IRS Plane Attacker Part of ‘Right Wing,’ Christmas Bomber Just a ‘Lone Wolf’

-By Warner Todd Huston

No clearer difference can be seen in how the Old Media and its left-wing compatriots treat mass killers, terrorists and nutjobs than the way Abdul Farouk Abdulmutallab and Joe Stack have been portrayed by the Old Media and the left. Abdulmutallab, the jihadi Christmas Bomber, was treated as an aberration unconnected with any larger group — despite that he trained with al Qaeda — and Joe Stack, who flew a plane into an IRS building in Austin, Texas, has been held up as the epitome of the “teabaggers” and the “anti-government right” despite that not a single tie to those folks has been yet discovered.

Immediately after Abdulmutallab tried to blow himself and a plane full of passengers into martyrdom on Christmas Day 2009, President Obama’s administration declared this guy an “isolated extremist” and said he had no connection to our Islamofascist enemies. Obama was helped along in this by many Old Media news sources.

On Dec. 26,for instance, CBS reported that Abdulmutallab was a loner. “As of now, he appears to be a lone actor with no conspirators. A report the following day said of the jihadist bomber, “’We’re not aware of anybody else,’ one official told Orr. No further arrests are imminent.”
Continue reading


IRS Plane Attacker Part of ‘Right Wing,’ Christmas Bomber Just a ‘Lone Wolf’”


Obama’s New Name For Iraq War

-By Warner Todd Huston


The indispensible Jake Tapper of ABC News is reporting that the Obama Administration is about to rename the Iraq war from “Operation Iraqi Freedom” to “Operation New Dawn.”

Gates writes that by changing the name at the same time as the change of mission — the scheduled withdrawal of U.S. combat troops — the US is sending “a strong single that Operation IRAQI FREEDOM has ended and our forces are operating under a new mission.”

Sounds like some good reasoning.

But Mr. Tapper missed the other naming news. Obama will also announce this week that he is changing the theme of his administration from “Operation Hope-n-Change” to “Operation Red Dawn.”

Operation Red Dawn, the Obama memo will read, replaces the hope and change that previously served as Obama’s battle cry and will herald the new direction of American culture from red, white and blue to just plain red.

No word if Obama agrees with Rham Emanuel that the nation should be renamed the New CCCP.
Continue reading


Obama’s New Name For Iraq War”


Vice President Joe Biden is a Prevaricating Hypocrite

-By Warner Todd Huston

I have it on good authority that Joe Biden was laughed at as a fool by his colleagues in the Senate before he was elevated to veep. Well, this recent Iraq flap of his is more proof of how silly this man is and shows that he cannot be taken seriously.

Oh, and let us remember here that this is Joe’s own doing. He is the one that keeps opening his big mouth.

As HotAir says :

If you’re keeping score at home, the supposed foreign-policy genius whom we call our VP has the following track record on Iraq: Voted against the Gulf War; voted in favor of the 2003 invasion; opposed the surge; called for the country to be partitioned and earned himself a healthy degree of infamy among Iraqis in the process; and has now taken to lying about his prior naysaying and insisting that the administration deserves more credit than it does. Point for point, it’s the precise opposite of conventional wisdom about how things have played out. To steal a line from Glenn Reynolds, they told me that if I voted for McCain we’d have a vice president who didn’t know anything about foreign affairs — and they were right!

Joe Biden is a stupid, stupid man.
Continue reading


Vice President Joe Biden is a Prevaricating Hypocrite”


Representative John Murtha Dead at 77

-By Warner Todd Huston

Pennsylvania Congressman John Murtha has passed at age 77. He’d been in the hospital for several days and died from complications from gallbladder surgery.

Murtha was a Vietnam vet serving in the Marine Corps there. He resigned his commission as a Colonel from the Marine corps Reserves in 1990. He’s served in Congress since 1969.

Despite all his military service, Murtha emerged as a Congressional enemy of the armed forces. He was ill-tempered and one of the most outspoken left-wingers in Congress during the Bush years. He was also a loud anti-war voice. Murtha gave succor to our enemies by being one of the most outspoken members of Congress calling for the prosecution of our own soldiers. For this he became the favorite of some of the most virulently un-American groups in the country.

