Behold the statue of The Dockworker in Amsterdam (found here via here). It stands between the Portugese Synagogue and the Jewish Historical Museum on Jonas Daniel Meijerplein Square.
What journalist wouldn’t want to be Paris Bureau Chief for Time magazine, or anything else? Sounds so glamorous. But look closer and the job qualifications — sharia-compliance — are more than a little off-putting, certainly as exemplified by the man with the job, Bruce Crumley, on weighing in on the bombing of Charlie Hebdo. Poor man. Full-blown, late-stage and terminal Dhimmitude.
I wasn’t even looking for this. I just went to the ISAF website to see whether the grossly underreported weekend murders of two American soldiers (and shootings of four others) by an Afghan security contractor — again — was considered newsy enough to post by the official powers that be. “The slayings bring to nine the number of U.S. soldiers who have been killed by rogue Afghan security force members, whether uniformed or private security contractors, in the past two months,” NBC reports.
Politico reports that Gen. Stanley McChrystal has been “summoned” to Washington from Kabul over “biting and unflattering remarks” he and his staff made to Rolling Stone magazine about members of the Obama administration, including Obama himself. The general is now winging homeward for a meeting with the president tomorrow. “The face-to-face comes as pundits are already calling for McChrystal to resign for insubordination.”
Over at National Review Online, Andrew C. McCarthy has written a judiciously authoritative overview of the Petraeus-Israel controversy, which occupied my blog in recent weeks, particularly as it became an exploration into the mindset of denial as exemplified by the writings of Max Boot (encapsulated here; more here). Andy weighs in on that aspect of the story as well. Indeed, he opens with it, writing:
US media seem to be missing a Big Piece of the post-election picture in Iraq, perhaps, as noted yesterday, because it is taking place in Iran. Asia Times, The Guardian, The Independent, the Irish Times have all noted, at the very least, the intriguing news, missed here as far as I can tell, that last week, Iraqi PM Maliki, in second place after the vote count with 89 setas to Allawi’s 91, sent emissaries to garner support for a ruling parliamentary coalition (153 seats) to Tehran, where they met with A-jad, and to Qom, where they met with Moqtada al-Sadr. But didn’t Maliki leave Shiite politics behind him, or something? Isn’t the Allawi “victory” — by two seats — an indicator that “secular” Iraq is here to stay? (Right.) Some would laugh, almost, but maybe we should just say time will tell.
Max Boot, who has taken the lead in defending Gen. Petraeus against the meaning of the general’s own Senate testimony, has responded to a lengthy post I wrote parsing this testimony and related material without addressing any argument I actually made. Boot prefers to address one that he invented: namely, that I claim that Petraeus learned, or, rather, “imbibed” his Arabist, anti-Israel attitudes from Stephen Walt.
The American Spectator reports that Gen. David Petraeus has “poured cold water” on the controversy caused by reports, later corroborated by testimony he submitted to the US Senate Armed Services Committee, that he views the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as driving unrest in the Centcom region, which includes Iraq and Afghanistan (and all that that implies for the security of our troops). After first dwelling on a detail of minor importance (that he didn’t ask the White House to extend Centcom’s jurisdiction to include Israel and the Palestinian Authority), he turned to the crux of the matter, his Senate testimony.
Earlier this week, New York State Governor David Paterson signed a bill into law that is sure to help derail �libel tourists� in their attempts to take New York authors and publishers for a ride to the book-pulping machine via expensive, speech-chilling foreign libel suits.
Rep. Sue Myrick, North Carolina Republican, is really doing things right. First, she calls for Jimmy “Hamas” Carter’s passport to be revoked; now, she has unveiled the �Wake Up America� Agenda, the first bold and coherent plan to use means at our disposal to begin to investigate, isolate and take appropriate measures against the jihadist threat inside the US.
I recently received an email from the father of Sgt. Evan Vela, who, having served his country in Iraq is currently, and wrongly, serving a ten year sentence in prison. Sgt. Vela’s father asked me to look into his son’s case because of the distinct parrallels between his son’s wartime dilemma in Iraq and that of the SEAL team in Afghanistan that was immortalized by former SEAL Marcus Luttrell in the best-selling book Lone Survivor.
