media again.

Until the media can show that it can be proportional, media opinions about the disproportionality of Israel’s offensive can rightly be ignored.

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“And why don’t I have any respect for the UN?” asks frequent hat-tippee Jim.  This video tells the story; watch it to in end and be sure to note the markings on the rear door of the ambulance and the flag its flying:

Hamas – and, apparently, the UN – are flagrant violators of international law and should be treated as such.

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