I have seen a miracle at Butterworth Hospital in Grand Rapids.
Two beautiful baby boys, born at 26 weeks. Small, so small. Each weighing a bit less than two pounds.
I stood close to the incubator and stared in amazement at the details. My pinky finger is approximately the same size as these little boys' forearms, and the smaller toes are about the size of a dull pencil lead.
Second trimester, and thriving.
There are times when I feel the need to drive a sharpened garden instrument into my right eye socket and out of my left ear. Repeatedly.
Norway provides today's motivation for such action.
Norway's Security Service fears that an Islamic terror attack will do serious harm to Norwegians. However,
the concern is all with an imagined backlash, not with preventing it by heading off a terror attack, and calling upon Muslims in Norway to be active in anti-terror efforts.This is beyond stupid. The fear is that, let me get this right, if a terror attack occurs, there will be a backlash against Muslims? That is the legitimate fear? How about a fear that the bus you are riding in might blow up?
The big day has arrived!
Finally, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has had his opportunity to address the American public via a forum afforded him by those believers in the free exchange of ideas at Columbia University.
Evidently Columbia University, champion of free speech and the free exchange of ideas (idea 1. Genocide is bad; idea 2. In theory, yes. Unless Jews are involved), is taking certain precautions to make sure that their ostentatious commitment to “free speech” and the “free exchange of ideas” remains untroubled by the kind of annoying dissent that can turn such a signature moment of academic “tolerance” into a potential hate crime. To that end, the entire performance is being tightly controlled by doctrinaire relativists, a growing cadre of oxymoronic leftist thought police to whom free speech is only free once it is protected from the kinds of responses that might presume forcefully to challenge it. Which is why Mahmoud’s speech is closed to the public, no protest signs are permitted, and students will ask questions from index cards, with no give and take allowed.I completely understand the narrative, I just didn't realize that exchange could be like, so one-sided.
If terrorism is solely the fault of Bushhitler's invasion of Iraq and Israel's dominance over the Palestinians, why then were there five separate attacks in Thailand carried out yesterday by Islamist Muslims (in Allah's name) against peaceful non-Muslims?
How many Muslims will have to die worldwide before this Pope learns that Muslims should never be intellectually challenged? How many rioters and innocents will have to be trampled before Pope Benedict learns that any comment on Islam is an insult?
Charles Johnson submits his 10-day forecast:
Our 10-day forecast: extended seething, with a 70% chance of rioting and murder by next Friday.I'm no forecaster but I think the cold front might roll in before Friday.
Some people are stupid beyond words.
BOSTON — An MIT student with a fake bomb strapped to her chest was arrested at gunpoint today at Logan International Airport and later claimed it was artwork, officials said.
Star Simpson, 19, had a computer circuit board and wiring in plain view over a black hooded sweat shirt she was wearing, said State Police Maj. Scott Pare, the commanding officer at the airport.
“She said that it was a piece of art and she wanted to stand out on career day,” Pare said at a news conference. “She claims that it was just art, and that she was proud of the art and she wanted to display it.”
The device had wires connected to a battery, allowing it to light up, he said. Simpson also had Play-Doh in her hands, he said.
Simpson was charged with disturbing the peace and possessing a hoax device, and was to be arraigned in East Boston District Court later today.
“I’m shocked and appalled that somebody would wear this type of device to an airport,” Pare said.
Simpson was “extremely lucky she followed the instructions or deadly force would have been used,” Pare said. “She’s lucky to be in a cell as opposed to the morgue.”
I've screamed my head off over moderate Muslims not distancing themselves from the murderous Islamsists that are trying to become the only recognizable face of Islam.
So, when we have Muslims speaking out against radicals from within, why don't the rest of us stupid non-Muslims listen?
Before losing his job, Ali upset people at Friday prayers by inviting a guest preacher who praised pro-Taliban rebels in Pakistan as martyrs, The Times reported. The preacher, a British-born father of four, had previously been banned for life from a local mosque, the Greenwich Islamic Centre. The institution spent at least 30,000 pounds taking legal action to the county court so that Ali could be forbidden from attending the mosque.I think people have gotten so afraid of being accused of being Islamophobes that they overlook legitimate fear.
