Showing posts with label Protecting America. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Protecting America. Show all posts

Thursday, June 05, 2008

Markos Moulitas-brand White Strips


This is Markos Moulitas.

This is Markos Moulitas had he spent more than half a decade in a prisoner-of-war camp.

Talk amongst yourselves.

Also: Fausta has more on HaliKosis.

What to wear when the wife has chores for you


Hat tip: Bern

Monday, May 26, 2008

Happy Memorial Day: an Alternative Google Logo


Disapppointingly, Google failed to note Memorial Day with a special logo treatment. Last year Zombie held a contest and demonstrated that tasteful designs were not only possible, but quite straightforward.

In depicting a Memorial Day logo, I took the opposite tack. Had it not been for America's brave warriors, whose memory we mark today, there would be no Google.

Candidly, Google's management team is brilliant. They are certainly bright enough to recognize this simple fact.

Thursday, May 22, 2008

Home Security Ad


  *Creak!*

  Did you hear that?

  It's our first night in the new house... do you want me to check?

  Are you f*****g kidding me? Hell yes, I want you to check, you lazy SOB!

  What the...?

  KA-BLAM!! KA-BLAM!! ............ *** Thump! ***

  Problem solved, babe!

  Nice double-tap, dear! I'm so happy we invested in a Glockk Home Security System™!

Tuesday, May 20, 2008

Wednesday, May 14, 2008

GOP 2.0 - resuscitating the brand


Paul Mirengoff, writing at Powerline:

The Democrats appear to have picked up another House seat in a formerly "safe" Republican district tonight. The latest win for the Dems comes in Mississippi where Travis Childers, a county chancery clerk, seems to have edged out Greg Davis, a mayor. President Bush carried this district twice with about 60 percent of the vote each time. But Childers ran as a strong social conservative (Ed: pro-life and pro-gun).

...my takeaway is that the Republican brand is in such bad shape that the Dems can win virtually anywhere if they nominate a candidate whose position on key issues is, or can be made to seem, close to that of the Republican... Fortunately, the Democrats will not nominate such a candidate for president. And the Republican nominee, whether we feel comfortable about it or not, isn't necessarily seen as intimately associated with the Republican brand. Even so, I think that Republican nominee is running uphill.

Indeed. The Republican brand has lost its way. I believe that it's time for citizens to rise up and demand a new Republican Party! I'm calling it GOP 2.0. And I'm perfectly willing to throw out those "Republicans" who are stuck on stupid -- and are stuck in the GOP 1.0 world.

The tenets:

STRENGTHEN NATIONAL DEFENSE - increase the size, capability and efficiency of our Armed Forces, bringing back our defense spending to historical levels as percentage of GDP.

GAIN ENERGY INDEPENDENCE - open up ANWR and the OCS to exploration; aggressively pursue nuclear energy and green technologies; and incent private industry to aggressively pursue clean, renewable energy sources.

SECURE THE BORDERS - build physical barriers immediately as a precursor to an overarching, sensible immigration policy. If the boat's sinking, you plug the holes first.

DEATH TO EARMARKS - zero tolerance for earmarks.

DEATH TO CORRUPTION - zero tolerance for corruption.

ENGLISH AS NATIONAL LANGUAGE - national unity requires a national language. That language is English.

IMPLEMENT FLAT TAX OR FAIR TAX - simplify the tax system by eradicating a tax code gone mad.

REDUCE SIZE OF GOVERNMENT - provide "whistleblower-style" awards for reducing the size of government and task the IRS (which will no longer have to worry about enforcing the tax code) with achieving the reduction goals on an annual basis

SPUR HEALTHCARE COMPETITION - Address health-care deficiencies - with competitive, free-market solutions, not Government largesse.

ADDRESS ENTITLEMENTS - engage a bipartisan consortium to create a multi-million dollar competition to incent teams from private industry and academia to create solutions for our social security and Medicare liabilities.

