Shut Up, General Powell

General Colin Powell is living proof that military officers (particularly Generals) and politics don't and shouldn't mix. It is mind boggling that this man, who has never been elected to anything, should continue to lecture the Republican Party on inclusiveness and the need to adopt more liberal policy positions. Has anyone else noticed that when the Republican Party nominated just such a candidate, the most liberal candidate it has ever nominated for the Presidency of the United States, Colin Powell endorsed Barack Obama?

We can well understand the guilt and the regret Powell must feel for his race-based endorsement, but he has lost all standing, if he ever had any, to lecture the Republican Party on how to win elections.

What rankles the arrogant General is the impertinence of real Republicans like Dick Cheney and Rush Limbaugh for suggesting that he is a horse's ass and a hypocrite, who endorsed a Marxist simply because he is black.

If General Powell has any commitment to the Republican Party and believes his liberal views are the path to its revival, let him demonstrate that at the polls. If he is unwilling to show us how it should be done, he should get off his high horse and shut up.

Archbishop of Westminster: Tony Blair "Not a Good Guide to the Teachings of the Catholic Church"

From LifeSiteNews
By Hilary White

The newly installed Archbishop of the Catholic diocese of Westminster, recently told Times columnist Dominic Lawson in an interview that former Prime Minister Tony Blair is not someone worthy of trust on religious matters. Archbishop Vincent Nichols called it "extraordinary" that Blair should have presumed to "lecture" the Pope on moral issues in an interview last month.

In April Blair gave an interview to a homosexualist magazine in which he attacked Pope Benedict XVI and the Catholic teaching on homosexuality. Nichols, however, said that Blair's strong "political instincts," are "not a good guide to the teachings of the Catholic Church."

He continued, saying that "a bit more reflection is needed as to the relationship between political instinct in general - and certainly his - and the nature of the truth that the Church tries to put forward.

"Maybe he lacks a bit of experience in Catholic life."

Nichols, usually described as a "conservative" by the British press, is widely credited with having helped spearhead the fight against the Blair government's legislation that caused many of the British Catholic adoption agencies either to close or secularise in the face of new requirements that they allow adoption by homosexual partners.

At his May 21st installation Mass at Westminster Cathedral in London, Nichols urged Catholics to express themselves confidently in the public square. "Faith is never a solitary activity, nor can it be simply private," he said. "Faith in Christ always draws us into a community and has a public dimension."

In the Times, Lawson described Nichols, the former archbishop of Birmingham, as "still seething" over the adoption agency issue and describes him as never having "been afraid of taking the battle to the politicians when he feels his church is under attack."

He quotes the Nichols saying, "We have been pushed out unnecessarily ... It was a disproportionate response [by the government] and the victims are the children, not the church."

Nichols said that all government adoption agencies except for the 11 Catholic ones accepted homosexual partners for consideration for adoptions, and therefore the Catholic agencies should have been allowed to opt out of the law.

However, critics of the archbishop's reasoning point out that by the archbishop's own admission, his own Birmingham Catholic adoption agency had "for years" been accepting single homosexuals as potential adopters against the teachings of the Church. In 2007, at the height of the adoption agency controversy, Nichols told the BBC in an interview that his agency was happy to adopt children out to single homosexuals but that the objection was only to those in legally recognised domestic arrangements.

The Birmingham diocesan agency would also allow single non-homosexuals and unmarried but cohabiting heterosexual couples to be considered. However, the teaching of the Catholic Church says that to allow children to be adopted into irregular domestic situations, including with homosexual partners, unmarried single people or unmarried "common-law" partners, constitutes an act of "violence" to their natural development. Children, the Church teaches, have the right to be raised in the context of the natural family, with a mother and a father.

Critics have also pointed out that as head of the archdiocese of Birmingham, Nichols, with the rest of the Catholic bishops of England and Wales, had been fully briefed by an expert on Britain's discrimination laws that it was unnecessary for any Catholic adoption agency either to close or secularise. "Regulation 18" in the law allows them to operate according to their religious beliefs said Neil Addison, a barrister and the author of a textbook, "Religious Discrimination and Hatred Law."

