Tonight, July 31, at 8:00 P.M. Phoenix time, WC and I will host "Voices of Freedom," a one-hour weekly show on KFNX 1100. See this time-zone chart (Refresh the page!) if you are in a different time zone than Phoenix, Arizona; click directly on the word "PHOENIX" to get a world map of time zones.
Tune in if you can! In addition to AM air time at the scheduled hour, KFNX offers live streaming at the station's web site. VOICES OF FREEDOM: THE SHOW THAT MAKES JIHADISTS CRY.
Muslims storm Protestant school in Jakarta, injuring 265 students
Over the week-end Muslim fanatics target a Christian school in the capital’s east side. Police evacuate the institute to protect students. Hundreds of police agents are now guarding it to prevent further violence.
Jakarta (AsiaNews) – Police evacuated the Christian Theological Arastamar Institute (STT SETIA) which is located in an eastern district of the Indonesian capital after it suffered damages during clashes between Christians and Muslims over the week-end. At least 1,500 students were moved to nearby police headquarters and a local Christian-based political party. The situation remains critical and further violence between opposite factions cannot be ruled out.
“The school foundation urged us to intervene to protect people,” said East Jakarta District Police Chief Senior Superintendent. “For this reason we moved everyone out.”
Last night hundreds of residents from the village of Kampung Pulo had taken up arms threatening to storm the school after being instigated by an imam at a local mosque who claimed that a bunch of Christian gangsters were coming to “protect” the school after it was attacked on Saturday by a Muslim mob, causing damage to the building and hurting hundreds.
In an attempt to solve the problem East Jakarta District Chief Murdani held a close door meeting with the warring parties to discuss the issue. At the same time though, he said that police would conduct a thorough investigation and check if the school’s legal status was in order and that it respected all building regulations. In case of violations he would issue orders to demolish the unlawful structures.
At present hundreds of agents are guarding the school and have orders to stop any act of violence and disarm people.
The Arastamar High School for Theology and Biblical Studies, locally known as STT SETIA, was established by Rev Mathew Mangentang in 1987.
The SST SETIA has more than 29 branches school across the country. In Jakarta alone it has thousands of students, including 265 who were injured in latest clashes.
Tensions between Christians and Muslims flared up on Saturday following rumours that a SETIA student had stolen a motorcycle that belonged to a Muslim from a neighbouring village.
Senny Manafe, a spokesperson for the school, rejected the accusation, claiming instead that the attacks were triggered by a trivial incident. In an attempt to chase a mouse in the street, a student threw a slipper against a house owned by a local Muslim. Outraged by the deed, the latter kicked and punched the student as people gathered drawn by the rumour that a Christian student had tried to steal the Muslim’s motorbike.
“Many students suffered various injuries to the head. Others were burnt by Molotov cocktails,” Manafe said.
The violence and charges against SETIA are the work of Risman Hadi, chairman of Muslim Brotherhood Forum of Kampung Pulo Village, who in the past opposed the opening and continued existence of the Christian institute.
Buried in my Google alerts, the following, entitled "There should be no doubt now that Obama is Socialist, Marxist, and Communist," appeared over the weekend in my inbox. In my view, the essay is an excellent analysis. Excerpt:
...The first thing to note is that he opened up his speech with a lie -
Tonight, I speak to you not as a candidate for President, but as a citizen - a proud citizen of the United States, and a fellow citizen of the world.
Do any of you out there truly believe that as a regular Joe American that you could go to Berlin in front of the Brandenburg Gate or the Victory Column and give a speech to 200,000 Germans? Is there anyone out there that as a regular Joe American would be able to get an audience with the German Chancellor? He was obviously there as a candidate for President otherwise his campaign would not have financed this trip. Also - pay particular attention to his use of “citizen.” It pops up frequently throughout this speech.
Remember, the term “Good Citizen” was used in communist Russia to delineate those who supported the government versus those who did not. Those who opposed the Russian government and Tsars were immediately sent to “re-education camps” because they were not good citizens and their speech against the government was politically incorrect (yes - this term originated in communist russia as well).
The second point to make about his opening statements is that he immediately threw down the race card....
Read the rest HERE at Driving The Loony Left Loonier. The essay is worth your time and provides information as to which euphemistic key words to listen for when Obama gives his speeches.
During his NAACP speech earlier this month, Sen. Obama repeated the term at least four times. "I've been working my entire adult life to help build an America where economic justice is being served," he said at the group's 99th annual convention in Cincinnati.