Murtha was also one of the most corrupt Congressmen in Washington with many, many ethics violations. His nick name was “the king of pork” he was such a profligate Washington spender.

Let us hope that Pennsylvania picks a better representative to fill his now empty chair because we need no more like him in D.C.


Where’s the Outrage: 1 Year Later, Gitmo Not Closed

-By Warner Todd Huston

One of the first things that Barack Obama did after being swept into office on the wings of “hopenchange” was to sign an executive order that would close the terrorist detainee facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. President Obama gave a one-year deadline after which he triumphantly informed us the facility would be closed. Well, we are at one year plus ten days after the signing of the order and Gitmo is still open. Yet few stories expressing outrage about this lapsed promise have made the rounds in the Old Media.

On January 22, 2009, Obama signed the Executive Order that gravely asserted that Gitmo would be closed “no later than 1 year from the date of this order.” That was January 22, 2009. It is now February 1, 2010. I’d say a year and ten days after the order was signed just might constitute more than “no later than one year,” wouldn’t you?

Naturally, last year when Obama signed this order the Old Media covered it quite heavily. It was big news and was represented as an example of Obama’s fulfilling a campaign promise. All one need do is type “close Guantanamo executive order” into Google and page after page of Old Media coverage of the signing of the EO will be discovered.
Continue reading


Where’s the Outrage: 1 Year Later, Gitmo Not Closed”


Another American Islamic Convert Planning Mass Murder Spree?

-By Warner Todd Huston

The New Jersey Star-Ledge is reporting that police have apprehended one Lloyd Woodson, 43, of Reston, Virginia who had a grenade launcher and a weapons cache secreted in a Somerset County motel.

When arrested, Woodson was wearing a “military-style ballistic vest with a reinforced steel plate and carrying a .223-caliber assault rifle that had been altered to fire .50-caliber ammunition.”

Detectives later searched Woodson’s room at the Red Mill Inn on Route 22 and found weapons including a .308-caliber semi-automatic assault rifle with a defaced serial number, a grenade launcher, hundreds .50-caliber and .308-caliber rounds, a police scanner, and the maps of a U.S. military installation and an out-of-state civilian community…

And that isn’t all they found. The Star-Ledger also reports that a “Middle Eastern red and white traditional headdress” was also found in the motel room.
Continue reading


Another American Islamic Convert Planning Mass Murder Spree?”


Lefty Narrative: Rapes, Torture at ‘Iran’s Guantanamo’

-By Warner Todd Huston

A left wing narrative has for some time been developing centered on abuse of Iran’s democratic demonstrators at the hands of Iranian officials. You may have seen the shocking news about forced rapes and torture of Iranians imprisoned by the Mullahs in Iran but it is how the story is being sold to the west that is of note here. The prison story is being called “Iran’s Guantanamo” and it is being sold as if it is explicitly true that Iran has acted in the same way as U.S. officials have acted at the Guantanamo Bay, Cuba detainee facility.

Conflating Guantanamo with the sort of criminal actions perpetrated by the Iranian government is simply the wrong message to send, but it is one that the media loves to see pushed just the same. This way of selling the story is just another example of the anti-American narrative that the left loves to slyly push under everyone’s nose.

As the story goes, the totalitarian government in Iran has been grabbing up off the streets people that merely want to see democracy come to their beleaguered nation. Afterward, in Iran’s Evin prison, the Mullah oppressors have imprisoned these innocents, tortured them, raped them, and beat them, with many dying as a result of the abuse. And how has the news been selling the story? By equating these illicit, monstrous actions of the Iranian government to America as if the two are morally indistinguishable.
Continue reading


Lefty Narrative: Rapes, Torture at ‘Iran’s Guantanamo’”


DeMint Decries Union Obstruction in TSA

-By Warner Todd Huston

The Democrats are trying to paint the GOP as “obstructionists” for blocking the appointment of Obama’s choice of Erroll Southers to head up the Transportation Security Administration (TSA). Democrats are claiming that by blocking the closure of debate on Southers the GOP is trying to obstruct “tighter security at airports.”