Addison told LifeSiteNews.com that there was no need under the law for any Catholic adoption agency in the UK to close or secularize, if they had been acting in accordance with Catholic teaching, or willing to change their practices to do so. Addison claims that the bishops were complicit in the closure or secularisation of the adoption agencies due to their unwillingness to fight for the religious nature of the agencies.

Addison told LSN that, with the exception of Bishop Patrick O'Donohue of Lancaster, the bishops of the Catholic Church of England and Wales simply ignored the existence of Regulation 18, claiming in the media that the government was forcing their adoption agencies to close.

Susan Boyle Has Got Talent!

The star born of YouTube and worldwide acclamation got off to a shaky start on the first couple of notes in her semi-final performance this past weekend on Britain's Got Talent; but Susan Boyle finished strong and brought the audience and judges to their feet once again. She continues on to the final, and regardless of the outcome, probably one of the best selling albums of 2009.

And here is a recently discovered video of Susan in 1984:

Obama Aide - Not Our Goal to Reduce Abortions

From LifeSiteNews
Commentary by Wendy Wright

Author’s Note: Because of the Obama speech at Notre Dame and the widespread misunderstanding that this Administration has fostered, others have urged me to make public what the White House official in charge of finding “common ground” stated in our meeting.

Two days before President Obama’s commencement address at Notre Dame, I was at the White House for one of the meetings that he spoke about. About twenty of us with differing views on abortion were brought in to find “common ground.” But the most important point that came from the meeting was perhaps a slip from an Obama aide.

It revealed that what many people believe -- including high-profile pro-life leaders who support Obama -- is sorely wrong.

Ask nearly anyone, “What is Obama’s goal on abortion?” They’ll answer, “Reduce the number of abortions.” A Notre Dame professor and priest insisted this in a television debate after Obama’s speech. The Vatican newspaper reported it. Rush Limbaugh led a spirited debate on his radio program the next day based on this premise.

But that’s not what his top official in charge of finding “common ground” says.

Melody Barnes, the Director of Domestic Policy Council and a former board member of Emily’s List, led the meeting. As the dialogue wound down, she asked for my input.

I noted that there are three main ways the administration can reach its goals: by what it funds, its messages from the bully pulpit, and by what it restricts. It is universally agreed that the role of parents is crucial, so government should not deny parents the ability to be involved in vital decisions. The goals need to be clear; the amount of funding spent to reduce unintended pregnancies and abortions is not a goal. The U.S. spends nearly $2 billion each year on contraception programs -- programs which began in the 1970s -- and they’ve clearly failed. We need to take an honest look at why they are not working.

Melody testily interrupted to state that she had to correct me. “It is not our goal to reduce the number of abortions.”

The room was silent.

The goal, she insisted, is to “reduce the need for abortions.”

Well, this raises a lot of questions.

If you reduce the need, doesn’t it follow that the number would be reduced? How do you quantify if you’ve reduced the “need”? Does Obama want to reduce the “need” but not the number of abortions? In that case, is he okay with “unneeded” abortions?

Note what Obama said in his speech at Notre Dame:

“So let us work together to reduce the number of women seeking abortions. …”

Abortion advocates object to the phrase “reducing abortions.” It connotes that there is something bad or immoral about abortion. Melody’s background as a board member of one of the most hard-core abortion groups in the country (Emily’s List even opposes bans on partial-birth abortion) sheds light on why she was irritated when that was stated as her boss’ goal.

The Los Angeles Times reported in 2004 that Democrats, after losing the presidential election, began rethinking their harsh, no compromise stance on abortion. Their solution?

Change their language but not their position.

The LA Times interviewed me on this strategy and reported: “Wright said it was too early to know whether Democrats would change their votes on upcoming antiabortion legislation, or would only change the way they speak of abortion. She said the comments of some party leaders led her to believe that ‘it would just be changing of wording, just trying to repackage in order to be more appealing -- really, to trick people.’”

Howard Dean, then head of the Democratic National Committee, validated my concern. He told NBC's Tim Russert: "We can change our vocabulary, but I don't think we ought to change our principles."

By all his actions so far, Obama is following this plan.

