Rep. Charles Rangel compared Bush to southern racist: ''George Bush is our Bull Connor''
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Now Playing: Libtardation from Belafonte, Rangel and Hillary Clintax
Topic: Lib Loser Stories

(Better told) Story also at... Rush Limbaugh ** Hillary Cozies Up to Black Caucus Kooks

President Bush Is 'Our Bull Connor,' Harlem's Rep. Charles Rangel Claims

WASHINGTON - Comparing President Bush to the Birmingham, Ala., police commissioner whose resistance to the civil rights movement became synonymous with Southern racism, Rep. Charles Rangel said yesterday of the president: "George Bush is our Bull Connor."

Mr. Rangel's metaphoric linkage of Mr. Bush to the late Theophilus "Bull" Connor - who in 1963 turned fire hoses and attack dogs on blacks, including Martin Luther King Jr., demonstrating in favor of equal rights - met with wild applause and cheering at a Congressional Black Caucus town hall meeting, part of the organization's 35th Annual Legislative Conference.

Yesterday's town hall meeting was a highlight of the four-day conference, which today will feature an anti-Iraq-war forum with a roving, protesting anti-war mother, Cindy Sheehan; a prominent New York black activist, the Reverend Al Sharpton, and a former president of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, Kweisi Mfume. The conference culminates in a gala tomorrow evening.

Mr. Rangel, a Democrat who has represented Harlem for almost 35 years, spent his portion of yesterday's forum reminiscing about the civil rights struggles of the 1960s, and calling on his audience to undertake similar action today, inciting them to "revolution" after the devastation wrought by Hurricane Katrina and particularly its impact on indigent blacks in the Gulf Coast region.

The storm, he said, showed that "if you're black in this country, and you're poor in this country, it's not an inconvenience - it's a death sentence." Denouncing Mr. Bush for waging "a war that we cannot win under any stretch of our imagination" instead of providing for those devastated by the hurricane, Mr. Rangel left his audience with a parting thought.

"If there's one thing that George Bush has done that we should never forget, it's that for us and for our children, he has shattered the myth of white supremacy once and for all," the congressman said.

A White House spokesman, Kenneth Lisaius, said: "I don't think we would dignify any such inflammatory comments with a reaction."

Joining Mr. Rangel as town hall participants were Senator Clinton, a Democrat of New York; Senator Obama, a Democrat of Illinois; an entertainer and left-leaning activist, Harry Belafonte, and the conference's two cochairmen, Rep. Danny Davis, a Democrat of Illinois, and Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, a Democrat of Texas.

Mrs. Clinton and Mr. Obama arrived at the Washington Convention Center together yesterday, prompting the town hall forum's moderator and a Harvard law professor known for litigating slavery reparations, Charles Ogletree, to quip: "I just keep having in the back of my mind this bumper sticker that says 'Clinton-Obama' - I don't know why." Mr. Ogletree's suggestion was met with widespread, enthusiastic applause.

Before a similarly appreciative audience, and after exhortations that she stay in Washington "as long as possible," Mrs. Clinton urged support for her Senate legislation creating a "9/11 Commission"-style body to investigate what went wrong in the Katrina response and to oversee the rebuilding effort. She repeated her concern, cited in recent speeches, that "it is not confidence building that the first contracts issued went to Halliburton on a no-bid contract."

Mrs. Clinton, who seeks re-election to her Senate seat next year and is widely believed to be a potential presidential candidate in 2008, also discoursed on how Hurricane Katrina demonstrated the need for a more expansive federal government. Strategists and political analysts have said the national Democratic Party in 2006 and 2008 will likely seize on Katrina in an attempt to discredit the limited-government philosophies of Republicans, hoping to identify them as dangerous and inadequate for addressing massive national disasters.

"I believe that one of the great challenges we face is how we're going to define the role of government in the 21st century," Mrs. Clinton said yesterday. "And there are those, it won't surprise you, who want government to be limited to doing very few things, mostly national defense."

"Obviously, at a time where there are real dangers and threats, we have to be vigilant," Mrs. Clinton added. "But America must be strong at home in order to be strong around the world. And I don't believe that strength comes from turning our backs on what has been happening, and Katrina helped to sharpen the focus for many Americans and people around the world about issues that many of us have known about and worked on for a long time."

Saying that "we were embarrassed in front of the entire world that we didn't do the kind of job that people expect America to do to take care of Americans first and foremost," Mrs. Clinton urged Democrats later: "I don't think we should cede the moral high ground to anyone who tries to put forth a private moral agenda and ignore what is the most important part of what we are called to do, which is to do unto others as we would have them do unto us."

The senator was joined in offering advice to her party by Mr. Belafonte, who spoke of the Democratic Party as being "ravaged," wondering openly whether there was anything of the institution to save. The performer, a former civil rights activist, was flanked by Senators Clinton and Obama, who smiled and nodded as he excoriated Democrats and Republicans alike for their negligence toward blacks.

