Truth And Common Sense

First of all, Newt all that.  He thinks he is, and frankly the more I see him in action, acting like a “I’ll say anything to get elected” politician, the more I see the similarities between him and Obama.

Ideology is fine.  But if it is driven by a personality convinced that he or she is the smartest person in the room it makes that ideology- not matter what it is- dangerous.  It is one thing to think you are right, it is another to be so convinced you are right you can’t be convinced otherwise.   In Obama’s case, he suffers from a great number of personality challenges, one of which is his own sense of self.  He really does think his way and he is always right.  As some have said, when he walks into a room, he believes he is the smartest one there and often appears bored.

Newt, on the other hand, as my MENSA bright buddy says, “thinks he is the smartest guy in the room and all the other rooms in the world at the same time.”  Newt is also that guy who will promise you anything you want in order to get what he wants.  Sadly, that is a good political scam in today’s society.  I see now that Romney didn’t bite on the “moon colony” thing.  Good. He gets my respect for that.

I hope people, the voting public, recognizes that the days of free stuff are over and anyone who promises it is lying.  The last thing we need in our Oval Office is another pathological liar.  Besides space stuff is cool, but simply not necessary right now.

Oh, Bother. Space Again? What Are You, Ten Years Old?

We’ve gone around on this before; in fact it seems that we must do it at least once a year.

Yes, space travel and moon bases and mars missions are cool. No, there’s not a single reason the taxpayers should be paying for it simply because you think it’s cool. You know what Liberals think is cool? On-demand abortion. No, there’s no reason taxpayers should be paying for that either.

The idea that we must have some culturally significant and symbolic government project to spur the next generation to new heights of blah blah blah is utter crap. The moon race and the space agency incidentally aided other industries. And it eventually gave us Tang and that weird freeze-dried astronaut icecream stuff. Which is very cool and all, but I suggest to you that neither represents a GREAT WORK in the history of mankind that we would be worse off for not having.

I suppose the Baby Boomers and their parents would have just been demoralized all to hell if the Soviets had beaten them to the moon. Well, good for them, they beat those commie bastards. Now you’re telling me that we have to go back to the moon and eventually Mars because if we don’t we’ll have lost the race against . . . who? Who are we racing? And why are we racing? And what are we racing for?

We forget the people who run the country eat, sleep, think, act and are only people, just like us.  We think they are smarter and better prepared, and outside people like Larry Summers and other eggheads, our thinking is wrong.  Especially when dealing with politicians like Obama, Rahm, Pelosi and Reid.  They just aren’t that bright or educated in certain areas.  Honestly, do you think Pelosi gets even the slightest part of macro-economics?  Heck, she can’t spell economics.

On the other hand, Larry Summers is egghead bright.  My MENSA buddy has quite  a lot of respect for him.  AEI summarized Summers’ fifty-seven page memo into eleven points.  You need to read them and the full document. To say politics overwhelmed ability and understanding is an understatement.

1. The stimulus was about implementing the Obama agenda.

The short-run economic imperative was to identify as many campaign promises or high priority items that would spend out quickly and be inherently temporary. …  The stimulus package is a key tool for advancing clean energy goals and fulfilling a number of campaign commitments.

2. Team Obama knows these deficits are dangerous (although it has offered no long-term plan to deal with them).

Closing the gap between what the campaign proposed and the estimates of the campaign offsets would require scaling back proposals by about $100 billion annually or adding new offsets totaling the same. Even this, however, would leave an average deficit over the next decade that would be worse than any post-World War II decade. This would be entirely unsustainable and could cause serious economic problems in the both the short run and the long run.

3. Obamanomics was pricier than advertised.

Your campaign proposals add about $100 billion per year to the deficit largely because rescoring indicates that some of your revenue raisers do not raise as much as the campaign assumed and some of your proposals cost more than the campaign assumed. … Treasury estimates that repealing the tax cuts above $250,000 would raise about $40 billion less than the campaign assumed. … The health plan is about $10 billion more costly than the campaign estimated and the health savings are about $25 billion lower than the campaign estimated.

4. Even Washington can only spend so much money so fast.

Constructing a package of this size, or even in the $500 billion range, is a major challenge. While the most effective stimulus is government investment, it is difficult to identify feasible spending projects on the scale that is needed to stabilize the macroeconomy. Moreover, there is a tension between the need to spend the money quickly and the desire to spend the money wisely. To get the package to the requisite size, and also to address other problems, we recommend combining it with substantial state fiscal relief and tax cuts for individuals and businesses.

5. Liberals can complain about the stimulus having too many tax cuts, but even Team Obama thought more spending was unrealistic.

As noted above, it is not possible to spend out much more than $225 billion in the next two years with high-priority investments and protections for the most vulnerable. This total, however, falls well short of what economists believe is needed for the economy, both in total and especially in 2009. As a result, to achieve our macroeconomic objectives-minimally the 2.5 million job goal-will require other sources of stimulus including state fiscal relief, tax cuts for individuals, or tax cuts for businesses.

