Michelle Obama's America -- and Mine, By Michelle Malkin

by Michelle Malkin

Like Michelle Obama, I am a "woman of color." Like Michelle Obama, I am a working mother of two young children. Like Michelle Obama, I am a member of the 13th generation of Americans born since the founding of our great nation.

Unlike Michelle Obama, I can't keep track of the number of times I've been proud -- really proud -- of my country since I was born and privileged to live in it.

At a speech in Milwaukee this week on behalf of her husband's Democratic presidential campaign, Mrs. Obama remarked, "For the first time in my adult lifetime, I am really proud of my country, and not just because Barack has done well, but because I think people are hungry for change."

Mrs. Obama's statement was met with warm applause from other Barack supporters who have apparently also been devoid of pride in their country for their adult lifetimes. Or maybe it was just a Pavlovian response to the word "change." What a sad, empty, narcissistic, ungrateful, unthinking lot.

I'm just seven years younger than Mrs. Obama. We've grown up and lived in the same era. And yet, her self-absorbed attitude is completely foreign to me. What planet is she living on? Since when was now the only time the American people have ever been "hungry for change"? Michelle, ma belle, Barack is not the center of the universe. Newsflash: The Obamas did not invent "change" any more than Hillary invented "leadership" or John McCain invented "straight talk."

We were both adults when the Berlin Wall fell, Michelle. That was earth-shattering change.

We've lived through two decades' worth of peaceful, if contentious election cycles under the rule of law, which have brought about "change" and upheaval, both good and bad.

We were adults through several launches of the space shuttle, in case you were snoozing. And as adults, we've witnessed and benefited from dizzyingly rapid advances in technology, communications, science and medicine pioneered by American entrepreneurs who yearned to change the world and succeeded. You want "change"? Go ask the patients whose lives have been improved and extended by American pharmaceutical companies that have flourished under the best economic system in the world.

If American ingenuity, a robust constitutional republic and the fall of communism don't do it for you, hon, then how about American heroism and sacrifice?

How about every Memorial Day? Every Veterans Day? Every Independence Day? Every Medal of Honor ceremony? Has she never attended a welcome home ceremony for the troops?

For me, there's the thrill of the Blue Angels roaring over cloudless skies. And the somber awe felt amid the hallowed waters that surround the sunken U.S.S. Arizona at the Pearl Harbor memorial.

Every naturalization ceremony I've attended, where hundreds of new Americans raised their hands to swear an oath of allegiance to this land of liberty, has been a moment of pride for me. So have the awesome displays of American compassion at home and around the world. When millions of Americans rallied to help victims of the 2004 tsunami in Southeast Asia -- including members of the U.S.S. Abraham Lincoln Carrier Strike Group that sped from Hong Kong to assist survivors -- my heart filled with pride. It did again when the citizens of Houston opened their arms to Hurricane Katrina victims and folks across the country rushed to their churches, and Salvation Army and Red Cross offices to volunteer.

How about American resilience? Does that not make you proud? Only a heart of stone could be unmoved by the strength, valor and determination displayed in New York, Washington, D.C., and Shanksville, Pa., on September 11, 2001.

I believe it was Michael Kinsley who quipped that a gaffe is when a politician tells the truth. In this case, it's what happens when an elite Democratic politician's wife says what a significant portion of the party's base really believes to be the truth: America is more a source of shame than pride.

Michelle Obama has achieved enormous professional success, political influence and personal acclaim in America. Ivy League-educated, she's been lauded by Essence magazine as one of the 25 World's Most Inspiring Women; by Vanity Fair as one of the 10 World's Best-Dressed Women; and named one of "The Harvard 100" most influential alumni. She has had an amazingly blessed life. But you wouldn't know it from her campaign rhetoric and her griping about her and her husband's student loans.

For years, we've heard liberals get offended at any challenge to their patriotism. And so they are again aggrieved and rising to explain away Mrs. Obama's remarks.

Lady Michelle and her defenders protest too much.

Original Source

DRILL NOW!

Dear (American),

We launched our “Drill Here, Drill Now, Pay Less” campaign earlier this week, and the response has been overwhelming.

Already, more than 10,000 people have signed the petition urging Congress to start drilling for oil domestically. If you haven’t signed the petition, I hope you’ll sign it now and join me in sending a message to Congress that we need real solutions to stop the pain Americans are feeling at the pump.

If you go online and make a special investment of $10 or more we will send you this “Drill Here, Drill Now, Pay Less” bumper sticker.

Thank you for standing with me for real change. I hope you have a great Memorial Day weekend.