This should not be a platform. It should be a promise -- an ironclad commitment -- to voters.

I'm asking for help here. If you agree, please email this post to your friends and/or post it on your blog (no credit or link needed). We need to resuscitate the Republican brand. ASAP.

Update: A Jacksonian published a comprehensive platform of similar traits in 2006.
Linked by: Gateway Pundit, Fausta, Jo's Cafe and Vanderleun. Thanks!

Update II: Reclaim Conservatism: rebooting the GOP!

Sunday, May 11, 2008

Saturday, May 10, 2008

Steyn takes on all comers in the war on "thought crimes"


As a guest on Toronto's The Agenda, hosted by Steve Paikin, Mark Steyn takes on all comers in a no-holds-barred debate over his book excerpt in MacLeans.





Ironic: at the end of the show, Paikin previews the next night's show on Darfur.

Update: If you have trouble getting the video to work, jpm100 posted YouTube links in the comments section. Thanks!
Hat tip: Charles Johnson.

Saturday, May 03, 2008

Iran's "Navy" suffering from intestinal distress


The US Navy just launched the USS Independence -- a Littoral Combat Ship (LCS) capable of 50 knot speeds combined with stealth characteristics. Instapinch has all of the photos (click on any of the pics, below, to visit).



The Navy Times adds:

The ship first saw the sun April 26 when workers at Austal USA moved the striking, aluminum-hulled trimaran out of its building shed and onto a floating drydock. The 417-foot-long ship was balanced on its center section while stanchions steadied the outriggers covering the craft’s 100-foot beam...

...Meanwhile, Lockheed Martin, [General Dynamics'] competitor in the LCS program, marked an engineering milestone in late April when the USS Freedom’s two Fairbanks Morse diesel engines were run for the first time... The Freedom, launched in September 2006, is being built at Marinette Marine in Marinette, Wis. Lockheed Martin hopes to move the ship under its own power during engineering trials in May, and is expected to deliver the ship to the Navy in late summer.

The Navy plans to test each design against the other and in 2010 select a winner. A total of 55 LCS ships are planned.

Hat tip: Michelle Malkin

Friday, April 04, 2008

Juan remembers MLK and dismembers Barack Obama

 
On the 40th anniversary of Martin Luther King, Jr.'s tragic assassination, Juan Williams writes:

Mr. Obama's major speech on race last month was forced from him only after a political crisis erupted: It became widely known that he'd sat for 20 years in the pews of a church where Rev. Jeremiah Wright lashed out at white people. The minister cursed America as worthy of damnation, made lewd suggestions about the nature of President Clinton's relationship with black voters, and embraced the paranoid idea that the white government was spreading AIDS among black people.

Here is where the racial tension at the heart of Mr. Obama's campaign flared into view. He either shared these beliefs or, lacking good judgment, decided it politically expedient for an ambitious young black politician trying to prove his solidarity with all things black, to be associated with these rants. His judgment and leadership on the critical issue of race is in question.

While speaking to black people, King never condescended to offer Rev. Wright-style diatribes or conspiracy theories. He did not paint black people as victims. To the contrary, he spoke about black people as American patriots who believed in the democratic ideals of the country, in nonviolence and the Judeo-Christian ethic, even as they overcame slavery, discrimination and disadvantage. King challenged white America to do the same, to live up to their ideals and create racial unity. He challenged white Christians, asking them how they could treat their fellow black Christians as anything but brothers in Christ.

...as his campaign made headway with black voters, Mr. Obama no longer spoke about the responsibility and the power of black America to appeal to the conscience and highest ideals of the nation. He no longer asks black people to let go of the grievance culture to transcend racial arguments and transform the world.... And he chooses not to confront the poisonous "thug life" culture in rap music that glorifies drug use and crime.