And as president, "we'll ensure that economic justice is served," he asserted. "That's what this election is about."...
[...].
"Economic justice" simply means punishing the successful and redistributing their wealth by government fiat. It's a euphemism for socialism.
In the past, such rhetoric was just that — rhetoric. But Obama's positioning himself with alarming stealth to put that rhetoric into action on a scale not seen since the birth of the welfare state....
Weekly Blog Talk Radio Show: August 1 — Colonel Gordon Cucullu
(This post stuck here for a few days. Please scroll down)
Listen to The Gathering Storm Radio Show, which WC and I cohost. The show broadcasts live every Friday beginning at noon, Pacific Time.
The call-in number is (646) 915-9870.
Callers welcome!
Friday, August 1 (60 minutes): Our guest today for most of the hour will be Colonel Gordon Cucullu. --------- You can listen to the August 1, 2008 edition of The Gathering Storm Radio Show, live or later, by CLICKING HERE.
Remember when hula hoops were just plain fun and also offered the benefit of exercise?
Now hula hoops are so much more. ------ An example of New Age thinking:
...At the end, instructor Noelle Powers puts on Mozart and teaches them to stretch with their hoops.
Powers tells her students that hooping is a meditative exercise, a workout for the body and mind. The hoop creates a sacred circle around them, she said, and can be a metaphor for life.
"You're in the middle of this circle, and you're the center, and whatever you decide to do and how you decide to act inside of that will either keep things up, or perhaps the hoop will fall," Powers said. "Then it's up to you to just pick it back up and start moving again."
"It might sound silly," added Martine "Hoopzilla" Koissy, 31, of North Bethesda, "but I feel like the hoop is spinning away the negativity that I have inside."...
Are we no longer capable of having some fun, without overanalyzing and imposing ideology?
You're right, Martine "Hoopzilla" Koissy. It does sound silly. And it is silly, too.
Weekends here at our house typically bring the odious task of mowing the lawn. This fellow (not Mr. AOW) decided that the mower had better start — or else!
A Milwaukee man was accused of shooting his lawn mower because it wouldn't start. Keith Walendowski, 56, was charged with felony possession of a short-barreled shotgun or rifle and misdemeanor disorderly conduct while armed.
According to the criminal complaint, Walendowski said he was angry because his Lawn Boy wouldn't start Wednesday morning. He told police quote, "I can do that, it's my lawn mower and my yard so I can shoot it if I want."
Check out the legal penalty he's facing: an $11,000 fine and over six years in jail.
Pastorius has named Mr. Walendowski "IBA Man of the Year."
Information about the show, which airs on Fox News Channel on July 26-27, 2008:
Unimaginable crimes -- fathers killing daughters, brothers killing sisters -- to restore their family's "honor." It's been all too common in places like Afghanistan, Pakistan, and the Middle East. But now a FOX News investigation exposes how this heinous crime against women has arrived in America.
Inversionism is a process in which an ideological group finds to its horror it has allied with or even become the "boogyman" it has assailed previously. In full panic mode, rather than reassess its situation, the group attempts to "invert" reality. This phonomena is everywhere these days.
No doubt, regular readers here will be able to cite numerous examples of inversionism. --------- In his first posting about inversionism, Max Publius cited this July 13, 2008 article from the Daily Mail:
A BBC drama has triggered a barrage of complaints after it showed gruesome images of a Muslim being beheaded.
Bonekickers, about a group of archeological sleuths, depicted an extremist Christian decapitating a man with a sword.
The bloody scene has prompted 100 complaints since it was broadcast on BBC1 on Tuesday evening.
[...]
The show, watched by 6.8 million, also sparked new claims of anti-Christian bias in BBC programmes.
One viewer wrote on the corporation's website: 'If it had been another religion portrayed in that manner, the PC police would have been up in arms about the nastiness and their rights not to have their religion ridiculed - as it was Christians, it was apparently OK.'
Last fall, in the season opener, the popular CBS television series Cold Case presented a similar case of inversionism. In that episode, a group of Christian high-schoolers stoned a wayward member of group. That's right — a stoning, in a modern American high school in 1998.
Additional reading: World Net Daily has two stories about the above episode of Cold Case, one here and one here.