6. Team Obama wanted to use courts to force massive mortgage principal writedowns.

The next step in the housing plan is responsible bankruptcy reform along the lines of the Durbin bill you cosponsored. This would allow bankruptcy courts to write down the principal of primary residences to the current market value. We recommend announcing this reform to begin immediately following the close of the enhanced Hope for Homeowners period.

7. Team Obama thought a stimulus plan of more than $1 trillion would spook financial markets and send interest rates climbing.

To accomplish a more significant reduction in the output gap would require stimulus of well over $1 trillion based on purely mechanical assumptions-which would likely not accomplish the goal because of the impact it would have on markets.

8. Greg Mankiw, economic adviser to Mitt Romney, was dubious about the stimulus.

Greg Mankiw is the only economist we have consulted with who refused to name a number and was generally skeptical about stimulus.

9. But the Fed was a stimulus enabler.

Senior Federal Reserve officials appear to be of the view that a plan that well exceeds $600 billion would be desirable.

10. IPAB was there at the very beginning.

There are two possibilities for making tough decisions on the long-run budget, which could be done either separately or together: creating an executive-branch “health board” (which focuses on one part of the issue) and a Congressionally chartered commission (which could focus more broadly).

11. The financial crisis wasn’t just Wall Street’s fault.

A significant cause of the current crisis lies in the failure of regulators to exercise vigorously the authority they already have.

The eleven points are an insight from a man in the know, trying to warn the people who had no idea what was going on.  I often wondered what motivated Summers to be associated with the Obama people.  Most ran like scalded dogs, unless they had a stake in the outcome (future private industry jobs in investment banking for example). But Summers, a man with some level of morality it seems, stayed the course.  Why?

I think part of it is Summers tried to manage a bad situation by hoping someone with some sense would listen. Had he not been there, it may have been worse kind of a deal.  I could be wrong.  But the bullet points from the report are damning for the Obama administration.  It really is too bad one side doesn’t try to keep the other in check by threatening them with civil and criminal prosecution when administrations change.  The old “wink and a nod” agreement they have must be hard to live with if the people involved have any sense of justice.  Regardless, this is a big indictment  of a bunch of people motivated by greed, corruption and driven by a grandiose sense of themselves.  Politics and money over the welfare of three hundred million citizens.

Somewhere in there is a crime.

I like Mark Steyn but can’t really get why he fears someone else than Romney running for President.  The arguments against Newt are great, but so are the ones against Romney.  If he was such a great opportunity, Romney would run away with the nomination, but he isn’t- why?  I’ve said, as many others have, that Romney is a nice big government “status quo” kind of guy.  He is true blue to his wife, he is very smart, probably a good executive who would surround himself with people who know what they are doing.  The problem is that citizens are suspicious of exactly WHAT they would be doing.  Keeping the power structure that caused our heartache in place?  Cutting deals with democrats like GWB did?  Looking the other way when politicians commit what cannot be considered anything other than criminal negligence in handling their duties (Barney Frank), or what acting in a manner that would be an outright crime in any other profession- the insider trading issue.  Or worse, continuing the systematic dismantling of our Constitutional form of government by increasing the power and range of the central government by fiat, regulation and badly written laws (EPA, HHS, Obamacare)?

The nature of this peculiar primary season - the reason it seems at odds with both the 2009-2010 political narrative and the seriousness of the times - was determined by Mitt Romney. Even if you don’t mind Romneycare, or the abortion flip-flop, or any of the rest, there’s a more basic problem: He’s not a natural campaigner, and on the stump he instinctively recoils from any personal connection with the voters. So, in compensation, he’s bought himself a bunch of A-list advisers and a lavish campaign. He is, as he likes to say, the only candidate with experience in the private sector. So he knows better than to throw his money away, right? But that’s just what he’s doing, in big ways and small.

Small: It’s a good idea to get that telegenic gal (daughter-in-law?) to stand behind him during the concession speech, but one of those expensive consultants ought to tell her not to look so bored and glassy-eyed as the stiff guy grinds through the same-old-same-old for the umpteenth time. To those watching on TV last night, she looked like we felt.

Look, it isn’t the fact he’s a little stiff.  Stiff is good after three years of gooey Gumby-like vacillation Obama exudes.  It is more than that. Americans, some from the Left, many from the middle, and a ton from the Right are fed up with being hammered by high energy (like Obama didn’t warn us), a bad economy, stupid policies, stifling of our freedoms and truly the almost in your face theft of our national treasure.  The Republican response is a man who just stands there and says, “Hey, that’s not very nice.” like he was Jimmy Stewart playing George Bailey instead of Mr. Smith goes to Washington Jefferson Smith.  You can be a nice guy and still get into someone’s grill a little.  Romney can’t without looking a little fake.  Besides half the stuff he should be really taking on he’s done himself- like Romneycare.

