A Clear and Present Media Bias

I just ran across an excellent post by Larry Clifton over at the American Politics and Media blog. Mr. Clifton published the post on September 8th. I'll share some of it with you...

... There is a lot about Sarah Palin that I don’t know. I do feel that I am comfortable and impressed with what I do know about her. On the other hand, there is a lot about McCain that I do know. Probably too much. In either case, I believe both are brave patriots who put country first.

Regarding Obama…not so much. Perhaps there is a bias behind my discrimination against his campaign; if so, it is appropriate and well documented. Today, Obama claims he is for the Bush tax-cuts that he has railed against for so long. Last week, along with House Speaker Pelosi and her ilk in Congress, he suddenly decided that offshore drilling might be a good idea after opposing it for his entire 300 or so career days present in Congress. And that whole thing about rural Americans “clinging to guns and religion…” he didn’t mean it, but it sure sounded good in San Francisco. Far more troubling is Obama’s reluctance to show our military - the military he wants to lead - a small modicum of respect.

Americans may argue the merits of the Iraq war for decades, or at least until Middle Eastern women no longer need to worry about being murdered by their fathers for choosing their own husbands. But arguing that our soldiers and their highly successful surge against Al Qaeda, which calmed the country and slowed violence against civilians while drastically lowering our troops’ combat casualties, didn’t work – well, even Al Jazeera can’t spin that garbage.

So, last week Obama admitted that the surge that he voted against and vehemently protested is a military success. It seems that as the election enters the home stretch, Obama is morphing into a rabid right-wing Republican. ...

You should read the entire post -- here.

T-shirt from NOBama.com

Seven Years Later: How to Remember September 11

Note: This commentary was delivered by Prison Fellowship Ministries President Mark Earley.

September 11, 2008

Today, seven years after terrorists flew a plane into the Pentagon, killing 184 people, a memorial to that attack will be dedicated. That it has taken seven years to erect this memorial is a testimony to our uncertainty as to how best to memorialize the events of that day.

In contrast to the Pentagon memorial, any memorial to the victims in New York is “years away.” Reinhold Martin of Columbia calls the situation at “Ground Zero” an “incredible mess.” The iconic status of the site, combined with “disagreements and competing priorities among government agencies, family groups, and Wall Street interests,” has made settling on a design near impossible.

While we debate what to do with stone and metal, there are some things we can do with our thoughts and actions right now.

I do know this: The best way to honor those who died has nothing to do with architecture.

One group is calling on Americans to make September 11 a “national day of charitable service.” They urge us to “volunteer, donate to a cause, or perform another good deed of [our] own choosing.”

Charitable service is always a good idea, and any attempt to inspire volunteerism is welcome. So is the decision by the presidential candidates to pull campaign ads on this day. That kind of respectfulness is appropriate. But there is more to memorials than architecture and good deeds, as important as they are. The word memorial comes from the Latin word memor, which means “mindful,” “remembering,” and even “grateful.”

What should we remember? Of course, we remember the victims and their families. And we are grateful for those, such as the New York firefighters and police, who died trying to save others. But we should also be mindful of why they died. We should not let the passage of time dull us to the threat posed by those who perpetrated the attack, their distorted worldview, and their continuing determination to kill us. You can be sure that bin Laden, his followers, and would-be followers will be celebrating the seventh anniversary of these attacks and calling for more just like them.

Events like the Madrid and London bombings testify to the continuing appeal of al Qaeda-like jihadism. The cult of the suicide bomber is, unfortunately, alive and well in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan. Their resilience should come as no surprise: Their memories go back nearly 1,400 years. They bemoan events that took place before the discovery of America. Their attention span and patience easily accommodate seven years. The real question is: Do ours?

We should also remember that their inability -- for now -- to attack us on our own soil does not mean they cannot threaten our way of life. Recent months have highlighted our dependence on foreign oil -- oil that disproportionately comes from the part of the world where these enemies are most active.

While architecture can honor the past, the only memorial worthy of that name are the lessons we learn that keep the past from ever being repeated again.