Instead the senator, in a full political pander, is busy excusing Rev. Wright's racial attacks as the right of the Rev.-Wright generation of black Americans to define the nation's future by their past. He stretches compassion to the breaking point by equating his white grandmother's private concerns about black men on the street with Rev. Wright's public stirring of racial division...

...when Barack Obama, arguably the best of this generation of black or white leaders, finds it easy to sit in Rev. Wright's pews and nod along with wacky and bitterly divisive racial rhetoric, it does call his judgment into question. And it reveals a continuing crisis in racial leadership.

What would Jesus do? There is no question he would have left that church.

Hat tips: Atlas and Larwyn

Tuesday, April 01, 2008

Unfortunately, it's not an April Fool's Day Joke at the DHS

 
Jacob Goodwin, writing at Government Security News, reveals a seemingly bizarre intelligence gap at DHS. Namely, that "DHS has no formal process to add names to [the] terrorist watchlist."

"The Department of Homeland Security has made very few nominations to the consolidated terrorist watchlist because its components are rarely originators of derogatory information linking persons to terrorist activities," explained a report submitted last month by the DHS Inspector General...

Perhaps for that reason, DHS does not even have in place an "overarching policy" that guides its various components on processing such nominations, said the IG’s report.

DHS components are certainly "consumers" of terrorist watchlist information. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) consults the watchlist as it processes about 1.1 million passengers and pedestrians at U.S. ports of entry each day. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) coordinates the investigation of watchlist individuals with the FBI. U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) taps the watchlist as it consider approximately six million applications and petitions each year. The Transportation Security Administration (TSA) checks the watchlist against passenger manifests as it examines more than 50,000 commercial flights a day.

Nonetheless, concluded the IG, "DHS does not have a management directive, quality control process, or training program for the [terrorist] nomination process."

Sadly, it appears to be a legitimate gaffe and not a hilarious April Fool's Day press release.

Sunday, March 23, 2008

Opposing Code Stink and Berkeley City Hall

 
ProtestShooter has the must-see gallery of photos from a pro-U.S. rally in Berkeley, California. Specifically, a variety of groups rolled into town to support the U.S. Marine recruiting office targeted by Code Stink.

This photo is the first of many good ones.

Hat tips: Gateway Pundit and Larwyn

Sunday, March 09, 2008

"I loved that jet"

 
Major Brian Shul, writing at Maggie's Farm, describes his experiences flying the SR-71 Blackbird.

In April 1986, following an attack on American soldiers in a Berlin disco, President Reagan ordered the bombing of Muammar Qaddafi's terrorist camps in Libya. My duty was to fly over Libya and take photos recording the damage our F-111's had inflicted. Qaddafi had established a 'line of death,' a territorial marking across the Gulf of Sidra, swearing to shoot down any intruder that crossed the boundary. On the morning of April 15, I rocketed past the line at 2,125 mph.

I was piloting the SR-71 spy plane, the world's fastest jet, accompanied by Maj Walter Watson, the aircraft's reconnaissance systems officer (RSO). We had crossed into Libya and were approaching our final turn over the bleak desert landscape when Walter informed me that he was receiving missile launch signals. I quickly increased our speed, calculating the time it would take for the weapons-most likely SA-2 and SA-4 surface-to-air missiles capable of Mach 5 - to reach our altitude. I estimated that we could beat the rocket-powered missiles to the turn and stayed our course, betting our lives on the plane's performance.

After several agonizingly long seconds, we made the turn and blasted toward the Mediterranean. 'You might want to pull it back,' Walter suggested. It was then that I noticed I still had the throttles full forward. The plane was flying a mile every 1.6 seconds, well above our Mach 3.2 limit. It was the fastest we would ever fly. I pulled the throttles to idle just south of Sicily, but we still overran the refueling tanker awaiting us over Gibraltar.

