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DECEMBER 23,  2014

SHORT TAKES ON THE DRIFTING WRECKAGE – AT 11:50 P.M. ET: 

SICKENING – Even New York's red mayor, Bill de Blasio, asked anti-cop protesters to suspend protesting until the assassinated New York police officers were buried.  He was rejected.  We saw tape tonight of the vulgar left marching down Fifth Avenue with their anti-cop signs.  Many had Arab-style scarves, and it wasn't a coincidence.   The sponsor of the march was International Answer, a Communist front group that also champions hatred of Israel.  But we were never told this by the mainstream press.  We were simply told that these were marchers protesting "police brutality."  Only Jonah Goldberg, at Fox, to the best of my knowledge, had the courage to identify Answer as a bunch of old Stalinists.

OBAMA BOOST – It is depressing, but less than two months after our side's landslide victory in the midterms, President Obama is enjoying a major boost in the polls.  He's at 47% approval in Gallup, 48% in CNN's poll.  The reason is probably the economy, which, in fairness, is showing some serious signs of improving.  The president's obvious shift to a harder left-wing line, his opening to Cuba, and his irresponsible rhetoric involving police/African American relations, apparently haven't penetrated.  In part, of course, this is due to twisted news coverage, which in too many cases still portrays anything Obama does as a great victory.

MILESTONE – From NRO:  "A fascinating tidbit from the U.K., where former member of Parliament and BBC journalist John Freeman died this week at the age of 99: Elected to the House of Commons in 1945 and serving until 1955, Freeman was the last living member or former member of Parliament to have served before Queen Elizabeth II.  According to a tweet by the Labour Party History Group, eight peers – members of the House of Lords – who took their seats under the queen’s father, King George VI, still survive, and three of them remain in the upper house. America’s longest-serving congressman, John Dingell (D., Mich.) retired this December, but even he took office, in 1955, after the queen.  The queen has been on the throne since 1952, and next September, the 88-year-old is set to become Britain’s longest-reigning monarch, a record currently held by her great-great-grandmother, Queen Victoria."  The World War II generation is truly passing, and it cannot be replaced.

OH, I CAN'T WAIT – SONY will enable a limited showing of "The Interview" on Christmas day.  You'll recall that the studio previously pulled the film in the face of North Korean threats.  From CNN Money:  "The movie studio's CEO, Michael Lynton, said Tuesday afternoon that 'while we hope this is only the first step of the film's release, we are proud to make it available to the public and to have stood up to those who attempted to suppress free speech.'  By Tuesday evening, slightly more than 200 independently-owned theaters had agreed to show the film."  SONY, which received a hail of criticism for having buckled to North Korea, now pictures itself as a great defender of the Constitution.  That's Hollywood, and its concept of truth.

December 23, 2014       Permalink

WELL DESERVED – AT 9:56 A.M. ET:  Not every locality is appeasing unruly demonstrators.  At least one place is fighting back.  From CBS in Minnesota:

In the next few days, the Bloomington City Attorney Sandra Johnson expects to file criminal charges against the organizers of Saturday’s protest at Mall of America.

The mall went into a partial shutdown for about two hours as thousands of protesters filled the rotunda on one of the busiest shopping days of the year. The group, “Black Lives Matter” chose the mall for its high visibility, but was warned repeatedly that it was private property.

Mall officials are reportedly gathering estimates of how much money the stores lost on Saturday.

Combined with the amount of overtime put in by police, Johnson said the numbers will be “staggering,” and she wants the protest organizers to pay.

The moment the chanting started Saturday, officers locked down about 80 stores and several mall entrances. In and around the rotunda, business came to a halt for about two hours.

Nate Bash works at one store near the rotunda, which he didn’t want us to name.

“You had people yelling and screaming inside the mall that wanted out and you had people yelling and screaming outside the mall that wanted in,” he said. “I would say the mall was less than half as busy as it should have been considering what day it was.”

“This was a powder keg just waiting for a match,” said Johnson.

The City Attorney is now building criminal cases against the protest organizers. She said she’ll try to get restitution for money lost by the mall, the city and police agencies that came from as far away as Hastings and Red Wing.

