Friday, September 22, 2006
The People's Cube Strikes Again...
Wednesday, September 20, 2006
A Proper Send-Off
Hopefully I'm jumping the gun thinking about my funeral arrangements - but now I have seen what a proper send-off for a man with good football judgement looks like...
Thursday, September 14, 2006
Rudy 2008
George W. Bush will have historical stature far, far higher than he holds in much of the mainstream press around the world today. George Bush and Tony Blair will draw comparisons to Churchill in their steadfast commitment to preserving civilization in the face of great evil while most would rather turn their head and pretend we can manage it without sacrifice. Each has paid a tremendous personal price, and are held-up as reprehensible war-mongers by many of their citizens. Churchill would sympathize.
Where the historians will not compare our President favorably with Churchill is his ability to speak, to make his case, and to rally people to the cause he so clearly understands. Tony Blair is better at it, but his country is not what it once was - they despise him - and themselves.
Islam and individual liberty are not compatible. We in the West have a choice, we can submit, we can face the conflict in front of us, or we can turn our heads and hope it doesn't get to our neighborhood before we pass on. Then it's the kid's problem. Most of the world will bury their heads until its time to submit. The Netherlands has already announced they are ready and waiting for their Imams. France will submit of course, as will Spain and Italy. The US will not, Australia will not. We're going to have a big donnybrook.
No one of political stature in America is better at making the case for the defense of civilization and individual liberty than Rudy Giuliani. This is the most important thing we need from the next President.
It is often pundited that Rudy Giuliani cannot be nominated by the Republican party because of his positions on gay marriage and abortion. Really. If the most important thing to you is that there be no gay marriages and no abortions, submit to Islam now and elect Muslim candidates for office, your utopia will soon be here. What constitutes reasonable positions for a free society to take on gay marriage and abortion can only be worked out in a free society. The purpose of the executive branch of government is not to create law. If the country is ready for a constitutional ban on gay marriage, we'll have it. If that is the law, a President Giuliana will enforce it.
The purpose of the executive branch of the Federal government is to secure our nation and enforce our laws. To do that, the President must be able to lead from the podium, and he must be able to lead the gargantuan buearacracy. Giuliani has done both. There is no comparable figure on the stage.
Rudy 2008
Where the historians will not compare our President favorably with Churchill is his ability to speak, to make his case, and to rally people to the cause he so clearly understands. Tony Blair is better at it, but his country is not what it once was - they despise him - and themselves.
Islam and individual liberty are not compatible. We in the West have a choice, we can submit, we can face the conflict in front of us, or we can turn our heads and hope it doesn't get to our neighborhood before we pass on. Then it's the kid's problem. Most of the world will bury their heads until its time to submit. The Netherlands has already announced they are ready and waiting for their Imams. France will submit of course, as will Spain and Italy. The US will not, Australia will not. We're going to have a big donnybrook.
No one of political stature in America is better at making the case for the defense of civilization and individual liberty than Rudy Giuliani. This is the most important thing we need from the next President.
It is often pundited that Rudy Giuliani cannot be nominated by the Republican party because of his positions on gay marriage and abortion. Really. If the most important thing to you is that there be no gay marriages and no abortions, submit to Islam now and elect Muslim candidates for office, your utopia will soon be here. What constitutes reasonable positions for a free society to take on gay marriage and abortion can only be worked out in a free society. The purpose of the executive branch of government is not to create law. If the country is ready for a constitutional ban on gay marriage, we'll have it. If that is the law, a President Giuliana will enforce it.
The purpose of the executive branch of the Federal government is to secure our nation and enforce our laws. To do that, the President must be able to lead from the podium, and he must be able to lead the gargantuan buearacracy. Giuliani has done both. There is no comparable figure on the stage.
Rudy 2008
Osama Rising
As the fifth anniversary of 9/11 passes - honest assessment of world developments since that day leads to the conclusion that Osama is succeeding in his goals, and civilization such as the West has enjoyed, largely peaceful and affluent since the end of WWII, is coming to a violent end.
Osama is not a fool, nor Nasrallah, or AhWantMyJihad. They make foolish, trumped-up, "we will crush them" speeches to their faithful, but the faithful have been raised to suck-up that drivel and they strap-on their bomb-belts and march with the band. The West has raised two generations that don't believe in their cultural heritage - will celebrate anything but - and with the exception of some of America and some of Australia, have abandoned any sense of who we are, what we should fight for, and how to distinguish good from evil.