Today, in the Twenty-first Century, who is carrying out stonings? Consider the following excerpt from this source:
Stoning is a brutal and outdated practice that is kept alive only by Muslims under Sharia rule. Although it has been practiced since biblical times, every other culture has systematically ceased the practice in favor of more humane forms of punishment. The torturous sentence leaves the victim in agony.
[...]
Typically, a stoning victim is first wrapped in cloth and buried up to the waist for men, or up to the chest for females. Then the crowd is to throw stones at the victim. However, it is very important that, “… no stone should be thrown that should kill with the first or second blow, or so small as a pebble to do no injury to the condemned.” (Hulagu's Web, 64) Stoning is a unique form of punishment in that there is no single executioner. The simplistic act of gathering the victim’s peers around him creates killers out of everyone.
Today, stoning is only practiced in Islamic culture in order to maintain the submission of its women and those in the lower cast.
[...]
Among the countries that still practice stoning are Afghanistan, Iran, Nigeria, Saudi Arabia, Sudan and the United Arab Emirates. Other Islamic countries denounce the practice as inhumane and indicate that the Qur’an provides no grounds for such a vicious practice. Those who practice stoning claim that it is demanded by Islam and have gone so far as incorporating it into their countries penal codes.
For some time, I've been saying, "I feel as if I'm living in an alternate universe." Max Publius's term, inversionism, however, better expresses the surreality with which we are confronted every day.
As ever, commenters are invited to share their own observations as to various manifestations of inversionism.
French anti-terrorist officers are searching for 28kg (61lb) of Semtex explosive missing from a depot in the suburbs of the city of Lyon.
France's interior ministry confirmed an investigation was underway, saying the manager of the site had been suspended.
Semtex is a powerful explosive favoured by terrorist groups as it is odourless and difficult to detect.
Police said detonators were also missing and that they are treating the theft "very seriously".
The depot, in a disused 19th century fort at Corbas, is used for storing explosives by a civil defence unit charged with the job of blowing up bombs and ammunition left over from the two world wars.
Police said the discovery that the Semtex was missing was made on Friday but admitted the explosives could have been taken up to a week ago.
In a statement released late on Friday the interior ministry said there had been "security failings" which had made the theft possible.
Police sources have declined to confirm a newspaper website report which said that the store had been unguarded.
Semtex, which was first made in the Czech Republic, is used in mining and demolition work.
A bomb containing about half a kilogram of the explosive caused the blast which brought down Pan Am flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, in 1988, killing 270 people.
See Bob's posting to find out why the story caught his eye!
Listen to The Gathering Storm Radio Show, which WC and I cohost. The show broadcasts live every Friday beginning at noon, Pacific Time.
The call-in number is (646) 915-9870.
Callers welcome!
Friday, July 25 (60 minutes): Our guest today for most of the hour will be Chaim of the web site Freedom's Cost. --------- You can listen to the July 25, 2008 edition of The Gathering Storm Radio Show, live or later, by CLICKING HERE.
...Mr. Paterson, who was a Clinton super-delegate and often joined her on the campaign trail, said the outcome of the November election would decide whether America moves beyond its legacy of slavery and segregation.
"Can America reject the crucible of race that has dictated and pervaded all of our history to embrace an African-American man who has the right polices for the next decade in this country?" he said. ------ He continued: "Can America go past the crippling way that we've shot ourselves in the foot over and over, denying opportunity to people who are bright, to people who are qualified, to people who are able because they didn't look like us, or they didn't come from where we came from, or they are from a different gender, or they are from the African continent? Can America push that away and find new leadership? We'll find out in the next few months what America can do."...
Governor Paterson isn't the only one saying that a vote against Obama is a vote motivated by racism. In fact, I've heard a similar view expressed in several private conversations with friends and family. For example, a few months ago, shortly after Obama became the presumptive nominee, I heard a similar view expressed by one of my best friends living in Illinois: "A lot of people won't vote for Obama because he's black." Obviously, my Illinois friend is convinced that race will be the deciding factor in November. The converse could also be true, of course: some voters might well cast their ballots for Obama to prove to themselves that they are not racists.
How do voters make their ballot-box decisions? I'm not sure that we know the full answer. Certainly, relying on soundbites and the front-page headlines of newspapers, many American voters do not take the time to study the candidates' platforms. Furthermore, Americans often vote "by their gut," sometimes even unable to explain why they voted a particular way. Such methods of deciding how to cast the ballot give Obama's message of hope and change significant power at the polls — as does the race card, one way or the other, whether it should or not, because Americans prefer a simplistic view of politics.
