Infantile "Adults"

This kind of oblivious self-absorption continues to amaze me.  "The photo of 7 women cheerfully taking a selfie on 2nd Avenue—as buildings crumble and burn behind them, and victims of the explosion remain missing—was almost unbelievable. The selfie stick, the beaming smiles... surely this was Photoshopped. It wasn't."  I've heard of the selfies at graves, at concentration camps, and other completely inappropriate places, so this shouldn't surprise us at all.

Peeps Diorama 2015

Click here to see the winning entry and the finalists in this year's Washington Post Peeps Diorama Contest.

And here are the top 50 dioramas.

Watcher's Council News

The Council has spoken! Here are the latest Watcher's Council results!

The Weasel of the Week is White House Chief of Staff and Israel basher Denis McDonough.

Enjoy the read.

Peace in Our Time

When I saw on the news about Obama alienating Saudi Arabia and Israel in favor of Iran and Yemen, I wasn't at all surprised. Ed Morrissey has Richard Engel's report: "I know several people in the US military who were taken by surprise by this [action in Yemen]. Senior officials who would have been expected to know that there was going to be an operation in Yemen, they didn’t. They were finding out about it almost in real time.
And they believe, and some US members of Congress believe, that the reason Saudi Arabia and other states didn’t tell the US that it was going to launch this war against Shi’ite backed, or Iranian-backed rebels in Yemen, is because Saudi Arabia and other countries simply don’t trust the United States anymore, don’t trust this administration — think the administration is working to befriend Iran to try and make a deal in Switzerland, and therefore didn’t think that the intelligence frankly would be secure."

I applaud the Saudi-led coalition. At least they know who the enemy is, unlike Obama. And congratulations to them for realizing what we have known for the past 6 destructive years: this administration simply cannot be trusted.

Heartbreak

Is this what it's come to?  You kill 150 innocent people because you are "struggling with heartbreak"?  "Bild said that Lubitz was in the middle of the 'relationship crisis' with his girlfriend in the weeks before the crash and may have been struggling to cope with a break-up." The only people who are struggling with heartbreak are the loved ones of the murdered passengers and crew, and with the break-up of that plane! Think of the terror of those people in the last 8 minutes of that flight.

Germanwings Murder

So,  even though I immediately suspected terrorism, the Obama administration immediately said the crash of Germanwings 9525 wasn't terrorism.  CNN and other news stations seemed to go out of their way to avoid using the word "terrorism", even suggesting the co-pilot might have had a heart attack.  And if you want to commit suicide, can't you just shoot yourself? The knowledge that this crash was deliberate makes this even more terrible for the friends and families of the victims.

Lots 'o Links

Here's the latest on the news and culture scene from Maggie's Farm, Betsy's Page, and Larwyn's Linx. And here are Newsmax's Top 50 Conservative Blogs of 2015.

King Charles

Roger L. Simon has a nice column on Charles Krauthammer (as seen at Instapundit.) 

Lincoln and the Jews

(Or as H*Y*M*A*N K*A*P*L*A*N would have called him, Abram Lincohen.)  The Jewish Week has a nice article about an exhibit showing the good relationship between Abraham Lincoln and the Jews. Obama ought to go see it. 

Links to Make You Forget About Obama

Well, for a little while, anyway.  I can't take much more bad Obama news today, so here are two nice links instead.

Do you like music from the 30's and 40's? Then tune in to the Grandpa's Naptime station at Songza, as seen at very short list.

Next time you see a lazy young bum begging on highway, think about this salesman who is still working at age 100.

Attack on a Synagogue

"A mob of 20 antisemites described as 'youths' attacked a British synagogue in the Stamford Hill community of North London this weekend, reportedly shouting 'We will kill you!' attacking synagogue property, and leaving several injured." Look at this video. I doubt that if a mob of Jews attacked a mosque, they'd be called "youths"!

I love how they are always referred to as "youths", as if they are kids out for a lark. If I recall, the thugs who rioted and overturned and set fires to cars in France were called "youths", as were the ones who plotted a terrorist attack against the Sears Tower. Nothing at all to worry about.

How's This for Bad Optics?

