Ahmadinejad is not a warrior for Allah.  He is a warrior for Gaia.

In one fell swoop, he states that he plans to launch an action which will not only cool the planet, but also "thin the herd" to combat overpopulation.

By launching a nuclear strike against Israel, Ahmadinejad would trigger a nuclear war and a regional conflagration, both of which would kill millions.  Interested nations (i.e. nations that use petroleum derivatives) would likely intervene, thereby raising the death toll.

This combination--the massive amount of nuclear fallout, which would trigger a "nuclear winter" and reverse the increasing global temperature; the large decrease in human population, which would decrease the amount of fossil fuels burned for fuel; and the destruction of the infrastructure of nations which supply petroleum, which would lead to further reduction of fossil fuel consumption and use of renewable sources of energy--would accomplish so much for the "Earth".

Ahmadinejad is merely a visionary in being able to foretell what he can accomplish through the destruction of a nation once described by a French diplomat as a "sh---y little country".  He can save the world.

No wonder Europe and the American left has no desire to do anything to counter Ahmadinejad, despite the fact that he has many times committed acts of war against the United States and her allies.

Everything makes so much more sense when you throw common sense out the window.  Additionally, if anyone would like to dispute anything I've written, call a doctor.  It's all written in jest.  Kind of.

I hope.

Non-breaking news:

The only nations and peoples covered under the Geneva Convention protections are signatories of the Conventions.  Terrorists, to include AQ, have not signed the Conventions.  They do not, therefore, have any protections under the Conventions.

Additionally, protections for terrorists are conspicuously absent from later additions to the Conventions, which include protections for guerrillas.

The only thing which requires U.S. good treatment of captured (non-U.S. citizen) terrorists is the American concept of Justice (and the UCMJ).

Back to your regularly scheduled mundanity. 

Mundanity is a word.  I looked it up.

A HAMAS Mickey Mouse clone accused of inciting hatred of Israel had one last shot to fire: he was killed by a fictional Israel.

That'll do wonders for the Palestinian children.

When a nation has nothing but hatred of the "other" to justify its existance, it is a nation not worthy of existance.  Palestine does not deserve to exist as a nation. 

The Roman Catholic Archbishop of Zimbabwe has called on Great Britain to invade her former colony and depose the dictator Bob Mugabe.

I'm not surprise the ineffectual African Union has done nothing.  Especially as the most powerful member of the AU, South Africa, is an apologist for Mugabe.

Supra-national organizations are hamstrung by their member's competing interests.  Supra-national organizations seek their easy, short-term interests, rather than their hard, long-term interests.  That is b/c they have too many politicians making their decisions.

The next time you hear someone complain about the coming American Theocracy, make a citizen's arrest, charging the person with blasphemy...

Oh, wait, that's ludicrous.

But not in Bangladesh, where a journalist faces death by hanging, or a slow death in prison, for supporting Israel and for blasphemy.

Salah Uddin Shoaib Choudhury supports Israel and has a problem with Madrassas teaching children to hate, rather than reading, writing, and arithmetic.

At least the Bangladeshi gov't is in control:

"Although the government privately agreed to drop the charges, which officials quietly admitted were false, the Public Prosecutor said in the brief court session that he intends to proceed with the case. "

Or not. 

This charlie foxtrot is after Choudhury was tortured for 17 months.

This is why (or one of the reasons why) I fail to understand moral relativism.

"There is little chance, however, that Amnesty's appeal will have any impact on Iranian authorities..."

Thank you, Captain Obvious.

Iran continues to hold American citizens hostage, while the gov't of the U.S. continues to do nothing visible.  The U.S. may be doing something backalley, but such actions are worthless against a regime that held American hostages for over a year, at the birth of the regime.  Iran has yet more evidence that the U.S. will do nothing (until, possibly, it is too late) in response to provocations and acts of war. 

Iran continues to arm and supply Iraqi insurgents.  Iran continues to have its personnel on the ground, in Iraq, aiding and assisting the insurgents.  The U.S. does nothing. 

Perhaps the U.S. is moving behind the scenes, but in this instance, behaving quietly is as bad as doing nothing.  Iran can be seen to publicly defy the U.S. and get away with it, thereby establishing the pecking order of nations for those as yet unaligned. 

The reason the U.S. does nothing, of course, is that the U.S. lacks to resolve to follow through on any ultimatums it issues.

No further comment necessary: "Israel won't risk security to bolster Abbas."

Sometimes the devil you know isn't any better than the devil you don't.

Maybe it's time we just drop a bomb on Los Alamos. 

It seems as though America's enemies get just as much knowledge out of Los Alamos as does the U.S. (I exaggerate).  The PRC is probably the second leading employer at Los Alamos.