Sadly, when the November election is over and done with, analysis of the factors leading to the outcome will be issued on a gut level as well. And, in keeping with human nature, each of us will concentrate on reading the views of those with whom we most agree.
For those who may not have before seen the following, I'll close with "Obama words: what he really thinks of white folks," from YouTube:
YouTube Link, where you can read additional information and comments
UPDATE: See the video "Little Tin God Obama" at Gayle's site!
Some Greenie Trouble At The Democratic National Convention
(With a hat-tip to Raven, who emailed me the following link)
Sometimes, the Sunday funnies can be found in the news section:
DENVER Throwing the "greenest national political convention to date" is easier said than done, as Democrats are learning the hard way.
Amid much fanfare, Democratic National Convention officials have for months promoted their commitment to an environmentally sustainable event.
They've hired a first-ever "director of greening," set an ambitious recycling goal of 85 percent, and banished plastic water bottles and plastic foam cups from the premises.
[...]
The biggest environmental disaster to befall the convention hit two weeks ago, when the Barack Obama campaign announced that the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee would make his acceptance speech at Invesco Field at Mile High stadium.
The decision to move to the stadium threw a Chernobyl-sized wrench into the sustainability plan. Switching the venue from the Pepsi Center, which seats fewer than 20,000, to Invesco, which holds 78,000, threatens to saddle the convention with the Shaquille O'Neal of carbon footprints.
According to the above-cited article, a blogger has done some numbers crunching:
The Invesco Field speech could, therefore, result in more pollution emissions than all four days and nights combined of the Republican National Convention in St. Paul, Minn., according to the blogger's estimates.
"Who knew Obama's ego would be so costly ... to the environment?" concluded [blogger] RiNOsaurusRex in an article titled "Obama Speech is Environmental Disaster."
The article in the Washington Times continues:
Things are simpler in St. Paul, where organizers of the Republican National Convention are taking a more laissez-faire approach to the event's environmental sustainability.
Greenies, take note! Obama and his monumental ego are damaging the environment! Not to mention all his hot air pouring carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.
Regular readers here know that I am no atheist. In fact, I am a Christian.
I have posted the above video of atheistic orientation because the video makes points which the West needs to consider in its dealings with the Muslims amongst us. Thus far, too many of us, particularly our leaders, are not considering those points enough to ensure the survival of our culture of freedom! Instead, denial prevails. Such denial will serve only to make matters worse.
Additional reading and worth your time: Cassandra USA's Letter to Muslims.
Weekly Blog Talk Radio Show: July 18 — Cassandra USA
Listen to The Gathering Storm Radio Show, which WC and I cohost. The show broadcasts live every Friday beginning at noon, Pacific Time.
The call-in number is (646) 915-9870.
Callers welcome!
Friday, July 18 (60 minutes): Our guest today for the full hour will be Cassandra USA. --------- Cassandra USA is the author of Escape! From an Arab Marriage: Horror Stories of Women Who Fled From Abusive Muslim Husbands and Thirty-Three Secrets Arab Men Never Tell American Women: A Dissection of How Muslims Treat Women and Infidels. The topic under discussion: shari'a finance.
You can listen to the July 18, 2008 edition of The Gathering Storm Radio Show, live or later, by CLICKING HERE.
Because our KFNX show "Voices of Freedom" utilizes the music from the film Patton as our theme song and debuts tomorrow, Thursday, July 17, at 8:00 PM Phoenix Time, below is an updated message from the general (some adult language):
Key elements of Christian doctrine are offensive to Muslims, the Archbishop of Canterbury has said in a letter to Islamic scholars.
[...]
His comments came in a published letter to Islamic leaders, intended to promote closer dialogue and understanding between the two faiths.
However they come just months after Dr Williams was forced to clarify comments in which he said some parts of Islamic law will "unavoidably" be adopted in Britain.
[...]
Discussing differences between the religions, Dr Williams acknowledges that Christian belief in the Trinity is "difficult, sometimes offensive, to Muslims".
The Trinity is the Christian doctrine stating God exists as the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit and conflicts with Islamic teaching that there is one all-powerful God....
Late last year, we thought Sheba was a goner. In fact, we very nearly had Sheba euthanized on January 19.
