War Porn

Indie war correspondent Michael Yon is suing Michael Moore for copyright violation.  Basically he used one of Yon’s pictures in the banner on his website, and despite numerous requests to take it down has refused to do so.  Be sure and read the whole thing for the specifics, but this section really struck me as being right on.

Justice Potter Stewart once defined pornography by saying, “I know it when I see it.” Pornography and propaganda are closely related, as they are both cynical attempts at manipulation, rooted in a lack of respect for humanity. War Porn is one of the more disturbing developments in the new media, as people on both sides of the Iraq War get their kicks watching video images of death and destruction – as long as it’s their opponents who get killed. Whether it’s an Al Qaeda cell-phone video of an IED attack or the grisly footage of a Coalition air strike, War Porn is degrading and incendiary. Of course, some footage is newsworthy and informative and the public deserves to see it. There is also great value to soldiers in watching footage for training purposes and to better understand battlefields and weapons. But at some point, especially when the material is used to make political points, images of combat can cross the line into pornography. People die in war, but we must never forget that each casualty is a human being, even people as deserving of death as Al Qaeda. Denying our opponents’ humanity, we lose a little of our own.

When someone’s grandmother disseminates the photo of Major Beiger cradling a dying girl in his arms, I allow the usage because I feel she is trying to share the human tragedy. When Michael Moore puts that same photo on his web site, alongside images of George Bush, John McCain and Hillary Clinton, the clear implication is that Farah’s death is their fault. That is a misrepresentation of the facts on the ground, as well as the story of the photo. Farah was killed by a suicide car bomb in Mosul on May 2, 2005. Major Bieger and other soldiers literally risked their own lives to save many children and adults that day, but Farah didn’t make it. Michael Moore apparently does not understand – or refuses to acknowledge – the moral distinction between a man who would murder innocent people, and a man who would sacrifice himself to save them. The photo, as I took it, is the truth, but Moore uses it – illegally – to convey falsehoods. His mind is that of a political propagandist who sees Farah’s death not as a human tragedy, but a tool.

Hey, as long as Mikey can sell his shitty movies and books and keep on making himself even more millions, what the hell does he care?

Broken Clocks

Jim summed up Mikey’s screed nicely in the previous post.  There is, however, one small section I want to focus on.

Let’s assume that’s true. Do you want a President who is so easily misled? I wasn’t “misled,” and millions of others who took to the streets in February of 2003 weren’t “misled” either. It was simply amazing that we knew the war was wrong when none of us had been briefed by the CIA, none of us were national security experts, and none of us had gone on a weapons inspection tour of Iraq. And yet… we knew we were being lied to!

We’ve all heard the expression that even a broken clock is right twice a day.  Michael Moore opposes war. All war.  Especially when it could in any way conceivably benefit America.  He opposed Afghanistan.  He opposed Kosovo, going so far as to make the asinine assertion that it inspired the Columbine killers. He opposed the first Gulf War.  He opposed the Cold War.  He just opposes ALL WAR.

Now, let’s look at what he wrote. By his own admission he had no inside information.  He wasn’t briefed by the CIA.  He isn’t an expert on national security.  He’d never gone on a weapons tour of Iraq.  Yet somehow, mysteriously, he just KNEW he was being lied to.  My question is, how did he know?

Imagine, for a second, if I wrote the following.  “I didn’t graduate from Harvard medical school.  I hadn’t been Chief of Thoracic Surgery at John’s Hopkins for the past ten years.  I hadn’t done over 600 heart transplants.  But I KNEW that my child didn’t need surgery.” Sounds pretty ignorant, doesn’t it?  Even if it turned out that, in the end, the surgery was indeed unnecessary, so what?  The doctor was basing his opinion on his education and years of experience, and the parent is basing it on a gut feeling.  When it comes to making critical decisions, which do you think is a more prudent course of action?  President Bush makes a lot of his decisions based on “gut feeling” and we can all see how well those turned out, can’t we?

So, back to Mikey.  Somehow, through some mystical, magical process he just “knew” that this war was bad.  I imagine he “knew” this in the same way that a fundamentalist Christian “knows” that fags are going to burn in hell, or that a suicide bomber “knows” that there will be 72 virgins waiting for him in Paradise. 