But there is an ulterior motive in play for the Democrats, naturally. And, again naturally, it is an effort by Democrats to hand a victory to unions. One of the things that Senator Jim DeMint (R, SC) is trying to stave off is the unionization of our airport security personnel as the Democrats are trying to slide this by the American people in the guise of “security.”

DeMint brought this up in an appearance on CNN on Dec. 29. When asked why he is putting up a protest about Souther DeMint noted that Obama waited 8 months to appoint someone to fill this spot then wanted the appointment to sail through with no debate.

But DeMint also warned about the stealth unionization that Obama is trying to slide past the American people.
Continue reading


DeMint Decries Union Obstruction in TSA”


Ill. Rep Says Terrorists in Ill. Prisons Increases Risk

-By Warner Todd Huston

CNSNews is reporting that Don Manzullo, the Republican Congressman that represents the area in which Thomson prison is located, is saying that moving Gitmo terrorists to the Illinois prison will “increase risk” to residents of Illinois.

Rep. Don Manzullo (R-Ill.) said last week he was “shocked” to hear a senior Department of Defense official agree with him that the administration’s plan to move detainees of Guantanamo Bay to Thomson, Ill., would pose an increased security risk.

Manzullo expressed shock that the Obama Administration claimed that it could manage a danger it couldn’t even quantify.

“That’s when I said, ‘Well, if there’s no way that you can estimate — measure — the extent of the increased risk, then why are you making the move in the first place?’”

Manzullo is right. With the utter failure of our system of protection that resulted in the “underwear bomber” attempting to destroy a plane over Detroit, how can the Administration guarantee that Thomson prison will be safe enough to house these sort of terrorists?
Continue reading


Ill. Rep Says Terrorists in Ill. Prisons Increases Risk”


BG Exclusive: Confirmed, Obama Sending Terrorists to Illinois

-By Warner Todd Huston

In a shocking news flash, BigGovernment.com has published a Department of Justice Memo that authorizes the Obama Administration to send terrorists into Illinois!

Via Obama Executive Order 13492, terrorists WILL BE SENT to Illinois.

Here is the text of that memo (download document here):

Thursday, December 10, 2009

MEMORANDUM FOR THE SECRETARY OF DEFENSE THE ATTORNEY GENERAL                           



SUBJECT:  Directing Certain Actions with Respect to Acquisition and Use of Thomson Correctional Center



By the authority vested in me by the Constitution and the laws of the United States, including by article II, section 2, clause 1 of the Constitution, which designates the President as Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States, and by the Authorization for Use of Military Force, Public Law 107-40, 115 Stat. 224, I hereby direct that the following actions be taken with respect to the facility known as the Thomson Correctional Center (TCC) in Thomson, Illinois:



1.  The Secretary of Defense shall relocate detainees currently held at the Guantanamo Detention Facility to the TCC as expeditiously as possible, to the extent permitted by laws related to Guantanamo detainees, and consistent with the findings in, and interagency Review established by, Executive Order 13492 of January 22, 2009.



2.  The Attorney General shall as expeditiously as possible acquire and activate the TCC as a United States Penitentiary, which the Attorney General has determined would alleviate the Bureau of Prisons’ shortage of maximum security cell space and could be used for other appropriate purposes.  The Attorney General shall also provide to the Department of Defense a sufficient portion of the TCC to serve as a detention facility to be operated by the Department of Defense, to accommodate the relocation of detainees by the Secretary of Defense in accordance with paragraph 1 of this memorandum. This memorandum is not intended to, and does not, create any right or benefit, substantive or procedural, enforceable at law or in equity, by any party against the United States, its departments, agencies, or entities, its officers, employees, or agents, or any other person.



The Secretary of Defense is authorized and directed to publish this memorandum in the Federal Register.