Scores of significant aircraft have been produced in the 100 years of flight, following the achievements of the Wright brothers, which we celebrate in December. Aircraft such as the Boeing 707, the F-86 Sabre Jet, and the P-51 Mustang are among the important machines that have flown our skies. But the SR-71, also known as the Blackbird, stands alone as a significant contributor to Cold War victory and as the fastest plane ever-and only 93 Air Force pilots ever steered the 'sled,' as we called our aircraft...

Read it all.

Sunday, March 02, 2008

Going to be in the DC area in July? Golf for a good cause...

 
The 2008 Ol’ Liberty Charity Classic Golf Tournament benefits The Special Operations Warrior Foundation.

The Special Operations Warrior Foundation is a 501 (c)(3) tax-exempt organization, which provides college scholarship grants, along with financial aid and educational counseling, to the children of Army, Navy, Air Force and Marine Corps Special Operations personnel who were killed in an operational mission or training accident. The Foundation is a "Four-Star Charity" according to CharityNavigator.

The venue? The spectacular Lake Presidential Golf Club in Upper Marlboro, Maryland (east of the DC area). Visit the 2008 Ol’ Liberty Charity Classic website for registration and sponsorship information.

Wednesday, February 13, 2008

Secrets of the Great Seal of the United States

 
The Great Seal of the United States is the insignia that appears on the back of every one dollar bill. It is the nation's official emblem and represents the country's authority and sovereignty. It's now celebrating its 225th birthday; its origins date back to the first secretary of state -- Thomas Jefferson -- who headed the State Department from 1789 to 1793.

The National Treasure films have popularized the seal's mythology. Among the rumors:

• That the Seal proves the domination of the United States by a powerful, quasi-religious cult. The Ancient Scottish Rite of Freemasonry is a perennial favorite of conspiracy theorists as some Founding Fathers were Masons and the Seal uses several Masonic symbols.

• That the Seal draws on Satanism or polytheistic ritual to promote a universal new world order under which Earth would be ruled by a single omnipotent government.

• That repeated references to 13 — the number of steps in the unfinished pyramid, stars in the constellation over the eagle's head, arrows in the eagle's claw, stripes on the eagle's shield, letters in the phrase "Annuit Coeptis" — demonstrate the power of 13 American families.

• That there are two seals: one in which the eagle's head faces the arrows for times of war and another in which the eagle's head faces the olive branch for times of peace.

The real history of the seals -- at least its official history as described by the State Department -- appears somewhat less ominous.

• That known Masons like the first U.S. president, George Washington, and Benjamin Franklin had no role in designing the final seal, which uses elements of traditional heraldry, such as the unfinished pyramid to symbolize a work in progress, arrows for war and an olive branch for peace. Masons share some of those symbols, but they have never been exclusively the domain of the order.

• That the phrase "Novus Ordo Seculorum" below the Roman numerals for 1776 at the base of the pyramid translates as "A New Order of the Ages" that began with independence and does not imply the United States will be the lynchpin of a sinister "New World Order."

• That the words "Annuit Coeptis" ("Providence favors") and the eye of providence that hovers over the pyramid refer to unexpected interventions of fate that assisted the colonists in creating a new country.

• That the references to 13 refer to the number of colonies that formed the original United States.

All that said, I'm not sure I buy this all-too-innocent fable. Using our electron blogoscope, let's examine the seal in detail.






Barack Obama? What the... ?

Sunday, January 20, 2008

Avoid being charged by Canada's Human Rights Tribunal!

 
Some advice for Mark Steyn: here's how you can, in the future, avoid being dragged before the Canadian Human Rights Commission.

Simply do not, under any circumstances, write, verbalize or even think of the following:

* Flags, Uniforms and Soccer Balls that depict offensive crosses, stars of David and American flags.

* Buildings, Monuments and Status including the WTC, Pentagon, Buddhas, the Beslan Memorial, Kaaba-shaped bars, Movie Theaters, and the Eiffel Tower.