Here we have a guy who just opposes all war, period.  Eventually he opposes a war which, guess what, turns out to be a disaster.  Then, completely disregarding all the other wars he’s opposed in the past and been wrong about, he hails himself as possessing some kind of mysterious power of prognostication, wherein he “knew” that something was up with this war.  This despite the fact that, by his own admission, the very people who had access to all the information and data disagreed with him.  But somehow he “knew.”

So, which is more likely.  Did he “know” something, or did the broken clock just happen to be right this time?

Beat to the punch

I was preparing a fisking of Moore’s latest email screed.  Whenever I do these long fiskings (which I admit is rarely!) I often stop a number of times to help me 1. get away from it for a bit and 2. formulate what I want to say.  Well, I popped over to Wizbang and Jay Tea already wrote almost every single thing i wanted to say.  Yay!  Less typing for me.  Definitely read the whole thing...he nails Mike’s hide to the wall.

Example:

The Soviet Union got out of Afghanistan in 36 weeks. They did so and suffered hardly any losses as they left. They realized the mistake they had made and removed their troops. A civil war ensued. The bad guys won. Later, we overthrew the bad guys and everybody lived happily ever after. See! It all works out in the end!

Funny how Moore fast-forwards from “the bad guys won” to “we overthrew the bad guys.” What happened in the meantime? Well, a little thing called the Taliban happened—the Islamist thugs who brutally oppressed their own people and gave a home to an innocuous little group called Al Qaeda. You might have heard of them—they’re the ones who killed 3,000 people in New York, Pennsylvania, and Virginia back in September of 2001. Yeah, that’s an example we should be looking to emulate.

Nice.

SGT Mike Stokely, a year later

Last December, I wrote about SGT. Mike Stokley over at Moorewatch.  His father, Robert Stokely, graciously responded to me via email to thank me.  Unfortunately, I let other mail pile on top of them, and I only just found the two emails he sent me again.

Last night I went through a lot of old mail to delete things that were just taking up space.  Email with attachments, spam I missed, messages from servers, auto-responses...the clutter that accumulates.  I get around 250-500 messages a day depending on spam levels, and things often get lost or buried.

I’m kind of ashamed that I let these two slide by.  I was reminded of SGT. Stokely just the other day from this post at Blackfive.  I suppose it was serendipity that led me to re-discoverthose two email a couple of days later.

When I wrote at length over the last year about Casey Sheehan and his mother, and by extension about how I felt a parent could - not should, but rather could - grieve for their child and not cross lines of taste, decorum, honesty and sanity, Robert Stokely was the man I kept in mind.  The things he said about Mike, the way he talked about him as a person, they way it was always about Mike and not any political agenda...these are the kinds of things that struck me as good and decent and above all, honorable.  Whenever I read an email that Robert sent to someone for their site, I felt like he was honoring his son as a person and a soldier.

It is sad that a man who inspired such love and pride in his father was lost to us, but at the same time if anything good can come from this kind of loss, it’s that sense of honor, dignity and love.  I hope other people can see it.

Nothing illustrated it more than this story:

It is an irony that you can have so much grief interspersed with such pride swelling in your heart even as tears well in your eyes, and still be able to laugh.  The memory of the very loved we had lost was caught in a moment Mike would have found humorous, and laughed himself that special laugh he had.  As we traveled the highway through Loganville that day of his “welcome home parade”, and again to the church for his funeral, many businesses had posted a tribute to Mike on their sign boards.  Our favorite and one to be remembered for all time, was at a small meat market and said this:

“IN HONOR OF MIKE STOKELY”
pork ribs $1.69 lb.

Although they probably didn’t mean it to come out that way, we loved it, and laughed a much needed, deep down laugh.  Mike would have loved it and probably thought this business was the only one with any sense left, given all the fuss being made over him.  Forever more, whenever I see pork ribs, I will think of that day and what we now call the “Mike Stokely Special”.

A few days past a year later, and I still think about Mike Stokely and everyone else who gives up time, health, safety and sometimes their lives in service to their country as warriors.

I only hope that we can someday deserve what they do for us.

Mr. Stokely, if you should see this, I apologize for my lack of response and lack of respect in not paying more attention to your email.