Your friend,

Newt Gingrich
General Chairman
American Solutions

School offers bizarre life lesson: Kill yourself!

Al-Qaida camp trained children to plant IEDs

LONDON – Officers in Britain's MI6 intelligence service, working alongside Pakistani intelligence officers in that nation's remote North West province, have located a training camp where children, some as young as six years old, were being trained as suicide bombers, according to a report in Joseph Farah's G2 Bulletin.

The camp – one of several al-Qaida training camps in the region – is under the direct control of the terror group.

The intelligence officers led Pakistani Special Forces to the children's camp outside the village of Spinkai in the mountainous region.

An MI6 report on the school describes it as "a classroom equipped with documents and gadgets for the children to learn how to carry out suicide bomber attacks. There was also evidence they had been subjected to intense religious indoctrination. As well as the Quran, there were texts by bin Laden. There also was video footage of successful attacks on targets in Iraq and Afghanistan."

Al-Qaida is known to have a unit that films attacks.

In one of the DVDs was footage of the children receiving instruction from a masked man. Like all the children, he wore a white headband inscribed with verses from the Quran. In the footage he is demonstrating various kinds of hand grenades.

The transcription of the tape by MI6 linguists in London revealed the information was instructing the pupils on how to plant roadside improvised explosive devices, IEDs.

During the operations in the area, Special Forces rounded up boys who admitted they had received suicide bomber training at the school. They had fled with their instructors before the intelligence-led team raided the building.

Joseph Farah's G2 Bulletin is the premium, online intelligence news source edited and published by the founder of WND.

For the complete report and full immediate access to Joseph Farah's G2 Bulletin, subscribe now.

Has CAIR Violated Its Non-Profit Tax Status?

By Joe Kaufman
FrontPageMagazine.com

CAIR or the Council on American-Islamic Relations was founded, in June of 1994, as part of a Hamas-related quad of groups known as the Palestine Committee. Since then, CAIR has lost a number of its representatives due to terrorist activity, and it has been named by the U.S. government as a co-conspirator for a Hamas financing trial. Yet, of the four groups in the committee, CAIR is the only one that still remains in existence, leading to the question: If terrorism won’t bring down CAIR, what will? The answer may very well be in its status as an American organization – its non-profit tax status.

United States Representative and co-founder of the Congressional Anti-Terrorism Caucus, Sue Myrick, is one of a growing number of lawmakers to speak out against CAIR. As reported in World Net Daily, in December 2007, she stated, “Groups like CAIR have a proven record of senior officials being indicted and either imprisoned or deported from the United States.”

Recently, Representative Myrick released a personal ten-point agenda, entitled ‘Wake Up America,’ put out, according to her office, “to alert and educate Americans to terrorist threats here at home posed by radical Islamic extremists.” Point number four in the agenda states, “Will call for the Internal Revenue Service to investigate the Council on American-Islamic Relations’ (CAIR) 501(c)(3) non-profit status which restricts ‘lobbying on behalf of a foreign government.’”

The United Arab Emirates (UAE), which owns CAIR’s Washington, D.C. headquarters, in May 2006, approved a multi-million dollar endowment to CAIR. This was just months after the U.S. Congress, worried about a potential terrorist threat from UAE, acted to stop a deal that would allow a UAE company to run American seaports. As reported by investigative journalist Paul Sperry, the endowment to CAIR was worth nearly $75 million, two-thirds of which allotted towards a “public-relations campaign aimed at repairing Islam’s – and the UAE’s – image in America.”

CONTINUED

Minnesota madrassa officials attack news crew

Tarik ibn Zayad Academy Update. "News crew attacked during report at TiZA charter school," by Nicole Muehlhausen for KSTP, May 19 (thanks to Itachi):

The state Education Department on Monday directed a Minnesota charter school to "correct" two areas related to religion at the school.

Tarik ibn Zayad Academy, which focuses on Middle Eastern culture and shares a mosque with the Muslim American Society of Minnesota, came under fire after a teacher alleged that the school was offering religious instruction in Islam to its students.

"The Minnesota Department of Education goes to great lengths to make clear to charter schools and their sponsors that, while schools should appropriately accomodate students' religious beliefs, they must be 'nonsectarian' under the state's charter school law," said the state's education Deputy Commissioner Chas Anderson.

The allegations first surfaced after an article by a columnist for the Star Tribune. The Education Department subsequently began a review of the suburban Inver Grove Heights school and released its findings Monday.

The agency said it was concerned about the school, with about 300 students, accommodating communal prayer and providing transportation to an after-school religious program.