* Famous Christians and Christian Practices such as the Holy Trinity, Pope Benedict XVI. Pope John Paul II, Australian Prime Minister John Howard, Coptic Pope Shenouda III., Robert Spencer, Crusaders, Crosses, Christmas presents, Bibles, selling Bibles, lip-synching videos, Valentine's Day, Christians who accidently touch the Koran, Street Evangelists, the letter X, Muslim converts to Christianity, the Knights of Malta, the Bishop of Rochester, and use of the word Allah by Catholics.

* Jews and World Jewry including the existence of Israel, the Holocaust, anti-revisionism, Holocaust Day in the UK, teaching of World War II history including the Holocaust and the Annapolis Peace Talks.

* Hindus, Buddhists and other religious figures such as the Dalai Lama, Baha'i, Pagans and Zoroastrians.

* Cartoons including the Danish cartoons, videos of Danes drawing Mohammed, cartoons about Uday and Qusay's death, the "Buddy Christ" from Dogma, the Cambridge University cartoon, Pokemon, Opus and David Low's Jack Hobbs cartoon.

* Movies, TV, Theater and Radio programs involving "The Passion of the Christ", 'Il mercante di pietre, 24, Disney's Aladdin, Theo Van Gogh's Submission, Looking for Comedy in the Muslim World, Rubber duck hostage videos, the movie 300, the PBS documentary Islam vs. Islamists, Jihad the Musical, True Lies, Michael Savage or Paul Harvey.

* Food involving Burger King ice cream cones, Passover cookies. pork, alcoholic beverages, Quebec day-care lunch menus, hot-cross buns, Cola Cola, Easter Eggs, Ham Sandwiches, peanut butter and jelly sandwiches served in jail, and parking lot signs smirkingly labeled "the Porking Yard."

* Music in general, but also rap CDs with Quranic verses. an award winning Spanish song, a party honoring the late rock star Freddy Mercury, Mozart, Gospel music in a church van, and rock singers who bare their chests.

* Animals and inanimate objects resembling them including piggy banks, the Chinese "Year of the Pig", toy pigs, pig-shaped stress relievers, Piglet from Winnie the Pooh, the story of The Three Little Pigs, dogs, guide dogs, teddy bears, and lost dog posters.

* Public figures such as Walid Shoebat, Kamal Saleem, Zachariah Anani, Daniel Pipes, Ayaan Hirsi-Ali, MP Phil Woolas (UK), Virgil Goode, Jack Straw, bloggers, the US Congress, Paris Mayor Bertrand Delanoe, the Mayor of Mirfield and Robert Bennett.

* Women and depictions of women including the passport photo of a five year-old girl, women who allow themselves to be raped, Egyptian feminist Nawal al-Saadawi, femailes who hug men in public, the anatomy of female mannequins, female dolls, pin-ups on RAF jets, breast feeding, Britney and Madonna, male gynecologists, the word "women", refusing to wear the hijab, Benazir Bhutto and Nouriya Al Subeeh.

* Books, publications and various writers such as Salmon Rushdie's "Satanic Verses", books by Egyptian feminists, French and German newspapers, the Tampa Flyers, the Nobel Prize winning author Naguib Mahfouz, Harry Potter,the autobiography of Norwegian politician Carl I. Hagen "Ærlig talt", Bangladeshi feminist writer Taslima Nasreen, the National Review and Mark Steyn.

* Various types of clothing including western-style trousers, colored underwear, the Nike "flame" logo, Italian soccer t-shirts, Iraqi tennis players who wear shorts.

Just avoid mentioning any of these topics in public and you may be able to be avoid being brought up on charges before Canada's various, august Human Rights Commissions.

Update: Mark Steyn's Scandal exposes the corruption endemic to this travesty of a sham of a faux "Commission."

Texas-sized tip o' the hat to: Amboy Times

Friday, January 18, 2008

What LGF looked like in February 2001

 
If you had surfed to Little Green Footballs in February 2001, this is what you would have seen.

I like the modern LGF better.

Hat tip: Wayback Machine