Then we changed to a new veterinarian, one proficient in feline geriatrics! ---------- Dr. Villar came to our home and spent a full forty-five minutes with Sheba on January 22. As a result of Dr. Villar's recommendations, Sheba is on a new regimen, one which has worked beautifully. Of course, after Mr. AOW and I saw what an outstanding vet Dr. Villar is, we switched all our cats over to get their medical care from him.
Today Sheba turns twenty years old. Though she occasionally widdles on her blankie (a bathmat with an oil-drip pan underneath), she eats like a pig and even chases the laser dot with her front paws.
We know that Sheba's time with us is limited. But as long as she has a decent quality of life, we'll continue to enjoy her company and her love.
In a discussion about the recent cover of the New Yorker magazine, Brian Kilmeade, one anchor of Fox and Friends, said, "I've been on the Internet. It's a scary place."
Yeah, Brian. We bloggers are scary, all right. Get used to it.
I decided to send "Fox and Friends" an email: ------------- In the first hour of today's show, Brian said, "I've been on the Internet. It's a scary place."
Scary???
The blogosphere is neither perfect nor always accurate. We aren't professional journalists, after all. Nevertheless, it would behoove the mainstream media to do some reading of certain sites on the web and stop ignoring the valid stories which break and are discussed in the blogosphere -- the stories which you will not tell or cover in any depth.
I hope that you understand that the mainstream media is losing credibility -- and why.
We bloggers are the pamphleteers of the Twenty-first Century. Get used to it.
In my view, this story is just one more illustration of the hypersensitivity pervading our culture, thanks to political correctness and the emphasis on self-esteem at all costs:
Zondervan faces $60M federal lawsuit over Bible, homosexuality
GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. (WOOD)--Christian publisher Zondervan is facing a $60 million federal lawsuit filed by a man who claims he and other homosexuals have suffered based on what the suit claims is a misinterpretation of the Bible.
[...]
[Bradley Fowler's] suit centers on one passage in scripture -- 1 Corinthians 6:9 -- and how it reads in Bibles published by Zondervan.
[...]
Fowler says his family's pastor used that Zondervan Bible, and because of it his family considered him a sinner and he suffered....
In addition to suing for $60 million, Fowler is demanding an apology, all because the passage in Corinthians caused him and others emotional and mental distress for the past twenty years. The "objectionable" Zondervan versions cited were published in 1982 and 1987.
Whoa-oa-oa! I feel good, I knew that I would, now I feel good, I knew that I would, now So good, so good, I got you
Whoa! I feel nice, like sugar and spice I feel nice, like sugar and spice So nice, so nice, I got you
When I hold you in my arms I know that I can't do no wrong and when I hold you in my arms My love won't do you no harm
And I feel nice, like sugar and spice I feel nice, like sugar and spice So nice, so nice, I got you
So good, so good, I got you HEY!!
We need new lyrics for our litigious-crazed society: "I feel bad. I knew that I would now...." The possibilities are endless — even new words using information from "The List of Things That Offend Muslims." Or perhaps we could create new words for the music by using a list of things that offend infidels.
Any lyricists out there? This little activity can be such fun!
Thanks to Chaim, who notified me of the following at the left-leaning UK blog Harry's Place:
We’re Being Sued By Hamas UK Last Friday, in the wake of a closely argued debate about whether Mohammed Sawalha, the President of the British Muslim Initiative, had used the phrase “Evil Jew” or “Jewish Lobby” in a speech, Harry’s Place received a letter. The letter is from Dean and Dean, a firm of solicitors who are acting for Mr Sawalha. Mr Sawalha has demanded that we take down certain articles from Harry’s Place..."
The nerve of IslamoFascists is galling, they can say or do whatever they feel like but we, infidels, may not expose them. Hamas is now trying to stop a great British blog Harry’s Place from telling it like it is. How? By suing him! Regardless of your political views, right, left or in between… if they succeed in this case any of us could be next. I appeal to every blogger to post about this outrage, I appeal to every blogger to support free speech by publicizing this suit. It is a question of your rights and mine!...
Listen to The Gathering Storm Radio Show, which WC and I cohost. The show broadcasts live every Friday beginning at noon, Pacific Time.
The call-in number is (646) 915-9870.
Callers welcome!
Friday, July 11 (60 minutes): Our guest today at the bottom of the hour will be Jungle Mom of the blog The Jungle Hut. She will discuss with us the Iran-Venezuela connection. --------- You can listen to the July 11, 2008 edition of The Gathering Storm Radio Show, live or later, by CLICKING HERE.