TOPIC: Radical Islam is Our Sworn Enemy; Why Doesn't Our Government See That Fact?

Article from ChristiansUnite.com

Colonel David Hunt told Fox News last week that our soldiers could have killed Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri in 2005. However, they were stopped from taking any action by then Secretary of State, Donald Rumsfeld.
What were the reasons for this insane decision? We are told that it was to protect the fragile democracy of President Musharraf in Pakistan and to further President Bush's goal of establishing democracies. When will we realize these people do not want a democracy, they want a government controlled by Radical Islam?
Apparently President Bush thinks by insisting upon giving them a democratic form of government they will accept it. What President Bush doesn't seem to realize is that these people are not our friends, they are our sworn enemies. Why don't we understand that Radical Islam is the greatest threat America has ever faced since World War II? Why don't we understand the words of Jihad being spoken nearly every day by Iran's President Ahmadinejad? Why don't we realize that Radical Islam teaches its followers to lie to non-believers?
Don Swarthout, President of Christians Reviving America's Values (CRAVE) said, "The real question is, Why doesn't America realize these Radical Islamic countries are our sworn enemies and that we must be defeat them by a show of force? Force is the only thing they understand." Swarthout said, "America has to wake up very soon to the real threat these people pose to our nation. Our leaders talk about the amount of chatter heard today like it is nothing. They had better wake up to the fact that Al Qaeda and Radical Islam are very real threats to us." Swarthout concluded, "We have become so politically correct that we have lost track of how America should act. Those who teach tolerance are really teaching us not to express our true opinions. Whatever happened to our freedom of speech everyone is always hollering about? Where is the value in not saying anything when you strongly disagree with something?"

CRAVE is contacting our Senators and Congressman to ask who is keeping a watchful eye on all of the Radical Islamic groups. We strongly suggest that our readers do the same. You may call 202/225-3121 and they will connect you to your Congressman and Senator's offices in Washington D.C.

Poll: 1 in 4 U.S. Young Muslims OK With Homicide Bombings Against Civilians

Article from FOXNews.com

One out of four young U.S. Muslims believe homicide bombings against civilians are OK to "defend Islam," according to a new poll. The poll by the Pew Research Center also finds some Muslim Americans seem to be separating from mainstream America in their attitudes toward the War on Terror and U.S. Mideast policy.
The study found that among the nation's younger Muslims, 26 percent say homicide bombings can at least rarely be justified "in order to defend Islam from its enemies." "It is a hair-raising number," said Radwan Masmoudi, president of the Washington-based Center for the Study of Islam and Democracy, which promotes the compatibility of Islam with democracy.
The poll briefly describes the rationales for and against "suicide bombing and other forms of violence against civilian targets" and then asks, "Do you personally feel that this kind of violence is often justified to defend Islam, sometimes justified, rarely justified, or never justified?" Younger U.S. Muslims under the age of 30 are much more willing to accept homicide bombing in the defense of Islam than are their older counterparts, the study found. While 69 percent of Muslims under 30 say homicide bombings are never justified, 2 percent say they're often justified, 13 percent say bombings are sometimes justified and 11 percent say they are rarely justified. Only 9 percent of older U.S. Muslims said homicide attacks are at least rarely justified.
In addition to young Muslims' attitudes towards homicide bombings, the study found that only 40 percent of U.S. Muslims believe that Arabs carried out the Sept. 11 attacks. Another 28 percent said they don't believe it. Since the Sept. 11 attacks, 53 percent said it's been more difficult to be Muslim in America. The Pew poll also found that almost half of the nation's Muslims are more likely to identify themselves as Muslims first and then Americans, with 47 percent placing religious affiliation above nationality. Three out of four people surveyed said the decision to go to war in Iraq was wrong, and 48 percent said using force in Afghanistan was wrong. Five percent of those surveyed had a "very favorable" or "somewhat favorable" view of Al Qaeda, while 58 percent had a "very unfavorable" opinion of the terror group. But the study also found that most of the nation's Muslim community is "largely assimilated, happy with their lives, and moderate with respect to many of the issues that have divided Muslims and Westerners around the world."
The poll also found that U.S. Muslims reject Islamic extremism by larger margins than do Muslim minorities in Western European countries. In Pew surveys last year, support in some Muslim countries exceeded 50 percent, while it was considered justifiable by about one in four Muslims in Britain and Spain, and one in three in France. "We have crazies just like other faiths have them," said Eide Alawan, who directs interfaith outreach at the Islamic Center of America in Dearborn, Mich., one of the nation's largest mosques. He said killing innocent people contradicts Islam.
The survey included more than 1,000 of the nation's estimated 2.35 million Muslims and was conducted in English and several foreign languages. Andrew Kohut, Pew director, said in an interview that support for the attacks represented "one of the few trouble spots" in the survey.