Court papers claim he showed a video to children in the mosque containing clips of the 9/11 incident and chanted "Allah-o-Akbar". The mosque said it tried informally to warn the hospital about its concerns months ago.
According to PowerLine Blog, Michigan has yet another thing to be proud of its Senate members for.
Yep, Sens. Carl Levin and Debbie Stabenow have come forward and bravely refused to condemn the General Betray-Us advertisement placed in the New York Times by Moveon.org. The ad ran on the opening day of testimony given by General Petreaus before a joint session of Congress.
The amendment wishes
To express the sense of the Senate that General David H. Petraeus, Commanding General, Multi-National Force-Iraq, deserves the full support of the Senate and strongly condemn personal attacks on the honor and integrity of General Petraeus and all members of the United States Armed Forces.Levin and Stabenow have determined that they cannot turn their backs on their most important of constituents, the hardened left as exemplified by MoveOn.
From the UN absurdity files and the Jerusalem Post:
Two weeks after Israel's alleged bombing raid in Syria, which some foreign reports said targeted North Korean nuclear material, the UN's nuclear watchdog elected Syria as deputy chairman of its General Conference on Monday.And the UN is headquartered in the US for what reason?
The 51st session of the General Conference of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) opened in Vienna on Monday and will run through Friday.
The Syrian news agency SANA proudly reported the election on Tuesday, adding that Syria was also successful in including "the Israeli nuclear arsenal as an item on the agenda of the conference."
The agenda for the meeting includes the item "Israeli nuclear capabilities and LGFthreat." While Iran will be a focus of the discussions, there is no item on the agenda referring to the Islamic Republic by name.
Israel's Foreign Ministry had "no public comment" on Syria's election.
But Gerald Steinberg, chairman of Bar-Ilan University's political science department and an authority on nonproliferation, said the election "reflects the absurdity of the political process inside the IAEA."
Please say it isn't so. From the New York Sun:
In a move that has stunned New York, the Bloomberg administration is in discussions to escort the Iranian president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, to ground zero during his visit to New York next week, Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly said today.Is there no thing sacred to this country any more? If there was ever a place that should not succumb to relativist political maneuvers, this is it. If Mayor Bloomberg even engages in discussions like this he will help to raise Ahmadinejad's political status in Iran and will help to heighten his credibility to many Muslim the world over.
The Iranian mission to the U.N. made the request to the New York City Police Department and the Secret Service, which will jointly oversee security during the leader's two-day visit. Mr. Ahmadinejad is scheduled to arrive September 24 to speak to the U.N. General Assembly as the Security Council decides whether to increase sanctions against his country for its uranium enrichment program.
Mr. Kelly said the NYPD and Secret Service were in discussions with the Iranian Mission about the logistics for the possible visit, and whether it will take place at all. He said that for safety reasons related to ongoing construction at ground zero Mr. Ahmadinejad would not be allowed to descend into the pit.
"There has been some interest expressed in his visiting the area," Mr. Kelly said. "It's something that we are prepared to handle if in fact it does happen."
Mr. Kelly said Mr. Ahmadinejad had not indicated why he wants to visit the site of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.
But not denied because Sneezy is a tinpot dictator hell bent on imposing radical Islam around the world or that he wants to wipe Israel off the map. Not denied because he is arming insurgents in Iraq. Not denied because he is a Holocaust denier. No, no, because of fucking security and safety. Un-fucking-believable. Takes quite a bit to get me to curse in writing. I put this in the "Beyond Moonbat" category, but, perhaps I should have a new one "What the F*ck is going through your head?"
There seems to have been a bit of confusion for Larry Celona in the New York Post as he covered a story about a student at Renaissance Charter School in Jackson Heights.