The "eradicating poverty" town hall meeting had several hundred in attendance at the Washington Convention center yesterday, and according to Caucus leaders, another 100,000 listened to the politicians' remarks over a live Web cast.

NY Sun ~ Meghan Clyne ** President Bush Is 'Our Bull Connor,' Harlem's Rep. Charles Rangel Claims

House backs religion-based school hiring
Mood:  special
Topic: News

House backs religion-based school hiring

WASHINGTON - The House voted Thursday to let Head Start centers consider religion when hiring workers, overshadowing its moves to strengthen the preschool program's academics and finances.

The Republican-led House approved a bill that lets churches and other faith-based preschool centers hire only people who share their religion, yet still receive federal tax dollars.

Democrats blasted that idea as discriminatory.

Launched in the 1960s, the nearly $7 billion Head Start program provides comprehensive education to more than 900,000 poor children. Though credited for getting kids ready for school, Head Start has drawn scrutiny as cases of financial waste and questions about academic quality have surfaced nationwide.

Overall, the House bill would insert more competition into Head Start grants, require greater disclosure of how money is spent and try to improve collaboration among educators in different grades.

Yet on Thursday, the dispute over religion eroded the bipartisan support for Head Start's renewal.

The House passed the bill 231-184; only 23 Democrats voted for it.

GOP lawmakers, with backing from the White House, contend that preschool centers should not have to give up their religious autonomy to receive federal grants.

"This is about our children, and denying them exemplary services just because the organization happens to be a religious one is just cruel," said Rep. Virginia Foxx, R-N.C.

The Republican plan would, for example, let a Catholic church that provides Head Start services employ only Catholic child care workers.

Democrats and Republicans offered different interpretations of whether the Constitution, federal law and court rulings protected - or prevented - federally aided centers from hiring based on religion.

"Congress should not be in the business of supporting state-sponsored discrimination," said Rep. Alcee Hastings, D-Fla. Said Rep. Lynn Woolsey, D-Calif.: "The (Republican) majority has decided to choose religious discrimination over what could have been a rare bipartisan agreement."

Billings Gazette ~ Associated Press ** House backs religion-based school hiring

Louisiana Governor Marco Blanco's Approval Rating in Free Fall
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Topic: Lib Loser Stories

Gov. Blanco's Approval Rating in Free Fall

The bottom has fallen out of Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Blanco's poll numbers, with her approval rating tumbling sharply in the wake of the Hurricane Katrina crisis.

While President Bush's approval rating has fallen by two or three points in most polls, Survey USA found that Gov. Blanco's favorability rating has dropped by a whopping nine points among Louisianans, from 50 to 41 percent since the last survey in August.

Gov. Blanco's negative numbers have shot up by an even higher margin - 13 points. In August, 43 percent disapproved of the way she was doing her job. Now, 56 percent give her a thumbs down.

Meanwhile, the same survey found that in Mississippi, which was also devastated by Katrina, Gov. Haley Barbour's approval rating is way up - to 58 percent.

It was 43 percent just four weeks ago - a 15 point improvement for Barbour.

Gov. Blanco's sagging poll numbers may be behind her latest effort to deflect blame for mishandling the Katrina crisis.

On Thursday she endorsed Sen. Hillary Clinton's call for an independent commission to investigate the disaster.

In a letter to President Bush Blanco urged:

"I am hopeful that you will join with me and others who have called for an independent commission to investigate this tragedy. . . .

"Only an independent, nonpartisan commission investigation that commands full support from the executive and legislative branches will accomplish what we need - a thorough, comprehensive review which is only concerned with getting to the truth."

News Max.com ~ Carl Limbacher ** Gov. Blanco's Approval Rating in Free Fall

Child-sex book canceled after World Net Daily report ~ Part of the title, ''Same-Sex Desire'' ~ defending pedophilia
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Now Playing: LIBTARD "VALUES" ALERT
Topic: Lib Loser Stories

This is EXACTLY what concerns me about the radical "gay rights" movement . . . give 'em an inch, they take a MILE . . . and this is where it will end up!

I would NOT let that man get within a mile of any kid. Academic study, or otherwise, to praise this bullshit tells me this bastard JUST might have some 'feelings' about YOUNG boys himself.

Child-sex book canceled after WND report

'Expert' author claimed sex good for 'nurturing,' 'mentoring' young boys

Two days after WND exclusively reported on a new book claiming sex with children "can benefit" boys and even serve a "mentoring function," the publishing company has announced it is canceling the book in light of the public outcry the story prompted.

"Same-Sex Desire and Love in Greco-Roman Antiquity and in the Classical Tradition of the West" features "scholarly" treatises by a raft of mostly-Ph.D. academics, all praising earlier civilizations – particularly Greece and Rome – for the role homosexuality played in those ancient cultures.