So, what happened to all those Illinois lawmakers that were talking about having state hearings, discussions, and debates on the efficacy of this state exposing its citizens to terrorists? What happened to state officials having a word on the matter? Or is accidental Governor Pat Quinn and his pal President Obama simply going to decide to put these dangerous killers amongst us no matter what we have to say about it?

All questions that we apparently aren’t going to even be allowed to ask!
Continue reading


BG Exclusive: Confirmed, Obama Sending Terrorists to Illinois”


Another Obama Gitmo Official Resigns in Obama Smoke Screen Effort

-By Warner Todd Huston

Earlier this month President Obama fired Greg Craig, his main counsel on matters concerning the Guantanamo Bay Facility — unless, of course, you really believe the claim that Craig resigned. And this week Obama sheds another one of his GITMO team with the resignation of Deputy Assistant Secretary for Defense for Detainee Policy Phillip Carter.

It appears that Obama’s GITMO team is being systematically eliminated. One has to ask, why? The only real answer has to be that Obama is setting up some plausible deniability by firing or forcing the resignation of officials involved with GITMO policy. Once enough of these people are gone, Obama can look wide-eyed to the public and claim that he was badly served by his GITMO advisers and, therefore, it isn’t his fault.

Unfortunately for Obama the failure is not with the henchman but with the chief hench, Obama himself. Obama has allowed Attny Gen. Holder to reveal his utter ignorance by pushing for civilian trials of some GITMO detainees while at the same time arbitrarily denying such a privilege to others. Obama has also backed this plan despite that there is no precedent in American history for such trials.
Continue reading


Another Obama Gitmo Official Resigns in Obama Smoke Screen Effort”


Letter from Illinois GOP Congressional Delegation on transfer of terrorists to Thomson, IL

All Republican members of Illinois’ Congressional Delegation have signed the following letter to President Obama:

Dear Mr. President:

According to the Chicago Tribune, your Administration may transfer up to 200 Al Qaeda terrorists from their detention facility in Guantanamo Bay a prison in Thomson, Illinois, 150 miles from Chicago.

If your Administration brings Al Qaeda terrorists to Illinois, our state and the Chicago Metropolitan Area will become ground zero for Jihadist terrorist plots, recruitment and radicalization.

Furthermore, since Thomson is located in the Northern District of Illinois, any civilian prosecution of Al Qaeda terrorists would occur in Rockford or downtown Chicago.

As home to America’s tallest building, we should not invite Al Qaeda to make Illinois its number one target.

The United States spent more than $50 million to build the Guantanamo Bay detention facility to keep terrorists away from U.S. soil. Al Qaeda terrorists should stay where they cannot endanger American citizens.

As elected officials in the State of Illinois, we urge you to put the safety and security of Illinois families first and stop any plan to transfer Al Qaeda terrorists to our state.

Rep. Peter Roskam
Rep. Mark Kirk
Rep. Judy Biggert
Rep. Tim Johnson
Rep. Don Manzullo
Rep. Aaron Schock
Rep. John Shimkus


Say NO to Terrorists in Illinois

-By Warner Todd Huston

In a follow up to my earlier post advocating for an actual debate on this issue here in Illinois on this business of bringing terrorists to live in Illinois, a new effort to try and stop this mess has been launched.

Go to Not In Illinois and sign the petition and tell Governor Pat Quinn that we do NOT want terrorists living among us.

We, the undersigned, do not willfully agree with the transfer of terrorists onto American soil. Terrorists must be tried in military courts and not in civilian courts. They are a danger to the citizenry of the United States and should not be brought onto our shores.

We, the undersigned, will work to unseat any politician who agrees with the transfer of terrorists into Illinois or any state in the union.


Illinois’ Gov And Senator Think Terrorists Bring ‘Good-Paying Jobs’

-By Warner Todd Huston

Once again we see how clueless Democrats like Illinois Governor Pat Quinn and Senator Dick Durbin are on matters of national security. With Barack Hussein Obama’s decision to treat the terrorists at Guantanamo Bay as if they are common American criminals, as the president bestows all American rights upon them, and with his decision to spread these monsters out across the U.S.A, we see Quinn and Durbin idiotically asserting that terrorists equal “good paying jobs.”