September 19, 2007 -- A Queens teen was arrested yesterday after placing fliers in his teachers' mailboxes asking them to convert to Islam - then made threats once he was caught, authorities said.However, in one of those moments that helps to clarify a typical reporter for the relativist he is, Larry finishes his article with a line of pure genius.
Yaseen Chowdhury, 17, of Woodside, wrote the fliers himself and put them in the mailboxes at the Renaissance Charter School in Jackson Heights, sources said.
When confronted there about the fliers, he made unspecified verbal threats, according to the sources.
Chowdhury was charged with aggravated harassment as a hate crime.
A Department of Education spokesman did not return a call seeking comment.
"The student's religion was not immediately known."Though the fact that conversion to Islam was the purpose of the fliers, only an Islamophobe could accurately deduce that the miserable little bastard was indeed a Muslim. And, by all measures that are worldly and accepted, Larry Celona is no Islamophobe.
The opening line from Michael J. Totten's Middle East Journal today:
RAMADI, IRAQ – In early 2007 Ramadi, the capital of Iraq’s Anbar Province, was one of the most violent war-torn cities on Earth. By late spring it was the safest major city in Iraq outside Kurdistan.A very interesting article from a man who actually visits those areas most journalists only hear about from local stringers. He is both critical when he sees negatives and approving where he sees progress.
Qur’an 8:12 Your Lord inspired the angels with the message: I will terrorize the unbelievers. Therefore smite them on their necks and every joint and incapacitate them. Strike off their heads and cut off each of their fingers and toes.Now, why is it again that Islamophobia is so misunderstood at the UN and elsewhere?
I'm in a non writing mood. Which really sucks because I've had to spend the whole day writing.
It is on days like this that I like to toss out little gemlets of phrasing that I find on the net. There are incredibly talented people out there that do not get the recognition that they deserve.
Today's little gems come from Christopher Johnson's The Midwestern Conservative Journal and are taken completely out of context. But hey, a gem can be really sparkley even if it isn't in a gold setting.
Gem number 1 from his September 13 post "Faux Cats"that wonders aloud over the wisdom of Jessica Rowley being ordained a Catholic Priest even though she is Episcopalian.
Gem number 2 from his September 13 post "KATHARINE THE FRIENDLY GHOST, THE FRIENDLIEST GHOST YOU KNOW!!" where he comments on a recent sermon delivered by Katharine Jefferts Schori.[MCJ] Are you going to be the first pregnant priest?
[MCJ] Of course there have. Where do you think atheists come from?[Jessica Rowley] Probably the first Catholic pregnant priest. I’m sure there have been Episcopal priests who’ve been pregnant.
[MCJ] Johnson's Third Law of Episcopal Thermodynamics: every joke you make about the Episcopal Church eventually comes true. I used to quip that the UN was the Episcopal Vatican. But I really think that some day, sooner rather than later, there will be a liturgy in the prayer book for the required Episcopalian haj to Turtle Bay.There are a number of reasonable excuses to visit the Midwestern Conservative Journal. Great writing is but one.[Katharine Jefferts Schori] The mission of the United Nations is peace with justice, the same mission that is claimed here in Micah and the psalm for Jerusalem, the city built on a hill. Each and every one who labors in that city to build a just and peaceful world participates in God’s dream. Ambassadors, translators, mail clerks, and those who maintain the building in which the nations gather, all contribute to that vision of possibility.[MCJ] You used to trick-or-treat for UNICEF, didn't you, Kate? Me, I was just in it for the candy. Back in the day, if my mom had ever said to me, "We'll give you a big bag of candy if you'll stay home and forget about the costume and all the rest of it," I would have replied with a big smile, "Jim dandy," stayed home on Halloween night and watched television.
There's that dreaming god of hers again. I think I know why so many people leave the Episcopal Church for Rome, Constantinople or Geneva and it has nothing to do with doctrine. It has to do with the fact that in those three traditions, God actually does something once in a while. Kate's stoner deity just sits around all day, gets baked, listens to Pink Floyd and wishes that somebody somewhere would do something about all the problems of the world. And bring him some Doritos.