One chapter in particular, titled "Pederasty: An Integration of Cross-Cultural, Cross-Species, and Empirical Data," has Temple University's Bruce Rind Ph.D. praising the rampant child molestation that reportedly occurred in those societies, at one point citing evolution as supporting a pro-pedophilia worldview.

At one point, Rind writes:

Pederasty, or sexual relations between men and adolescent boys, is condemned in our society as an unqualified evil that maims and destroys. In ancient Greece, samurai Japan, and numerous other cultures, pederasty was seen as the noblest of human relations, conducive if not essential to nurturing the adolescent's successful intellectual and physical maturation.

In a statement e-mailed yesterday to WorldNetDaily from Sandy J. Sickels of Haworth Press, the publisher announced it has no interest in supporting "abuse against children and others":

The Haworth Press, Inc., has canceled publication of the book "Same-Sex Desire and Love in Greco-Roman Antiquity and in the Classical Tradition of the West." The company Board of Directors and Ethics Committee met on the matter and have voted not to proceed with publication of the book.

Our editors generally have sole authority over what they decide to publish in the journals and books they edit, and this good-faith agreement usually works well, but on occasion, an editor accepts something that sparks negative controversy.

We have decided not to go ahead with publication of this book. We wish to note the majority of this book deals with the historical aspect of homosexuality in ancient Greece and Rome, which is classified as scholarship. Readers have noted, however, that one chapter of the book could be interpreted as advocating adult and adolescent sexuality. We thank the public for bringing this to our attention.

Haworth publishes many valuable journals and books on the treatment and prevention of child sexual abuse (among other topics that address problems in our society), and we wish to reiterate our commitment to the treatment and prevention of all types of abuse against children and others.

The same author, Bruce Rind, embarrassed the American Psychological Association in 1999 when it published a report by Rind disputing the harmfulness of child molestation. Titled "A Meta-Analytic Examination of Assumed Properties of Child Sexual Abuse Using College Samples," the report, which claimed child sexual abuse could be harmless and beneficial, was published in the APA's official peer-reviewed journal.

"Adult-child sex" is the next big "sexual liberation" movement on its way, warns David Kupelian, WND's managing editor and author of the "The Marketing of Evil."

"It's amazing how devious these people are. To mainstream sex with children, they resort to pseudo-scholarly research and produce heavily footnoted academic papers extolling the virtues of pedophilia in ancient societies.

"But the purpose is obvious – to desensitize good people to the terrible crime of pedophilia, and to blur the line between good and evil."

In one chapter of "The Marketing of Evil," which has been met with critical acclaim, Kupelian exposes the modern pedophile movement, which is firmly rooted in the controversial sex research of Indiana University's Alfred Kinsey.

"Kinsey relied on serial pedophiles for obtaining his so-called 'research,'" said Kupelian. "For instance, 'Table 34' on page 180 of Kinsey’s 'Sexual Behavior in the Human Male' purports to be a scientific record of 'multiple orgasm in pre-adolescent males' – which is based on the criminal sexual molestation of children, including infants and toddlers, for the purposes of obtaining 'data' for his research.

"It's amazing that, to this day, Kinsey, who is now known to have been a full-bore sexual psychopath, is still glorified as a scientific pioneer and cultural hero," added Kupelian.

Last November, Hollywood released a feature film, titled "Kinsey," and a current Broadway musical also celebrates the controversial scientist's life. It's called "Dr. Sex."

Get your autographed and personalized copy of "The Marketing of Evil," by David Kupelian, World Net Daily's managing editor - at Shop Net Daily

World Net Daily Exclusive ** Child-sex book canceled after WND report

Police Find Katrina Relief Supplies in City Official's Home
Mood:  silly
Topic: Lib Loser Stories

Virginia Army National Guard soldier John Rothmann, left, greets Hurricane Katrina victim Tom Leynes as he delivers ice in the storm ravaged beach area of Gulfport, Miss., Tuesday, Sept. 20, 2005. >>>>>

Get aquainted with Cedric Floyd, the first African-American school board member in Jefferson Parish and a court-certified demographer for black voters... reported to have "vigorously fought for black voter rights."

Storm Donations Found at Official's Home

BATON ROUGE, La. - Police found cases of food, clothing and tools intended for hurricane victims at the home of the chief administrative officer for a New Orleans suburb, authorities said Wednesday.

Officers searched Cedric Floyd's home because of complaints that city workers were helping themselves to donations for hurricane victims. Floyd, who runs the day-to-day operations in the suburb of Kenner, was in charge of distributing the goods.

Police plan to seek a charge of committing an illegal act as a public official against Floyd, and more charges against other city workers are possible, police Capt. Steve Caraway said.

The donations filled a large pickup truck four times. "It was an awful lot of stuff," Caraway said.

