One Thing Considered: Gas Prices  
by John Nixon
...perhaps we should think in terms of regulating the oil industry following the principles of the regulation of public utilities.
Related: O'Reilly--Gas Prices Up, Pres' Approval Down     Oil Industry Unapologetic

Beyond the News: Weekend Journal  
Salem Radio Network
Rising gasoline prices, the "Party of Death," the religion of our Founding Fathers, ripple effects of Iran's nuclear program, faith and atheism, the origin of our species, and more are discussed in this week's program.

Dedication and Danger in Iraq
by Joseph E. Robert Jr.
...Nothing in history is inevitable; events unfold as they do because leaders and their publics make choices. Neither civil war nor a democratic, pluralist government is predestined for Iraq. But one fact is clear: Premature withdrawal of U.S. forces -- before Iraqi troops are ready, or before the political and economic situation stabilizes -- will condemn Iraq and the region to a future of chaos, destruction and death.
Related: No More Vietnams: This Time, Let's Finish the Job

Combat Season and the Human Intelligence Front
by Fred Burton
...The web of protection that al Qaeda leaders have spun around themselves has varied and nuanced threads. There are shared religious convictions, cultural and religious obligations to protect guests, ties of friendship and intermarriage with locals, and other factors that would make one loathe to betray their locations. But significantly, there is also fear -- a double-edged sword...
And from the "Duh" department: Al Qaeda Wields Press as Terror Weapon, Report Finds
Meanwhile, 'Separate Laws for Muslims' Idea Slammed by Sweden's Equality Minister

The Geopolitics of China
by George Friedman
...The United States has openly discussed a hedge strategy on China, under which economic relations would proceed while the United States increased its military presence in the region as a hedge against future trouble. China, for its part, has been more than a little troublesome in areas where the United States does not want it to be, particularly during the current confrontation with Iran...

Iran Buys Surface-to-Surface Missiles Capable of Hitting Europe
by Ze'ev Schiff
...from North Korea with a range of 2,500 kilometers...The missiles are known in the West as BM-25s, operate on liquid fuel and are single-stage. The BM-25 was originally manufactured in the Soviet Union, where the first generation, adapted for use by Soviet submarines and able to carry a nuclear warhead, was known as the SSN6. After the Russians retired the missiles from service, they sold them to the North Koreans, who developed them to carry a heavier payload...
Related: Gaming Out An Iran Divestment Campaign

Radical Islam: Globalization for Losers
by Jonah Goldberg
...Bin Laden's call to open a new front in Sudan [to complete the genocide] highlights some underappreciated aspects of the jihadist mission. First, most people being slaughtered by Sudan's Arab-controlled government are Muslims. Bin Laden wants his holy warriors to fight for a Sudanese right to exterminate indigenous Muslim tribes. In this, Bin Ladenism represents a perverse form of globalization...

May 1 Protest Aims to "Close" Cities
by Dan Whitcomb
..."We want full amnesty, full legalization for anybody who is here (illegally)," Rodriguez said. "That is the message that is going to be played out across the country on May 1."Organizers have timed the action for May Day, a date when workers around the world traditionally have marched for improved conditions, and have strong support from big labor and the Roman Catholic church. They vow that America's major cities will grind to a halt and its economy will stagger as Latinos walk off their jobs and skip school...
Related: Bush, Senators Agree on Alien Citizenship, Shut Out Critics     Mexican Officials Feather Their Nests While Decrying U.S. Immigration Policy     Your SSN Stolen by an Illegal? Feds Won't Help     Welfare to Kids of Illegals at $276 Million     Horse Droppings Can Stop Border Agents from Monitoring Illegals on 'Endangered Lands'

Chernobyl Hype
by Andrew Bolt
...And so the papers this past week reported not this boring [bus] crash, but -- for the 20th straight year -- more apocalyptic hype about a nuclear disaster, which we're told may have killed hundreds of thousands of people, or could. But which in fact never did, or will. Ignore all that wailing. Chernobyl's true message on today's anniversary is simple. The Chernobyl accident killed very few people. More lives were lost from the panic than from the explosion...