Army Meets Its Retention Goal

You often hear from the media (and coincidentally, the left) that the U.S. military is stretched thin and can’t staff the positions they need staffed.  Not exactly true.

Both the Army National Guard and the Army Reserve expect to meet their re-enlistment goals for this fiscal year, which are 34,875 and 17,712, respectively. Both totals are slightly higher than last year’s goals.

Granted, this is re-enlistment and not recruiting, but the recruitment picture is no less optimistic when you get past the political rhetoric.  Regardless of how you feel about the war, the fact - that is an important word, fact - the fact is that the military branches are meeting thier goals.

Another far-left/mainstream media meme shot down.  Look for headlines to never appear anywhere, ever.

One of these things is not like the other

I defy anyone, left right or center, to read this and then ever again compare the US military to Saddam’s sadistic regime.

Some rooms in the museum don’t have pictures at all. Instead they show the instruments and the methods of torture. In one room, the so-called “Washington Room,” men and women had hot electric irons pressed into their skin.

Torture:

Not torture:

Let’s stop pretending Saddam’s Iraq was a kite-flying paradise already shall we?  From the comments at Michael J. Totten’s site:

Two years ago, I produced the documentary film VOICES OF IRAQ, where we sent 150 DV cameras across Iraq and allowed Iraqis to film their own lives. The cameras got into the prison you visted and others. I viewed several hours of video and testimony detailing the horrors of Saddam’s torture. One woman recalled tearfully how her newborn baby was fed to dogs infront of her eyes. Another video shows floors stained with blood and fat that liquified off torture victoms and poured onto the tiles below them.

Americans, and especially a certain political group of Americans, completely ignored that film.  What a shame...and how shameful.  Shameful to disrespect those who suffered by dismissing them as political fodder.  Shameful to line the pockets of a man like Michael Moore while ignoring the voices of those who were there and suffered losses unimaginable to the average American.

I don’t care why we went into Iraq.  I stopped caring about why the first time I heard about stories like these.  I don’t understand anyone who doesn’t feel the same way.

Smash has the story

Why isn’t the mainstream media this good at asking tough questions?

DEBORAH JOHNS: And this gentleman is absolutely correct, because it’s Debbie Argel. The Williams… I have over 1200 families that have sent you requests…

CINDY SHEEHAN: Sent me requests? I’m not in charge of those memorials.

DEBORAH JOHNS: ...California, spoke with you personally, on the telephone, and demanded that you stop using her son’s name. So did Joe Williams…

CINDY SHEEHAN: I’m not using anybody’s son’s name.

DEBORAH JOHNS: You have used their names in Crawford, Texas, Cindy. I was there. And I removed their sons’ names. And the sheriff down there took the list of the names from me, because he said in the middle of the night, you and your people go back up and put the names back up…

CINDY SHEEHAN: You’re…

DEBORAH JOHNS: Cindy, you have used their names in the newspaper.

CINDY SHEEHAN: You know what… Deborah, that’s not the truth.

DEBORAH JOHNS: You have used their names in the newspaper…

CINDY SHEEHAN: No, I haven’t used anybody’s name in the newspaper.

DEBORAH JOHNS: USA Today, Cindy…

(applause)

CINDY SHEEHAN: What… what newspaper have I used their names in?

DEBORAH JOHNS: USA Today, Cindy, when you took out ads across the United States…

(crosstalk)

CINDY SHEEHAN: ...I can’t take that. I’m not the only person who does this stuff…

You’ll have to go to Smash’s site and follow the links that prove how many lies Mama Moonbat tells in a short exchange.

As an aside...obviously she’s Moore-related, and as long as she runs her mouth, we shoudl call her on her bullshit.  But...and I never thought I would say this...I cannnot WAIT for Mikey to release another movie so we can start talking about something the fuck else.  I can’t wait to show Casey Sheehan’s mother the bottom of my shoe.  Maybe she’ll hug a few Hamas or Hezbollah after she’s done protesting the wounded and they can explain it to her.

Terrorist-loving, Dictator hugging “Peace Mom” to protest in Germany

One soldier’s opinion on Mama Moonbat’s planned protest:

One soldier, who recently returned from Iraq, did give his name but didn’t have much to say about Sheehan.