"We have directed the school to take appropriate corrective actions regarding these matters and will continue to provide oversight to ensure that the school is in compliance with state and federal law," Anderson said.

In an attempt to report about the new findings from the Department of Education, 5 EYEWITNESS NEWS went to TiZA. While on school grounds, our crew was attacked by school officials. The two men were able to grab our camera and kept it until police arrived.

Our photographer was treated by paramedics after suffering minor injuries.

Original Source

UAC's Jim Horn speaks out on Islam

Part 1



Part 2



Part 3

Will Global Food Crisis Affect Americans Too?

by Jim Horn

The crisis hasn’t reached our shores yet, but hold onto your hat. The world is experiencing its first serious food crisis in years, and it could soon be coming to your pantry.

Government figures spoke of 250,000 job losses within the first quarter, 80,000 in March alone. Official unemployment rates are 5%. But have you driven a freeway lately at morning rush hour? Where are the contractor pickup trucks, the lumber trucks, the cement trucks, the painters, the roofers? They look to be missing in action. It seems as though those 250,000 job losses are in Southern California alone. And ask the Mexican government about their new migrant problem – huge numbers of returnees looking for food, work, and shelter – a migrant crisis for Mexico. Many other hourly workers have had their hours cut back, and that doesn't reach the government tally sheets.

Add to this the fact that the prices of certain products are starting to soar and demand is outstripping supply. For example, my wife and I recently went to COSTCO and the rice pallet was empty. We went a week later and that space (for rice) no longer exists because our COSTCO doesn’t have any rice. An Asian green grocer store where we often shop usually has abundant stacks of rice, but last week several pallets were empty.

Yes, we’ve heard about starvation in North Korea for years – because of the North Korean government’s mismanagement. We’ve also been receiving reports about famine in Darfur, Sudan – in fact, throughout the Sahel of Africa. Some of that sad, tragic saga is not new. Part of the problem was created by the Europeans and Americans, but that’s another long, complex story.

The world is entering a new stage of genuine famine, and you can bet that when things really get ugly, don’t be surprised if America, the world’s whipping boy, will be held to blame for the tragedy.

Thirty years ago, the United States’ efforts in south Asia succeeded in developing new variants of hearty, fast growing, high yield rice grains that were drought and disease resistant. It was the green revolution, and suddenly formerly famine ridden countries like India, Pakistan, China, and Indonesia became net food exporters. Bangladesh could even nearly feed its 150+ million people (all living in a space the size of Wisconsin).

Is the party over? There have been riots in Mexico over the high costs and shortages of corn. (Is it because we Americans are busily turning it into ethanol?) People are killing one another in Haiti for a bowl of rice. The Philippines is also facing a food crisis. India, Brazil, Vietnam, and others have halted exports of grains in their efforts to maintain stocks to feed their own people, and to hold their domestic prices down. The continuing Australian droughts have halted their mighty grains export business.

Corn costs are so high that ranchers are raising smaller herds, which will translate to even higher meat, milk and egg prices in the near future. Other foodstuffs are seeing a hike in prices as well, as corn and corn syrup are used in a wide array of products.

A so-far unmanageable wheat rust (blight) has socked Africa and the Arabian Peninsula, wiping out crops. This is spreading into grain belts of Turkey, the Ukraine, Russia, and eastern and south Asia. By next year, it could be in China and also here, in the Americas, having a devastating effect on our wheat crops if no remedy for the blight is found.

Bees pollinate crops – especially those from annuals like trees, and bee hives are collapsing. When crops go unpollinated there are very low yields, if any, so nut and fruit costs may soon soar as well.

In a year, famine will be widespread and millions people worldwide face death as a result. Here in America, it’s an election year. What are our political leaders doing – fiddling à la Nero? Where is the House of Representative’s leadership? Where is the Senate’s leadership? Besides spitting at each other, what are Presidential candidates doing? Is it too soon within the election cycle to raise these critical issues? I realize the public often has a short attention span, but some things are simply too important to wait for the electorate to wake up and smell the coffee.

Before you know it, the looming crisis means that Americans will be called on to ante up billions in food aid to the world’s starving. That will cost us more, in both taxes and in actual grocery charges, as we will be competing with ourselves for dwindling food supplies.

Here’s an idea: OPEC oil producers are rolling in cash, and they ought to be the ones to ante up cash to feed the poor this time. Their gouging is part of the reason we have moved food off of the shelves and into fuel tanks. I, for one, have had enough. And as I’m waiting for the fertilizer to hit the fan, I’m quietly stocking up on non-perishable foods.