It’s not that people want Newt over Romney, they want someone INSTEAD of Romney, because they don’t trust him.  Heck, I like him but I don’t trust him.  He is a placeholder.  A good one, but still that is not what I want to see. I want the guy to have that honest conversation with me. The one who says “Hey bud, that whole Social Security thing. Well, we kinda screwed that up and its broke. So, don’t really depend on it.  We can fix it but you’ll have to work long, wait a little and I think we are going to kick a whole lot of able bodied folks off it. And as for welfare and the tax code. That we’ll fix too, and you may or may not like it.”

At least he’ll be honest.  Washington is its own universe filled with people who make money screwing you out of yours. It is one of the few places in America that is actually growing in this recession.  Why?  Concentrated money and power.  I want the guy who not only says it has to end, but works four years or more to cripple D.C. instead of allowing D.C. to continue to cripple us.

Romney isn’t that guy.  He telegraph his weakness in this area like a leper telegraphs a “no touch” option. It just radiates off of him.  Can he beat Obama?  Yes.  Can Newt?  I don’t know, but the reality is this. If we get Romney, will he be willing to do anything different than Obama?  I guess energy would be one area he might be better in.  Or maybe not.

“I believe that climate change is occurring–the reduction in the size of global ice caps is hard to ignore. I also believe that human activity is a contributing factor.

I am uncertain how much of the warming, however, is attributable to man and how much is attributable to factors out of our control. I do not support radical feel-good policies like a unilateral US cap-and-trade mandate. Such policies would have little effect on the climate but could cripple economic growth.

Oil is purported to be one of the primary contributors to rising global temperatures. If in fact global warming is importantly caused by our energy appetite, it’s yet one more reason for going on an energy diet.

Scientists are nearly unanimous in laying the blame for rising temperatures on greenhouse gas emissions. Of course there are also reasons for skepticism. The earth may be getting warmer, but there have been numerous times in the earth’s history when temperatures have been warmer than they are now.”

Huh? Jeezzz… it’s been a day for Jeeez’s

Let’s be clear.  Just because a bunch of rich and important people think they can control the world doesn’t mean they can- unless we let them.  However, once again we are subjected to a bunch of humans ( and remember they are just humans with all the failings, weakness, ignorance and bigotry of humans) pondering how, if they could, they would change the world.  This leads to a bunch of lesser trusting people being convinced there is a conspiracy afoot. I think that is the wrong word for the situation. It isn’t a conspiracy as it is in the open, but more a challenge offered by the elites to each other on how they can effectively manipulate the world… and note- not for the greater good.

Economic and political elites meeting this week at the Swiss resort of Davos will be asked to urgently find ways to reform a capitalist system that has been described as “outdated and crumbling.”

“We have a general morality gap, we are over-leveraged, we have neglected to invest in the future, we have undermined social coherence, and we are in danger of completely losing the confidence of future generations,” said Klaus Schwab, host and founder of the annual World Economic Forum.

“Solving problems in the context of outdated and crumbling models will only dig us deeper into the hole.

“We are in an era of profound change that urgently requires new ways of thinking instead of more business-as-usual,” the 73-year-old said, adding that “capitalism in its current form, has no place in the world around us.”

Some 1,600 economic and political leaders, including 40 heads of states and governments, will be asked to come up with new ideas as they converge at eastern Switzerland’s chic ski station for the 42nd edition of the five-day World Economic Forum which opens Wednesday.

The eurozone’s failure to get a grip on its debt crisis and the spectre this is casting over the global economy will dominate discussions.

“The main issue would be the preoccupation with the global economy. There will be relatively less conversation about social responsibility and environment issues — those tend to come to the fore when the economy is doing well,” John Quelch, dean of the China European International Business School, told AFP.

“The main conversation will be about a deficit of leadership in Europe as a prime problem,” he added.

The annual talk-shop comes barely a week after the eurozone’s reputation took a further battering, as ratings agency Standard and Poor’s downgraded the credit-worthiness of nine eurozone countries, including stripping France of its triple-A grade.

While saved from the downgrade embarrassment, the region’s economic powerhouse Germany has nevertheless been forced to lower its growth forecast, dragged down by its neighbours’ debt woes and weaker demand from emerging markets.

At least they are honest, very refreshing. When things are going good, they are worried about issues such as environment and poor folks, but when the money gets tight it is everybody for themselves…and they think capitalism is dead!  Here’s an idea, how about the theory that overblown, ego driven elitists are the reason our world crashed as they attempted to manipulate the free market system for their own profit and fame, and that THEY should be banned from ever speaking again, as their presence is now a corrupted and proven failure?  But that’s just me and my lonely opinion,  or not.

In reality, Bilderberg is an annual conference for a few dozen of the world’s most influential people. Last year Bill Gates and Larry Summers hobnobbed with the chairman of Deutsche Bank, the boss of Shell, the head of the World Food Programme and the prime minister of Spain. One or two journalists are invited each year, on condition that they abstain from writing about it. (Full disclosure: the editor of The Economist sometimes attends.)