To anyone who thought it was no big deal that Harvard accepted a virtually illiterate Talib:

Massachusetts FBI agents warn local colleges of the dangers of espionage.

According to the Bureau, foreign agents conduct economic espionage by building spy networks in three ways:

1. They aggressively target and recruit susceptible people (often from the same national background) working for U.S. companies and research institutions
2. They recruit people to locate economic intelligence through operations like bribery, discreet theft, dumpster diving (in search of discarded trade secrets), and wiretapping; and
3. They establish seemingly innocent business relationships between foreign companies and U.S. industries to gather economic intelligence including classified information[.]

Susceptible=likely to be blackmailed; or vain; or greedy; or an ideological "true believer"; or whatever. 

Talk about a target rich environment.

Just some bits to think about:

Russian spy activity against the U.S. has reached Cold War levels according to a U.S. counterintel chief.

A fifth person has been convicted in the Mak spying (a spy ring which provided U.S. military technology to the PRC) case. 

I found the stories are originally linked at cicentre.com. 

I think I'd like to delve into some needless hyperbole.

And why not?  This is a blog, after all.

For years, the left has accused the President and Karl Rove of attempting to destroy the two party system in America.  I am beginning to agree.  Only it's not the DNC that the President is attempting to eliminate.

I'm not saying that all these illegals, soon to be amnestied (heaven forbid), will magically vote DNC, or that by rejecting amnesty the GOP will forever banish the minority voter from their ranks.

I'm saying that the President is so, needlessly, dividing the coalition that makes up the GOP, with his insistence on the amnesty bill.  It's gotten so bad that I can no longer buy anything made in Texas because a bunch of "businessmen" in Texas have gotten together to buy television adverts calling for "comprehensive immigration reform" (amnesty).

I'm sorry, if these businessmen cannot find workers in America (Jobs Americans won't do--JAWD--under a different guise), then they should go to Mexico, etc and recruit workers, assist those workers through the visa process and demonstrate to an immigration official that this immigrant will fill an important role, that an American cannot fill. 

The prospective immigrant, if found to fill an important role, would then be granted one of the extant temporary visas--agricultural worker, medical worker, skilled labor, unskilled labor, etc--and would be free to enter the country and work the duration of the visa.  This legal temporary would be eligible to apply to become a permanent resident or just have the temporary worker visa renewed indefinitely.  They'd be in the same situation that the President wants to put illegal immigrants in.

The difference, and an important one it is, is that they would not have broken the law.  They would not be one of 12million amnestied law breakers.  People who break the law would not be rewarded for having done so (don't get me started on the Administration's treatment of the NorK situation).

This bill is a cancer.  It serves no purpose that cannot be fulfilled currently, with a little effort.  It is separating good conservatives like Sandra Wise and BrianR, needlessly.

Luckily, the bill appears to be lost in the government ether.

Gee, bribery doesn't encourage responsible behavior?

How surprising.

Agreed Framework, part II appears to be producing the same results of Agreed Framework, part I, only more quickly.

Apparently I don't love America.

That, at least, is the claim of the White House regarding those who oppose the current immigration bill.

The WH has a nasty habit of denigrating its allies.  Those who questioned the wisdom of the Harriet Myers nomination were called misogynists by spokesmen and apologists of the WH.   Currently, those who oppose the McCain-Kennedy immigration bill are labeled "xenophobes" and "nativists".

Regarding the former, any time someone's qualifications consist of that person's identity, then I am skeptical, to put it mildly.  Regarding the later, when the main selling point is the introduction of a redundancy, then I am, again, skeptical.

The "z visa" is redundant.  There already exist temporary worker visas--for agricultural workers, unskilled workers, skilled workers, medical workers, et cetera--with the difference being that one need merely follow the law to obtain such a visa.  It is likely that many unskilled workers have not heard of such visas, but employers who "require" such workers are in no way hindered from recruiting such workers and assisting them in acquiring such visas.  Ergo, the "z visa" is an unnecessary redundancy and serves no purpose but to legalize those who have already broken the law.  That sounds an awful lot like amnesty to me.

Now, to the question of "loving America": why does loving America require being in favor of what is, effectively, amnesty? 

Allegedly, such workers are necessary to do jobs Americans won't do, but if those workers were not illegal, and the legitimate market set the wages, then Americans would likely be willing to do the work.

Such workers are also necessary, allegedly, to continue American traditions of hard work and self-reliance (and prop up the burgeoning welfare state).  The problem is that illegals have the highest rates of all manner of social pathologies, from high school drop out rates, to teenage pregnancy, and children born out of wedlock. 