COMMENT:  The right to peacefully assemble does not include the right to do damage.  Society accepts certain costs to maintain the First Amendment – I don't think peaceful protesters need to pay for police overtime – but damage to individuals and property, including livelihoods, is another matter.

December 23, 2014       Permalink

WAITING FOR A BETTER DEAL – AT 9:19 A.M. ET:  There is talk in the air of "normalization" of relations between the United States and Iran, a murderous state.  And why not?  We're normalizing relations with Cuba, without getting any concessions in return. 

The expected scenario goes as follows:  The United States and Iran will reach some kind of agreement on Iran's nuclear program, probably as a result of absurd American giveaways.  Then Obama will talk about the "natural" next step, a normalization.  He will consider this, and Cuba, part of his leftist legacy. 

But an Iranian representative says that's not in the cards.  Why would Iran express any enthusiasm now for normalization, when there are so many American concessions to be demanded down the road?  The Iranians have Obama's number, and it's zero.  From the Jerusalem Post: 

A top Iranian official on Monday ruled out any possibility that an agreement with the West over the nuclear issue could eventually lead to a full resumption of diplomatic ties with the United States.

In an interview with the Financial Times, Ali Shamkhani, the secretary of the Supreme National Council, said that while a deal on the Iranian nuclear program would go a long way toward defusing tensions with the West, there are no plans to strive for a full-fledged rapprochement with Washington.

Shamkhani told the Financial Times both sides “can behave in a way that they do not use their energy against each other [in the region]. A nuclear agreement can be very crucial in this regard.”

“Everything will depend on the honesty of the Americans in the nuclear talks," he said.

Shamkhani, a former defense minister, is considered a respected voice on foreign policy matters who has the ear of the supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

He told the newspaper that Iran's diplomacy with the United States would be strictly limited to the nuclear issue.

Shamkhani sounded upbeat regarding the Islamic Republic's burgeoning regional influence, citing the continued survival of the Bashar Assad regime in Syria as well as the Iranian role in facilitating the relatively stable political transition in Iraq.

COMMENT:  The comments are not at all surprising.  I have no doubt that Iran wants Obama to come begging for normalization, and to give up a great deal to get it.  Obama is interested in Obama, not the fate of the United States, and certainly not the fate of our allies.

I don't recall a foreign-policy moment quite like this one.

December 23, 2014       Permalink

NICE GUYS – AT 9:07 A.M. ET:  As New York prepares to bury two dead officers, the radical leftists behind the anti-cop demonstrations are defying a request from the ham-handed mayor of New York to stand down during the mourning period.  Hey, what's a couple of dead cops, right?  From Fox: 

Activist groups in New York City have rejected a call by Mayor Bill de Blasio to hold off on any new demonstrations until after the funerals of two NYPD officers who were ambushed and murdered Saturday in Brooklyn.

The killings have aggravated tensions between police, City Hall, and protesters who have staged regular demonstrations since a Staten Island grand jury refused to indict an officer earlier this month in connection with the death of 43-year-old Eric Garner. Amateur video appeared to show the officer putting Garner in a chokehold while questioning him over the sale of untaxed cigarettes.

"We are in a very difficult moment. Our focus has to be on these families," de Blasio said Monday at police headquarters. "I think it's a time for everyone to put aside political debates, put aside protests, put aside all of the things that we will talk about in all due time."

However, the Rev. Al Sharpton told Reuters late Monday that de Blasio's request was too "ill-defined" to heed.

"Is a vigil a protest? Is a rally?" Sharpton asked.

Another group, The Answer Coalition, said it would go ahead with a long-planned march Tuesday evening, and denounced the mayor for what it called an "outrageous" attempt to chill free speech. The New York Post reported that a few dozen protesters staged a "die-in" at Grand Central Terminal before marching toward Times Square.

"We will not let recent tragic moments derail this movement," one protester shouted. "This is the revolution and we will not be repressed."

COMMENT:  Yup.  It's the revolution.  And the Answer Coalition is a red front operation, but the mainstream press will never describe it that way.  You know, we don't want to be like Joe McCarthy. 

Reckless, irresponsible news reporting, a legacy from the warped reporting of the Vietnam War and its accompanying "anti-war" movement, is making it impossible to separate protesters with serious concerns and the hardened left, which always shows up, and whose true nature is masked by willing "journalists."