The donated materials must be processed as evidence but eventually will be distributed to victims. "We have lots of families that are begging for these supplies," said Attorney General Charles Foti, whose office assisted in the investigation.

Attempts to reach Floyd were unsuccessful at home numbers listed under his name in Kenner. His office number went unanswered after business hours.

Philip Ramon, chief of staff to Kenner Mayor Philip Capitano, has said city officials were investigating the alleged pilfering but added that many employees were themselves hurricane victims.

Yahoo News ~ Associated Press ** Storm Donations Found at Official's Home

Dems Revive Filibuster Talk for Next High Court Vacancy - TIME TO REVIVE THE NUCLEAR OPTION
Mood:  chatty
Topic: Lib Loser Stories

Democrats revive filibuster threat
Big battle brewing over O'Connor spot on Supreme Court
By Tom Curry

WASHINGTON - President Bush's nominee to the Supreme Court to replace Sandra Day O'Connor appeared to be skating on thin ice Wednesday, even though the president hasn't yet revealed who the nominee is.

In the war of nerves leading up to Bush's announcement of his next high court nominee, Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid and other Democrats were signaling Wednesday that the filibuster — extended debate in order to kill a nomination — is an option they might use.

Referring to chief justice nominee John Roberts, who looks certain to win Judiciary Committee approval on Thursday and confirmation by the full Senate next week, Sen. Joseph Lieberman, D-Conn. said, "I don't think anybody would call him an extremist, or a divisive or confrontational nominee. But if the next nominee is, I think there'd be a real possibility of a filibuster."

Lieberman sees filibuster potential
Lieberman said Roberts was "a mainstream nominee. But because of the focus on the balance on the court and Justice O'Connor being a mainstream conservative, if the next nominee is not a mainstream conservative, then a filibuster is definitely possible."

Lieberman was one of 14 Democratic and Republican senators who signed a May 23 accord in which they pledged to not support a filibuster of a judicial nominee unless there were "extraordinary circumstances" which made it impossible to approve the nominee.

Lieberman said Wednesday that under the terms of that accord, "we reserved the right for each of us to make the determination individually to decide that a nominee was outside of the mainstream, the circumstances were extraordinary, and therefore we would attempt to require 60 votes for confirmation."

Usually 51 votes are required to win Senate confirmation, but it takes 60 votes to overcome a filibuster.

Another Democrat, Sen. Tim Johnson, D-S.D., said Wednesday that he would vote for Roberts but intended that vote "to be a signal to the president that I'm prepared to cast votes for Republican nominees if they are in the jurisprudential mainstream. There is no need for him to have to go to an extreme candidate…."

Provocative Judge Brown
Praising Roberts, Johnson said, "He has not left a trail of inflammatory, extreme comments behind either on the bench or otherwise."

This seemed a veiled reference to Janice Rogers Brown, a Bush appeals court nominee whom the Democrats filibustered in 2003, but then finally allowed to be confirmed on June 8.

Brown, who is said to be on the list of potential Bush nominees for the impending O'Connor vacancy, gave a speech prior to becoming a federal judge in which she called Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal "our own socialist revolution," a term that rankled some Democratic senators.

Some of her rulings as a California Supreme Court justice were also provocatively phrased: she denounced a San Francisco housing ordinance which exacted a fee from hotel owners by writing, "Theft is theft even when the government approves of the thievery. Turning a democracy into a kleptocracy does not enhance the stature of the thieves; it only diminishes the legitimacy of the government."

One Republican senator and potential 2008 presidential contender, Sen. George Allen of Virginia, scoffed that Reid "doesn't have the votes to filibuster."

Reid would need 40 other senators to join him to keep a filibuster going.

"The architect of this filibustering of judges, Tom Daschle, is a former Democrat leader," Allen noted. (Daschle lost his seat to Republican John Thune in last November’s election.) "The people of America think justices ought to have deliberation and examination, with dignity in the process, but ultimately senators ought to get off their cushy seats and vote 'yes' or 'no.'"

Despite Judiciary Committee chairman Arlen Specter's advice to Bush at a Wednesday morning meeting to wait until June before naming an O'Connor successor, Bush's announcement of the new nominee could come as soon as the Senate finishes its vote on Roberts next week.

A 'sharp stick' in the eye
Hinting at a filibuster, Reid (left) said Tuesday it would be "a real poke in the eye with a sharp stick if they give us (any of) the ten (judicial nominees) we turned down" by filibusters in 2003 and 2004.

Those ten include Brown and another federal appeal court judge, Priscilla Owen. (right)

A Republican senator who serves on the Judiciary Committee, Sen. John Cornyn of Texas, said Reid's implied filibuster threat "doesn't sound too 'implied' to me. There are some on that (Democratic) side who would like to influence the president's decision or maybe intimidate the president and affect his choice."