These jobs might come from the sale to the federal government of the Thomson correctional facility in west central Illinois where Obama could send some 100 detainees in preparation of closing down the Guantanamo Bay, Cuba facilities. Obama is struggling to figure out what to do with these detainees after his hastily made, ill-informed decision last January to close down the terrorist detainment facility.

After the idea was announced both Quinn and Durbin found themselves all excited to welcome these monsters into their state and both imagined that the occasion means that Illinois gets jobs. Durbin is quoted in the Wall Street Journal as saying that this is a dramatic opportunity.
Continue reading


Illinois’ Gov And Senator Think Terrorists Bring ‘Good-Paying Jobs’”


Obama and Democrats Don’t Understand ‘Sacrifice’

-By Warner Todd Huston

The jihadi movement has never made any bones about the fact that it intends to destroy western civilization from within using the West’s own principles as weapons against it. This is why, for instance, that radical Islamists have been angling to institute Sharia “law” inside England and Canada and to a lesser extent in the U.S.A. But this effort isn’t even necessary when, in the U.S. for instance, a large part of the political class cannot even agree upon what the word “sacrifice” means for its own, much less find themselves able to define the terms of enemies to their civilization. What does terrorism, Sharia, or radicalism mean when Democrats cannot even properly understand what “sacrifice” means in the context of what happened at Fort Hood, Texas?

On November 7, it was reported by the New York Daily News that President Obama shamefully exploited the murderous Hasan’s crime in Texas in an effort to flog his healthcare bill in Congress.

According to the Daily News President Obama “invoked the Fort Hood shootings in an emotional appeal to Democrats to pass health care reform.” The Daily News followed this statement up with a quote from New Jersey Democrat Rob Andrews.
Continue reading


Obama and Democrats Don’t Understand ‘Sacrifice’”


Newsweek: Nidal Hasan, It’s Not Islam, It’s a ‘Military on the Brink’

-By Warner Todd Huston

Andrew Bast of Newsweek thinks he’s got the real reason behind Major Nidal Hasan’s murderously criminal rampage at Fort Hood last Thursday. Could it be that Hasan was steadily radicalized and steeped in hateful Islamofascism? Could it be a jihad mindset that sent Hasan into that military clinic yelling Allahu Akbar as he shot at anyone that got in his way?

Nope. Ridiculously, it was a “military on the brink,” it was the “stress” an uncaring U.S. military is forcing upon its members that was at fault as far as Bast is concerned. This is his obtuse conclusion in Newsweek’s piece headlined, “Is Fort Hood a Harbinger? Nidal Malik Hasan May Be a Symptom of a Military on the Brink.”

Ominously, Bast begins with his worry that there could be more members of the military about to follow Hasan’s murderous example. Bast absurdly starts his piece with this: “What if Thursday’s atrocious slaughter at Fort Hood only signals that the worst is yet to come?” And why would it be a sing that “the worst is yet to come,” you might wonder? Why else but that all that “stress” the military is putting everyone under is about to cause the whole combined services to explode?
Continue reading


Newsweek: Nidal Hasan, It’s Not Islam, It’s a ‘Military on the Brink’”


Rep. Joe Wilson on Healthcare and Afghanistan

-By Warner Todd Huston

Does Joe Wilson or any of his colleagues on the Hill care about the Constitution?

I participated in a conference call last Friday with Representative Joe Wilson (R, SC) who wanted to rally the troops against Pelosi’s healthcare bill. He also talked of Afghanistan, as well. But I think he made a revealing comment about the Constitution that distresses me.

Rep. Wilson started off his comments with his condolences to the families of the victims of the criminal actions at Fort Hood which had only recently happened at the time. “As a 21-year veteran of the military myself with three sons in the Army, one in the Navy, and a nephew in the Air Force, I truly do have a deep sympathy for the families at Fort Hood,” Wilson said.

Wilson then went into the issues of the day and said he was pleased to see the “clean sweep” that Republicans in Virginia saw in the governor’s race there.