December 23, 2014       Permalink

AND THE TRUTH COMES OUT – AT 8:41 A.M. ET:  Oh no, we're told.  The murder of two New York police officers had nothing to do with the vitriolic anti-cop rallies recently held in New York and elsewhere.  Nothing to see, nothing to see.

Uh, not so fast.  It turns out the assassin attended at least one of those rallies, and the images from his cell phone prove it.  From Gateway Pundit: 

Today New York police officials announced that Brinsley had attended a Mike Brown rally in New York City.

He took video at the protest.

“He talks about Mike Brown and Trayvon Martin, as I said. We’ve recovered his cellphone from Baltimore. There’s over several thousand images on it. We’re paring down that as well. One of the cellphone images that we have is a video from Union Square Park where he is a spectator watching one of the protests. We date that around December 1st.”

The Eric Garner grand jury decision was announced on December 3rd. There were #HandsUpWalkOut protests in New York on December 1st.

And yet the liberal media has been working overtime trying to distance this cop-hater from the Mike Brown police protests.

COMMENT:  I can't wait for some jerk to go on a TV show and say that Brinsley had a perfect First Amendment right to attend that rally.  The left is into major subject-changing this week, and it will continue.

The president's golf game presumably went well yesterday.

December 23,  2014     Permalink

DECEMBER 22,  2014

SHORT TAKES ON THE DRIFTING WRECKAGE – AT 11:51 P.M. ET:

ONCE A GREAT PAPER – From The Politico:  "The New York Times editorial board has called upon President Barack Obama to prosecute former Vice President Dick Cheney for the torture of terrorism suspects.  The sharply worded editorial, published Monday, comes amid an effort by the American Civil Liberties Union and Human Rights Watch to launch an investigation into U.S. torture practices. The two groups will submit a letter to Attorney General Eric Holder on Monday calling for the appointment of a special prosecutor.  'The question everyone will want answered, of course, is: Who should be held accountable? That will depend on what an investigation finds, and as hard as it is to imagine Mr. Obama having the political courage to order a new investigation, it is harder to imagine a criminal probe of the actions of a former president,' the Times editorial board wrote."  The crazed editorial was spurred by the recent Senate report on the CIA, Which was written only by Democrats.  The leftists would love to see Cheney in the dock, just as they'd love to bring down American defense.  These are not liberals we're talking about.

THE NERVE OF THIS GUY – From the Washington Examiner:  "New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio, on the defensive following the killing of two police officers in Brooklyn, accused the media Monday of stoking racial tensions rather than objectively covering 'peaceful protests.'  'What are you guys going to do? Are you going to keep dividing us?' de Blasio said when asked whether aggressive demonstrations contributed to shootings of officers Wenjian Liu and Rafael Ramos.  'The few who want conflict attempt that,' he told reporters in a press conference Monday afternoon. 'You guys enable that.'"  What nerve.  This guy ran against the police during his campaign.  He has made inflammatory statements.  He has embraced Al Sharpton.  He has a history of pro-Communist affiliations.  And he blames the press.  Apparently, it's not left-wing enough for him.

FUN FOR DRIVERS – From the Washington Examiner:  "National gasoline prices have fallen for 88 consecutive days, breaking a U.S. record, according to the AAA motor club.  A gallon of gas averaged $2.39 on Monday, the lowest level since May 2009. Gas prices have declined every day since Sept. 25, and motorists in only Alaska and Hawaii currently pay more than $3 per gallon.  Analysts have said the falling prices are acting as a stimulus for U.S. drivers, with the U.S. Energy Information Administration saying the average household will pocket an additional $550 next year.  Low pump prices are a reflection of global oversupply of oil — chiefly from surging U.S. production and a decision by the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries not to cut supply — along with sagging demand. While U.S. drivers have benefited, the tumbling oil prices have created worry for financial markets and could slow the growth of U.S. oil production."  I suspect prices will start to inch up soon, as OPEC squeezes production.  Enjoy the prices while you can.  And remember that Obama opposed every measure that made these lower prices possible.  Al Gore is selling gas at a higher price, but he autographs every gallon.