Sandy Berger, the former National Security Adviser for President Clinton who months ago admitted to taking classified documents from the National Archives and destroying them, has himself a brand spanking new consulting job.
Berger has joined the advisory team of the Hillary Clinton campaign for President as an expert on national security.
I suppose after producing some kick-butt strategies on how to end Muslim terrorism (the subject incidentally of the memos he destroyed) he might have a couple suggestions on ways to keep the Archives a bit more burglar proof--a topic we can be sure he is an expert in. The Archives gig might have to wait though at least until he actually gets his security clearance back.
That Kathy Griffen is one brave envelope pusher.
You see, her original plans were to tell Muhammed to suck it, but when she got all frazzled by the hoopla, and the lights and the crowd of the Emmy Awards, Jesus' name just kind of sneaked out instead.
If not for that tight dress and poor handwriting her bravery would have been proven to the world!
The latest mind-numbed European official to declare his dhimmitude to Islam is Terry Davis who serves on the Council of Europe. These comments came out on 9-11 and were in response to a demonstration that had been banned in Brussels by that city's socialist mayor.
Strasbourg, 11.09.2007 - European values are under threat, say the organisers of a protest march under the banner “Against the Islamisation of Europe” which was due to place today in Brussels in spite of the ban by the city Mayor.Ok, so far so good.
The fact is that Europe and its values are indeed under threat, but the danger is not coming from Islam. Our common European values are undermined by bigots and radicals, both islamists and islamophobes, who exploit fears and prejudice for their own political objectives.What did he just say? People that would prefer not having train stations blown up are now in some way the same as those blowing up the trains? People that would rather not live in a society that allows honor killings, female genital mutilation, and forced segregation are somehow on the same level with those that embrace those things?
The self-proclaimed defenders of European values say that the Mayor has violated their rights under the European Convention on Human Rights. The freedom of assembly and the freedom of expression are indeed essential preconditions for democracy, but they should not be regarded as a licence to offend.What is wrong with being offended once in a while? The sheer idiocy of Davis offends me--just reading this nearly made me want to jab a plastic Wendy's spork into my brain. But I at least feel he has the right to irritate me and, apparently, to inflate the stock prices of fine North American plasticware manufacturers.
I will not enter into the discussion about whether the march should have been allowed or not, but I note that the protesters’ reading of the Convention is selective to say the least. It is very important to remember that the freedom of assembly and expression can be restricted to protect the rights and freedoms of others, including the freedom of thought, conscience and religion. This applies to everyone in Europe including the millions of Europeans of Islamic faith, who were the main target of today’s shameful display of bigotry and intolerance.According to Davis it is those like himself sitting atop the thrones of Utopia that have the arbitrary right to bless the citizenry with whatever rights fit his social objectives. And I cannot help but believe that since radical Muslims scare the shit out of him he might as well pick on peaceful protesters.
A couple days ago I was harping on the US prison system using its own brand of relativism in its purging of many Christian and Jewish religious books in prisons.
Not to be outdone by federal bureaucrats, a genius school administrator at Hobbton High School in North Carolina has determined that no students should be allowed to wear clothing with any flags on them, of course, including the US flag. The new rule was passed just in time for 9-11.
The new rule is designed to squash farther controversy over students wearing clothing with foreign flags on them.
The superintendent of schools in Sampson County calls the situation unfortunate, but says educators didn’t want to be forced to pick and choose which flags should be permissible.And this idiot is helping to educate children?
But note that they lifted it for all flags. The moral equivalence mindset is still driving their decisions.Wow! Who could see that one coming.
With arms bound, conservative leader Frank Vanhecke discovers the contempt that socialist police and politicians hold for free-marketers. 
Can you even imagine such a thing happening to the head of a political party in the United States? What if Howard Dean was treated thusly or Mel Martinez was roughed up in such a way? (No one would worry so much if this happened to Dennis Kucenich whose testicles fell off years ago.)