Because the meetings are off the record, they are catnip to conspiracy theorists. But the attraction for participants is obvious. They can speak candidly, says Mr Davignon, without worrying how their words might play in tomorrow’s headlines. So they find out what other influential people really think. Big ideas are debated frankly. Mr Davignon credits the meetings for helping to lay the groundwork for creating the euro. He recalls strong disagreement over Iraq: some participants favoured the invasion in 2003, some opposed it and some wanted it done differently. Last year the debate was about Europe’s fiscal problems, and whether the euro would survive.

The world is a complicated place, with oceans of new information sloshing around. To run a multinational organisation, it helps if you have a rough idea of what is going on. It also helps to be on first-name terms with other globocrats. So the cosmopolitan elite-international financiers, bureaucrats, charity bosses and thinkers-constantly meet and talk. They flock to elite gatherings such as the World Economic Forum at Davos, the Trilateral Commission and the Boao meeting in China. They form clubs. Ethnic Indian entrepreneurs around the world join TiE (The Indus Enterprise). Movers and shakers in New York and Washington join the Council on Foreign Relations, where they can listen to the president of Turkey one week and the chief executive of Intel the next. The world’s richest man, Carlos Slim, a Mexican telecoms tycoon, hosts an annual gathering of Latin American billionaires who cultivate each other while ostensibly discussing regional poverty.

Yeah, not a conspiracy at all. Nope.  Nothing to see here, move along. Just a bunch of like minded people trying to increase their edge by conferring with each other in a way that no one outside that inner circle can witness and take advantage of, thus leaving the ability to increase wealth only to those inside the circle…

Nope, nothing here.   Jeezz…

Except against  sitting Senators that think the agency should be disbanded.

The Hill has more about Senator Paul’s ongoing political battle with the TSA:

Both Pauls have been vocal critics of the TSA, calling for the controversial agency to be disbanded.

“This kind of gets back to this whole idea of what we are willing to… give up as a country,” Sen. Paul said of pat-downs last summer during a hearing in which TSA Administrator John Pistole appeared before lawmakers.

“The press reports are horrifying,” Rep. Paul also said last summer, during one of his weekly “Texas Straight Talk” audio addresses.

“Ninety-five-year-old women humiliated, children molested, disabled people abused,” he continued. “Men and women subjected to unwarranted groping and touching of their most private areas, and involuntary radiation exposure.

This history between the Pauls and TSA tend to raise questions about whether today’s demand was motivated by something else other than security.  For that matter, so does the fact that Rand Paul is not terribly likely to hijack a flight or use an airplane for terrorism.  TSA’s we-have-to-treat-everyone-equally-to-avoid-appearance-of-profiling approach puts political correctness ahead of actual security, and perhaps there will be no better example than the demand to pat down a sitting US Senator and detaining him when he refused to consent to it.

No one thinks a Senator should get different treatment than anyone else, but that proves that the security theater we experience at airports isn’t designed with flight security as its primary goal.  Besides, let’s not forget that TSA is already working on programs for clearing frequent travelers on an expedited basis who they know through prior investigation won’t pose a security risk on commercial flights.   Who in their right mind thinks that Senator Rand Paul represented any kind of real security risk on board an aircraft?  Anyone? Anyone?  Bueller?  Bueller?

The next Congressional hearings on the TSA will prove very interesting, and probably very entertaining.  So will the debate on their appropriations for FY2013.

Understand the problem with the TSA clearly.  They were created through a jumbled process of political correctness, democratic maneuvering, and political  back room deals.  They were NOT created to actually secure anything.  But that doesn’t stop them from reaching out with the great power given them into areas they don’t belong in.

In the local news report above, which my colleague James Fallows notes here, a Tennessee TV news broadcast reports that TSA is already operating on highways in the state. The brilliant reasoning? “Where is a terrorist more apt to be found? Not these days on an airplane more likely on the interstate,” said Tennessee Department of Safety & Homeland Security Commissioner Bill Gibbons. Perhaps he can be forgiven for this absurd quote. After all, his job is to keep Tennessee safe from terrorists. By definition he’s guarding against a remote threat. But it ought to make us all upset that the federal government assessed its counter-terrorism resources and decided that the best use of scarce funds would be random checks on vehicles on Tennessee highways.

Feel safer?

The TSA agents are urging all drivers to “say something” if they see something suspicious, which brings us to another great quote from the piece: “If somebody sees something somewhere, we want them to be responsible citizens,” says Paul Armes, TSA Federal Security Director. “Report that and let us work it through our processes to vet the concern they had when they saw something suspicious.” Granted, if I were driving (rather than traveling by train) to Chattanooga, and I saw an 18 wheeler with a “Death to America” bumper sticker and fertilizer spilling out the back, I’d call the cops; but if there were any actual terrorists on the highways of Tennessee, wouldn’t their explosive filled truck look, from the outside, like any other truck?