INTERNET NEWS – From CNN:  "(CNN) -- North Korea's Internet was back up Tuesday after a more than nine-hour outage, according to Dyn Research, a company that monitors Internet performance.  The disruption came amid an escalating war of words between the United States and North Korea over a massive cyberattack on Sony Pictures.  'Usually there are isolated blips, not continuous connectivity problems. I wouldn't be surprised if they are absorbing some sort of attack presently,' Doug Madory, director of Internet analysis at Dyn Research, said when the Internet was down."  I hope we did it. 

December 22,  2014     Permalink

CHILLING – A well-known German reporter has gotten inside ISISA, and has brought back a chilling report that is spreading over the internet.  We are facing a very determined enemy.   This is from the Logan Reporter, but I have seen it, in the last day, on many larger sites: 

THE first Western journalist in the world to be allowed extensive access to Isis territories in Syria and Iraq has returned from the region with a warning: the group is "much stronger and much more dangerous" than anyone in the West realises.

Jürgen Todenhöfer, 74, is a renowned German journalist and publicist who travelled through Turkey to Mosul, the largest city occupied by Isis, after months of negotiations with the group's leaders.

He plans to publish a summary of his "10 days in the Islamic State" on Monday, but in interviews with German-language media outlets has revealed his first impressions of what life is like under Isis.

Speaking to the website Der tz, Todenhöfer revealed that he actually stayed in the same hotel in Benghazi as James Foley, the US journalist who was beheaded on camera by Isis in August.

"Of course, I've seen the terrible, brutal video and it was one of my main concerns during the negotiations as to how I can avoid [the same fate]," he said.

Once within Isis territory, Todenhöfer said his strongest impression was "that Isis is much stronger than we think here".

He said it now has "dimensions larger than the UK", and is supported by "an almost ecstatic enthusiasm that I have never encountered in any other warzone".

"Each day, hundreds of willing fighters arrive from all over the world," he told tz. "For me it is incomprehensible."

COMMENT:  We'll look for further details from this reporter, but read this whole preliminary article now.  It's packed with information.  This is a very determined opponent.  We have a tendency to ridicule these new, ideologically based movements, just as we ridiculed Fidel Castro before he took power.  We do this at our peril.

December 22, 2014       Permalink

THE PRICE OF OUR WEAKNESS – AT 9:31 A.M. ET:  North Korea has scored a key victory over the United States in its successful hacking of the American branch of SONY, and its intimidation of SONY, leading to the studio's withdrawal of a comedy ridiculing the North's regime.  North Korea is feeling victorious, and acting that way.  From Fox: 

North Korea issued a new threat against the United States late Sunday and accused President Barack Obama of "recklessly" spreading rumors that Pyongyang is behind last month's devastating cyberattack on Sony Pictures.

The long statement from the powerful National Defense Commission warned of strikes against the White House, Pentagon and "the whole U.S. mainland, that cesspool of terrorism."

Such rhetoric is routine from North Korea's massive propaganda machine during times of high tension with Washington. But the statement also underscores Pyongyang's sensitivity at a movie whose plot focuses on the assassination of its leader Kim Jong Un, who is the beneficiary of a decades-long cult of personality built around his family dynasty.

The North Korean statement offered no details of a possible response, but warned that the country's 1.2 million-member army is ready to use all types of warfare against the U.S.

This is the result of years of appeasing North Korea, and pretending that we've had successful negotiations with the regime.

"Our toughest counteraction will be boldly taken against the White House, the Pentagon and the whole U.S. mainland ... by far surpassing the 'symmetric counteraction' declared by Obama," said the commission's Policy Department in a statement carried by the official Korean Central News Agency.

The latest threat came hours after President Obama confirmed that he was considering returning North Korea to the State Department's list of state sponsors of terrorism. Obama, who previously promised in his year-end press conference on Friday to respond "proportionately" to the attack, has termed the breach as an act of "cybervandalism that was very costly, very expensive" as opposed to an act of war.

"We're going to review those through a process that's already in place," Obama told CNN's "State of the Union" in an interview broadcast Sunday. "I'll wait to review what the findings are."

COMMENT:  Yeah, let's wait, Barack.  Like you always wait.  Wait until the anger blows over, and then do almost nothing.  And when people like John McCain call for a more effective response, call them warmongers. 

Don't worry, Barack.  Hollywood will always support you in the end.