Osama's goal in attacking the US on 9/11 was not to bring it crumbling down in a single master-stroke. His goal was to incite an American response that was sufficient to ignite a global call to jihad throughout the Islamic world. In that - he has proven successful. Since 9/11, we have had a world spinning headlong into a global war with Islam. Each step we take, or more frequently fail to take, that indicates we are unable or unwilling to commit to winning such a fight accelerates their recruiting. Osama's miscalculation, if there was one, is that Iran is the spearhead. Osama envisioned Sunni muslims overthrowing their "royals" and leading the jihad.
Our ridiculous search for Islamic moderates, where we define a moderate to be any cleric who has not called for genocide and martyrdom operations in the last 4 weeks, is illuminating. There is no Islamic outcry against the hijacking of their religion because it is not being hijacked. It is being practiced, by the book, in large measure by a generation of jihadists who have been treated to nothing else in the way of education than to prepare themselves for jihad.
Does anything look more foolish than the EU 4 plus the US offering a complete turn-key commercial nuclear power program to Iran? In return for what? Would we want them to hide their nuclear weapons program better? Would we want them to forsake obvious partnership with the whack-job in North Korea on a nuclear ICBM program? In the face of repeated, crystal-clear statements by AhWantMyJihad and Khameni that they intend to acquire and use atomic weapons we pretend that the UN has a serious role. We are digging up the sand as fast as we can to try to stick our heads in, but the jihadists keep blowing up the sand. In America, Israel, Lebanon, Bali, Somalia, India, Spain, Great Britain - they kill civilians wantonly and the West keeps trying to pretend this is not a war. The more we do so, the more they are encouraged that they can succeed by being perpetually angry enough to kill. They are right. If the West does not wake-up and face the music, this jihad will succeed, and Osama will win.
I supported the Iraq invasion. But I do not support wasting another American soldier's life trying to prevent internecine bloodshed between Shia and Sunni in Iraq, because, before this is over, we will be promoting Sunni - Shia bloodshed. It is time to declare victory, Hussein is out, there is no effective weapons program, and we need to create an alliance with the Kurdish province and get permanent bases there. We'll have need of them very, very soon. The Kurds are ready for Western civilization, the Shia and Sunni are not. At the end of the day, the Shia and Sunni do not want democracy, they want to kill each other and all of the infidels in the name of Islam. That is tragic, and America should stand tall after having offered them the chance at an alternative future, but we cannot want it more than they do.
The case is often made that if we do not succeed in standing up a pluralistic democracy in Iraq, we will lose our chance to transform the Middle East from the despots and death-cults that rule it now. That is, I think, largely true. We will not stand-up a pluralistic democracy, and we cannot convince a generation of kids raised to believe in jihad to wise-up and embrace freedom. It is possible to do so, but it requires that Iraq be colonized, ruled with an iron-fist, and a new generation raised with different aspirations. We aren't going to get that kind of time even if we had the will. We're going to have Iran exporting nuclear devices into Iraq and everywhere else they can stir up jihad long before then. The first battle of Iraq is over, we have saved what we can. We cannot succeed in Iraq with Iran next door pumping in weapons and zealots. We need to prepare for the battle of Iran.
Osama is not a fool, nor Nasrallah, or AhWantMyJihad. They make foolish, trumped-up, "we will crush them" speeches to their faithful, but the faithful have been raised to suck-up that drivel and they strap-on their bomb-belts and march with the band. The West has raised two generations that don't believe in their cultural heritage - will celebrate anything but - and with the exception of some of America and some of Australia, have abandoned any sense of who we are, what we should fight for, and how to distinguish good from evil.
Osama's goal in attacking the US on 9/11 was not to bring it crumbling down in a single master-stroke. His goal was to incite an American response that was sufficient to ignite a global call to jihad throughout the Islamic world. In that - he has proven successful. Since 9/11, we have had a world spinning headlong into a global war with Islam. Each step we take, or more frequently fail to take, that indicates we are unable or unwilling to commit to winning such a fight accelerates their recruiting. Osama's miscalculation, if there was one, is that Iran is the spearhead. Osama envisioned Sunni muslims overthrowing their "royals" and leading the jihad.
Our ridiculous search for Islamic moderates, where we define a moderate to be any cleric who has not called for genocide and martyrdom operations in the last 4 weeks, is illuminating. There is no Islamic outcry against the hijacking of their religion because it is not being hijacked. It is being practiced, by the book, in large measure by a generation of jihadists who have been treated to nothing else in the way of education than to prepare themselves for jihad.