Cornyn added, "My experience has been, working in Texas and now in Washington with President Bush, that he is not going to be intimidated, he's not going to be influenced. He'll listen, and if people have reasons on the merits for or against nominees, I'm sure he's glad to listen, but he's not going to be deflected in his judgment."

Sen. Ben Nelson, D-Neb. (right), one of the seven Democrats who signed the May 23 no-filibuster pledge, noted Wednesday, "I voted against Priscilla Owen (as a judge on the appeals court for the Fifth Circuit). I felt and still believe that she was a judicial activist. Having said that, I don't know that it (an Owen nomination to the high court) triggers a filibuster, but what I can say is she would be a very controversial nominee."

He added, "another nominee in the likeness of John Roberts – where there's no question about competence… and very little question about judicial integrity or concern about whether he'd be judicially active on the bench — that's where we'd like to see it."

Cornyn sounded a similar theme: "I don't expect the president to nominate an ideologue. I think he'll nominate someone as close to a John Roberts as he can find. That doesn't mean someone won't call them an ideologue, or try to paint them as extreme or out of the mainstream. That's part of the game up here. I think most people see through it."

Senate GOP leaders, unlike Specter, don't want Bush to delay announcing his next nominee.

"There's no reason to wait," said Allen. "Justice O'Connor wants to retire, and a man or woman ought to be nominated forthwith and we in the Senate ought to move forthwith."

"The filibuster threat doesn't change things," said Ronald Cass, co-chairman of the Committee for Justice which supports Bush's judicial nominees.

"The President should do exactly what he has said he would: find a nominee who will adhere to the text and history of the Constitution, who will be committed to applying law, not making law," Cass said. "If the Democrats decide to filibuster a nominee who is manifestly qualified for the job — look at John Roberts as an example — the American people will see that they are trying to change the historical practices of the Senate.”

Click for related story
MSNBC.com ~ Tom Curry ** Justice Stevens is key to court's future

MSNBC.com ~ Tom Curry ** Democrats revive filibuster threat

CNN'er Soledad O'Brien: Katrina Worse Than Beheadings
Mood:  silly
Topic: Lib Loser Stories

CNN'er: Katrina Victims Better Off Beheaded

CNN's "American Morning" host Soledad O'Brien said Tuesday that Hurricane Katrina evacuees housed at the Superdome were worse off than beheading victims in Baghdad.

The normally mild-mannered newswoman offered the overwrought observation while speaking at Redbook Magazine's "Movers and Shakers" awards luncheon in New York.

According to the New York Daily News, O'Brien blurted out:

"It is a sad thing to watch military veterans cry as they tell you the beheadings in Baghdad were less horrific than what they saw as 30,000 people marched from the Superdome through a shopping mall and onto buses to who knows where."

Ms. O'Brien didn't identify the veterans who told her that Katrina victims would have been better off being beheaded.

News Max.com ~ Carl Limbacher ** CNN'er: Katrina Victims Better Off Beheaded

Julie Myers, 36, To Head Immigration
Mood:  chatty
Topic: Yahoo Chat Stuff

Critics say Julie Myers, the niece of Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Richard Myers, isn't qualified to be the head of Immigration and Customs. (Reuters) >>>>>

Levin Threatens to Block Julie Myers' DHS Nomination

Julie Myers, 36, To Head Immigration and Customs

Julie Myers is 36 years old, a lawyer and a political appointee to the Bush administration with limited executive experience.

Yet, she is slated to become head of one of the nation's most critical security-related agencies, the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency (ICE), part of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS).

The Myers appointment, in the wake of FEMA's disastrous handling of the Katrina Hurricane and the resignation of its chief, Michael Brown, has people from both sides of the political aisle raising hackles.

"The Bush administration has barely rebounded from the resignation of horse show organizer Michael ‘Heck of a job' Brown from FEMA, and yet is pushing forward with the nomination of another inexperienced bureaucrat to a key post at the Department of Homeland Security," conservative syndicated columnist Michelle Malkin railed in an article out this week.

Despite the obvious resume problems, the Bush administration is not likely to back down on the appointment.

Myers' uncle is none other than the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Richard B. Myers.

And Myers' husband is DHS chief Michael Chertoff's current chief of staff, John F. Wood.

Great contacts, but "what exactly are the 36-year-old lawyer's main credentials to solve ... dire national security problems?" asks Malkin in her op-head piece.

"Zip, Nada, Nil," answers Malkin.

Some lawmakers on Capitol Hill are also worried that tapping the relatively inexperienced Myers may engender down the pike another debacle like that of Katrina fall-guy Michael D. Brown, the recently resigned head of Homeland Security's Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA).

At a Senate hearing last week, rumblings over Myers were apparent, according to the Washington Post, with Sen. George V. Voinovich, R-Ohio, at one point baldly concluding that Myers' resume indicated that she is "not qualified for the position."