“Anything I would have to say about her, you couldn’t print,” Army Staff Sgt. Mark Genthner said.

Thank you, Sargeant.  We read you five by five.

At least someone is planning to step up.

Mikey Loves Osama

There’s trouble a-brewin’ in the love triangle of Chris Matthews, John Kerry, and Michael Moore.

A remark by MSNBC’s Chris Matthews in which he said that Osama bin-Laden “sounds like an over-the-top Michael Moore here, if not a Michael Moore” has outraged opponents of the war in Iraq and leading Democrats including former presidential candidate John Kerry. Matthews made the comment during an interview with Sen. Joseph Biden on Hardball Thursday in which they discussed an audio tape by bin-Laden that aired earlier in the day on Al Jazeera, the Arab news channel. Kerry commented: “You’d think the only focus tonight would be on destroying Osama bin-Laden, not comparing him to an American who opposes the war. ... If the administration had done the job right in Tora Bora we might not be having discussions on Hardball about a new Bin Laden tape. How dare Scott McClellan tell America that this Administration puts terrorists out of business when had they put Osama bin-Laden out of business in Afghanistan when our troops wanted to, we wouldn’t have to hear this barbarian’s voice on tape.”

Okay, let’s begin by ignoring Kerry’s usual blustery idiocy regarding Tora Bora and focus on his haughty indignation regarding Matthew’s statement.  The fact is, when you look at what OBL said and the crap that Michael Moore has been spewing for the past five years, there’s no a whole lot of difference between the two.  Here’s just a few of the more glaring similarities.  (The Osama bin Laden quotes below are all from the BBC News transcript.  The Michael Moore quotes are as linked.) First there is praise for the Islamofascist forces currently fighting the United States.

OBL: “I say that despite all the barbaric methods, they have failed to ease resistance, and the number of mujahideen, praise be to God, is increasing.”

MM:  “The Iraqis who have risen up against the occupation are not ‘insurgents’ or ‘terrorists’ or ‘The Enemy.’ They are the REVOLUTION, the Minutemen, and their numbers will grow—and they will win.”

Bush has no plan.

OBL:  “The wise ones know that Bush has no plan to achieve his alleged victory in Iraq.”

MM:  “In your heart of hearts you know Bush is a miserable failure. From having no plan on what to do in Iraq once he conquered Baghdad to the 380 missing tons of explosives that could be used to kill our brave young men and women, this guy doesn’t have a clue how to fight and win a war.”

The war in Iraq has made America less safe by creating terrorists.

OBL:  “Reality testifies that the war against America and its allies has not remained confined to Iraq, as he claims.  In fact, Iraq has become a point of attraction and recruitment of qualified resources.”

MM:  “We are hated, we are despised, we are less safe,” Moore said, inciting cheers and applause from the audience. “George W. Bush has made us less safe in this world.” Moore made it clear that the war on terror, or in his words, “the war on a noun,” is not making the world a safer place, but serving as a training ground for more terrorists. “You do not liberate a people with the barrel of a gun,” Moore said.

The war was all about corporate profit.

OBL:  “There is no defect in this solution other than preventing the flow of hundreds of billions to the influential people and war merchants in America, who supported Bush’s election campaign with billions of dollars.  Hence, we can understand the insistence of Bush and his gang to continue the war.”

MM:  “Halliburton is not a “company” doing business in Iraq. It is a WAR PROFITEER, bilking millions from the pockets of average Americans. In past wars they would have been arrested—or worse.”

I could have posted twenty more similarities between the two, but these are sufficient for illustrative purposes.  There are significant parallels between the rhetoric we hear coming from the Islamist terrorist camp and from the radical western left.  There always have been.

Now, that being said, there’s more going on here.  Basically OBL, with this “truce” offer, is playing to an audience.  The offer isn’t aimed at Bush or the Muslim world.  No, my friends, it’s aimed at the activist liberal left, the MoveOn and Michael Moore crowd, the bongo playing drum circle hippie asshats who stage a protest every five minutes because they have nothing better to do.  Much like the USSR used the anti-war movement to great benefit during the Vietnam era, so the terrorists know that the useful idiots in the contemporary peace movement can serve the same purpose.

