What would you say if you saw a man wearing a ball and chain walking down Lexington Avenue?  Would it startle you?  It startled me to see a woman in a burqa pushing a baby carriage down Lexington Avenue last week.  Although it’s no longer unusual to see women wearing headscarves and even full body covering in New York, this is the first up-close burqa I’ve seen since a trip to Afghanistan in 1973.  In those pre-multi-culti days, Kabul was considered one of the most primitive places in the world and one made adjustments in comparative cultural expectations based on a 12th century lifestyle of open sewers, no residential electricity and the exclusion of women from public view.  Those who think that nuns’ habits or Chasidic women’s garb is a western counterpart to the burqa have never seen the de-humanization of a woman without a face.  In addition to the myriad cultural symbols attendant to the disappeared female, there are the visual problems that ensue for women who see the world from behind a grid.  And just as we would find it unacceptable to watch an enslaved man on public view, even if this were his disturbed, voluntary choice, we are shocked to see the symbol of an enslaved woman parading in our midst.

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In other words, like much of the world, Italy for decades allowed itself to be blackmailed by OPEC.

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Netanyahu does what comes naturally. He stands by the demonstrators. He also does the diplomatic thing and keeps mum on Obama while giving a reluctant Gregory a lesson in democracy and immoral equivalency.

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Michael Ledeen has a letter from Mousavi. He is not amused:

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A hiker missing for three days in North Cascades National Park has been found safe.  Doctors say he is cold, hungry, and somehow “married” to a bear.

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Dr. Srdja Trifkovic sent in the following:

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Thanks to the Newsbusters web site for pointing out that a recent New York Times/CBS News poll on health care was skewed to show that most Americans favor President Obama’s position.

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I also know that Iran’s women stand in the vanguard. For days now, I’ve seen them urging less courageous men on. I’ve seen them get beaten and return to the fray. “Why are you sitting there?” one shouted at a couple of men perched on the sidewalk on Saturday. “Get up! Get up!”Another green-eyed woman, Mahin, aged 52, staggered into an alley clutching her face and in tears. Then, against the urging of those around her, she limped back into the crowd moving west toward Freedom Square. Cries of “Death to the dictator!” and “We want liberty!” accompanied her.

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The ABC television network has decided to drop the apparently over-burdensome pretense of being an unbiased news source. Next Wednesday, they’ll be broadcasting from inside the White House, presenting America with president Barack Obama’s vision for nationalizing health care. Dissenting voices? Off limits.

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I’m not the only one, but I’ve been saying for a few years now that the power of the Internet to move data quickly and at little to no cost will overhaul the music industry, taking power away from big record companies and retailers and allowing artists to market themselves directly to fans.

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For those of you who aren’t climate change experts, here’s a great little cheat sheet to help you understand the absurdity of the energy bill now under debate in the Congress.

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Qatar’s English daily,The Peninsular,provides us with the information MSM does it’s best to hide for it does not support the claim that Obama’s caution has been reciprocated or prevented the US from becoming “the issue.” The chants were too complex not to have been carefully orchastrated:

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Ok, so police in Northern Ireland arrested two teens in connection with a series of attacks on Gypsy families this week, according to the Associated Press. 

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Unlike, literally, every other politician in America, a real man is running for office. His name is Jesse Petrilla and he is running for City Council of Rancho Santa Margarita. Balkans-savvy readers should know that Petrilla also happens to be one of the only non-Serb Americans who knows the score in the Balkans. Witness his 2007 piece “My Trip to Kosovo and Bosnia.”

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I hope Barack Obama takes the time to read Ayatollah Khamenei’s speech. He would find it most educational. For the Supreme Leader, as Obama likes to call him, has not directed his rhetorical fire at his most forthright detractors, France and Germany. No, he directed them, as he always did and would have done if Obama had been more forthright in his response, at the United States. If president Obama hoped his “tepid” response would undermine Khamenei’s ability to posit America as the enemy (second, of course, to the Zionists), he was wrong. In other words, he betrayed American values in a manner that disgusted EVEN the editors of the Egyptian government daily Al Ahram and got “Death to America” chants in return.

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An Iowa school district hired a collection agency to collect lunch money debts. When asked if they thought it would work, a spokesperson replied, “Have YOU ever tried swinging from the monkey bars with broken thumbs?”

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While the gay community is good at dishing it out, apparently it can’t take any ribbing back.

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Regarding the security of Israel, the United States, and the free world Stephens said, “Assurance does not lie in diplomacy … or a military strike. The only way we will have security is if the nature of the regime changes.”

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The head of Israel’s military intelligence argues that Street protests beginning of end for Iran

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Kids in Massachusetts played a 36-hour, 101-inning baseball game for charity.  The charity part was when they decided to let the Nationals win.

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I know he’s not dead yet, but like so many newspapers which compose obituaries years in advance of a major figure’s death — just to be ready — I’ve been sitting on this one for a while. And I just couldn’t wait anymore. I also figured it’s best to publish now, since it’s wrong to speak ill of the dead.

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First, a recent news item, about which JihadWatch.com’s Robert Spencer would say “tiny minority” alert:

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For months as I listened to all the “conversation” about the “green shoots” and watched the stock market going up and up, I had a funny feeling that something is not on the up and up but I dared not write a word. On what basis? But last night I tuned in to the last minutes of the Charlie Rose show and heard Michael Lewis, the man Rose said was described to him “as best writer about economics today,” express similar sentiments:

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Does anyone remember when liberals were champions of human rights and freedom? I don’t mean their infatuation with their PC domestic agenda, such as gay marriage or amnesty for illegal aliens. I mean the JFK, “I can assure you that every degree of mind and spirit that I possess will be devoted to the long-range interests of the United States and to the cause of freedom around the world” kind of freedom. So what’s president Barack Obama’s response to thousands of Iranian protesters putting their lives on the line against a totalitarian regime? He doesn’t want to “meddle” in Iran’s affairs.

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President Obama: We are good boys. You may do anything you wish to your people and we will remain respectfully silent:

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Why are Iranians questioning the validity of the election results? Well, consider the case of Kerman, a city of half a million located in the southeast part of the country. According to the election map published this morning in the NYT, Ahmadinejad won over 70% of the votes in Kerman province.

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Benjamin Netanyahu says he supports the establishment of a Palestinian state as long as it has no military capabilities…or a Home Depot.

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There is a popular notion that the world has changed dramatically with the election of a new American President and that the United States will not be challenged by ambitious peer competitors and rogue states in the coming decades. While this is a hopeful concept, it is also inaccurate.

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For those of you with fathers, take time out this coming Sunday to do something special for him. I was with one of my sons last weekend and we got to talking about how quickly time goes by. We were comparing dates in my life as compared to dates in his. You know how you do; you look back twenty or thirty years and begin to realize how quickly time goes by.

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By the way Moussavi is no Moderate or reformist either. You Americans are interesting people. Get with the program - Moussavi is the means we used as an excuse to tear the regime apart.

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David Letterman has apologized for a very bad joke about Sarah Palin’s daughter. Palin has accepted the apology. All’s well that ends well?

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