Does anything look more foolish than the EU 4 plus the US offering a complete turn-key commercial nuclear power program to Iran? In return for what? Would we want them to hide their nuclear weapons program better? Would we want them to forsake obvious partnership with the whack-job in North Korea on a nuclear ICBM program? In the face of repeated, crystal-clear statements by AhWantMyJihad and Khameni that they intend to acquire and use atomic weapons we pretend that the UN has a serious role. We are digging up the sand as fast as we can to try to stick our heads in, but the jihadists keep blowing up the sand. In America, Israel, Lebanon, Bali, Somalia, India, Spain, Great Britain - they kill civilians wantonly and the West keeps trying to pretend this is not a war. The more we do so, the more they are encouraged that they can succeed by being perpetually angry enough to kill. They are right. If the West does not wake-up and face the music, this jihad will succeed, and Osama will win.
I supported the Iraq invasion. But I do not support wasting another American soldier's life trying to prevent internecine bloodshed between Shia and Sunni in Iraq, because, before this is over, we will be promoting Sunni - Shia bloodshed. It is time to declare victory, Hussein is out, there is no effective weapons program, and we need to create an alliance with the Kurdish province and get permanent bases there. We'll have need of them very, very soon. The Kurds are ready for Western civilization, the Shia and Sunni are not. At the end of the day, the Shia and Sunni do not want democracy, they want to kill each other and all of the infidels in the name of Islam. That is tragic, and America should stand tall after having offered them the chance at an alternative future, but we cannot want it more than they do.
The case is often made that if we do not succeed in standing up a pluralistic democracy in Iraq, we will lose our chance to transform the Middle East from the despots and death-cults that rule it now. That is, I think, largely true. We will not stand-up a pluralistic democracy, and we cannot convince a generation of kids raised to believe in jihad to wise-up and embrace freedom. It is possible to do so, but it requires that Iraq be colonized, ruled with an iron-fist, and a new generation raised with different aspirations. We aren't going to get that kind of time even if we had the will. We're going to have Iran exporting nuclear devices into Iraq and everywhere else they can stir up jihad long before then. The first battle of Iraq is over, we have saved what we can. We cannot succeed in Iraq with Iran next door pumping in weapons and zealots. We need to prepare for the battle of Iran.
Wednesday, September 13, 2006
The Long War
A mind bred in a madrassa is incapable of critical thinking. The structure of the brain is largely established in childhood through the strengthening and atrophy of inter-neural connections. A 13-year-old who has been mono-maniacally trained never to query anything in the Quran and to martyr themselves for Jihad will never learn to live and work in a westernized civilization. On the flip-side, a mind trained to critical thinking, and prepared to live and work in a westernized society, is entirely capable of nursing a real or imagined grievance into a psychotic death-wish. We've met them already in this war.
This speaks poorly for the chances of a substantive reformation of Islam without an intervening cataclysm. In Yemen, Iran, Iraq, Gaza, Lebanon, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Somalia, Nigeria, Pakistan, Afghanistan we face, conservatively, 50 million such martyrs or proto-martyrs. They are young, selfless, mindless, and very, very few will undergo any nature of transformative mental development. They can win, or they will be killed. There's no middle ground. The West is equipping them with weapons and material through the purchase of oil and illicit drugs. We are watching them equip themselves with nuclear weapons.
One of AhWantMyJihad's jobs in the years between his work holding American's captive in the US embassy and his rise to the presidency was as a teacher. His subject was teaching young Iranians to commit themselves to be martyrs for Jihad. It's helpful to keep that in mind when we here calls from the UN for negotiated solutions with Iran. Iran is not seeking a negotiated solution, they may use it tactically as they did in southern Lebanon, but they have no interest in peaceful coexistence with the West. We are pandering favor from Iran by offering them nuclear power plants in hopes that they will cease to seek nuclear weapons - but this is patently absurd. They have no greater goal. As Mark Steyn has pointed out, they are already engaged in full-spectrum warfare with the West in all corners of the globe. They are manufacturing and delivering bombs for use against Americans in Iraq. They are delivering missiles to be used against Israel from Lebanon. There is reason to believe they attacked India for supporting the NPT. They are not friendly - they do not want a peaceful life beside us - they are raising their children to kill us.
It is not an avoidable conflict. The men in leadership in Iran today have dedicated their lives to the ascendancy of Islam - Shia Islam - over the entire domain of human experience. These men must be stopped - they cannot be bought off.