From Daniel Greenfield: "Just two days after President Barack Obama urged the Iranian people to take advantage of an 'historic opportunity' to resolve the nuclear issue, an Iranian crowd on Saturday chanted 'Death to America' – and the country’s Supreme Leader agreed."  (By Supreme Leader, they mean Ayatollah Khamenei, not Obama.) 

Remembering Etan Patz

Here's a photograph of him that we never saw before.

Watcher's Council News

The Council has spoken! Here are the latest Watcher's Council results.
The Weasel of the Week is James Clapper, Director of National Intelligence. I wish someone would clap him off!

The Neverending Horror

"More than 13 years after the twin towers fell, medical examiners have been able to identify another one of the 2,753 people who died in the Sept. 11 terror attacks. The city identified Matthew David Yarnell, 26...The identification brings the total number of positively identified victims in the attack to 1,640."  I am relieved for the Yarnell family,  but remember the pulverization of lives and hope that was wreaked by Al Qaeda, and think of the families who are still waiting.

Lots 'o Links

Time once again for the weekly roundup of news and culture from Betsy's Page, Maggie's Farm, and Larwyn's Linx.

Take Pepto Bismol or a tranquilizer when you read this Noah Rothman column about our President's utter vindictiveness: he wants to help charge Israel with war crimes!

Republican Bracketology

Cartoon by Gary Varvel.  I like Walker, Rubio, Graham and Bush, but I simply cannot see the Democrats and the media allowing another Bush to be elected President.

Hooray for Bibi and Israel!

I liked Peter Wehner's column Netanyahu’s Historic Win — and Obama’s Humiliating Loss.  "Mr. Netanyahu is hardly a person without flaws. But for those of us who admire his toughness and moral clarity on world events — and who appreciate his obvious love for his nation and for ours — it was a splendid turn of events. As for the current occupant of the White House, it was a disastrous one."

PM Stephen Harper of Canada tweeted, “I congratulate PM Netanyahu on his election results. We look fwd to working w/ the gov’t once formed. Israel has no greater friend than Cda.” Well, that's certainly true now that Israel no longer has a great friend in America!

Victory in Israel

Read some of the amusing Twitter comments in response to the happy outcome of the Israeli election:

• HEADLINES: "NETANYAHU BEATS OBAMA"!

• No "mazel tov" from Obama??? Shocking.

• Hope ESPN will run a ticker that @netanyahu won. How else would @BarackObama find out? 

• Hey, @SpeakerBoehner, why not invite @netanyahu back just to rub it in?

And my favorite: 

• BREAKING: Barack Hussein Obama demands Israel count all hanging chad votes in Florida

Re-elect Benjamin Netanyahu!

Read Quin Hillyer's column at National Review: "Israelis Should Send Obama a Message of Defiance. He’ll be gone in 22 months. Netanyahu will ensure that Israel remains." 

And "If there is one thing Israeli voters ought to both resent and revolt against, it is the idea that the proud Jewish nation is a mere vassal state of their American allies.

If there is something that should make them not just resentful but also red-raged furious, it is the idea of an American presidential administration deliberately trying to dictate the results of an Israeli election.
And if there is a single thing those voters can do to fight back against those two insults — and, far more important, to safeguard the independence and survivability of the nation of Israel — it is to reelect Benjamin Netanyahu as prime minister."

Adventures in Antisemitism

Sometimes people take things more seriously if a celebrity is involved.  While I'm sorry to hear that Michael Douglas' son experienced anti-Jewish sentiment, I am very glad that he wrote this column if it means more people will read it.

Meanwhile, David Duke, that old KKK member with a new face, has come out of the hole he's lived in to resort to that sure attention-getter, Jew hatred. Among other things, he is accusing Republicans of “having sold their soul to the Jewish power”.  Jewish power? That sure sounds like a compliment to me!  Still, he ought to throw a sheet back over his face and slink back to where he came from.

Obama and Dangerous Lunatics

What a perfect cartoon by Nate Beeler!

The Israeli Elections

Lori Lowenthal Marcus offers a primer on understanding Israeli elections.

In her latest column titled Newly emboldened "lame duck" out for blood, Carolina Glick asks, "And so we need to ask ourselves, which leader will do a better job of limiting the danger and waiting Obama out while maintaining sufficient overall US support for Israel to rebuild the alliance after Obama has left the White House.  The answer, it seems, is self-evident." Let's hope so.