Obama needs to be honest with Americans. Is it true that it is not his goal to reduce the number of abortions?

More importantly, will he do anything that will reduce abortions? Actions are far more important than words.

"All Gave Some, Some Gave All"

Obama to Apologize to Germany for World War II?

The Atlas Shrugs blog has distilled several recent news stories and scholarly articles that suggest Obama is about to apologize to the Germans for World War II. Were this any other American politician of the Left, we would consider such an idea sheer lunacy. Of course many of them hate America, its history, and all that it has stood for in the world. But most have enough political pragmatism to keep such impulses in check. In Obama we have an ideologue whose hatred and arrogance surpasses base political pragmatism. He is a narcissist whose hatred and evil is on a grand scale. Once he has finished apologizing to the world for all the evils of America, can reparations be far behind?

As you reflect this Memorial Day weekend on the hundreds of thousands who gave all for their country, consider the fact that all they fought against now occupies the White House.

From Atlas Shrugs

The latest inconceivable Obamaction is yet another unbecoming apology in Europe, this time in Germany for WWII. John Rosenthal suggests, "As bizarre as it may seem, President Obama’s impending trip to Dresden suggests that German revisionists have a friend in the White House".

And American Thinker adds, "the message Obama intends to send by visiting both sites is clear; while the Germans did bad things during World War II, they were also victims of Allied atrocities."

The latest German reports suggest Obama’s principal German destination will be Dresden. According to an article in the local paper Die Dresdner Neueste Nachrichten, representatives of the German and American governments met in Dresden last Wednesday to discuss preparations for the visit. An American security detail is reported to have already scoped out sites in the city: presumably for a public speech.

The symbolic significance of a visit to Dresden by the American president — especially one undertaken in connection with a D-Day commemoration in France — may be missed by some Americans, but it is absolutely unmistakable for the German public. For Germans, Dresden is the symbol bar none of German suffering at the hands of the Allies. The city was heavily bombed by British and American air forces in February 1945, toward the end of the war. According to the most recent estimates of professional historians, anywhere from 18,000 to at most 25,000 persons died in the attacks. These numbers come from a historical commission established by the city of Dresden itself. But far higher numbers — ranging into the hundreds of thousands — have long circulated in Germany and beyond. The bombing of Dresden is commonly described as a “war crime” in German discussions.

Alleged crimes committed by the Allies against Germans and Germany have indeed become a sort of German literary obsession in recent years, with numerous books being devoted to the subject. The taste of the German public for the theme was made particularly clear by the enormous success of author Jörg Friedrich’s 2002 volume The Fire [Der Brand], which is about the Allied bombardment of Germany. The book’s success was so great that Friedrich and his publisher quickly followed up with a picture book on the same topic titled Scenes of the Fire: How the Bombing Looked.

Obama should spend the day tending to the graves of our brave and glorious dead, who sacrificed their lives so that Europe could live on to descend into a pathetic, amoral collectivism. Europe owes us an apology for squandering our blood and treasure on a morally bankrupt transnational gobbledy goop EU wallowing in pathetic collectivism.

Time for a history lesson. What better day to teach the foreign exchange student in the White House a lesson about American exceptionalism, heroism, and greatness?

America's European Arrogance (hat tip Joan S)

1. The American Cemetery at Aisne-Marne, France. A total of 2,289 of our military dead. We apologize.


2. The American Cemetery at Ardennes, Belgium. A total of 5,329 of our dead. We are so ashamed of our arrogance.


3. The American Cemetery at Brittany, France. A total of 4,410 of our military dead. Excuse us.


4. Brookwood, England American Cemetery. A total of 4,680 of our dead. We are such an evil country.


5. Cambridge, England. 3,812 of our military dead. What on earth were we thinking?


6. Epinal, France American Cemetery. A total of 5,525 of our military dead. Please forgive us.


7. Flanders Field, Belgium. A total of 3,680 of our military. We are so sorry.


8. Florence, Italy. A total of 4,402 of our military dead. We are a bully nation.


9. Henri-Chapelle, Belgium. A total of 7,992 of our military dead. They deserved what they got.


10. Lorraine, France. A total of 10,489 of our military dead. FDR and Truman were lying war criminals.


11. Luxembourg, Luxembourg. A total of 5,076 of our military dead. Arrogant oppression, pure and simple.

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12. Meuse-Argonne. A total of 14,246 of our military dead. Just think of how many civilians they killed.