The last thing America needs is to let TSA and its absurd, security-theater loving bureaucrats out of the airport. Reports a local newspaper: “Larry Godwin, deputy commissioner of TDSHS, said the checks at the weigh stations were about showing the people of Tennessee the government is serious about transportation safety.” But quotes like that in fact show that they aren’t serious about transportation safety so much as the appearance of it.

If we get any further down this rabbit hole, I’m convinced we’ll be seeing Spooky Mulder from the X-Files nosing around! This is, nor has it ever been about securing our nation.  We cannot be secure by the sheer nature of our society!  We are an open society. We can travel from house to house, town to town, city to city, state to state without being searched or detained or asking permission to do so from some central government agency…at least for now.  The above article is called “Mission Creep” and it is a very true statement as is “creepy mission” because this whole venture into a centralized agency that detains citizens without reasonable suspicion is a dangerous and dark act.  Who runs this nation?  You or them.  We cannot exchange freedom for security.  Life is a risk and there are bad guys out there.  We have some really good police officers and agents working to catch them in the act of criminal behavior.  We should not lose our freedoms over some vague promise of greater security offered by an agency which thinks detaining a sitting Senator is a good idea.

Update:

The TSA released a statement saying they don’t treat anyone differently and that is why Paul was detained.  Think about this for a second. They didn’t say the policy was bad, or just plain silly, or the results of the policy were useless, nope.  They start their argument from the position that the TSA and its methods are actually a good idea!  That is like a drunk driver saying “Hey, listen, when I drink and drive I don’t discriminate on who I run over, I run over everybody equally! So I’m a good guy right?”  No dumbass, maybe the real question that should be asked is why are you allowed to drink and drive in the first place, which is exactly what Paul is going to ask them when their budget comes up in 2013.  The TSA is like a big and uglier version of the ATF back in the seventies.  A political agency which depends on “doing something to prove its worth” and “be willing to do what is asked politically without question” for its yearly stipend of funding.  The difference is as many mistakes that the ATF has committed, they are small potatoes compared to the power, reach and potential damage of the TSA.  The FBI is a different creature because it has sixty years of policy, procedure, rules and laws to keep it in check.  The TSA is like a 500lb ten year old with a spoiled disposition and holding a baseball bat.

You watch, the TSA will morph into some kind of national police force and the people who started it will be as shocked as anyone, and nobody will be safe from its touch.

Seriously….

Okay, that might be a bit much, but there is something wrong with Patriots doing so well for so long.  And here is the question of the day, why can’t someone in the NFL actually cover Welker?  I mean seriously!  The guy is like 5-9 and a buck eighty, isn’t that fast and for years he catches every ball thrown his way.  How about getting a plan together to cover him?? I COULD COVER HIM!(Okay, again I stretch, but I would rap his knee with a iron pipe and make him slow enough for me to cover him!)

I give credit to the team for playing so hard.  But I really can’t get my head wrapped around a team with a bad defense playing well and an offense a little less than stellar running all over the place.  Maybe there is something to Brady’s boast.

Then again, the Ravens have a quarterback they “MF” during the week and make his so cautious he was afraid to throw.  Stupid.

Well, there is hope for us yet,  The Giants and SF can beat them… if Hitchens was wrong that is.

When the shooter in Arkansas was interviewed by the local media an audio tape was released to the resounding sound of silence from the MSM.  FOX did a better job putting the pieces together.  So a lone shooter isn’t news if he kills multiple people? Hardly, as the liberal media jumped all over the idea somehow Sarah Palin had something to do with it and then the Tea Party and then the NRA and then anybody they could hit while swinging the crazy guy who actually did the shooting around like a dead cat.  When the truth came out, it was apparent the shooter was nuts- period.

However, there is nuts, like in crazy, and nuts like in “I believe if I kill a bunch of infidels I get laid by 72 virgins”. That is a totally different set of circumstances.  One is rare, the other is not as this article from the American Thinker points out.

It is almost every day now. Jihadi attacks in America. This past week there were three attempted jihad attacks. And what does the media consider the problem? Racistislamophobicantimuslimbigots, of course.

On Saturday, a Muslim named Sami Osmakac was arrested in Florida on charges of plotting to go jihad on nightclubs and the Tampa, Florida, sheriff’s headquarters. “We all have to die,” Osmakac said, “so why not die the Islamic way?”

Osmakac is from Kosovo, making his jihad another thank-you for U.S. involvement in Bosnia. And the U.S. still supports an independent Kosovo state, a militant Islamic state, in the heart of Europe. That is our policy. America refuses to own up to the terrible mistake we made in Europe — worse still, we continue to prosecute the Christian Serbs.

Media reports said that Osmakac, a devout Muslim, was “self-radicalized.” You have to wonder if Western dhimmis stay up nights thinking up new terms for jihad.  Pathetic. Soon after his arrest, video emerged that showed how pious and violent Sami Osmakac really was, as he attacked and bloodied Christian street preachers. The pious Osmakac, who was completely the aggressor, then cried victim to the police, saying that he had been “insulted,” the same fictitious narrative that we are bombarded with daily by Islamic groups and Muslim Brotherhood organizations like the Hamas-tied Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR).