Original Source

Bob Barr: He's In It to Lose It

By William R. Hawkins
FrontPageMagazine.com | Thursday, May 15, 2008

Bob Barr, a Georgia Republican congressman from 1995- 2003, formally announced his campaign for president on the Libertarian Party ticket on Monday, May 12. It was widely reported that his candidacy will take votes away from the GOP presidential hopeful Sen. John McCain, similar to the way Ralph Nader’s campaign will hurt the Democratic nominee. But while Barr was a conservative Congressman, he has moved rapidly to the left since breaking with the Republican Party two years ago. He has claimed that a McCain victory would be a “third term” for the Bush administration. On issues of national security and foreign policy, he now sounds more like Nader or Barack Obama. Instead of running to the right of McCain, Barr will be running well to his left – perhaps even further left than the Democratic nominee. Indeed, one of his best-known competitors for the nomination is far-leftist Mike Gravel.

At his announcement, Barr claimed he was “in it to win it,” echoing Hillary Clinton’s losing campaign. But his positions indicate, like Gravel, Barr is “in it to lose it” when it comes to the War on Terror, or any contest against America’s foreign enemies.

In a video posted on the left-wing Huffington Post the day of his announcement, Barr says, “Only a fool would signal to whatever our adversaries are, whoever our adversaries are, exactly how and when we would be drawing down our troops. But I do believe that it is extremely important, and in the best interests of America's defenses and our security, and our relationship with our allies, that we do begin immediately setting in place a plan to draw down, dramatically decrease the military, the economic and the political footprint that we maintain in Iraq.” Barr’s vagueness about who the enemy is in Iraq, be it al-Qaeda or Iranian-backed militias, makes it easier for him to ignore the consequences of his proposed withdrawal of all tools of American influence from the region. Allies and those considering whether to align with the United States, are not going to be favorably impressed by a demonstration of American weakness; nor is crippling political divisions at home a persuasive argument for democracy.

Only five months ago, Barr noted, “Regardless of how one feels about the war in Iraq – and I am among those believing the invasion and continued occupation of this Middle Eastern nation (‘nation building,’ if you will) was and remains ill-advised – the performance of our armed forces in Iraq improved dramatically this past year, especially in the last half of the year.” Barr’s advocacy of a complete U.S. withdrawal from Iraq, regardless of the situation on the ground or the consequences, is the manifestation of ideology, not strategic reasoning. Barr exudes Isolationism, a naïve desire to retreat into an idyllic world far different than the one that actually exists. As America learned the hard way during the 1930s, the rest of the world won’t go away.

Barr opposes any military action against Iran, even though he acknowledges Tehran’s quest for nuclear weapons and support for terrorist groups. In a column last October, he called for “strengthening economic and political pressure on Iran” without offering any specifics. At the same time, he argued “What is important, however, should be to quell the simplistic blustering by the White House and by many presidential candidates designed to prove each will be tougher on Iran than the others. Also helpful would be putting a lid on unnecessary and repetitive insults and threats directed at the Ahmadinejad administration.” In the months since his column, Iran has shown that it has no respect for the diplomatic approach of the U.S. and its European allies. Not only is the Tehran regime moving ahead with its nuclear program, but it has felt secure enough to unleash its Hezbollah proxy army against the Lebanese government, which is supposedly backed by the same Western powers. CONTINUED

A Pro-Hamas Libertarian

By John Perazzo
FrontPageMagazine.com | Monday, May 12, 2008

As the Clinton-Obama political slugfest rages on and John McCain awaits the winner, a fourth presidential candidate also remains in the race, aggressively distinguishing himself from his rivals as the candidate most eager to negotiate with terrorists.

A Massachusetts native who served in the Alaska House of Representatives from 1963-66 and in the U.S. Senate from 1969-81, Mike Gravel began his run for the White House as a Democrat but failed to gain any traction as such, thus he crossed over to the Libertarian line. Gravel’s previous claim to fame came in 1971 when he read, into the Senate record, some 4,100 pages of the “Pentagon Papers,” which Daniel Ellsberg initially had leaked to The New York Times in a move that unquestionably violated the Espionage Act’s explicit prohibition against the release of “any document … relating to the national defense which … could be used to the injury of the United States or to the advantage of any foreign nation.”