Bin Laden’s message is simple:  “We are only fighting back against American imperialism and aggression, and for the liberation of Palestine from the Zionists.  The so-called war on terror is a war Bush cannot win.  Prolonging the war will only serve to enrich Bush’s corporate masters even further.  I am offering you a truce.  You might not like me, but I am willing to end this war right now.  If you believe in peace you will support me.” This is EXACTLY the mantra of the peace movement.  Go down the list of left-wing beliefs.

1) America is an aggressive imperialist which seeks global economic hegemony.
2) Israel does not have a right to exist, and the Palestinians are an oppressed group on par with black South Africans.
3) The war on terror is not an actual war, since terrorism is a tactic, and a war cannot be waged on a tactic.  Therefore the war on terror cannot ever actually be won, and is used solely as a justification for endless war, resulting in massive corporate profits.
4) Peace is defines solely as the absence of conflict.  Anyone should be trusted when they claim to have peaceful coexistence as their primary motivation.

It goes on and on and on.  What remains to be seen is if Michael Moore and his ilk will repudiate this message.  Don’t hold your breath.

Update: It appears that the fine folks over at Ankle Biting Pundits had exactly the same idea I did.  Don’t miss their selection of Mikey quotes.

A parent who lost a child, but not their perspective

Via Mudville Gazette, we hear from Robert Stokely, father of SGT Michael “Mike” James Stokely, KIA Operation Iraqi Freedom 16 Aug 05.

No pity for me is needed, for as a friend said to me, I am lucky to have a son who has brought such honor to his father and the entire family. My son was a man who had a heart that cared deeply for others, and they likewise cared for him. In all of this, so many stories of his simple kindness have been shared with us and touched us. My favorite is the one where he and his buddies had been on continuous duty for several days (their normal day was 22 hours long). He and one of his fellow soldiers had to pull guard duty after being on missions for that continuous period without any sleep. He told his buddy to take a nap and he would stand watch and then they would swap out. For the next six hours, he let his buddy sleep while he stood the whole watch.

We miss him so much. We hurt inside. But we burst with pride in our son and brother. His memory will not fade nor will our love for him. When Mike was just becoming a teenager, I tried to imagine what he would be one day. I often told people I wasn’t sure where life would take him, but I knew he would do something different and be very well known in his chosen field. I never dreamed he would become an American Hero who would serve his country so well.

I’ll not attempt to trump his words.  Read the whole thing.  Mr. Stokely, I thank you for your words and I thank your son for his sacrifice.

Pruneface Goes to England

Casey Sheehan’s mother wasn’t making news here any more, so she went somewhere new to get her name get back in the papers.

Hundreds of anti-war protesters, including American Cindy Sheehan, attended an international peace conference in London on Saturday to condemn the Iraq conflict.

Tony Benn, a veteran leftist politician in the governing Labour Party, opened the one-day meeting by calling the war “illegal, immoral and unwinnable.”

He said the peace movement wants to see coalition troops withdrawn from Iraq, justice for Palestinians and a ban on any Western military attacks on Iran or Syria.

In other words, they want to see retreat and defeat in Iraq, the destruction of the state of Israel, and to give a clear signal to our enemies that they can conspire to attack us with total impunity. 

Up to 1,500 anti-war protesters and activists gathered for the 10-hour conference, which was organized by the Stop the War Coalition.

The scheduled speakers included Sheehan, who has become a focus of anti-war sentiment in the United States by camping outside the Texas ranch of President George W. Bush; Hasan Zergani Hashim, a spokesperson for Iraq’s radical Shia cleric Muqtada al-Sadr; and leftist British legislator George Galloway.

Okay, we’ve got a barking moonbat from the “peace” movement, a spokesman for an Islamofascist, and a guy who made millions of dollars from Saddam through the oil-for-food program.  What a pathetic coalition the American left now finds itself allied with. 

It’s really sad.  The radical left views western civilization, particularly the United States, and especially the US under George W. Bush, as being the focus of all evil in the world.  Nothing that happens in the world cannot somehow be traced back to find western civilization as its root cause.  So, therefore, anyone who happens to be an enemy of George W. Bush’s America, such as al-Sadr, must therefore be a good guy on the side of “peace.”