The police, in what has become standard practice in dealing with Islamic supremacists, treated the perpetrator and the victim with equal contempt, actually charging the bloodied Christian with battery. This was in the same town, Tampa, that classified what was obviously an honor killing of a Muslim woman, Fatima Abdallah, as a “suicide.”

Even worse, after the terrorism arrest, Hassan Shibly, director of the Florida chapter of CAIR, cried “entrapment.” This is, of course, typical of jihadis, but what is really outrageous is that the FBI briefed Shibly prior to Osmakac’s arrest.  Hamas-CAIR was briefed? Was Qaradawi briefed, too?

“The weapons and explosives were provided by the government. Was he just a troubled individual, or did he pose a real threat?” Shibly asked. Hey, Shibly, he was a devout Muslim. Watch the videos: he is preaching the word of Allah in one and head-butting Christians in another.

Also on Sunday, a Muslim in Alabama named Luis Ibarra-Hernandez (the media did not release his Muslim name) shot out store windows and tried to get into a shootout with police officers. Gadsden, Alabama Police spokesperson Capt. Regina May said: “After the man was taken into custody, he reported that he knew he must do something extreme to draw attention to Islam and himself, so he planned to shoot police officers.”

I think it is poetic that this Alabama Muslim wanted to call attention to Islam by shooting at police. He is right, of course. Such actions best illustrate the violent and true nature of jihad. He would have been richly rewarded in paradise, perhaps 73 virgins instead of 72. But as Islamic scholar Robert Spencer points out, “he did not, however, succeed in gaining the space that is guaranteed in Paradise for those who ‘kill and are killed’ for Allah (Qur’an 9:111).”

In the FOX report on the Arkansas shooter the suspect demanded recognition as what he was- a terrorist in action.

He said he later confirmed it was an FBI agent from the Nashville office. Once Carlos Bledsoe was released from prison and returned to Memphis, where his family runs a tour bus company, Melvin Bledsoe says his son was interviewed again by the same FBI agent in Nashville. It was February 2009 - just four months before the suspect allegedly opened fire on the recruitment center in Little Rock.

Some counterterrorism analysts say the case is the first known domestic attack linked to Al Qaeda in Yemen, whose leadership includes the American cleric Anwar al-Awlaki, the first American on the CIA’s kill or capture list. Al Qaeda in Yemen, or Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, was behind the failed underwear bomber on Christmas day 2009 and the cargo printer bombs that were meant to explode over U.S. airspace in October 2010.

Though he has entered a plea of not guilty in court, Carlos Bledsoe said in a letter to the judge, “I’m affiliated with al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (al Qaeda in Yemen)…This was a Jihadi attack on infidel forces.”

Bledsoe also did a jailhouse interview that I listened to.  In it he warned there was more coming and repeatedly referred to “we” when talking about the terrorist movement. As in “we” are coming.  Obviously, he was telegraphing what was going to happen to anyone who would listen. Many did not.

How long as this been going on in America?  Well, we know about the famous 1993 WTC bombing that failed.  We know about the 9/11 attacks, but what we miss is that now these attacks are becoming a constant background noise we tend to ignore as a steady drip of low level assaults are being executed in America.  The MSM, the political correct crowd, the appeasers of Islam in America all work hard to suppress this reality, even as people are being maimed and killed.

I’m not talking about the honor killings, that is a totally different issue for another time, I’m talking about the attacks on civilians by committed Muslims as a way to “strike” against the county they consider “the Great Satan.”

Back in 2002 two black men, an older man and a young kid, went on a nationwide sniping spree and killed a number of innocent people and frightened an entire area of the nation.  Of course the “profiler” for the police figured it was a disgruntled white man between twenty and forty with relationship issues….yes, I know…the same guy all the time… . You would think they would update the text book at Quantico, but you know how it works. It took a momentous shift in mindset for the police to be able to wrap their brains around the fact a twosome of black Muslims were systematically working their way across the nation, shooting everybody who wasn’t like them, in order to fulfill some kind of mission.  When they were finally caught, people were shocked, and many PC types lost interest, many worked hard to suppress the fact John Allen Muhammad was a Muslim.  I think he was a little frustrated in his attempt to get some attention.  However, he did manage to get this much out.

As a member of the Nation of Islam, Muhammad helped provide security for the “Million Man March” in 1995, but Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan has publicly distanced himself and his organization from Muhammad’s crimes.^[9] Muhammad kidnapped his children and brought them to Antigua around 1999, apparently engaging in credit card and immigration document fraud activities. It was during this time that he became close with Lee Boyd Malvo, who later acted as his partner in the killings. Williams changed his name to John Allen Muhammad in October 2001.

After his arrest, authorities also claimed that Muhammad admitted that he admired and modeled himself after Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda, and approved of the September 11 attacks. One of Malvo’s psychiatric witnesses testified in his trial that Muhammad had indoctrinated him into believing that the proceeds of the extortion attempt would be used to begin a new nation of only young, “pure” black people somewhere in Canada. Muhammad witnessed the Mark Essex shootout live on television when he was 13.

