Liberals and President Bush

June 23 - I've tried to play down the US election somewhat until the Canadian election is over, but Michael Moore hasn't shown similar restraint and has linked the two elections.

A post over at Belmont Club puts quite a hurting on Moore and his fellow progressives by looking at their real grievance against the U.S. President and those who support them (The Revolution Within the Revolution) and, by extension, the Conservative Party of Canada:

The particular venom with which the Liberals regard President Bush is at heart a reaction to what they perceive as a coup d'etat directed against the carefully constructed edifice of their historical achievements. To understand why the President and individuals like Paul Wolfowitz are described as "illegitimate", one should not, like the man who doesn't get the reference, look to the Florida chads or US Supreme Court decisions. Liberals are not talking about that kind of statutory legitimacy. Rather they are referring to what is perceived as a brazen attempt to negate the cultural equivalent of the Brezhnev doctrine, the idea that certain "progressive" modes of behavior, once attained, are irreversible. In this view, an entire set of attitudes, commonly referred to as "political correctness" and their institutional expressions, like the United Nations, have become part of a social contract, part of an unwritten constitution.

[...]

In the days following September 11, the Liberals watched aghast as America went to war -- when that had been abolished! -- against Muslims in the Third World, all but twitching away the hapless figures of France and the United Nations in the process. (Emphasis added.)

I wish I could write like Wretchard but I can't, so read the whole thing. Just how progressive are Democrats when they can't progress beyond the "summer of the 90's?"

There are some serious threats to us, yet when we should be debating issues, we are dodging mud. Liberals and Democrats are shaming themselves during these elections and the voters should be outraged.

By the way, A Chick Names Marzi eviscerates Moore to the delight of us who can never read enough Moore bashing (via this post at Moore Watch.)

Read them all. I'm off to work.

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More stupid Bush = Hitler nonsense

June 22 - Ghost of a Flea caught something that did slip many of us by, an article in the Chicago Sun-Times that proves that those who are journalists should look a little harder at themselves before attacking (Flea: Hitler.)

Anti-Semitism is on the rise in Europe and Canada, yet it seems to me that articles like the one in the Sun-Times would tend to encourage notions of an International Jewish Conspiracy, which I hardly think is the president's fault unless he is being accused of appointing too many people with Jewish surnames to his administration (and what the hell is that about, anyway? I recognize German surnames, but how does one know they are Jewish?) and if that's a criticism, it implies that those who object are anti-Semitic.

In plain English: since when do Americans judge a person's politics and motives by their surname or colour of their skin? Those who bandy words like neo-con and hint that it has Jewish roots are doing more harm to our country's ideals than the terrorists could possible achieve, or, if you prefer, are helping the terrorists achieve their aims, one of which is for the USA to stop supporting Israel.

It never escaped most of us that the war on terror would, by necessity, have to take on Arafat. That unprincipled scoundrel failed to take President Bush's Road Map seriously; this was not only anticipated but expected, but what Arafat didn't understand was that it was indeed his last chance to be relevant. Now he sits amid the rubble. Who says there is no justice?

The worst anyone can really say about President Bush is that he says what he means and means what he says. So they accuse him of failing to lie! Only a fool could think that a failure in leadership.

Who didn't understand that removing Saddam also removed a major financier of terrorism directed against Israelis? The Palestinians certainly understood it, and those who chose to duck that fact again reveal more about themselves and their anti-Semitism than than any laboured comparisons of President Bush to Hitler.

Who leaked information that the redacted portions of the 2002 report on terrorism covered up Saudi complicity? Was it by chance Democrats? So who is inciting hatred and suspicion?

And yet the staff of the Sept. 11 Commission has found no evidence that top Saudi officials have given money to al Qaeda (No Saudi Payment to Qaeda Is Found.)

The new account, based on 19 months of staff work, asserts flatly that there is "no evidence" that the Saudi government or senior Saudi officials financed the group, which is led by Osama bin Laden.

more...

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Zahra Kazemi - All about the oil?

June 8 - Via Paul, Stephan Hachemi, Zahra Kazemi's son, has written a hard-hitting letter to the editor of the National Post which, given the short link life at the Post, I'm going to quote in full:

June 3, 2004

To former prime minister Jean Chretien:

Like many Canadians, I recently learned of your coming visit to Iran as a representative of a Calgary-based oil company. It is reported that the purpose of your trip is to conclude a deal with the Iranian government on behalf of this firm.

I write to congratulate you.

Your failure to ensure justice was served in the case of my mother, Zahra Kazemi -- who was murdered by the Iranian regime while you were prime minister -- has apparently paid off: You are now most welcome in Tehran.

Last June, my mother was arrested without cause by agents of the Iranian government, who then beat and tortured her to death. No doubt, you remember the case and so are well-informed of the systematic violations of human rights that take place in Iran, as well as the circumstances that surround the killing of my mother.

And yet, knowing this, you are off to shake hands with representatives of the Islamic Republic of Iran, the executioners who less than a year ago had my mother murdered.

I can only thank you for doing this now, Mr. Chretien -- for you are demonstrating clearly what a charade Canada's fervent defence of human rights is. Despite your speeches about human rights when you were at the head of our government, you are now conferring your personal prestige on Iran's regime, and by extension its crimes against humanity.