And don’t for a second think that Sheehan’s whole pruneface thing isn’t a carefully crafted image.  When she was camping outside the ranch she got sunburned and wasn’t wearing any makeup out of necessity, but she maintains that look everywhere she goes, whether indoors or out, on a plane or a bus or in a building.  It makes her look driven, like the only thing she cares about is bwinging home da widdle soldier chiwdrwn who are dying in Iwaq.

Update: In the comments to this post over on my main blog a reader named rdz809 asks “[W]asn’t Sheehan killed while on a mission to rescue fellow soldiers who were ambushed and pinned down by al-Sadr’s thugs?” He’s right.

In the first 48 hours of fighting Sadr’s followers seized police stations and government buildings across the country including the Governor’s Office in Basra. At least 75 Iraqis and 10 American servicemen were killed, among them Army Specialist Casey Sheehan.

So now Casey’s mother is consorting with a representative of the Islamist whose militiamen slaughtered her son.  What a vile, disgusting woman.

Flip thier script

The Democrats.com idiots love to email me stuff.  Just got this one:

TUESDAY, DECEMBER 6, IS NATIONAL CALL-IN DAY TO END THE WAR

Tuesday is the day! Congress Members get back to DC today, and we want to welcome them. We’re asking you to call, Email, and fax your Congress Members and ask for an end to the war in Iraq. This National Call-In Day - organized by Democrats.com, Progressive Democrats of America, and After Downing Street, together with United for Peace and Justice and many other peace organizations - aims to flood Congress Members’ offices with our message for bringing this war to a close.

Our message is simple: “I am calling to let Rep. ______ know that I think the Iraq war is wrong and all our troops should be brought home immediately!”

Take Action Below, or call the Capitol toll free 888-818-6641.

Here’s my proposal: If you disagree, call and say so.  Don’t let these idiots be the only voices Congress hears.  Spread the word.

They can speak for themselves, and they do

I dare not presume to speak for men like this, but I would add that his words apply to Moore and his merry band of terrorist-sympathizing sychophants as well.

We in the military community have never believed that the anti-war left care about us. You can’t call soldiers baby-killers, fascists, or murderers in one breath, then claim to “support the troops” in the next. The bulk of the “withdraw now” gang have long been venemous anti-military activists. A few weak mutterings of “we support the troops not the war” can’t undo decades of calling us “murderers.”

This is about politics plain and simple. The anti-war crowd don’t want us to leave because they care for our safety, they want us to tuck tail and run because failure would make them right about the whole Iraq debate, waged since 2002. They want defeat, just so they can smugly smirk and say “we told you so.”

Move-On is using us. They’re using the hardships of military life -that have existed well before Iraq 2003- so that they can finally put a notch in their political win column.

Unfortunately a political win for Move-On means a military defeat for our troops. In military thinking, we don’t calling that “support,” we call it enemy action.

(emphasis mine)

Well said.  I thank John Noonan for saying it.

Another side of Iraq

The always amazing Michael Yon has a wonderful photo essay up on his blog.  It’s a side of Iraq that the legacy media refuses to show you.

Seek it out for yourself.

The nutcase did it again

Who can be bothered writing actually articles about this fruit anymore?  Just go read this and try not to throw up when you think how she prostitutes her dead son, his brothers-in-arms and herself all for the warmth of the spotlight.

Latte For Allah

“The Iraqis who have risen up against the occupation are not ‘insurgents’ or ‘terrorists’ or ‘The Enemy.’ They are the REVOLUTION, the Minutemen, and their numbers will grow—and they will win.”—Michael Moore, 4/14/04

Let’s meet the Minutemen.

Iraq’s al Qaeda leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi said militants were justified under Islam in killing civilians as long as they are infidels, according to an audio tape attributed to him on Friday.

“Islam does not differentiate between civilians and military (targets) but rather distinguishes between Muslims and infidels,” said the man on the tape posted on the Internet, who sounded like Zarqawi.

“Muslim blood must be spared ... but it is permissible to spill infidel blood,” said the speaker.

This is what Michael Moore and the entire rest of the liberal left simply refuse to believe: these men hate us and want to kill us simply because we aren’t Muslims.  No amount of anti-war fervor or Bush hatred or cries of support for the struggle are going to make al-Zarqawi and his ilk see us as anything other than a target to be killed.