We have many people in our country that are dissatisfied. They yearn for the government to supply more and do more. They covet a cradle to the grave government benevolence that is openly promised by socialists. They are also blinded to the dangers of ceding personal responsibility to an all-powerful government.
Socialism cannot survive and tolerate dissent.
The Brussels Journal covers yesterday's activity in Belgium.
At a press conference in the European Parliament yesterday evening foreign journalists openly doubted the statement by Philip Claeys and Koen Dillen, two members of the European Parliament for the Vlaams Belang party (VB), that the Brussels police had told the VB that they would tolerate yesterday’s anti-Islamization demonstration if it was a peaceful “static” protest at Schuman Plaza. Despite this agreement, the police beat up the peaceful demonstrators in front of the European Commission building. “You can tell us whatever you want, but we need proof,” one of the foreign journalists told Claeys and Dillen.
The proof was given yesterday on Flemish television when reporter Goedele Devroy told a colleague [video here, in Dutch] that she was amazed by the brutality of the police against the peaceful demonstrators “who just stood there.” She added: “This is strange because, when I rang the police this morning, they said that they would tolerate the demonstration if the demonstrators would not use violence and if they just remained put and would not try to march.”
It looks like a deliberate trap was set up for the demonstrators, who were gathered at Schuman Plaza. Riot police units from Liege in Wallonia, the French-speaking part of Belgium, maltreated the demonstrators, many of them from Flanders, the Dutch-speaking part of Belgium, in an excessively violent way, picking out the VB leaders for the worst treatment.
Jules Crittenden closed my day today with his perspective on a September 11th not so many years ago, and on another one that took place just today.
So, you want your utopia?
How about a visit to Brussels via Gateway Pundit where conservative leader Frank Vanhecke gets to enjoy a gentle massage of the Adam's apple at the hand of a do-all, care-for-all state.
In an effort to keep prisons from becoming recruiting havens for fundamentalist terrorists, the Bureau of Prisons is having its chaplains remove all the religious texts that might promote violence against non-believers and other-believers.
Not a bad start.
Because if there is one thing we should never tolerate it is crusading Jews and Christians killing innocents through the urgings of Charles Spurgeon and Thomas Aquinas. Unfortunately, in order to keep things fair, books by fundamentalist Islamic peace lovers are also casualties of the purge.
From the New York Times:
Behind the walls of federal prisons nationwide, chaplains have been quietly carrying out a systematic purge of religious books and materials that were once available to prisoners in chapel libraries.Like apologetic security guards who toss away their own pistols during a standoff with knife wielding thieves, the American system is becoming aggressively unconcerned with policies that might actually help to preserve our way of life in exchange for desire to level the playing field between what is American and a more worldly viewpoint.
The chaplains were directed by the Bureau of Prisons to clear the shelves of any books, tapes, CDs and videos that are not on a list of approved resources. In some prisons, the chaplains have recently dismantled libraries that had thousands of texts collected over decades, bought by the prisons, or donated by churches and religious groups.
[...]
Traci Billingsley, a spokeswoman for the Bureau of Prisons, said the agency was acting in response to a 2004 report by the Office of the Inspector General in the Justice Department. The report recommended steps that prisons should take, in light of the Sept. 11 attacks, to avoid becoming recruiting grounds for militant Islamic and other religious groups. The bureau, an agency of the Justice Department, defended its effort, which it calls the Standardized Chapel Library Project, as a way of barring access to materials that could, in its words, “discriminate, disparage, advocate violence or radicalize.”
Ms. Billingsley said, “We really wanted consistently available information for all religious groups to assure reliable teachings as determined by reliable subject experts.”
In the recently thwarted terrorist plot in Germany, how did German police discover that the German terrorists were to carry out their attack by September 15?
Uh-oh. They were eavesdropping on a phone call that originated in Pakistan and ended up in Germany.
This is the exact equivalent of the NSA program that is ritually, but inaccurately, described in the press as "domestic spying." Most Democrats denounce the program as unconstitutional.