This has also been an extraordinary week with the elections on Tuesday in the state of my ancestors, Virginia. I’m so grateful for the Commonwealth that there was a clean sweep and as it pointed out to me the Republican clean sweep there was for limited government and extending freedom is in the tradition of Thomas Jefferson.

Wilson also remarked that Jon Corzine, the incumbent Dem. gov. in New Jersey, had some “pretty strong things to say about me” and was happy that he lost his re-election bid.
Continue reading


Rep. Joe Wilson on Healthcare and Afghanistan”


D.C. Based Muslim Prays for ‘Recovery of Dr. Nidal Malik Hasan’ on FaceBook

-By Warner Todd Huston

I guess we shouldn’t be surprised, but a Washington D.C. based Muslim named Khadeeja Nuur has created a FaceBook Page offering prayers for the recovery of Fort Hood murderer Dr. Nidal Malik Hasan.

The page seems to have been started sometime before Friday at 3PM and she features this main message in her information section:

Together we pray for the recovery of Dr. Nidal Malik Hasan, MD. May Allah see fit to return this loyal son of Islam back to perfect health. Sallalahu Alayhi Wa Sallam.

Initially, it appears that a few Muslims celebrating Hasan’s evil actions were leaving messages in hopes that Hasan gets well, agreeing with his actions, or at the very least justifying them.

A Graal Reborn, for instance, leaves the message that, “killing is bad I agree but being forced to do somethnig [sic] you don’t want to do and being the minority standing up to the majority is respectable no matter who you are.” And Alex Gould wrote, “I pray to Allah that he may recover soon.” Later a fellow going by the name Abu Soleiman Al-nase wrote, “nidal malik is a brave mujahid,,he did jihad ,,he did kill the killers (american soldiers) that was going to iraq and afganistan [sic] to fight the islamic nation…my greeting and pray for him,,we will never forget you brother nidal.”
Continue reading


D.C. Based Muslim Prays for ‘Recovery of Dr. Nidal Malik Hasan’ on FaceBook”


Two (Actually Three) From Illinois Murdered by Muslim Madman

-By Warner Todd Huston

Two Illinois soldiers lost their lives from the evil, criminal actions of Muslim Nidal Hasan in Texas last week.

Private Francheska Velez, 21, of West Kamerling was one of the thirteen killed by Hasan at Fort Hood Army base on Thursday.

“She was the best I have. The light of my family,” Juan Velez said of his only daughter. “She was living my dream — to be part of the military, part of the United States. To be part of something. Just to give back to the United States because this is where we are from.”

Pvt. Valez was three months pregnant when she lost her life.

Also killed by this terrorist was Pvt. Michael Pearson, 21, of Bolingbrook. Pearson was training to become a bomb technician.

Screaming “Allahu Akbar,” terrorist Hasan entered a medical clinic where soldiers were waiting medical exams for deployment and began to fire at anyone in his way. 13 were murdered — actually 14 counting the baby in Velez’ womb. And therein lies a problem with the reporting of this story. No one mentions the loss of life suffered by Valez’ baby! It should not so easily be forgotten.

We have said a prayer for the families of victims and the tortured soul of this murdering Muslim terrorist.
Continue reading


Two (Actually Three) From Illinois Murdered by Muslim Madman”


2 Chicago Men Charged With Terror Plot

-By Warner Todd Huston

Fox News is reporting that two men from Chicago are being charged by the FBI for planning terror attacks against overseas targets.

David Coleman Headley, 49, and Tahawwur Hussain Rana, 48, were charged in separate complaints filed Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Chicago. Headley told FBI agents that the initial plan called for an attack against the newspaper building in Copenhagen, but he later proposed just killing the paper’s cartoonist and former cultural editor, according to an FBI affidavit released Tuesday.

These charges came after an Islamic slaughterhouse operation in Kinsman, Illinois was raided by federal officials. The meat business is owned by Tahawwur Hussain Rana.

