Sorry about the delays in posts. There seems to be either blogger problems or delays on my server. Will have to investigate.

Glenn has a long post on the "patriotism" issue regarding especially those who supported the war but now are pandering to the anti-war left base. He's spot on but missed this one important fact.

The democrats campaigned, at least their supporters did for sure, on the apparent lack of intelligence of the president. He has been mocked and ridiculed at every opportunity and it is a constant meme running through lefty blogs and other assemblages that Bush is a moron. But that argument falls flat especially when that card is played by democratic politicians.

In other words, they are now trying to tell the public that Bush hoodwinked them. So, that should inspire great confidence in the public. I can only imagine their next campaign slogan: "Don't blame me, I was fooled by the village idiot".

They were too inept to see through the lies, and are now asking us to trust them. What was it that PT Barnum said about underestimating the public?

Over a year ago, I implored the president to Take the gloves off. Let's rehash:

Republicans just don't get it. Liberals, and democrats in general, don't want to get along, they want to destroy the president and win at all costs. They don't want to be bi-partisan. To them, bi-partisan means both parties agreeing to liberalism. Liberals will use any tactic at their disposal. They will allow a single judge to thwart the will of the people, they will engage in the politics of personal destruction, they will exploit for political purposes any tragedy, victimize any person for political gain, and are the most hypocritical, duplicitous group of people known to man.

This past June, I again begged the president again to Take the gloves off:

The Bolton confirmation process is just the latest attempt in what I believe is an attempt at a bloodless coup. The democrats really have convinced themselves that the election was stolen, that Kerry should be president, and that even if not, they should still be running the country. They are going to do anything and everything in their power to destroy his presidency.
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That's not acting like a responsible opposition party. It's the machinations of a deranged and frightful bunch, deluding themselves and willfully collaborating to destroy the democratic process. These people are beyond dangerous. Is that hyperbole? I don't think so.

The president has either read this blog and taken my advice, belatedly as it seems, or has finally seen the light. If we're going to win this war, and win it we must, then he must wage war on all fronts. Sadly, this means on the domestic front as much, if not more than the foreign one.

Disgusting doesn't even begin to describe the blatant duplicity and hypocrisy of those who so quickly forget their very own words about the urgency of threat which Saddam posed. It borders on treason. Risking our national security to secure a few congressional seats is a shameful price they are willing to pay. Hopefully the president continues this path, and the only thing the democrats will gain is the enmity of the nation.

It's about time. Let's hope he continues.

(Trying to rememebr the full post that didn't from earlier today!!)

There are a few things we can conclude from the most recent Jordan bombings.

One, the bombings could have been far, far more deadly but weren't. If you compare the scale of the bomb to attacks in Baghdad from a year or two past, or even the Bali bombing, this was small by comparison. In addition, a year and a half back, a large cache of chemical weapons was captured in Jordan possessed by a group affiliated with al Qaeda. Now, why this didn't make the national headlines I'll never know (yeah, right), but even CNN reported it.

DAVID ENSOR, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Well, Kyra, U.S. officials are saying that the capture of this group with this massive -- with these tons of chemicals is clearly a big deal. But there is disagreement among U.S. officials over whether the chemicals really were intended to create chemical weapons, a toxic cloud kind of a weapon, or whether they were intended simply to create large conventional explosives.

At issue is the large quantity that was captured along with these men of sulfuric acid. Now U.S. scientists say that sulfuric acid can be used as a blister agent, but it is more commonly used, and in these quantities more commonly expected to have been used, to increase the size of a conventional explosion.

What I think is becoming more and more obvious is not the ability, but lack thereof, of the terrorists to inflict large scale damage. They can still kill, and even crash a wedding party or two, but their ability to cause the havoc they need is severely diminished. Whether they choose to admit it or not, clearly the efforts to seek and kill terrorists where they are has had a dramatic effect on their strength.

Two, it is becoming clearer to the Arab "street" who the real enemy is. While we might never gain their love and praise, they know who the real threat is, and from where the real terror comes. The rallies in the streets are against Zarqawi and terrorism, but more importantly, there is no condemnation of US policy. They are being forced to make a decision between the past, a very dreary past at that, and the future, and they are choosing the future.

We have chosen a unique and dramatic strategy to attack terrorism. We have undertaken an inside-out approach, starting directly in the belly of the beast and forcing the cancer out. This is entirely different from landings in North Africa, Italy and finally France. Then, the German army was able to retreat to bases closer to home, shortening their supply lines while extending ours. They fell back to supportive locales while we had to traverse ever more hostile ones. As they could finish the fight on their home soil, we had to fight on ever more foreign, and difficult terrain.

I believe in science it is could be called diffusion. Through internal pressure (thermal agitation if you will), the enemy has been forced out, rather than being free to hunker down. We have forced, whether intentionally or not, the rest of the Arab world to deal with the problem as it is pushed from Iraq. We have isolated Syria and Iran, the two remaining sponsors of terrorism. Now, it is not just the US whose actions they support is aimed at, but the rest of the Arab world.