Bravo, Mr. Chretien. I knew I could count on you to take the veil off your government's hypocrisy. The politics that you practice now show how your government favours "business as usual" before human rights. Congratulations.

Stephan Hachemi, Montreal.

I'm not bashing Canada here, because Sen. John F(reaking) Kerry has done something equally disgusting: his primarary Iranian supporter, Hassan Nemazee, is suing the Student Movement Coordination Committee for Democracy in Iran for $10 million in damages a move which the SMCCDI regards as frivolous but could restrict their ability to keep the Democrats honest in their dealings with Iran.

Read the whole thing; it is disturbing and raises some questions that should be directed at Sen. Kerry.

Sen. Kerry has already indicated his willingness to treat with the mullahs of Iran, in a move which may be cynical (maybe it's all about the oil!!!!) or could be appeasement but which amounts to a flagrant dismissal of the democratic aspirations of the Iranian people. Small wonder US Old Media coverage of the Iranian elections and subsequent demonstrations received so little air time.

As Americans and Canadians, do we support tyrants or those who yearn for freedom? Are we appeasers of murderous despots or do we actually believe in those human rights we are so quick to claim to revere?

Those issues may not seem as urgent or important as bread-and-butter issues, but if we lose our freedom to work and raise our families without fear we will lose the true meaning of freedom.

Election campaign coverage has a way of obscuring issues by focusing on the sound bites instead of the substance of remarks, but President Reagan's death has reminded us that indeed there are pivotal events that can lead either to victory or become yet another missed opportunity.

Would I rather rejoice because millions of Iraqis are entering a new era of freedom or bewail the fact that the French are annoyed with us for ignoring their advice?

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Bush at the Air Force Academy

June 3 - The text of the President's speech yesterday to the graduates of the Air Force Academy is here.

Just as events in Europe determined the outcome of the Cold War, events in the Middle East will set the course of our current struggle. If that region is abandoned to dictators and terrorists, it will be a constant source of violence andd alarm, exporting killers of increasing destructive power to attack America and other free nations. If that region grows in democracy and prosperity and hope, the terrorist movement will lose its sponsors, lose its recruits, and lose the festering grievances that keep terrorists in business. The stakes of this struggle are high. The security and peace of our country are at stake, and success in this struggle is our only option.

Those who believe Operation Iraqi Freedom is not connected to the War on Terror overlook the fact that there is one root cause of terrorism which we can address and help change, that being the repression and tyranny of Arab states which stifle the creative energy of millions of men and women who, like most of us, desire nothing more than to live, work and raise their families without fear and with hopes of a better tomorrow.

Lest we forget, the Iraqi people have also suffered from the bombs of Zarqawi and his associates as have our soldiers and civilian contractors, and our partnership with the Iraqi people has been forged in blood and perseverence.

Read the whole speech. There's been a lot of events in Iraq since the war first began, but the mission remains the same: Iraqi Freedom.

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The Return of The Coyne

June 1 - Andrew Coyne: The Blog is back with a New!Improved!Look but the same, vintage Coyne dry humour and clarity that makes his blog such a joy to read are unchanged.

I found his piece titled "Adscam, the election and the Conservatives" wonderful mostly because he said what I've been fumbling to say for a long time and clarified something I've had a lot of trouble with up here.

Because it isn't just about the $100 million, nor is it restricted to a few rogue bureaucrats and their sleazy advertising-industry friends. It isn't even about corruption, at least as defined in the Criminal Code. Adscam, rather, is woven into the very fabric of Liberal Party dominance, a web of personal, political and even familial ties built up over the party's many years in power and connected at every point with public money. It is of a piece with the HRDC scandal, the gun registry fiasco, the regional development slush funds, the lot. That is why the Liberals, whether Martinite or Chretienite, are so deathly afraid of the whole business. Whatever its virtues as a scandal in its own right, Adscam is more significant as the entry point, the single loose strand from which one can begin to unravel the rest. I do not mean this only in an investigative sense. It is rather the opportunity it provides to focus public attention, adjust public expectations, and through them alter the structure of Canadian politics.

Reform the civil service, get rid of the patronage rewards after elections, and try to make the government accountable to the people of Canada rather then the ruling Party. Check.

But it's this next bit that lends clarity to the muddle Canada has been in for the last little while, and perhaps even some clarity about our Old Europe allies:

For what is striking about the whole Adscam affair is how unsurprising it was, any of it, to anyone. Everyone knew what the Liberals were up to, and everyone knows there is much worse to come. And yet -- perhaps the Liberals' greatest achievement -- we had all grown accustomed to looking the other way, and having looked away the once, to congratulating ourselves on our sophistication. It was deeply shaming, and like all humiliated people, we learned to drown our shame in cynicism. After all, it wasn't as if there was anything we could do to change it. The Liberals were fixed in power, immovably, eternally. (Emphasis added)

I had never thought of cynicism as shame-based, but it could explain a few things, including (by inference) some of the attitudes of the "Anyone But Bush" Democrats in the USA.

Read the whole thing.

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