Headley was arrested at O’Hare airport where he was to meet with Pakistani terrorists. Headley has an extensive record of travels to Pakistan and told Joint Terror Task Force officials that he had received training from the terror group Lakshar-e-Taiba.

Rana is charged with funding Headley’s travels and plans.
Continue reading


2 Chicago Men Charged With Terror Plot”


Father Wants ‘Murdered by Muslim Terrorists’ on Son’s Memorial

-By Warner Todd Huston

Peter Gadiel’s son James was killed when Muslim murderers crashed a plane into the North Tower of the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001. In memory of that horrible day, James’ hometown of Kent, Connecticut wants to erect a plaque memorializing James’ death but there has come a snag to the city’s plans: James’ father, Peter.

Peter Gadiel wants a specific line added to the plaque making the city fathers squeamish. He wants the plaque to say, “murdered by Muslim terrorists.”

Town officials have been scandalized by this all too trenchant line that Peter wants added to the memorial to his son. Kent’s city officials are playing the can’t-we-all-get-along game.
Continue reading


Father Wants ‘Murdered by Muslim Terrorists’ on Son’s Memorial”


Ruling: Telcoms Not Liable for ‘Illegal Spying’

-By Warner Todd Huston

Looks like the anti-Bushies lost another one this week when lawsuits against telecommunications companies claiming that they assisted the Bush administration in “illegally spying on Americans” were dismissed in San Francisco.

Federal district judge Vaughn Walker ruled that Congress didn’t violate the Constitution by allowing the U.S. attorney-general to “certify privately to the court that the companies had been asked to co-operate in an antiterrorism programme authorised by the president.” Vaughn cited a law that retroactively gave the telecoms immunity.

Continue reading


Ruling: Telcoms Not Liable for ‘Illegal Spying’”


Ark. Killing of Soldiers Shows Why Terror Isn’t a Police Matter

-By Warner Todd Huston

The heinous act of Abdulhakim Mujahid Muhammad, 24, formerly Carlos Leon Bledsoe, a prison convert to Islam, is a perfect example of why terrorism cannot be fought using police procedures and is more effectively fought under military auspices. The fact that Muhammad was under FBI surveillance and already under suspicion of possible terrorist activities but got away with murdering one soldier and seriously injuring another is a lesson of how police procedures are prone to failure in stopping terrorism.

Many on the left in America lambasted President Bush for utilizing military tribunals and for his contention that the capture of foreign terrorists was a military matter. They said that these terrorist’s “civil rights” were being violated by the quick military actions and they abhorred the limited availability to legal council such procedures offered to suspects. The solution the left commonly offers is for the full American justice system to be placed at the disposal of foreign terror suspects. The left claims that doing so makes our own actions “consistent” with our traditions of justice.

Continue reading


Ark. Killing of Soldiers Shows Why Terror Isn’t a Police Matter”


Obama’s New War Priorities Deceiving, Maybe Wrongheaded

-By Warner Todd Huston

Some may look at Obama’s defense funding request coming in at about $144.6 billion as a welcome reduction over the 2008 budget of $186 billion. Some may also be tempted to claim that Obama is ramping down America’s war efforts. But that would be a hasty conclusion because the numbers are a bit deceiving. On top of that some of the areas that Obama wants to shift the money to shows that the president is heading down the wrong path to a successful conclusion of our Iraq/Afghanistan conflicts and that he is perhaps foolishly expecting Pakistan to follow his lead when it is already plain that she won’t, maybe even can’t.

Pakistan

Obama’s negotiation team had already gotten a “rude shock” last month when Richard Holbrooke and Joint Chiefs Chairman Admiral Mike Mullen were rebuffed by Pakistan when the pair proposed a joint operation against al Qaeda and the Taliban in her violence wracked tribal regions.

Continue reading


Obama’s New War Priorities Deceiving, Maybe Wrongheaded”


There Never Were Any ‘180 Waterboardings’

-By Warner Todd Huston

Once again, we see the truth take a back seat to the best spin by Democrats. NRO’s The Corner blog has an exclusive report on the supposed “180 waterboardings” that the US government conducted on terror suspects and it appears that the truth is a bit different than the spin.