Watcher's Council News

The Council has spoken! Here are the latest Watcher's Council results. The first place Council winner with 3-1/3 votes is The Right Planet's A Strong Warning from Trevor Loudon on Illegal Amnesty.  The first place non-Council winner is Mark Steyn's The Enemy Of My Enemy submitted by The Noisy Room.

The Weasel of the Week is none other than Hillary Clinton. 

Lots 'o Links

Catch up on this week's news with the good folks at Betsy's Page, Maggie's Farm, and Larwyn's Linx.

Two more cops were shot, this time in an ambush in Ferguson. They're lucky to be alive. Are all cops sitting ducks now? How about a march to support policemen? Or how about cops striking in Ferguson and letting the residents deal with the consequences? Let's stop apologizing and making excuses.

In Selma the other day, Obama said this: "Just this week, I was asked whether I thought the Department of Justice’s Ferguson report shows that, with respect to race, little has changed in this country.  And I understood the question; the report’s narrative was sadly familiar.  It evoked the kind of abuse and disregard for citizens that spawned the Civil Rights Movement.  But I rejected the notion that nothing’s changed.  What happened in Ferguson may not be unique, but it’s no longer endemic.  It’s no longer sanctioned by law or by custom.  And before the Civil Rights Movement, it most surely was."  How about the abuse and disregard for policemen?

From the Department of PC Idiocy comes this headline: Why chivalry may not always be what it seems: Men who hold doors open and smile may actually be sexist, study claims.  Does it ever occur to people that men were raised to be polite and that there are no sinister motives? That holding doors for women and smiling is the right thing to do? I like it, myself. What's happening in our society when simply being nice is criticized? Now both men and women are rude and vulgar, and I hate it.

Doubletalk and Deception

Isn't the American public fed up with revelations like this?  "Memo: Illegals To Receive Social Security, Credit For Time Worked Illegally...

Therefore, illegal immigrants who have previously paid into the Social Security system — while using a fraudulent Social Security number, for instance — will be eligible for benefits derived from that system. Those benefits include retirement, disability and survivor payments. The CRS admits that some immigrants could have trouble proving that they were using a specific, fake Social Security number while working illegally."  Can we please bring back the notion of stigma so that brazen fraud like this is not made acceptable?

Hillary Clinton

In his amusing column, Charles Hurt asks, "Are we ready for 10 more years of wrath from the eternal Woman Scorned?" I know I'm not. Eight years of Obama is trauma and punishment enough. To have to follow that with the Clintons? Don't ask.

Traitors

The headline is correct, but the photos should be of Obama and Kerry! They are the real traitors in this deal.

Didn't the Republicans WIN the Midterms??

You'd never know it from the cave-ins that have been going on lately. It's so discouraging, yet somehow not surprising. Emily Zanotti made me laugh with this: Mitch McConnell Pre-Surrendering on Debt Ceiling Just in Case.

The Clinton Saga Continues...

Whenever there's a Clinton scandal, you can trust Maureen Dowd to write about it, as she's done in her latest column, With the Clintons, Only the Shadow Knows. I like this  part:

"The Clintons don’t sparkle with honesty and openness. Between his lordly appetites and her queenly prerogatives, you always feel as if there’s something afoot.

Everything needs to be a secret, from the Rose Law Firm records that popped up in a White House closet two years after they were subpoenaed to the formulation of her health care plan.

Yet the Clintons always act as though it’s bad form when you bring up their rule-bending. They want us to compartmentalize, just as they do, to connect the dots that form a pretty picture and leave the other dots alone."

By now you almost feel that "Clinton" is a synonym for "shady".

The Ugly Americans

Mind you, these are supposedly adults: "Two female tourists from California have been cited by police in Rome for carving their initials into a wall at the city's ancient Colosseum and then taking a selfie to record the vandalism, Italian state media said on Monday...the news agency quoted police as saying the pair told officers they were sorry for what they did, 'and said they didn't realize it was such a serious thing.'"

Disappearing Act

Read Greg Crosby's latest entertaining column titled Things That Should Disappear From the Face of the Earth. The Obama administration is not listed, but "idiot drivers and the Clintons" are.

Still Missing

It's terrible that the families and friends of the passengers of flight MH370 are living in limbo, after a year of no answers and no clues: Families of Flight 370 Victims Fear Silence as World Moves On.