Voinovich further announced at the time that he wanted to meet with Chertoff to discuss Myers' qualifications. "I'd really like to have him spend some time with us, telling us personally why he thinks you're qualified for the job..."

Part of that highly scrutinized resume indicates that Julie L. Myers was nominated by President Bush on June 26, 2003, and confirmed by the Senate on October 17, 2003, to serve as the assistant secretary for Export Enforcement at the Department of Commerce.

During her brief tenure in her Commerce position, Myers was responsible for developing and coordinating the Department's efforts to prevent, and where necessary, sanction violations of U.S. dual-use export control laws and the anti-boycott provisions of the Export Administration Act.

She also managed Commerce Special Agents who work at eight field offices in the United States, and oversaw the Export Enforcement's international attache program.

At Commerce, Myers oversaw just 170 federal employees and managed a budget of $25 million. In her new job heading up ICE, Myers will be expected to manage more than 20,000 employees and a $4 billion budget.

The White House has been emphasizing that Myers' role in sanctioning violations of U.S. dual-use export control laws and the anti-boycott provisions of the Export Administration Act represents solid law enforcement experience.

As Erin Healy, a White House spokeswoman, told the Washington Post: "She's well-known and respected throughout the law enforcement community ... She has a proven track record as an effective manager."

Prior to joining the Department of Commerce, Myers served as the chief of staff of the Criminal Division for then-assistant attorney general Michael Chertoff at the Department of Justice.

Before that, she served as the deputy assistant secretary for Money Laundering and Financial Crimes at the Department of Treasury. She also worked as an Assistant United States Attorney in the Eastern District of New York and as an Associate Independent Counsel in the Office of Independent Counsel for Kenneth W. Starr.

"I realize that I'm not 80 years old," Myers testified recently on Capitol Hill. "I have a few gray hairs, more coming, but I will seek to work with those who are knowledgeable in this area, who know more than I do."

Malkin couldn't let that nugget slide without comment: "Please, spare us the not-so-clever rejoinders about age and wisdom. Reagan could pull them off. Myers can't. Why hire someone who needs to ‘seek to work' with those ‘who know more than I do' in order to her job?"

After Sept. 11, Immigration, then a Justice Dept. agency, was heavily criticized for failing to stop many of the al Qaida hijackers from entering the U.S. or having them deported, as many of them were here illegally.

Malkin says Myers' appointment in light of Sept. 11 is worrisome.

"Myers may be perfectly capable of writing legal briefs and organizing policy conferences," Malkin writes. "I'm sure her knowledge of export controls is second to none. But as long as the borders are broken and al Qaida continues to exploit lax immigration enforcement, she has no business heading ICE - or any other DHS agency."

The head of ICE is required by statute to have at least five years of experience in both law enforcement and management. That requirement alone spells a world of difference between Myers and Brown, the latter having joined FEMA with no experience in disaster preparedness.

But the experience factor aside, Myers has yet another headache in the works. Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., is threatening to use legislative delaying tactics against Myers' nomination - until he receives a secret FBI memo about terror suspect interrogations that he's been seeking for months, according to the Associated Press.

At the heart of Levin's issue is a heavily abridged May 2004 e-mail from FBI agents seeking guidance about questioning terror suspects held at Guantanamo Bay.

As far back as February, Democratic senators were asking for an unedited version of the memo to see if it mentioned or involved Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, who headed the Justice Department's criminal division from 2001 to 2003.

However, the Justice Department has consistently nixed the request, saying the memos contain "information covered by the Privacy Act," and had nothing to do with Chertoff.

Myers was Chertoff's chief of staff at the time.

News Max.com ~ Dave Eberhart ** Julie Myers, 36, To Head Immigration and Customs

Harvard's al Qaeda Apologist, Bid Laden just ''misunderstood'' in USA
Mood:  spacey
Now Playing: ''INTELLECTUAL'' LIBTARD EDUCATION ALERT
Topic: Lib Loser Stories

Harvard, CAIR, and Kos.

Meet Mohammad-Mahmoud Ould Mohamedou, Harvard's al Qaeda apologist.

Harvard's al Qaeda Apologist

After four long and bloody years of unresolved war, shouldn't America begin thinking about the possibility of an equitable diplomatic settlement with Osama bin Laden? Isn't it finally "Time to Talk to Al Qaeda?" So asks the headline on a Boston Globe op-ed piece published September 14. And so answers its author, Mohammad-Mahmoud Ould Mohamedou of Harvard University: Yes, he says. Let's make a deal.