There is an Iranian population, a Persian population, of great intelligence and completely capable of critical thought. I am sure substantive numbers of them despise AhWantMyJihad. There is the hope that through support of dissident elements this regime can be overthrown, and the "Jihad Now" policy of Iran reversed. We are late to that party - we have been warned for years, chiefly by Michael Ledeen. In those years, the Iranians have been breeding the mindless madrassa children. Training them to die in this war. The opportunity to support substantive change from within is slipping, and may be gone, demographically.
Iraq will not become a successful democracy with our current strategy. It is the culture that ensures democracy, not the other way around. The culture is not there. It would take an intervening period of benign autocratic rule, or colonial rule. During that period, a system of education outside of madrassas would have to be imposed to develop a generation of Iraqis prepared to stand-up their civilization. This was perhaps the chief merit of British colonialism, not that it was necessarily or universally benign, but that it prepared a generation to assume the mantle of self-government. We cannot do it by proxy from our side of the globe with Iran feeding the flames from next door.
The Kurds, however, are culturally prepared for self-rule and have the demonstrated capacity for it under unbelievably harsh conditions. We should ally ourselves with the Kurdish province of Iraq and establish permanent basing. If there is to be a near-term model for democracy in the Islamic Middle East - it is in Kurdistan. We need to be realistic, democracy in Kurdistan is not going to be like democracy in Belgium, but it will be a far cry from rule by a sadistic autocrat. Once before we asked the Kurds to stand with us in Iraq. They did. We left. They were treated to the perhaps the most devastating cocktail of chemical weapons in history. Men, women, and children. Let's not abandon them again.
This speaks poorly for the chances of a substantive reformation of Islam without an intervening cataclysm. In Yemen, Iran, Iraq, Gaza, Lebanon, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Somalia, Nigeria, Pakistan, Afghanistan we face, conservatively, 50 million such martyrs or proto-martyrs. They are young, selfless, mindless, and very, very few will undergo any nature of transformative mental development. They can win, or they will be killed. There's no middle ground. The West is equipping them with weapons and material through the purchase of oil and illicit drugs. We are watching them equip themselves with nuclear weapons.
One of AhWantMyJihad's jobs in the years between his work holding American's captive in the US embassy and his rise to the presidency was as a teacher. His subject was teaching young Iranians to commit themselves to be martyrs for Jihad. It's helpful to keep that in mind when we here calls from the UN for negotiated solutions with Iran. Iran is not seeking a negotiated solution, they may use it tactically as they did in southern Lebanon, but they have no interest in peaceful coexistence with the West. We are pandering favor from Iran by offering them nuclear power plants in hopes that they will cease to seek nuclear weapons - but this is patently absurd. They have no greater goal. As Mark Steyn has pointed out, they are already engaged in full-spectrum warfare with the West in all corners of the globe. They are manufacturing and delivering bombs for use against Americans in Iraq. They are delivering missiles to be used against Israel from Lebanon. There is reason to believe they attacked India for supporting the NPT. They are not friendly - they do not want a peaceful life beside us - they are raising their children to kill us.
It is not an avoidable conflict. The men in leadership in Iran today have dedicated their lives to the ascendancy of Islam - Shia Islam - over the entire domain of human experience. These men must be stopped - they cannot be bought off.
There is an Iranian population, a Persian population, of great intelligence and completely capable of critical thought. I am sure substantive numbers of them despise AhWantMyJihad. There is the hope that through support of dissident elements this regime can be overthrown, and the "Jihad Now" policy of Iran reversed. We are late to that party - we have been warned for years, chiefly by Michael Ledeen. In those years, the Iranians have been breeding the mindless madrassa children. Training them to die in this war. The opportunity to support substantive change from within is slipping, and may be gone, demographically.
Iraq will not become a successful democracy with our current strategy. It is the culture that ensures democracy, not the other way around. The culture is not there. It would take an intervening period of benign autocratic rule, or colonial rule. During that period, a system of education outside of madrassas would have to be imposed to develop a generation of Iraqis prepared to stand-up their civilization. This was perhaps the chief merit of British colonialism, not that it was necessarily or universally benign, but that it prepared a generation to assume the mantle of self-government. We cannot do it by proxy from our side of the globe with Iran feeding the flames from next door.