Watcher's Council News

The Council has spoken! Here are the latest Watcher's Council results, and there's a lot of good reading.

Can you guess who the Weasel of the Week is? It's none other than our former Attorney General, Eric Holder!

To Life, To Life, L'Chaim!

Read about, and listen to, the Holocaust Survivor Band, made up of Saul Dreier, 89, and Reuwen “Ruby” Sosnowicz, 85.  This little documentary is wonderful.  (As originally seen at Tablet magazine.)

Lots 'o Links

Here's this week's news and culture roundups courtesy of Betsy's Page, Maggie's Farm, and Larwyn's Linx!

E-Mails? What Difference Does it Make?!

Here's Ron Christie at the Daily Beast: "You Better Believe Hillary Clinton’s Emails Matter. Personal email account? OK, maybe. But why does Clinton get to pick and choose which emails she turns over? Same old Clinton song."  And "Did the Secretary email Libyan consular officials the night our outpost in Benghazi was attacked? What orders did she give and to whom did she give them?"  Good questions. I wonder if we will have to hear the tired old "war on women" defense by Democrats on this latest scandal. Their arrogance, like the Clintons themselves, never seems to go away.

USA vs. Iran

David French asks, "Have we forgotten we're a superpower?"  The answer is yes, for the past 6 years, and especially now.

Scenes From Space

Here are some gorgeous photographs from the International Space Station. It's photos like these that makes the Daily Mail worth looking at.

Notes on a Momentous Address

What a great speech, as usual, from Netanyahu.   I liked his lines "I can guarantee you this, the days when the Jewish people remain passive in the face of genocidal enemies--those days are over" and "We must all stand together to stop Iran’s march of conquest, subjugation, and terror.” He could have been talking about the Nazis.

When I heard that Nancy Pelosi was almost in tears, I assumed it was because she was moved by his words, especially these to Elie Wiesel: "Elie, your life and work inspire us to give meaning to the words ‘never again.’ I wish I could promise you, Elie, that the lessons of history have been learned. I can only urge the leaders of the world not to repeat the mistakes of the past."   Only later did I learn that she was angry that somehow Bibi had insulted our intelligence! You just can't reason with these appeasement Democrats.

Now get this: our own President couldn't be bothered to watch the speech and dismissed it as theatre -- but "Leading Arab opinion makers weighed in on the controversy surrounding Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s address to Congress on Tuesday and expressed strong support for his stance on the Iranian nuclear threat."

Obama: Cutting Off His Nose to Spite His Face

I saw this enraging Breaking News headline on CNN earlier tonight: Obama attacks Netanyahu's credibility ahead of speech. At AIPAC, Bibi said the United States and Israel are practically mishpoche, but Obama is more of an enemy than part of that family.

Winston Churchill was attacked and demeaned when he warned of the Nazi threat in the 1930s. You saw what happened then, and you'll see what happens now. You can't say we weren't warned, even if Bibi's address tomorrow falls on mostly deaf ears. The protection of Obama seems to be more important than the protection of our two countries.

Heaven help us.

(Dry Bones cartoon)

A Vital Speech

Here's a good column by Matthew Continetti: "Why Bibi’s Speech Matters: It exposes the Iran deal as indefensible—and Obama's politics as bankrupt."  He writes, "Netanyahu’s speech on Tuesday matters precisely because it is a rebuke to the Obama mode of politics to which America has become numb. Netanyahu’s refusal to back down in the face of political and media pressure, his insistence in making his case directly and emphatically, is as much a statement as any of the technical and strategic and moral claims he will make in his speech. And by going to war against Bibi, the White House has inadvertently raised the stature of his address from a diplomatic courtesy to a global event.

Netanyahu’s commitment to warning America about a nuclear Iran has given him the opportunity to explain just how devoid of merit the prospective deal is. His speech is proof that Congress is a co-equal branch of government where substantive argument can triumph over vicious personal attacks and executive overreach and utopian aspirations. Of course Barack Obama can’t stand it."

You can bet that Obama's media shills will be on the attack this week, but who cares?  This is a matter of life and death. Netanyahu is only saying what Obama himself should be saying about negotiating with Iran, if he was a president who actually cared about principles rather than his legacy.