Bid Laden and his confederates are widely "misunderstood" in the United States, according to Mohamedou, associate director of Harvard's "Program on Humanitarian Policy and Conflict Research." We like to flatter ourselves that the war on terrorism is "an open-and-shut matter of good versus evil," but the truth is very different, he suggests. Al Qaeda is not, in fact, a totalitarian and "apocalyptic" movement; it is an "industrious" and "committed" rational actor pursuing "political" and "limited" objectives. And September 11 "was not an unprovoked, gratuitous act." Rather, the murder of 3,000 office workers in New York is best understood as a "trained commando" operation "in the context of a war that had twice been declared officially and publicly."

And there being no realistic way for Americans to win such a war--against a "diffuse, ever-mutating, organized international militancy movement" enjoying "the rear-guard sympathy of large numbers of Muslims"--it becomes the better part of wisdom for us to seek a truce with al Qaeda in return for "some degree of satisfaction regarding its grievances."

The Scrapbook knows what you're thinking here: There's a numbskull on the Harvard payroll. Been there, done that.

But wait. There's more. This is new. This is worse.

For it turns out that Dr. Mohamedou's Globe op-ed is merely the condensed version of "Non-Linearity of Engagement," a 30-page treatise he produced, on Harvard's dime, back in July. And "numbskull" doesn't begin to describe the thing. It seems that Harvard University's associate director of "humanitarian policy" and whatnot believes the United States should belatedly "acknowledg[e] the logic in which terrorism is used as a method of warfare, according to a principle of indiscrimination whose rationale is negation of the notion of innocence of the civilian population, and imputation of collective responsibility." As Osama bin Laden himself has observed, American foreign policy is effected by politicians whom Americans have freely elected. And in that respect, concludes our man in Cambridge, al Qaeda clearly claims "a valid jus ad bellum case" against any and every one of us--man, woman, or child.

In the end, Mohamedou says, "these 'terrorists' are de facto combatants, and justice . . . is what they are after." Which is the true source of bin Laden's strength. And the reason that "no leading Muslim intellectual or scholar has denounced him."

Not at Harvard, anyhow.

CAIR's Interfaith Photo-Retouching

The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) often chooses curious means to further its self-proclaimed mission of "enhancing understanding of Islam" and "encouraging dialogue." But this may be the most curious of all.

An eagle-eyed reader of the website jihadwatch.org noticed last week on the CAIR website a photo taken at CAIR's "interfaith candlelight vigil" commemorating 9/11 on the grounds of the U.S. Capitol (see leftmost photo). Unfortunately, the group turned out to have been a little too interfaith for the tastes of CAIR's website.

As can be seen by close examination of the "improved" photo on the right (which at first accompanied the press release on the event but subsequently was removed from CAIR's website), a hijab was photoshopped onto the woman beside the CAIR lectern and onto two members of the audience: the brunette in the lower left foreground and the blonde in the lower right.

Women contemplating attendance at future CAIR outreach events should consider themselves forewarned--if you don't cover your heads beforehand, they may do it for you after the fact.

Kos Fires Blanks

The Scrapbook has been waiting with bated breath since August 22, when lefty blogger and Democratic-strategist-on-the-make Markos "Kos" Moulitsas of DailyKos.com announced an imminent campaign to make the centrist Democratic Leadership Council "radioactive." Moulitsas's hatred of the DLC was nothing new. Last May he wrote that it was "Time for the DLC to die," that it's "the most fundamentalist organization within the [Democratic] caucus," that it's "ideologically rigid," indeed "cancerous," and that it's past time to "euthanize" it. What was new about Moulitsas's August post, though, was that it promised all-out war between liberals and moderates by the beginning of September. "Two more weeks, folks, before we take them on, head on," he wrote. (This led to the mocking graphic by LittleGreenFootballs.com pictured at bottom.)

Well, over two weeks have passed, and plenty of people--Moulitsas's own readers included--have noticed that the DLC is still here. "Whatever happened," for example, "with the DLC thing from a few weeks ago," someone called "airwave" asked on a DailyKos.com message board on September 13?

"I didn't think a time of national crisis was the right time to do this," Moulitsas answered. Because, you see, "timing is important for things like media attention, people's attention, outrage generation, etc. The window wasn't there. Bush and his mishandling of Katrina is clearly more important now. So is the future of the Supreme Court." The anti-DLC campaign "isn't forgotten," he concluded. "Just deferred."

But, as any evil mastermind will tell you, having a catastrophic hurricane mess up your plans for world domination is no fun at all. Thus it wasn't a surprise when Moulitsas felt it necessary the following day--in comments appended to a post in which he labeled St. Paul's Democratic mayor Randy Kelly a "turncoat" (Kelly having committed the crime of endorsing George W. Bush last year)--to reiterate that, yes, he really will turn the DLC into Chernobyl one of these days, just you wait and see:

I've laid off the DLC for the time being. The Katrina disaster has not only made this sort of intraparty fight a bit counterproductive at the moment, but it has refocused the allies and the media I was going to engage in the campaign to the more important task of getting to the bottom of the disaster on the gulf coast.