Today Gravel is again prepared to injure the United States, this time by working to prevent America’s strongest Middle Eastern ally, Israel, from being able to defend itself against the onslaught of its jihadist, genocidal neighbors. Specifically, Gravel has denounced what he terms “the Washington establishment” for having “condemned and criticized Jimmy Carter for his latest attempt to make the world a safer place” by “meeting with Khaled Meshal, the leader of Hamas.” In Gravel’s view, Carter “should be praised” for his “brave gambit” which aims to “jump-start the peace process.” “When will we Americans learn that the only way to achieve true security is through diplomacy and negotiation?” says Gravel. “... [T]he only way to break the cycle of violence is a negotiated settlement.”

“Carter’s critics,” Gravel adds, “don’t know much about Israel’s real security situation -- nor do they really care about it. All they want to do is please AIPAC [American Israel Public Affairs Committee] and hawkish members of the American Jewish community who don’t have to live under the daily threat of terrorism.”

But in point of fact, it appears that Gravel himself knows very little about those with whom he would “negotiate.” Consider, for starters, that Mr. Meshal commonly preaches a message of genocide to frenzied Arab audiences that interrupt his speeches with thunderous, approving shouts of “Death to Israel!” and “Death to America!” Not long ago, Meshal declared that Israel “will be defeated with God’s help”; that “before Israel dies, it will not escape humiliation and surrender”; that “we [Muslims] will defeat them emotionally and mentally before we defeat them in the field of battle”; that “the army of Allah” will crush “Israel and America and all the abusers of this world”; and that Islam’s holy warriors are “people who care for dying for Allah, dying for honor and prestige more than they care for life itself.”

These hardly sound like the sentiments of a potential negotiating partner. But then, why would we expect Meshal to take a different stance? Indeed, to this day the founding Charter of the very organization he heads unambiguously states that “Allah is its goal, the Prophet its model, the Qur'an its Constitution, Jihad [holy war] its path, and death for the case of Allah its most sublime belief.” The Charter further says that Jihad “becomes an individual duty binding on every Muslim man and woman; a woman must go out and fight the enemy even without her husband’s authorization, and a slave without his master’s permission.”

“There is no other solution for the Palestinian problem other than Jihad,” the Hamas Charter elaborates. “All the initiatives and international conferences are a waste of time and a futile game.” This doesn’t appear to leave much wiggle room for negotiated settlements. Does Mike Gravel not understand this?

Moreover, the Charter is quite candid in declaring that it seeks to fulfill the Qur'anic scripture which reads: “The prophet, prayer and peace be upon him, said: The time will not come until Muslims will fight the Jews (and kill them); until the Jews hide behind rocks and trees, which will cry: O Muslim! There is a Jew hiding behind me, come on and kill him!” Exactly how does one have a “meeting of the minds” with a mindset like this?

Most notably, Meshal is by no means alone in expressing these sentiments. He speaks for a majority of his fellow Hamas leaders and for most of the Palestinian people. As Mahmoud al Zahar, the most senior Hamas member in Gaza, puts it: “We do not and will not recognize a state called Israel. Israel has no right to any inch of Palestinian land. This is an important issue. Our position stems from our religious convictions. This is a holy land. It is not the property of the Palestinians or the Arabs. This land is the property of all Muslims in all parts of the world.” “Let Israel die,” Zahar says succinctly.

Is Mr. Gravel unaware that whenever Hamas in the past has agreed to a “truce,” it was only for the purpose of buying time to rearm itself or to perfect its plans for Israel’s ultimate destruction? This has been candidly acknowledged by no less a personage than Abu Abdullah, a leading member of the Izzedine al-Qassam Martyrs Brigades, Hamas’ nominal military wing. In April 2007 Abdullah said: “We don't recognize Israel’s right to exist. We will never allow Jews to remain in our lands.... We have thousands of rockets ready to be shot…. We are preparing a major cemetery for them. We will step up attacks, including dispatching suicide bombers to Tel Aviv.”

When Hamas in 2007 suddenly announced that a “truce” it had made with Israel five months earlier was “officially over,” the terror group promptly fired 39 Qassam rockets and 79 mortars from the Gaza Strip into nearby Jewish communities on the very day that Israelis were celebrating their country’s Independence Day. But of course, Hamas “truces” and “cease fires” always have been shams. During those preceding five months of nominal “peace,” for instance, Hamas had simply passed its weaponry to other likeminded organizations which, in turn, launched hundreds of rockets from Gaza into Israel. CONTINUED

Palestinians in Gaza Are Phonebanking for Barack Obama

Phil Klein calls our attention to an al-Jazeera news report that sounds like a parody, but is genuine: A report on Palestinians in Gaza who are phonebanking in support of Barack Obama's campaign.