Since 9/11, we have heard of the importance of more of us learning to speak Arabic. Indeed, more and more people today are studying the Arabic language, many of these students enrolled in community colleges and prestigious universities as well as uncounted others studying by using software such as Rosetta Stone. I personally know a few young people who have attempted such classes, only to abandon their study of Arabic; the reasons they gave me, their former teacher, were vague but typically included a level of discomfort with the material or the instructor. --------- A July 5, 2008 Washington Postcommentary, written by a student at Harvard Law School, provides disturbing information about the material offered in such classes:
To study Arabic in America today is to be inducted into a world of longing, abandonment and regret. And that's before you even touch the political issues.
Most maps of the Middle East in "Al-Kitaab" [the curriculum used] do not include Israel, though a substantial minority of Israelis, both Jews and Arabs, are native Arabic speakers. Alongside simple Arabic poems, students read about anti-Western heroes such as Gamal Abdel Nasser.
The DVD that comes with "Al-Kitaab" includes footage of Nasser's mass rallies in Cairo -- including slogans in Arabic and French such as "Brother Nations in Struggle, We Are By Your Side." These scenes of totalitarian rage are fondly described by the narrator as "dreams of his youth."
The accompanying lesson describes the highlights of Nasser's career, including the nationalization of the Suez Canal and the formation of the United Arab Republic. No mention is made of Egypt's defeat in the Six-Day War or of Nasser's brutal, repressive rule. In my class, we were asked to recite a passage about Nasser to practice our vocalization. (I refused.)
The last lesson in the book -- which we skipped -- features Maha's mother speaking wistfully of her childhood in Palestine: "My childhood was taken from me!" Over mournful music on the DVD, she talks about returning to Jerusalem, as if she were a refugee, but the images suggest that she left voluntarily after the Six-Day War, when Israel offered citizenship to the Arab residents of East Jerusalem. The fact that Israel also claims Jerusalem as its capital is ignored.
My class watched three movies this semester, all with political themes. One was "West Beirut," which cast Christians as the prime bad guys in Lebanon's civil war (though, to be fair, there was plenty of hatred all around). Another was "The Tale of Three Jewels," an allegorical film about Palestinian nationalism that portrayed Israeli soldiers as bloodthirsty child-killers.
The third movie, "Destiny," told the story of the great medieval Islamic philosopher Averroes and his struggles against Islamic religious fundamentalism. It was a bit more nuanced than the first two. But the film omitted the fact that it was only through the Hebrew transcription of Averroes's writings by Jewish scholars in Egypt that his works were preserved for posterity.
Friends and relatives who have used "Al-Kitaab" at other American universities report similarly morose experiences.
[...]
...[T]here is something fundamentally wrong with this indoctrination into misery. Most introductory language classes avoid controversial political subjects. In fact, they often highlight the brighter side of different cultures. Particularly with the growing importance of Arabic, can't we do better?
The U.S. government has funded studies on anti-Semitism in Palestinian textbooks. Fairfax county officials have asked the State Department to investigate the teaching materials at a Saudi-funded school. "Al-Kitaab" is published by Georgetown University Press, with some assistance from the National Endowment for the Humanities. Perhaps we should also be looking into the content of the federally funded materials used in Arabic programs at our own universities.
According a friend of mine who studied Arabic as a second language in Saudi Arabia, lessons in The Kingdom included material much unlike primer readers to which most of us are accustomed. Specifically, beginning lessons used phrases such as "The sword is on the table," "The sword is under the table," and "The sword is behind the curtain." Certainly those phrases and their message are quite different from the early readers I encountered as a child, those primers including phrases such as "The cat is on the mat" and "See Spot run"!
Via a Google search of how language shapes thinking, I found the following essay entitled "Semanticide," by William Murchison at Human Life Review 1999:
George Orwell's stress on the distortive possibilities available in language remains fresh because of his descriptive and prophetic powers. Nineteen Eighty-Four sears the recollection, notwithstanding that when the title-year in question actually got here, the distorters-the Soviets-were stumbling toward ruin. Orwell's lesson is clear:Language shapes thinking; thinking shapes action. When language means other than it must, for a particular possibility to reach fruition, somebody is going to propose a new way of talking, and of understanding.
As the West rightly pursues the study of Arabic, precautions must be taken that the classes are not those of indoctrination and propagandizing. Instead, we have institutions such as the Islamic Saudi Academy instructing our military in Arabic. What else is being taught in those Arabic-language classes?