Most importantly, from a national security perspective, is that the continued inflow of illegal immigrants provide corrupt Latin American regimes with a means to vent potentially destabilizing youth out of their country.  These illegal immigrants send remittances back to prop up the inefficient economies of those countries.  This ensures the continued existence of such illiberal, corrupt, and insular regimes.  Such regimes are inherently unstable and potentially explosive.  Continually accepting these illegal immigrants guarantees that these regimes will not reform and will remain a powder keg to our south.

This powder keg is exacerbated by the failure of "capitalism" to produce the promised results, which enhances the attractiveness of populist socialism.  Such a governance nearly guarantees negative reform in those countries.  Socialist nations require scapegoats (c.f. Venezuela and the Islamic Republic of Iran).  That scapegoat will naturally be the nation that props them up--the U.S.A.

Illegal immigration is a dagger at our throats.

Related Topic:
The purpose of immigration should be to benefit the host nation.  Shouldn't the interests of the U.S. be best served by accepting those best trained and best educated, rather than by the cast-offs of other nations?

I've noticed many times that too many on the left (and a few on the right) mistake identity for an argument.  Think about it, though: does the validity of an argument change if it's spoken by Sen McCain or Rep Johnson, as opposed to Mayor Guilliani or Sen Liebermann?

The simple answer is "no".  The validity of an argument is determined by whether or not the conclusion follows logically from the premises.

Consider, for example:
(Premise 1): If we are seriously engaged in a war on terrorism, then we must not limit ourselves to those who perpetrate acts of terrorism, but also target those who sponsor and support terrorism (sponsorship and support are different animals: I'll explain later if anyone has any desire to read it).
(Premise 2): Iraq is a supporter of terrorism and was justly invaded.
(Conclusion): We are seriously engaged in a war on terrorism.

Some of you, no doubt, recognize immediately the problem with the argument--the structure, not the premises: we'll address that later.  Others will merely note that something feels off about the argument.

Something is off about the argument.  It is the logical fallacy of affirming the consequent.  Basically, it states: A->B.  B, therefore A.  To provide more concrete examples: If you are in Houston, then you are in Texas.  You are in Texas, therefore you are in Houston.

Put that way it is easy to see the problem, in both the example and the original argument.  A valid argument might go like this:
(Premise 1): If we are seriously engaged in a war on terrorism, then we must target both those who perpetrate acts of terrorism, as well as those who sponsor and support such acts.
(Premise 2, minor): A serious war on terrorism must not be limited to those who attacked us September 11, but must also include those who share the goals and methods of AQ.
(Premise 3): Iraq was a supporter and sponsor of terrorism.
(Conclusion): A serious war on terrorism would include Iraq.

Formal logical fallacies are not the most prominent of those utilized by the illogical (the other formal logical fallacy is that of denying the antecedent: If you are in Houston, then you are in Texas.  You are not in Houston.  Therefore, you are not in Texas.  Obviously invalid).  More common are informal fallacies, such as appeal to pathos (pity), ad hominem attacks, appeal to authority, and appeal to popular opinion.

The most common fallacious argument that I've seen is: we've lost over 3,000 service members in Iraq.  Therefore, we should leave Iraq.  There is also the unspoken minor premise that service members should not be in harm's way.  The conclusion does not follow from the premises.  The intent of the argument is to make one feel sorry for the person making the argument and concurring because of that pity.

The problem here is that if service members are engaged in a fight vital to the national interest, or in which departure would create circumstances very negative to the national interest, then the number of dead is irrelevant.

A favorite argument of parryisle is that persons who have not served in the military should not be able to make decisions to send service members into battle.  This is an appeal to authority.  It apparently does not matter if the same argument is made by a veteran and a non-veteran.  It also apparently does not matter that the U.S. has civilian control of the military.  Logical inconsistency is the hallmark of the fallacious argument.

Now, we come to the point of how to rebut a valid argument.  Most of those I attempt to engage resort to ad hominem attacks or merely accuse me of being wrong.  I may be (but I doubt it--I don't think the universe could handle such an occurrence).  The proper method is to question the legitimacy of the premises.  Perfectly valid arguments can lead to wrong results.  It is a case of garbage in, garbage out.  If the premises are incorrect, then it matters not that the conclusion logically follows from those premises.

I seriously doubt this will reach anyone in need of such advice, but that is the nature of the beast.

Maybe there is hope for the amnesty bill (from an e-mail to Jonah Goldberg appearing in the Corner):

...
MYTH: The bill will cost the taxpayers billions in welfare benefits and other services.

· FACT: In the bill, fines for hiring an illegal worker are $1 Kajillion maximum per illegal worker for the first offense, $2 Kajillion maximum per illegal worker for the second, and $3 Kajillion maximum per illegal worker for the third.