Zarqawi has done one thing for us that we could never have even imagined he'd do. He has removed any doubt among those who see his efforts as simply being against the US. As he continues to target Arabs and Muslims, he makes clearer every day that his vision is one shared by very few while he tries to impose his will solely through violence and fear.

We are still in a long conflict, and a difficult one as well. It is truly a revolution, and as such, they are never pretty.

We can learn much from the bombings in Jordan. They could have been far worse, that the terrorists are forced to disclose their true intentions, and that, most importantly, we are succeeding. Our efforts have been successful.

I have been using the Dashblog widget for the Dashboard feature of the new OS X. It worked for a while, but apparently is not now. Thus, several of my posts, including two from today have not posted. I was able to post from my school where blogger.com is otherwise blocked by our web filter. Oh well. I'll have to find another work around.

Democrats will no doubt see yesterday's rejection of all things Arnold as a sign of that voters are leaning democratic. They will be sadly mistaken if they think they can run simply as not-Republican. Arnold came into office promising reform. He failed to deliver. He promised to change the ways of Sacramento. He didn't. He promised to take no special interet money. He does. He let a goodly number of the voters down.

Look at the results from yesterday's eletion:

Prop 74 Teacher tenure: lost 55-45
Prop 75 Union Dues: lost 53.5-46.5
Prop 76 Spending limits: lost 62-38
Prop 77 Redistricting: lost 60-40

What are we to conclude? The people basically left Arnold on 74 and 75, and actually like the way things are in Sacramento. When one takes a trip back in history, California passed prop 13, the property tax limitation in 1979 but rejected an income tax limitiation proposition the next year. In reality, some things have never changed inteh Golden state.

People want goodies from government, and know that capping spending and reducing the power of elected officials through redistricting hurts that. They overwhelmingly rejected anything that will curtail their desires for more from government.

No doubt this was a huge loss for Arnold. I hope that he declines to seek reelection as he will have no chance.

Unions should only rejoice in that they were able to use their hundreds of millions of dollars to affect the outcome yet they have not secured the public's support. The voters rejected Arnold far more than they supported the unions.

However, the shrillness and disgusting manner that they presented themselves to the public will have a lasting impact on California politics for some time.

I truly hope the Republicans learn from this election. They need to understand a few things: namely that democrats and liberals don't play the game according to any sense of fairness or decency. Arnold lost control of the terms of the debate and allowed his opponents to cloud public perception. The left will lie, cheat, and steal, and will do anything and say anything to get their way.

Let the Republicans also learn from this election, and use it to prepare themselves for 2006 and 2008. The real problem is not that people are more favorable to democrats, it's that Republicans are less favorable to Republican lawmakers. We are angry at their spending, lax immigration policies, and complete failure to remain true to Republican principles. The ideas of limited government are gone.

If the Republicans lose seats in 2006 they will only have themselves to blame. They alienated their base, and if we don't turn out, they're going to lose.

Case in point is in Virginia. The governor-elect did not run as a tax-and-spend liberal, but rather as a more moderate, fiscally responsible candidate. Republicnas should learn from that one. Don't be more like the democrats, be more like a Republican. It's a winning formula.

The most dangerous feature of leftism is their view of the world and history, a paradigm called determinism. In short, Wikipedia defines it's premise:

The principal consequence of deterministic philosophy is that free will (except as defined in strict compatibilism) becomes an illusion.

It is a philosophy that goes back to the ancient Greeks, although with Herdototus and later Thucydides, the school of thought called Empiricism (the philosophical doctrine that all human knowledge ultimately comes from the senses and from experience. Empiricism denies that humans have innate ideas or that anything is knowable a priori, i.e., without reference to experience.) came to predominate Western thought and writing. However, whether it was Christian neo-Platonism, 19th century Marxism, or our post-modern cries of "racism", the continual battle between the paradigms continues to dictate our course of actions.

The battle over free will versus determination was seen no more visibly than the Enlightenment where the entire nature of people's relationship between man and his government was called into question. It is the very same question that is rocking the middle eastern world today. Currently, the inability to see the empirical nature of society threatens our future in dramatic ways. The left, predominantly determinist, sees the current riots in France as the result of a) Western oppression b) poverty c) racism or d) all of the above. None see it as one more in a long series of related and indeed coordinated events.

Since 9/11, we have seen attacks or threats of attacks in England, France, Spain, Turkey, Italy, Holland, and Russia. That the former Soviet bloc countries have been spared for now is far more a factor of their more recent past (Soviet satellites) than their more current status (democracies). We have also witnessed attacks on Westerners from Australia, Bali, to the Phillipines. Not surprisingly, the western response has been meek at best.

Over a year ago, al Qaeda was giving instructions to its minions in Italy. Instead of seeing the latest round of violence as the result of the vast network of operatives and their supporting elements, the riots are seen as some spntaneous uprising. It only serves to highlight the complete failure or refusal, you be the judge, to grasp the enormity of the situation.