The Kurds, however, are culturally prepared for self-rule and have the demonstrated capacity for it under unbelievably harsh conditions. We should ally ourselves with the Kurdish province of Iraq and establish permanent basing. If there is to be a near-term model for democracy in the Islamic Middle East - it is in Kurdistan. We need to be realistic, democracy in Kurdistan is not going to be like democracy in Belgium, but it will be a far cry from rule by a sadistic autocrat. Once before we asked the Kurds to stand with us in Iraq. They did. We left. They were treated to the perhaps the most devastating cocktail of chemical weapons in history. Men, women, and children. Let's not abandon them again.
Sunday, September 10, 2006
Christopher Wodenshek - Gone But Not Forgotten
On September 11, 2001, Christopher Wodenshek was killed in the attack on the World Trade Center. Chris led a group called TradeSpark, part of the Cantor Fitzgerald organization, and was working on the 105'th floor of the North Tower at the time of the attack. Chris was born September 22, 1965, and was killed at the age of 35, 11 days shy of his 36'th birthday.
Chris was an accomplished man, professionally, athletically, well-liked by all who met him, but most of all, Chris was a family man. Chris is survived by his wife Anne and five beautiful children: Sarah, Haley, Molly, Will, and Zach.
There are many notes from family, friends, and co-workers about Chris on the Cantor-Fitzgerald Families Memorial site. The Cantor tribute has these words from Chris's wife Anne,
Chris was so much more than just my husband. He was the father of my five beautiful children, my best friend, and truly my bettter half. He loved his family more than anything and he provided for us wonderfully. Chris took pride in his work and did an outstanding job! Everyone who ever worked with Chris only has nice things to say about him.
Chris was an avid runner, competing in the 1996 NYC Marathon. This is a picture of the starting line from the 1996 race - a day he undoubtedly remembered well.
Chris was universally regarded as an upbeat, considerate man
in a business perhaps not known for emphasis on those qualities. His wit and good-nature were more than a match for the circumstances. There's not a word about what he demanded from others, only words about his being there to support others, co-workers and friends alike. He was not a self-centered man - his life was about others - his family - his friends - his co-workers.Some small sense of the loss to his family is captured in an New York magazine article in which Anne was interviewed after the tragedy:
Christopher W. Wodenshek, the head of the electricity-brokerage department at Cantor Fitzgerald, had five children. His 37-year-old wife, Anne, now raises them alone. Zachary is 2. He tells people that his father has died, because that's what he's heard, but he keeps asking when his daddy is coming home. William, next in line, is 4. "He takes everything out on me," says Wodenshek. "He hits me, he punches me, he says, 'It's not fair, I don't have a daddy anymore.' "
Anne's 6-year-old, Mollie, grinds her teeth at night and begs her mother not to remarry. Sarah, her 9-year-old, says she's physically sick -- her arms hurt, her pulse races, her heart bumps and rattles in its cage. During the first week, one of her classmates told her she'd seen her father's car at the train station overnight. "I called the principal and told her to tell that kid to shut her fat mouth," says Wodenshek. "Kids say stupid things, you know?"
Wodenshek's 8-year-old daughter, Haley, is probably the most devastated. "She cries a lot," she says. "And she doesn't want to go to school. In fact, she doesn't want to believe it's true. She said, 'Well, Mommy, in Cast Away, the man came back after four years.' And I said, 'Honey, that was a movie.' She was really attached to my husband. Really attached."
It is to these children we must answer for our dedication, or lack thereof, in facing the evil that confronts us.
----------------------
This tribute is part of the 2996 project. The 5'th anniversary of the September 11 attack will see many blog tributes published. There is some anxiety in signing-up to write a tribute for a person one has never had the privilege to meet. The anxiety was unwarranted in this case - as so many people knew and cared about Chris that the Cantor Fitzgerald site has over 40 entries about him. I have rarely read of a man held in such singularly high regard by so many. I wish I had known him. His time here - while tragically short - was incredibly full. He's a hero to me - for the way he lived his life.
Never Forget.
Wednesday, September 06, 2006
Atlas Shrugs: The Radio Show
Pamela aka Atlas Shrugs has an excellent and extremely popular blog on the war for civilization. On September 7 she'll begin hosting an online radio show. I expect it will be phenomenal.
Blog-Absent - But Go To the UAC Rally
To those loyal GroundState readers - sorry I have been blog-absent. Starting a new business and I have no free time. I do want to note - if you're in the LA area on September 10 - that there's going to be a rally to hang Osama in effigy in Culver City by the United American Committee (HT - LGF). I think this will be interesting - because one would think that if there is ANYTHING Americans can agree on - it would be that Osama should be hung - at least. Yet I suspect the rally, and the news coverage thereof - will show how far down into the depths of self-hate America has fallen.