The window has closed for now.

Hmmm. Who wants to bet that it won't open anytime soon?

Weekly Standard ** Harvard, CAIR, and Kos.

Bette Midler, Tom Waits: Libtard halfwits
Mood:  silly
Now Playing: Libtards bashing Bush in the name of hurricane relief
Topic: Lib Loser Stories

Sounds like the not-so-divine Ms. M is stuck on stupid. Ahem, Bette Midler making fun of someone doing drugs? what is wrong with this picture?!?!?!

New York Goes New Orleans

Matthews, Waits, John serenade the Cresent City

New Orleans descended on New York for two concurrent concerts, dubbed From the Big Apple to the Big Easy, Tuesday night to raise money for the victims of Hurricane Katrina. Big names such as Dave Matthews, Simon and Garfunkel, and Elton John filled the bills of the shows held at Radio City Music Hall and Madison Square Garden, but New Orleans acts from the Meters to the Neville Brothers were the focus of the evening's entertainment.

Piano player and studio whiz Allen Toussaint led the house band for the first segment of the MSG concert, alongside Late Show With David Letterman bandleader Paul Shaffer. Together they hosted a rotating panel of guests that included Lenny Kravitz, Elvis Costello, Paul Simon, Jimmy Buffett and New Orleans soul queen Irma Thomas, who performed her classic "Time Is on My Side," famously covered by the Rolling Stones in 1964. Aaron Neville joined Toussaint for a chilling take on Sam Cooke's "A Change Is Gonna Come," sung against a backdrop of horrific images from flood ravaged New Orleans.

Political chatter was kept to a minimum at both events, with performers mostly sticking to the program: championing aid for New Orleans. But a few artists angrily denounced government officials for their slow response to Katrina's devastation. "I Wish New Orleans was dry and Washington was underwater," said Tom Waits. Bette Midler had even stronger words: "I got a letter from the Republican Party the other day. I wrote back, 'Go fuck yourself.'" She then added, "George Bush is a fan of mine -- he came to see me in the Seventies. His coke dealer brought him."

There was nothing but love for one former Oval Office resident, however: Bill Clinton's surprise appearances at both concerts were greeted with long standing ovations. He spoke of the urgent need to get money to the hurricane victims, and reminisced that "the first time I saw a building over two stories tall was in New Orleans, when I was three years old." He then introduced John Fogerty, who Clinton said "captured the soul of New Orleans," despite being born in Northern California.

The Dixie Cups, a Sixties girl group from New Orleans, were one of the Garden's best-received acts. Their brief set included their Number One hit "Chapel of Love," as well a forceful take on the classic Cresent City ditty "Iko Iko," on which they were joined by Cyndi Lauper. Other Garden highlights included Elton John's mournful rendition of "Funeral for a Friend (Love Lies Bleeding)"; Mississippi-born Buffett's lengthy set, which featured "Changes in Latitudes, Changes in Attitudes" and the obvious crowd favorite "Margaritaville"; and Fogerty's renditions of the all-to-appropriate Creedence Clearwater Revival tunes "Born on the Bayou" and "Have You Ever Seen the Rain." Scheduled guest Fats Domino was unable to make it into the city, but the Dirty Dozen Brass Band -- with help from Elvis Costello, Diana Krall and Fats' longtime collaborator Dave Bartholomew -- paid tribute to him with a rollicking take on the Domino classic "I'm Walking."

The Radio City show, hosted by comedian Harry Shearer, was aimed at a younger audience and featured Anastasio, the John Mayer Trio and Galactic. Matthews, the Neville Brothers and the Meters all took a page out of the Phil Collins Live Aid handbook and played at both events. Radio City's most anticipated guest was Waits, who rarely makes live appearances. His set, which was unfortunately marred by sound problems, included "Get Behind the Mule," "Murder in a Red Burn" and "House Where Nobody Lives." "There's so much music in New Orleans you can hold a trumpet above your head and it will play itself," he remarked. Matthews' solo acoustic set contained moving takes on "Gravedigger" and "Crush." Later, he joined Buffett at the Garden for a cover of Neil Young's "Heart of Gold."

Simon and Garfunkel, one of the final acts at the Garden, where introduced by actor Paul Newman. "As tonight proves, music has a power all its own," he said. "In our most trying times, music has a healing power like a bridge over troubled water." Minutes later, Garfunkel and Aaron Neville traded verses on the aforementioned tune. "As many times as I've sung that song, I don't think it's ever meant as much to me as it does tonight," said Garfunkel.

To end the five-hour show, the Meters and the Neville Brothers struck up "When the Saints Go Marching In," and a parade of children filled the aisles. In true New Orleans fashion, it was well past midnight.

Rolling Stone.com ~ Andy Greene / Austin Scaggs ** New York Goes New Orleans