Muhammad was twice divorced; his second wife, Mildred Muhammad, sought and was granted a restraining order. Muhammad was arrested on federal charges of violating the restraining order against him by possessing a weapon. Under federal law, those with restraining orders are prohibited to purchase or possess guns as per the Lautenberg Amendment to the Gun Control Act of 1968.^[10] Defense attorneys in the Malvo trial and the prosecution in Muhammad’s trial argued that the ultimate goal of the killings was to kill Mildred so he would regain custody of his three children.^[11]

You have to seize upon the reality that the people we are up against are committed, intelligent and very good out of the box thinkers.  They are matched against a government which is filled to the brim with bureaucrats and politically correct supervisors who designate their existence by a number letter system as in “GM” and “GS5″.  The bad guys are smart and agile, attacking from different directions and by different methods all the time.  Our guys are playing catch up in a world filled with memos, policies and procedures.  So when two black guys start shooting up the place so they could start a new nation of only young pure black people (of Islamic beliefs of course) the FBI’s and the rest of the team just froze.

Of course, for every hundred frozen bureaucrat, there is at least one good cop out there holding the line.  Yes, a bad ratio, but welcome to the world of policing.  I hope the out of the box thinkers are allowed to say their piece in meeting and in OP planning.  If not, all of us are going to be subjected to this under reported series of terrorist attacks until finally they manage to get organized enough to do some real serious damage.

Trust me on this.  When they can, they will, without hesitation because they hate us and always have.  Just listen to my newest new hero tell it like it is.

A thought about Tebow.

Anyone else shocked to see an NFL game with a 3:16 message in a commercial?  That is “Tebowmania” at work.  He is first a Christian who plays football as it is meant to be played- just a game where people of skill can compete with each other.

Will he be the starter next year?  I predict he will show enough improvement to make the Broncos nervous about dumping him.  I heard a radio commentator saying he had always felt Tebow was not a NFL quarterback because of how he threw, ran, etc.

The trouble is Tebow played in an option offense. He ran what he was told to run. He is 6-4, 240.  Has a good arm, excellent strength and can get out of trouble. (New England would have sacked other quarterbacks five times more than Tebow with that offensive line and scheme.) His reads are slow.  That is because he didn’t have to learn to read so fast in college.  But he learns quickly and is ten times quicker than last year.

That said, a few points need to be made.  1.  Vince Young was highly touted as a NFL quarterback…and he ran all the time, his ability to study and read playbooks was the worst the NFL had ever seen. But he was picked and loved for several years.  2. Michael Vick ran before he threw and arguably his aim wasn’t perfect yet teams went after him like crazy! (Makes you wonder about what qualifies as a great quarterback in the NFL, the running or the…you get my drift.  3. Both Drew Brees and Aaron Rodgers are top TOP notch quarterbacks who were on fire.  Neither won.  In fact, the San Fran defense and the Giants defense made them look a whole lot like, well, Tebow for most of the game.  Yet, they are great and Tebow- years younger and less experienced- is not quarterback material. 4.  There was another quarterback that people thought was a bust for years.  He was always a winner, a little out of control but managed to win all the time- and even one Superbowl. That guy was Brett Farve.  5. Another guy who was a loser for a while, a long while before finally winning a Super Bowl is Tebow’s boss John Elway.  Granted he was a great passer and one heck of a quarterback and it takes more than one person to win a game.  However, the facts don’t lie. In his first few seasons Elway won games but lost in the playoffs. It took him from 1983 until 1997 to win a Superbowl.

The game has changed.  Big, fast, strong quarterbacks are the rage.  In Tebow you have a natural born leader who doesn’t get rattled by losses.  He’s rough as he is having to learn a position over again and it might take a couple of seasons to really find out, if Denver wants to be patient.  In the meantime, they will need to get a better defense, one that can take the likes of Tom Brady and make him human again.  We saw San Fran do it to Brees and the Giants do it to Aaron Rodgers.  They also have to let him play.  I’m not sure if it was Tebow, the Pats or his offensive coordinator, or a combination of all of the above that made Tebow look slow and confused in the game. I know he’s smart enough and dedicated enough, but it takes time.  Time to learn the offense, time to anticipate what your receivers will do and, as he said, have faith enough just to heave the ball and let them make him look good.  He’s human and knows there are more people wanting him to fail- many inside the organization- than want him to succeed.  It would make their decision easy.  Frankly, I think he’ll surprise his critics next year and have a very solid season.

They’ll figure it out, and in the meantime, we can thank Tebow for the moment his faith allowed this to happen.  Miracles come in many different forms.  Who knows, maybe the 3:16 commercial caused a young person to think, a person who was lost, alone, frustrated and headed in the wrong direction.  Maybe he/she will pick up a bible, or Google the phrase, or may ask that Christian schoolmate, who couldn’t get through to them before, what this whole faith thing is all about.  And maybe they’ll change their lives and avoid death, violence, drug abuse, or any other dark paths they were headed down.