Simply connect the dots and we see not a series of single and isolated events, but an almost continual chain of ever escalating battles. Just as Hitler didn't invade Poland in 1935, he tested the waters ever so cautiously in the Saar. Just as he didn't annex Austria in 1936, he treaded ever so gently into the Rhineland.

Europe has been at war for a very long time. Returning to the beginning premise, it is a war of their enemy's choosing, their enemy's free will. The only influence on their enemy's thinking is past experiences with the west, which have unequivocbly proven to be pacifism, decay, and refusal to fight.

The sooner Europe drops their preconceived, post-modernist ideas of utopian society, the sooner they will be able to connect the dots.

Those who know me are aware of my passion for football, just like most American males. And like most football pundits and purists, I am equally disgusted with the antics of Terrell Owens. It's not just his most recent outburst, but his continual displays of immaturity and selfishness. As a long-time 49ers fan, I am all too familiar with his exceptional talent for creating problems for opposing defenses as well as his own team.

But, unlike many, I see TO as symptomatic of a much larger problem, one exacerbated by the very society that now criticizes his behavior. I offer not an apology for TO, for none will be forthcoming. Yet, there certainly are extenuating circumstances and contributing factors. That does not leave him faultless, but rather a sympathetic and tragic figure.

Recently, Laker coach Phil Jackson came under severe criticism for comments directed at rap music. Here's what he said:

I think it's important that the players take their end of it, get out of the prison garb and the thuggery aspect of basketball that has come along with hip-hop music in the last seven or eight years.

Sometimes the harshest criticism comes from those we love, and those who love us, the most. They have nothing to gain by being nice, nothing to fear from honesty. Nobody will sue a loved one simply because they tell us something we don't want to hear, though we might not speak to them for a while.

Many years ago, I needed a letter of recommendation from an employer. I was told that they only provide work dates and re-employment status. And that was in 1991. They were already feeling the heat from the threat of legal action. I know teachers who will not write such letters for any student simply because they feel that they must write a glowing letter for all: or for none. They know all too well that their honesty could bring them, especially if they politely refuse. And I can't say that I blame them.

However, the most recent episodes call upon us to reflect on the problems that many in the African-American community face. Could Phil Jackson, a man who has spent the majority of his life in a sport, and in a league, dominated by African-Americans really be a racist without it becoming obvious? No. Bill Cosby made some extremely prescient observations a while ago,and instead of being the impetus for national debate, or at least debate among so called "Civil Rights Leaders", he instead became ignored by mainstram media and scorned by those supposedly concerned with the plight of thier "consituents".

If those we know and trust best can't in good conscience be honest, then what hope is there?

Does anyone honestly deny this observation: We willingly tolerate, and even promote, behavior and dress from African-American youths that we would never tolerate, much less promote, from others. And that I dare say is not only racist, but the worst form of racism. It is far more deadly than the blatant, in your face, kind. It is far more subtle, and like a cancerous tumor, far more deadly.

I truly believe TO's behavior is symptomatic of decades of this pernicous form of tolerance. No doubt throughout his life, whatever he did was passed off as being part of his "culture". And that poor excuse metasticizes.

This pernicious ideology hardly permeates the entirety of the African-American population. But it is safe to say that all too often, in public schools, in popular media, among timid politicians, just to name a few, it is far safer to be intellectually dishonest and destructive than actually confront a problem head on.

That so many can criticize TO without fear of the nasty charge of racism is a sure sign of progress. As such, we find that his teammates rally around their quarterback and their team, not a "victim". But nobody asks why TO would feel such freedom, maybe even privilege, to act in the manner he so often does.

I have chronicled previously how society truly treats the races differently. In our quest to recant for our past sins, we have acted like the absentee parent who suddenly to decides to buy their way back into their child's life. For example, I highlighted the disgusting stereotypes that were the punchlines in "Bringing Down the House".

In a similar vein, we find that those who feel democracy incompatible with Arab societies are those on the far right and the left. The former was never known for its concern to achieve racial equality and has been justly ostracized. The latter is the driving force behind today's dangerous duo of tolerance to the extreme coupled with perpetual welfare dependency. As mentioned previously, the more dangerous of the two by far being the subtle and not the overt. One can only hope that they too will share a similar historical judgement.

Let's acknowledge TO's recent, and not so recent outbursts as symptomatic of a far larger pathology. Let's use it to open a debate, both honest and fearless. Let's admit our past sins, but also admit our present shortcomings. I imagine that my words could be contrued as racist, an attack which is to be expected. But that simply is the result of a refusal to respect differences of opinion, refusal to have preconeived notions challenged.

I truly feel sympathetic for TO. Worse, I have great fear for so many of our young, who are growing up in a society that refuses to put up boundaries and continues to offer only excuses. They deserve far more from us.

Time is short. Time to act.