13. Netherlands, Netherlands. A total of 8,301 of our military dead. They were murderers.


14. Normandy, France. A total of 9,387 of our military dead. Baby killers, one and all.


15. Oise-Aisne, France. A total of 6,012 of our military dead. They were torturers, too.


16. Rhone, France. A total of 861 of our military dead. Remorseless killers doing the bidding of an evil nation.


17. Sicily, Italy. A total of 7,861 of our military dead. What can America ever do to redeem itself?


18. Somme, France. A total of 1,844 of our military dead. Arrogant war-mongers of an arrogant nation.


19. St. Mihiel, France. A total of 4,153 of our military dead. War criminals.


20. Suresnes, France. A total of 1,541 of our military dead. Oh, God in heaven, please forgive us for being such an arrogant country.


The total number of Americans buried at the cemeteries above is 104,366 -- a mere fraction of those who died liberating Europe -- and yet an American president who confuses arrogance with leadership feels the need to apologize in Europe for the country he obviously holds in contempt.

It is virtually unthinkable that Obama could give a speech in Dresden and not allude to the bombing of the city. Most of the city’s historical monuments — which Obama’s advance team were apparently inspecting — were severely damaged or destroyed in the bombing and had to be rebuilt. Moreover, for Obama to visit both Dresden and Buchenwald would suggest precisely the sort of outrageous parallels that have become commonplace in Germany at least since the publication of Friedrich’s The Fire.

(As so happens, although tens of thousands of persons died there, Buchenwald was not one of the camps specifically devoted to the extermination of Jews. But far be it from Obama to know that. When, during the election campaign, he first referred to his Uncle Charlie’s WWII exploits, he said that his uncle had helped to liberate “Auschwitz.” Moreover, Charlie Payne did not really participate in the liberation of Buchenwald either, but rather in that of Ohrdruf: a lesser-known, affiliated camp some sixty kilometers away.)

Europe traded the lives of 6 million Jews for 55 million Muslims. Good luck with that.

And Ovamit is apologizing.

Thatcherite Wins Backing for Reagan Statue in London

From The Times
By Philippe Naughton

The former US ambassador apparently thought it a good idea. His replacement, when Barack Obama eventually names him, may not be so keen.

An interior designer from Chelsea who is a leading light in the Thatcherite Conservative Way Forward group has won approval for a statue of the great American conservative Ronald Reagan to be erected outside the US Embassy in London. The project was given the nod on Thursday night by Westminster City Council’s planning sub-committee in a break with its policy of allowing memorials only to people who have been dead for at least ten years. The former US President died in 2004 aged 93.

The 10ft bronze statue of the man hailed by Margaret Thatcher for winning the Cold War without firing a shot will be placed on a 6ft plinth of Portland stone outside the embassy building in Grosvenor Square, Mayfair, near an existing statue of Dwight D Eisenhower, the war hero President, unveiled by Mrs Thatcher in 1989.

The architects behind the project, the same firm responsible for the statues of Nelson Mandela in Parliament Square and the Queen Mother near Buckingham Palace, say that it was enthusiastically backed by the former ambassador, Robert Tuttle, who left office in February. It was also supported by the Ronald Reagan Foundation in California, which chose the sculptor Chas Fagan to create the statue.

Unsurprisingly, perhaps, the current inhabitants of the embassy — who are still waiting for President Obama to confirm Mr Tuttle’s replacement — appear less keen to have a larger-than-life statue of the darling of the American Right on their doorstep.

“This is not something that we have requested oractively tried to get brought about,” an embassy spokesman said yesterday. “We’re happy to have our presidents honoured but this statue was not a US Government initiative.” Asked whether the mission would take the statue with it when it leaves Grosvenor Square for its new head-quarters in Nine Elms, south of the Thames, he replied: “It’s not our statue.”

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