December 22, 2014       Permalink

A ONCE-GREAT ORGANIZATION – AT 8:52 A.M. ET:  The NAACP Legal Defense Fund used to be a generally fine organization.  With some exceptions, its leaders were thoughtful lawyers who had no use for fashionable radicals.  The organization, working effectively, was at the heart of the civil rights movement. 

In recent decades, though, the Fund has come on hard times.  Poor leadership has been its major curse.  Its response to the murder of the two officers in New York shows how thoughtless the group has become.  From Breitbart: 

On December 20 the NAACP Legal Fund issued a press release saying the execution of NYPD officers Wenjian Liu and Rafael Ramos show “the need for sensible gun control.”

I'm not kidding.  They actually led with that.

According to the release, we need also “need to thoughtfully address untreated mental illness.”

One thing the NAACP Legal Fund’s release said we don’t need to do is to “suggest a causal link between between these killings and the recent protests and activism focused on the serious issue of police violence against unarmed African Americans.” They suggest that pushing such a “causal link” may escalate “an already tense state through rumor and conjecture.”

That's absurd.  Of course there's a link.  The activism, and the raw nature of some of the chants we heard from radical marchers, inevitably had their impact on weak minds.  The murderer posted things on social media that clearly showed the effect of anti-cop hatred.

The NAACP does not mention that the attack on the officers took place in a state with some of the strictest gun control laws in the country–laws which were impotent against the criminal desires of the gunman.

COMMENT:  That is correct.  The NAACP is tired.  Like most tired liberals, its leaders fall back on the old discredited formulas.  No amount of gun control could have stopped this killer. 

Yes, he should have received proper mental help and, considering the fact that he had 19 arrests on his record, he probably should have been in prison.

In the end, though, this double murder was perpetrated by one man in a very highly charged atmosphere made worse by statements by the president, the attorney general, some black leaders, and the mayor of New York. 

December 22, 2014       Permalink

THE AFTERMATH – AT 8:16 A.M. ET:  I have no doubt that the liberal press will try to get the murder of two New York cops off the front page as quickly as possible.  Doesn't fit the party line. 

But this time I don't think it will work.  The shock has been too great, the possibility of more trouble also too great.  Already the alerts have gone out to police departments to be wary of copycat killers.  From Fox: 

Wear bulletproof vests. Avoid posting inflammatory statements on social media. Don't make arrests unless you have to. Don't patrol alone.

Those are some of the warnings police departments and unions around the country are giving to the rank-and-file after two NYPD officers were ambushed and shot in their patrol car in broad daylight Saturday afternoon.

The murders of Officers Rafael Ramos and Wenjian Liu in Brooklyn heightened fears about the safety of law enforcement officials nationwide, though there is no evidence any threats are imminent. The gunman, 28-year-old Ismaaiyl Brinsley, had vowed in an Instagram post to put "wings on pigs" as retaliation for the slayings of black men at the hands of white police.

Brinsley was black; the slain New York Police Department officers were Hispanic and Asian.

Investigators are trying to determine if Brinsley had taken part in any protests over the deaths of Michael Brown and Eric Garner, whose names he invoked in his online threat, or simply latched onto the cause for the final act in a violent rampage. Protests erupted in recent weeks after grand juries declined to charge officers involved in Garner's death following a New York officer's apparent chokehold and Brown's fatal shooting in Ferguson, Mo.

After the officers' killings, a union-generated message at the 35,000-officer NYPD warned officers that they should respond to every radio call with two cars — "no matter what the opinion of the patrol supervisor" — and not make arrests "unless absolutely necessary." The president of the detectives union told members in a letter to work in threes when out on the street, wear bulletproof vests and keep aware of their surroundings.

Another directive warned officers in Newark, New Jersey, not to patrol alone and to avoid people looking for confrontations. At the same time, a memo from an NYPD chief asked officers to limit their comments "via all venues, including social media, to expressions of sorrow and condolence."

COMMENT:  What is clear is that Mayor de Blasio of New York is losing control of his own police department.  It is the price he pays for running a left-wing campaign against a department that has reduced the murder rate in New York by 80%.  Like most leftists, de Blasio is not interested in results, only the ideology by which those results are achieved.

December 22,  2014     Permalink