I transcribed the most jaw-dropping parts:

REPORTER: It may be hard to believe, but working in this tiny Internet cafe in Gaza City may just be one of Barack Obama's biggest fans.

Before every U.S. primary, 23-year-old Ibrahim Abu Jayyab gathers 17 of his friends to try and rally support for Obama's campaign in the U.S.

So why does a young Palestinian living in Gaza spend so much of his time and money on an election thousands of miles away?

ABU JAYYAB: [translated] It all started at the time of the U.S. primaries. After studying Obama's electoral campaign manifesto, I thought, 'this is a man that is capable of change inside America.' As for potential change in the Middle East, he can also do that. I think he can bring peace to the area, or at least this is what we hope.

REPORTER: And the game plan? Ibrahim and his friends call random numbers in the U.S. before every primary to deliver one simple message:

ABU JAYYAB: [in English] Elect Senator Obama. I will change. I will achieve... the justice in the Middle East.

The rest of the report is about Bush failing to achieve peace in the Middle East, the U.S. "unwillingness to apply pressure on Israel over illegal settlements," a professor who says his students are following the election but

A potttery maker says, "unless you support Israel, you won't get in the White House."

The report concludes by showing graffiti in Gaza depicting a monstrous Bush, lips dripping with blood, clutching the world and drinking blood through a straw from a pile of skulls. The caption is, "Good bye Mr. Bush, we wont' miss you."

The reporter's voice over of the graffiti: "There does to be one thing people here agree on."

Above article was originally posted on NPO

Islam Over Runs London Streets - coming to a city near you

Submitted by Jeff:

At the beginning, a Muslim man using a microphone in a moving vehicle is on such a tirade that it’s hard to understand what he’s saying. He goes on so long and loud that I began to think this was going to be the point of the piece.

But watch all the way to the end. Observe the disturbing helplessness of the police. It is difficult not to be embarrassed for them, as they seem to have no cohesion and no ability to deal with mob behavior.

I am troubled by the extremes of reaction by the UK Police. On the one hand, the “community police” harass and even incarcerate the indigenous Brits for allegedly dropping an apple core on the sidewalk. On the other hand, they are seemingly helpless in the face of an aggressive crowd of immigrants who have only contempt for their authority.

This is worse than corruption. It is collapse. Corruption can be reformed, but where do you send the purported keepers of the peace for courage and judgment?

watch this video to the end and see how out of control the situation is.

Tribune Covers for Obama’s Terrorist Friends

http://www.aim.org/aim-column/tribune-covers-for-obamas-terrorist-friends/

The Weather Underground Communist terrorists have long peddled the line that their bombings didn’t kill anybody, except themselves.

The Chicago Tribune, which once employed Barack Obama campaign strategist David Axelrod, is refusing to publish the truth about a Weather Underground terrorist bombing that killed a policeman. The paper apparently does not want to tarnish the image of Obama friends Bill Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn, who were allegedly part of or had direct knowledge of the bombing plot that also injured several other police officers. The Tribune considers Ayers an education expert and has published various articles by him.

Please help Accuracy in Media expose the Tribune’s cover-up.

I sent a copy of the following email message to Tribune reporter Liam Ford on April 27. He was the co-author of an article that consisted of a series of questions and answers about Ayers, the communist terrorist who became a friend of Obama’s and helped launch Obama’s political career. My message said:

“Liam Ford and Mark Jacob:

“You state in your ‘Questions and Answers About Bill Ayers,’ April 24, page 4, that ‘The only people known to be killed or hurt by Weather Underground bombs were bombers themselves.’

“We ask for a correction of this false statement.

“The FBI report on the Weather Underground states, under the title of ‘WUO Bombings and Attempted Bombings,’ that on February 16, 1970, ‘A bomb detonated at the Golden Gate Park Branch of the San Francisco Police Department killing one officer and injuring a number of other policemen.’

“The Society of Former Special Agents of the Federal Bureau of Investigation authored a 1979 pamphlet on the WUO that reported, ‘On October 18, 1974, Larry Grathwohl, a former member of the WUO, testified before a US Senate Subcommittee that Bill Ayers, a WUO leader, had told him that Bernardine Dohrn, another WUO leader, had to plan, develop and carry out the bombing of the police station in San Francisco. Ayers told Grathwohl the bomb was placed on the window ledge and he described the bomb that was used to the extent of saying what kind of shrapnel was used in it.’

“Please tell us when and how you intend to correct the record so that we can inform our readers and members.

“Cliff Kincaid, editor, Accuracy in Media.”