Remember, folks.  Michael Moore believes that Abu Musab al-Zarqawi is the intellectual equivalent of the citizen soldiers who founded this country.

Friday’s tape was posted on a web site which usually carries statements and video tapes from al Qaeda’s wing in Iraq.

The speaker said the concept of Jihad (holy struggle) was coming under distorting attacks by “the enemies of Islam” trying to portray it as a tool “for spreading bloodshed and destruction”.

“Many Muslims have been affected by this campaign and they began shying away from using this term (jihad) for fear of being accused of terrorism. They instead replaced it with the term resistance…

“This has tarnished Jihad and its supporters and led to the inclusion of factions that have nothing to do with Jihad such as the rejectionist (Shi’ite) Hizbollah, Fatah movement and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine,” he said, referring to the Lebanese and Palestinian guerrilla groups.

“All this has been done under the pretext that whoever defends his country against the enemy and fights an occupier is involved in resistance. But Jihad is much deeper than that.”

But, this isn’t what Jihad means, is it?  I’ll leave you with the words of the always-brilliant Mark Steyn.

Bomb us, and we agonise over the “root causes” (that is, what we did wrong). Decapitate us, and our politicians rush to the nearest mosque to declare that “Islam is a religion of peace”. Issue bloodcurdling calls at Friday prayers to kill all the Jews and infidels, and we fret that it may cause a backlash against Muslims. Behead sodomites and mutilate female genitalia, and gay groups and feminist groups can’t wait to march alongside you denouncing Bush, Blair and Howard. Murder a schoolful of children, and our scholars explain that to the “vast majority” of Muslims “jihad” is a harmless concept meaning “decaf latte with skimmed milk and cinnamon sprinkles”.

Every picture tells a story, don’t it?

Good looking out at LGF, where we get to see the whoring of attention at it’s finest.

So here’s the sainted mother, grieving at her scheduled daily photo op.  With Al Sharpton no less.

What?  How dare I accuse her of manufacturing this moment?  Gee.  I don’t know where I would get such an idea.

Anyone else see an attention whore in this photo not named Al Sharpton?

Moorewatcher Eyewitness News

Gotta love our readers!

Hi, Jim.

I read your blogs religiously, and I am actually a registered user, but I forgot my password and need to register again. Having three small kids will make mush of your brain, I guess.  :P

My husband and I went to the counter protest in Crawford this weekend, and I snapped a lot of pictures. These are of the crosses refrenced today in one of the blog enteries. Also, this guy and his friend painted their horses with some messages for Cindy and her ilk. He said the horse’s butt was the most fitting place for his message. Lastly, a pic of Camp Cindy, or as maybe it should be re-named “the media center”. This is actually one of three camps. This is the main one. Don’t believe news reports that said that there were “several thousand” of the protesters. There were no where near that many. We didn’t stay terribly long, as those hippies are very mean, and threatening. We had our three kids and we felt unsafe, so we took off, but not before we got the gist of the whole media operation that they have running out there. If there were any more than maybe 500 of them out there, I would be very surprised.

Today, anyone can be a reporter.  Thank you, Angela, for taking these shots.  You’re telling a very important story here, especially with these first two.  First let’s see the shots:

Sorry, other moms who have lost loved ones…you don’t get no love

Apparently, everyone who predicted that Casey Sheehan’s mother didn’t give a fuck about the opinions of anyone else who lost a son or daughter in Iraq was 100% correct.

How can these moms who still support George Bush and his insane war in Iraq want more innocent blood shed just because their sons or daughters have been killed? I don’t understand it. I don’t understand how any mother could want another mother to feel the pain we feel. I am starting to lose a little compassion for them. I know they have been as brainwashed as the rest of America, but they know the pain and heartache and they should not wish it on another.

Lee?  Have we reached our limit of civility yet?

Update from Lee: Yeah, I would say so.  As you and I have explicitly stated numerous times, it has been prudent to extend to this woman a base level of understanding, if for no other reason than to remove from the left’s arsenal one more avenue to attack those of us on the right.  But now that this vile, detestable woman has decided to denigrate the opinions of other mothers whose sacrifice and loss is as great as her own, all I can say is “Fuck that bitch.”