Further, it was the NSA program that brought the German terrorists to light:The arrests were the culmination of an investigation that began a year ago, when U.S. officials alerted German authorities to e-mails intercepted from Pakistan.If the Democrats get their way, the NSA will not be able to use this tactic unless it has enough knowledge, enough days in advance, to get an order from a FISA judge. You can be sure, however, that the liberals will never mention this incident when they denounce the program as an invasion of constitutional rights.
This hilarious example of what can occur when governments believe they have become the all-powerful. From today's Patriot Post:
The Red Chinese have taken their long battle with Tibet's Buddhist monks to a new level. Indeed, Beijing's State Administration for Religious Affairs has made "an important move to institutionalize management of reincarnation." Translation: Buddhist monks may not reincarnate without permission from the Chinese government. According to Buddhist religion, the Dalai Lama reincarnates himself after death. This is particularly annoying to the Chi-Coms, since the current Dalai Lama has for many years vigorously campaigned for Tibet's freedom. The Chinese thus hope to gain the upper hand in Tibet by, in effect, choosing the next Dalai Lama. If these secular Reds actually believe they can pull this off, then they deserve to be embarrassed on the world's stage. For our part, we in our humble shop are just proud to live in a country in which we're free to reincarnate whenever and wherever we want!How long will it be before today's American atheist leftists demand the government take control over who can get into heaven?
From Paul Belien today in Pajamas Media:
It is a strange phenomenon that frightened, Islamist-appeasing authorities are allowed to draw a link between terrorism and Islam as they warn citizens not to be “provocative” towards Muslims. Yet, these citizens themselves are considered “racists” and “xenophobes,” - hence criminals according to European legislation - when they are perceived as making this link.Apparently only the enlightened are allowed to make certain observations.
Chris Collinsworth and Keith Olbermann on the same set.
Both. At. Once.
If I didn't have kids in school I'd jab bamboo in my ears and gouge my eyes out with a soup spoon.
The smartest thing Collinsworth has ever said in his broadcasting career was that he was in favor of the NFL fining the Detroit Lion because, as he figured, wasting a black man's time in a fruitless job interview would be better than being honest about the club's intent to hire a Caucasian candidate. And that was the smartest thing he ever said. His uncomfortable voice delivering inaccurate pronouncements is only rivaled by his refutable logic. This is a man Larry Craig would shy away from in Minneapolis.
But, I long for the day when Chris Collinsworth will fill my football evenings with his melodious incantations of ridiculous superlatives if it only meant I would never again be exposed to the self absorbed me-yammering of Keith Olbermann.
In his segment tonight "the worst person in the NFL" he nominated himself. Keith, when did you join the NFL?
You are worse than an idiot.
Qur’an 9:5 When the sacred forbidden months for fighting are past, fight and kill the disbelievers wherever you find them, take them captive, torture them, and lie in wait and ambush them using every stratagem of war.
I have to admit I was less than thrilled to hear that Larry Craig, disgraced wanna-be airport restroom fornicator, might not resign from the Senate after all.
I suppose that Craig has determined that there is nothing else for him to lose in this debacle. His career is on the rocks. He has lost respect from his party. His poll numbers are in the toilet.
Good grief. Is there any part of a person's ego that a politician will not put ahead of the good of the party and electorate?
Walk away Mr. Craig. Let your family and your country begin to heal. The longer that you cling to this sinking ship like a rat on the rail, the longer you hurt others around you. It isn't about you any longer.
"Allah did not create man so that he could have fun. The aim of creation was for mankind to be put to the test through hardship and prayer. An Islamic regime must be serious in every field. There are no jokes in Islam. There is no humor in Islam. There is no fun in Islam. There can be no fun and joy in whatever is serious." -- Ayatollah KhomeiniThe Ayatollah would be proud of pro-Taliban groups in tribal Swat, a district located in Pakistan's North West Frontier Province.
"But, but, but, we don't have troops in Iraq!
Don't you know who your friends are?"
Because, well, those Capitol Building's bathrooms were never any good for cruising ass anyway.