The Sope-Bocks: There is troubling information in the Pew Research poll results. It is estimated that there are upwards of 3 millions so-called U.S. Muslims -- though some groups' estimates are double that figure. If the Pew poll results are truly indicative of the Muslim population in America, that means that nearly 1 MILLION "Muslim-Americans" believe it's acceptable to kill civilians in order to "defend" their religion.
Couple that with the fact that Islam is hellbent on ridding the world of infidels through voluntary or forced conversion -- and the result is America is in a very dangerous predicament.
Why? Well, Islamists consider themselves to be Muslim ahead of being American. Therefore, they would put their religious fervor above the health and well-being of their fellow non-Muslim American neighbor. IOW, they would kill or allow the killing of other Americans because of their Muslim beliefs before they would defend the country they live in.
Americans may be subjected to a new definition of "melting pot" if we aren't careful in how we handle the radicals among us. Political correctness has NO PLACE in defending our nation against the extremes of Islamo-fascist element.

TOPIC: This is the True Face of Islam
Original source material: FOXNews
Abu Usamah, 43, is a New Jersey-born Muslim cleric with links to a suspected Al Qaeda operative. He is an example of the TRUE face of Islam.
The imam now is spewing his message of hate to a growing group of followers at a mosque in Birmingham, England. His target: the United States, the United Kingdom, Christians and Jews. Abu Usamah at-Thahabi regularly exhorts worshippers at the Green Lane Masjid, or mosque, in Birmingham to hate Westerners, whom he calls "pathological liars" and "kuffar," a derogatory term for non-Muslims. Abu Usamah also calls for the public crucifixion of all "kuffar" and says they should be "left there to bleed to death for three days."
Sources tell FOX News that Abu Usamah is a mysterious character — no one, including federal agents and fellow imams, seems to know what his name was prior to his conversion to Islam. Just prior to the invasion of Iraq in 2003, he called President Bush a "pathological liar" and constantly argued to his followers that "Jews controlled the media." The New Jersey-born imam, who claims to have studied a strict version of Islam at the Islamic University of Medina in Saudi Arabia rants, "Lying is part of their religion. ... They do whatever they want to do. They are liars, they are terrorists themselves. They are lying, you can't believe them. "They are pathological liars."
He also is heard ticking off an enemies list that includes mainstream British culture. "America, the U.K., Germany and France, they have come against the religion of Islam," he declares. "Popular culture … if you're a person who gives yourself to that, your mind is going to be controlled by the so-called powers to be, who make these manmade laws."
The mosque's official Web site says its purpose is to counter Muslim stereotyping, but the UK's Channel 4 report found there is a secret chat room area of the site that only mosque members know about, where At-Thahabi's lectures are broadcast. It is in this chat room, the report says, that Abu Usamah preaches the creation of a "total Islamic state" that advocates harsh punishments for non-believers. "Whoever changes his religion from Islam," he declares, "kill him, in the Islamic state."

The true face of Islam is one of violence & hatred bent on a worldwide Islamic state. Following that fact through, it also means the total annihilation of all other religious groups, especially Christians and Jews. Make no mistakes folks, Islam is out to kill or convert every single living human being on the planet. They really don't care which -- convert or die. It's time to take the gloves off and fight this evil before it takes over our culture and our country.

Click here to view the British news documentary on Abu Usamah.