He's a criminal, but he "did the right thing" when it mattered - alerting cops to what he feared was a terror plot the day before the Fourth of July.
At about 5 p.m. yesterday, an unidentified thief with a police record broke into a red van that had been parked at 53rd Street and Second Avenue in Brooklyn's Sunset Park for about a month, a source told The Post.
He was stunned when he looked inside - it was filled with gas cans and Styrofoam cups containing a mysterious white substance with protruding wires and switches.
The street is lined with brownstones, and there's a ballet studio and a small Muslim school. So he drove the van 15 blocks to 37th Street and parked it at a desolate waterfront location behind the Costco store and next to some little-used piers.
Then he got out and called a cop he knows from his run-ins with the law.
"He did the right thing," a high-ranking officer said. "And he possibly saved a lot of people's lives."
Another source said cops are unlikely to file charges for the break-in.
The van had Delaware plates that had been issued to another vehicle. It's not clear when its cargo was put inside.
Police Commissioner Ray Kelly joined cops from the Bomb Squad and the anti-terror task force at the scene. Cops shut down three blocks.
An attack averted? An attack abandoned? Terrorism without any punch? You decide.
I'm not all doom and gloom, you know. ------ Item in the Washington Post:
ANIMAL WATCH
Kitty Is Too Stuffed to Move
Sunday, July 6, 2008; C03
TAKOMA PARK, Elson Street, 1500 block, June 3. A homeowner asked an animal control officer who was responding to a call from a nearby address to remove a dead kitten from a yard. The officer went into the yard and found that the kitten was a stuffed animal that appeared to be real.
Ever get the feeling that Big Brother is watching? Technology allows for more and more tracking of what we often believe is secure information. As you read below the fold, keep in mind that YouTube is the most frequently visited site on the web. -------- From this Australian news source:
YOUTUBE has been ordered to give up records of each clip watched on the popular video-sharing website, along with the date, time and IP address of each person who watched it, to media giant Viacom.
In a ruling that could have major implications for online privacy around the world, US District Court judge Louis Stanton granted Viacom access to the records as part of its ongoing copyright infringement lawsuit against Google and its subsidiary YouTube....
The judge stated:
"The motion to compel production of all data from the Logging database concerning each time a YouTube video has been viewed on the YouTube website or through embedding on a third-party website is granted."
According to the Washington Post's article on the same topic:
... [M]aking the records anonymous is not fail-safe. In 2006, an AOL researcher inadvertently posted three months' worth of searches typed in by 650,000 anonymous AOL users. Although their identities were masked -- each user was given a randomly generated unique identification number -- the search terms, which included names, home towns and interests, could be collated and used to identify a person, as an enterprising New York Times reporter showed.
The ruling and the response to it underscores the concerns about data collection and Web surfers' lack of control over the use of their personal data.
Jennifer Urban, a law professor at the University of Southern California, said that even if Viacom does not use the information to sue users, "a future litigant may not keep the information private."
What videos people view, what books they read, have long been considered sensitive information, she said, "intensely personal pieces of information we expect people to be able to keep private."
Cases addressing copyright infringement and even national security can put individuals' private data at risk. At least, such is my view. How do you see the issue?
Weekly Blog Talk Radio Show: July 4 — Warren, Mr. Beamish, & The Beak
THE PERFECT WAY TO CELEBRATE INDEPENDENCE DAY!
Listen to The Gathering Storm Radio Show, which WC and I cohost. The show broadcasts live every Friday beginning at noon, Pacific Time.
The call-in number is (646) 915-9870.
Callers welcome!
Friday, July 4 (60 minutes): Our guests today will be three staunch patriots — Warren, Mr. Beamish, and The Beak. --------- Warren served in the army, designed my avatar, and adminstrates here at Always On Watch. Beak works immigration control because, after 9/11, he wanted to serve and defend America. Mr. Beamish hasn't served, but his brother was aboard the USS Cole — not on board when the attack came, thank God. All are well read, of course.
You can listen to the July 4th edition of The Gathering Storm Radio Show, live or later, by CLICKING HERE.
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Tonight, July 31, at 8:00 P.M. Phoenix time, WC and I will host "Voices of Freedom," a one-hour weekly show on KFNX 1100. See this time-zone chart (Refresh the page!) if you are in a different time zone than Phoenix, Arizona; click directly on the word "PHOENIX" to get a world map of time zones.