The only brainwashing going on here, Cindy, has been done by the despicable anti-war left, who have convinced you that you’re some kind of fucking saint. I imagine the publicity has gone to your head, what with drooling, sandal-wearing morons parading up to you in droves, lined up to get their pictures taken with you like children visiting Santa Claus.  I can imagine the ego boost this must give you, being the attention-whore you are.  The sad thing is that you are an absolutely soulless wretch, so devoid of any fundamental human compassion that you would deny other mothers the same degree of understanding that your political enemies—in other words, people like me—have gone to great pains to show to you.  In an unfortunately perverse way, the greatest thing that ever happened to you was the death of your son, because it gave your pathetic life meaning.  No longer were you a whimpering victim, cowering in fear while the world changed around you.  Now you had what con men refer to as “an angle,” a way that you could sink your claws into the public, to be a catalyst rather than a passive observer, using your grief as a means to get the public aware of your radical anti-American agenda.  And in the process you became a hero to millions of other simps around the world who share your political proclivities.

Tell me, Cindy.  When the PR flacks go home, and the tents are folded up, and it’s nothing but you and your lawn chair surrounded by miles of open land strewn with the remnants of the brief moment when your life had any purpose, will it be Casey’s image running through your head as the bullet enters your brain?  Or will it be the nagging regret that you couldn’t whore his memory out long enough to get your own talk show?

Anti-War Protests Target Wounded

So patriotic. So supportive of the troops, right?

The Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, D.C., the current home of hundreds of wounded veterans from the war in Iraq, has been the target of weekly anti-war demonstrations since March. The protesters hold signs that read “Maimed for Lies” and “Enlist here and die for Halliburton.”

The anti-war demonstrators, who obtain their protest permits from the Washington, D.C., police department, position themselves directly in front of the main entrance to the Army Medical Center, which is located in northwest D.C., about five miles from the White House.

Among the props used by the protesters are mock caskets, lined up on the sidewalk to represent the death toll in Iraq.

Code Pink Women for Peace, one of the groups backing anti-war activist [Casey Sheehan’s mother’s] vigil outside President Bush’s ranch in Crawford Texas, organizes the protests at Walter Reed as well.

Some conservative supporters of the war call the protests, which have been ignored by the establishment media, “shameless” and have taken to conducting counter-demonstrations at Walter Reed. “[The anti-war protesters] should not be demonstrating at a hospital. A hospital is not a suitable location for an anti-war demonstration,” said Bill Floyd of the D.C. chapter of FreeRepublic.com, who stood across the street from the anti-war demonstrators on Aug. 19.

“I believe they are tormenting our wounded soldiers and they should just leave them alone,” Floyd added.

But don’t you dare question their support of the troops.  Because it’s very supportive of soldiers to line up mock caskets and remind them of their fellow soldiers that got shot or blown up right next to them.  It’s so very supportive to rip open wounds and pour salt on them like that.  I often show rape porn on giant outdoor screens just outside group counselling sessions for rape victims.  It’s my way of protesting rapists.  Sometimes I like to put Bailey’s in the coffee at AA meetings too.  Oh, and pictures of dead children on billboards outside the Chidren’s Hostpitals.  After all, the evil medical establishment is killing kids and what better way to protest that than to stick those images in the faces of the parents coming and going.

Pure scum.  The whole lot of them.  And let’s not forget that Code Pink is one of the groups that is in bed with Saint Sheehan of Crawford.  That’s a tight, mutually supportive relationship, not just a group that is glomming on to her spotlight.

Who’s this about again?  The military personnel or the protesters?  I’m no fan of the more radical side of FreeRepublic.com, but in this case...they’re 100% right.  The hospital is not the place for scum to peddle their bullshit.  Can the wounded maybe have one place where they don’t have to worry about anything but geting well, maybe?

Disrespectful and disgusting, and may every one of those lowlife protesters rot in hell.  This is just another piece of evidence that you cannot pretend you support the troops if you don’t support the mission they’re performing.  To me, this proves they don;t support the troops, they in fact hate them.  Why else would you be so hurtful and disrespectful?

Hat tip: Moorewatcher Sean (as he signed it, a.k.a furious) and another version of the story at Drudge via Wizbang.