Reporter Ford told me that he would look into the matter but later said that he didn’t think the material I provided to him would be considered important enough. This struck me as strange. The paper was taking the word of the terrorists themselves that their bombings had never killed anybody else. The WUO had not publicly claimed responsibility for the bombing of the police station in San Francisco.

So the standard seems to be that if the terrorists themselves take “credit” for a bombing, it will be assigned to them. But if they refuse to publicly take credit, because they don’t want to be implicated in a murder, they will be absolved of responsibility, no matter what the evidence shows. This is partisan political journalism designed to benefit Obama.

The Bomb Blast

Newspaper accounts at the time put the number of people wounded at nine. Riddled with shrapnel, Sgt. Brian V. McDonnell died two days later at San Francisco General Hospital. A memorial was held for him in February 2007. He was a young man with his whole life ahead of him. But to Ayers and Dohrn, he was a “pig.”

“Sergeant McDonnell caught the full force of the flying shrapnel, which consisted of heavy metal staples and lead bullets. As other officers tried rendering aid to the fallen sergeant, they could see that he sustained a severed neck artery wound and severe wounds to his eyes and neck,” the San Francisco Police Officers Association Journal reports.

“Officers [Ron] Martin and [Al] Arnaud, who were standing several feet from the window ledge, were knocked to the ground and sustained injuries from the flying glass,” it says. The blast caused them hearing impairment and shock. One officer was knocked to the floor unconscious, while another “suffered multiple severe wounds on his face, cheek and legs from the flying fragments of the glass.”

The Facts

Tribune reporter Ford seemed willing at first to correct the record. But he said he would need more direct information. So I decided to go the extra mile. I obtained Grathwohl’s actual congressional testimony and provided this material to him.

The testimony was given by Grathwohl to the Senate Internal Security Subcommittee on October 18, 1974. He testified:

“When he [Bill Ayers] returned, we had another meeting at which time―and this is the only time that any Weathermen told me about something that someone else had done―and Bill started off telling us about the need to raise the level of the struggle and for stronger leadership inside the Weathermen ‘focals’ [i.e., cells] and inside the Weatherman organization as a whole. And he cited as one of the real problems was that someone like Bernardine Dohrn had to plan, develop and carry out the bombing of the police station in San Francisco, and he specifically named her as the person that committed that act.”

Grathwohl added that Ayers “said that the bomb was placed on the window ledge and he described the kind of bomb that was used to the extent of saying what kind of shrapnel was used in it.”

He was asked, “Did he say who placed the bomb on the window ledge?” He replied, “Bernardine Dohrn.”

Asked if Ayers said that he had personally witnessed Dohrn placing the bomb, Grathwohl responded, “Well, if he wasn’t there to see it, somebody who was there told him about it, because he stated it very emphatically.”

This testimony completely obliterates the notion, perpetuated by the Chicago Tribune and other media, that the Weather Underground communist terrorist bombings only killed the bombers themselves. Such propaganda is designed to play down the serious nature of the terrorist crimes. It is also designed to make Obama’s relationship with Ayers and Dohrn more palatable.

Grathwohl includes this conversation with Ayers in his 1976 book, Bringing Down America: An FBI Informer with the Weathermen. The park police station bombing in San Francisco was “a success,” Ayers is quoted as saying, “but it’s a shame when someone like Bernardine Dohrn has to make all the plans, make the bomb, and then place it herself. She should have to do only the planning.”

What a shame that Dohrn had to do all the dirty work. But it’s probably safe to assume that Ayers either helped her or knew about it in advance.

Grathwohl reveals that Ayers himself knew how to make bombs and didn’t care about people being killed. At one point, he says, Ayers displayed a diagram of a bomb, with dynamite and a fuse. The plan was to bomb a police station but an objection was raised that it would also destroy a nearby restaurant. “We’ll blow out the Red Barn restaurant,” Grathwohl said. “Maybe even kill a few innocent customers―and most of them are black.”

“We can’t protect all the innocent people in the world,” Ayers replied. “Some will get killed. Some of us will get killed. We have to accept that fact.”

Grathwohl says the Weather Underground also considered using kidnappings and assassinations in order to bring about their communist revolution in the U.S. Possible kidnapping targets were Vice President Spiro Agnew and presidential aide Henry Kissinger.

Time Will Tell

For more than a week I have gone back and forth with reporter Ford and the office of the Tribune ombudsman, or consumer advocate. His name is Timothy McNulty. I talked to his assistant and left messages on his telephone answering machine. Ford told me at one time that McNulty was on jury duty, which had left the issue unresolved. Eventually, the public editor’s office told me that they are under no obligation to disclose when or if they will correct anything.