Who knows.  But isn’t that what faith is all about?

Wow. This was sent to me by a buddy of mine who is very tough to impress, as he is a world champion in his own right.  However, for all of us who were bike riding nutjobs as kids wondering what feats we could accomplish if only…  this guy is the real deal! Enjoy!

There are times in life when you realize the guy standing in front of you is just so much better.  I’ll give him my applause and wish him well in his endeavors.  Heck, at my age I’m scared to try to ride a bike, forget jumping one off a bridge!

Over at Hotair, Allahpundit again rolls around the edges of what Tebow is really all about.  It is hard for a self proclaimed atheist to “grasp” faith.  It would be like asking a ghetto dweller to grasp higher mathematics.  Sure he  see it had to do with numbers, but that would be about it.

Tebow is a young man of faith.  His faith, which may not be sometimes a comfortable fit with other faiths or with people at a different level of faith, this is not a cookie cutter situation.  Faith is a strange thing, foreign to people who lack it.  I have faith, yet others see my faith as a little different than theirs, perhaps a little more pragmatic.  That is because I’m older and a little more jaded.

Tebow is a young man who has worked very hard to take advantage of his GOD given skills in order to “do more” than just play ball.  I know, after years of Plexico Burress and Randy Moss types we’ve become almost desensitized to the professional athlete. We expect them to be rich, spoiled, often nearly illiterate and shallow.  Truth is a good deal of them are hard charging, good men who live decent lives and manage NOT to get on the front page news by shooting themselves in the leg with an illegal gun.

Tebow, from his times with Gators, has never seemed to fall prey to all of the traps being a celebrity creates.  I am convinced that part of it is that he spends part of his year in another country, the Philippines, doing good works.  Currently, he is building a hospital to help those in need.  (Hey, Burress take a hint!)

In the article, you can tell Allahpundit is having some fun, but the posters take Tebow and either side of the argument very seriously.  I read a number before responding myself.  Below is the post I sent in.  Some agreed.

“I’ve listened as people try to imprint their theories, opinions and beliefs on Tebow. What they haven’t done, what they need to do to understand him is to just listen.

Tebow has repeatedly stated over and over that he is always grateful to GOD for his talent and skill and the opportunity to play. He NEVER assumes he gets this free (unlike a number of other talented players). But more importantly, as much fun as he has with football, he knows it is just a game, and said as much in his post game interview when he pointed out to the non-listening press that he loved the game but would love more spending time with “Bailey” a girl who went through 73 surgeries before that date and survived. He was more excited about spending time with her and her family than winning the game. Here is HER story (http://www.denverpost.com/breakingnews/ci_19707827).

People are jaded when they hear things like this because of our experiences with liars like Clinton, Obama, Romney etc. We know it is easy to tell us what we want to hear, so we figure they are lying to get to their goals. Tebow is NOT that guy. He is exactly what you see, a young man of faith who realizes that he has a mission to spread the gospel in his own way. He works to be a good man every day, despite being human- which is what faith is about.

Miracles? Everybody says he does miracles on the field. That is just a game. Here is what a Miracle looks like to non-believers. Tebow is born, works hard to develop his GOD given skills, plays football, becomes famous, talks about a young girl who is suffering a horrible and rare disease, someone out there watching the Tebow moment either picks up their checkbook and gives money to the family so they can continue their fight to save their daughter OR some bright kid- a fan of Tebow- decides he/she wants to cure the disease, becomes a doctor and does just that.

Thirty years from now Bailey is alive, other kids are saved and Tebow is just a memory.

The hand of GOD does not wave over games, as Tebow knows, it waves over lives and over time. You have to be willing to see a miracle before it becomes one and accept that there is something out there touching lives and not just a series of random events started with a bang.

Just my opinion from seeing one or two miracles in my life.”

I watched Tebow’s post game interview, he was insistent on making everyone understand that as much as he loves the game, it is still just a game, and LIFE is far more important.  He spoke of the girl, Bailey, who had 73 surgeries before that game, and she’s just a teenager.  He said, and I believe he means it, that his time with her would be far more special than a game.  I looked up her condition, it just doesn’t look good in the long run. I hope and pray GOD grants her a wonderful and peaceful life for as long as she has it, and meeting Tebow and spending time with him had to be a big part of it right now.

People who love football more than life have trouble with that statement. Those without faith have trouble with that statement.  I don’t.  Tebow gets it.  All of this is just a journey, and doing the best you can with what you have been given is your duty and what GOD asks of you.  He doesn’t expect you to leap tall building in a single bound.  He does expect you to live a decent life and try to do you best to help others, whether you are playing football for a living or handing out fries with a Big Mac or putting out fires or just helping some elderly person get across the street.   All HE asks is that you try.

And that is exactly what Tebow does every day.

Good luck to him in life.  If he beats the hated, arrogant, cheating Pats in the process, I’ll be just a little happier!