You see, it seems that there weren’t “180 waterboardings” but were instead 180 “pours.” In other words, water was poured on the suspects 180 times. Further, the rules were quite specific. No more than two sessions could be conducted on any suspect within a 24 hour period and no more than 6 “pours” of water were allowed per session.

This means that instead of 180 sessions on the waterboard there was a much lower 30.

But, as Cliff May notes on The Corner blog, all the carefully crafted rules for how to conduct waterboard interrogations reveals a far different situation than the Torquemada-like, torture loving Bush administration that critics are trying to advance.

Continue reading


There Never Were Any ‘180 Waterboardings’”


Obama’s Intel Services More Worried About Right-Wing Terror Than Islamists?

-By Warner Todd Huston

On the heels of the odious report by the State of Missouri, recently retracted, focusing on so-called “right-wing terrorism” and implying that every right of center group in American politics is an inch away from being terrorists, now we have a federal agency report doing the same thing.

The Department of Homeland Security has also created a secret report that wasn’t supposed to be made public but has leaked out nonetheless. In it we see the same outrageous conclusions that “right-wing terrorists” are a danger in this country. (Download PDF file)

Continue reading


Obama’s Intel Services More Worried About Right-Wing Terror Than Islamists?”


Muslims Try to Shut Down Property Rights of Tennessee Neighbor

-By Warner Todd Huston

Trevor Hill owns what was once a blighted, rundown building in Knoxville, Tennessee. Hill has upgraded and repaired the building and built a restaurant there that he’s christened The Hill restaurant. It’s a full service restaurant and that means it is to serve alcohol. And that last fact seems to be causing a conflict with the folks that own the neighboring building: the Anoor mosque.

Apparently one of the mosque board members, Nadeem Sidiqqi, is upset that an American property owner could possibly serve alcohol in his own business. Sidiqqi thinks he should be able to tell the owner of The Hill restaurant that he shouldn’t be allowed to serve alcohol so close to his mosque. He thinks that the city should invent a law that would mandate a “buffer zone” so that his religious tenets can be enforced on his neighbors. Sidiqqi wants to prevent neighboring property owners from doing as they wish with their own property.

So, is this America or Saudi Arabia?

Continue reading


Muslims Try to Shut Down Property Rights of Tennessee Neighbor”


Thanks for Sending us a Terrorist, President Obama

-By Warner Todd Huston

Dear President Obama,

We are thankful to you, our wonderful president, for showing the world that the citizens of Illinois are kinder and gentler than those evil Bushies. It has always been obvious to us that we are more open minded and far more caring than anyone but your gift to us this month proves our love for multi-culturalism. We can hold our heads up high in The Hague and in the hallowed halls of the École Nationale d’Administration at long last.

We are blessed and we thank god — not meaning to specify any particular god or gods to which you subscribe — for your beneficence with this action coming so soon during these early days of your administration of hope and change. To think that this hallowed day has arrived already!

Continue reading


Thanks for Sending us a Terrorist, President Obama”

Obama’s Nominee to Justice Dept. Was a Terrorist’s Lawyer

-By Warner Todd Huston

On March 9, the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee held a hearing on one of Barack Obama’s latest nominees. This time it was to assess the suitability of Tony West, Obama’s nominee for the assistant attorney general in charge of the U.S. Justice Department’s Civil Division. Things went “smoothly” according to the San Jose Mercury News, also publishing a nice bio of West. The Washington Post merely mentioned the hearing was “notable.” Similarly the East Bay Express simply makes mention of the hearing having occurred. Apparently there was nothing of interest in West’s nomination.

Curiously enough, though, not one of these brief reports mention that Tony West was “American Taliban” terrorist John Walker Lindh’s defense lawyer. Another key bit of info left out of these announcements was that Tony West raised $65 million for Obama’s presidential campaign. Money well spent if it gets a cushy government job, I suppose.

Continue reading Obama’s Nominee to Justice Dept. Was a Terrorist’s Lawyer”