Yet, the paper insists that “Publishing information quickly and accurately is a central part of the Chicago Tribune’s news responsibility and a value shared in all our publications…We take our readers’ concerns about accuracy seriously and will promptly investigate when we are alerted to possible errors.”

The reluctance to correct the record may have something to do with an April 18 Chicago Tribune editorial, “Guilt by Association,” which said that while Ayers and Dohrn should be repentant about their terrorist activities, “they have done good work in Chicago” and that Chicago Mayor Richard Daley was correct when he said that linking them to Obama was “playing guilt by association.”

Why should Obama be harshly judged because he hangs around with criminal terrorists? The paper advised people to get back to the “real campaign.”

But has the Tribune become part of the Obama campaign? It turns out that Obama campaign strategist Axelrod worked for the Tribune for eight years as a reporter. It also turns out that Ayers has been a contributor of columns to the Tribune. He has written for the paper on at least five occasions about educational matters.

So perhaps the paper is reluctant to spill the beans about someone whose work it has published and now regards as a respected member of the Chicago establishment.

The Big Lie

The Weather Underground Communist terrorists have long peddled the line that their bombings didn’t kill anybody, except themselves. The book flap for Ayers book, Fugitive Days, insists that the organization carried out “strategic, bloodless bombings, including one inside the Pentagon.”

Bloodless? Tell that to the family of the San Francisco policeman and those who were injured. The book flap goes on to say that “Ayers and his comrades” became “America’s other Viet Nam vets.”

Ayers was part of a communist movement, with controllers in such places as Hanoi and Havana, that resulted in a communist takeover of South Vietnam and the ultimate sacrifice of the lives of more than 58,000 American soldiers in vain. If he was a Vietnam vet, he was on the communist side.

Perhaps the paper can ask Ayers and Dohrn about their alleged involvement in or knowledge of the San Francisco bombing. Perhaps the paper already has this information and is sitting on it. There is a report that a grand jury is currently investigating the 1970 bombing.

If Ayers and Dohrn have refused to talk about this to the Tribune, could their silence have something to do with the fact that there is no statute of limitations on murder?

Which raises a question that the media should put to Senator Obama: do you think, in view of the evidence, that either of your friends, Bill Ayers or Bernardine Dohrn, should be indicted and prosecuted for murder?

· If you would like to ask the paper to correct the record on this matter, please contact Mr. McNulty at 312-222-3348. His email address is publiceditor@tribune.com

· The editor of the paper is Ann Marie Lipinski. Her email address is: ctc-editor@tribune.com She can also be reached through 312-222-3550. Please ask that she publish the truth about Bill Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn.

---

San Quentin Prison imam chokes wife with electrical cord, is not suspended from job

http://www.jihadwatch.org/dhimmiwatch/archives/020911.php

(Jihad Watch/Dhimmi Watch) Is no one at San Quentin uncomfortable with the idea of this imam preaching among prison inmates? Some of those inmates are probably doing time for crimes committed in similar circumstances. "Prison chaplain still on duty pending assault inquiry," by Gary Klien for the Marin Independent Journal, May 5 (thanks to JT):

San Quentin State Prison chaplain accused of choking his wife with an electrical cord will remain on duty pending the outcome of the investigation, a state spokeswoman said.

The investigation should not stop there. Prison officials should look into what he is preaching. Indeed, it is an opportunity to reconsider a great deal about the chaplaincy program, concerning who is hired, and what inmates are hearing and reading.

Rafeeq Hassan, 66, was arrested April 24 after an incident at his home on the prison grounds. Police determined that Hassan choked his wife with his hands and an electrical cord during an argument over "household issues," according to the sheriff's department.

Hassan, in a phone interview, said he was shaving at the time and was fending off his wife during a "ruckus."

Prosecutors are still reviewing the allegations, said Deputy District Attorney Charles Cacciatore. Hassan, who is free on bail, was assigned a May 12 court date to find out whether he will be charged.

Hassan, a full-time Muslim chaplain who makes $59,000 a year, has not been placed on suspension by prison officials.

"They need to wait until they receive all the documentation and reports until they make a decision about suspending him," said Terry Thornton, a spokeswoman for the state correctional department.

The prison employs five chaplains - Catholic, Protestant, Jewish, Muslim and Native American. Hassan pays about $800 a month to rent his home at the prison, Thornton said.

He may yet get a place for free.

PT. 1-5 Glenn Beck, Joel Rosenberg talk about the end times

A Video Portrait Of Barack Hussein Obama