Big Oil Versus Oily Bigs
by Debra Saunders
TV news slays me on the gasoline-price story. For years, cable journalists have reported breathlessly on the certain dangers of global warming and President Bush's refusal to play along with the highly flawed Kyoto global-warming pact. Then, the minute gasoline flirts with the admittedly painful $3 per gallon threshold, it's Armageddon -- but for consumers, not the planet. Suddenly forgotten is the fact that high oil prices may be the only mechanism that can reduce the use of fossil fuels -- the key Kyoto goal...
More: Coulter--It's Hard Out Here for a Pump

Signing One of the Best Free Agents
by Hugh Hewitt
...Tony Snow brings some very old fashioned virtues to his new job. Including especially good humor and sharp intelligence. Perhaps the best thing about this appointment is the very hostile WH press corps is suddenly confronted by an individual who has already out achieved them in the world of media, which means he knows their tricks and he knows their vanities...

The Desert One Debacle
by Mark Bowden
April 11, 1980...The meeting began with Jimmy Carter's announcement: “Gentlemen, I want you to know that I am seriously considering an attempt to rescue the hostages”. Hamilton Jordan, the White House chief of staff, knew immediately that the president had made a decision...America’s elite rescue force had lost eight men, seven helicopters, and a C-130, and had not even made contact with the enemy. It was a debacle. It defined the word “debacle.”

Our Rotten IntelligenCIA
Opinion Journal
...As for some of our media colleagues, when they stop being honest chroniclers of events and start getting into bed with bureaucrats looking to take down elected political leaders, they shouldn't be surprised if those leaders treat them like the partisans they have become...
More: Loose Lips win Pulitzers

Now Saudi Arabia Wants Seat on UN Rights Body
by Patrick Goodenough
...Yet the Islamic kingdom is on a list of "the world's most repressive regimes" as judged by the independent rights watchdog Freedom House, and is also designated one of eight "countries of particular concern" by the State Department for violating religious freedom...

Life Support Battle at St. Luke's  
by Wendell Edwards
...an ethics committee has recommended removing her ventilator and taking her off life support. But her family is fighting to stop that despite not having the law on their side. “If their ethics committee makes a decision, it doesn’t matter what the patient wants,” Dixon said. “It doesn’t even apparently matter what the patient’s condition is, because our sister is not in a coma, she’s not brain dead,” Dixon said...

Data on Illegal Immigrants Kept Secret
Tucson Citizen
...Privacy laws, they say, prohibit them from sharing their files with anyone, except in rare criminal investigations. But the agencies don't even use the power they have. The IRS doesn't fine even the most egregious employers who repeatedly submit inaccurate data about their workers. Social Security does virtually nothing to alert citizens whose Social Security numbers are being used by others...

How Radical Muslims Took Over the American Prison System
by Stephen Schwartz
...Saudi Wahhabi organizations recognized that the growth of normative Islam (as opposed to groups like the Nation of Islam) offered an extraordinary opportunity for the infiltration of radical ideology. In the United States, this normative base lacked a communal or institutional structure. So imams were imported to America, many from, or after training in, Saudi Arabia...

China, Saudis Sign Weapons-for-oil Deal
World Tribune
...Officials did not cite any defense or security cooperation plans. China has been protecting Sudan's oil sector from insurgency attacks.

Explaining Jews, Part V: Why are Jews Liberal?
by Dennis Prager
...other than blacks, no American group votes so lopsidedly for the Democratic Party. And the question is further sharpened given that traditional Jewish values are not leftist. That is why the more religiously involved the Jew, the less likely he is to be on the Left...

Another President 'Lied' Us Into War Too
by Thomas Bray
...Much of the pre-war intelligence was wrong. The civilian defense chief was detested as "brusque, domineering and unbearably unpleasant to work with." Civil liberties were abridged. And many embittered Democrats, claiming the war had been an utter failure, demanded that the administration bring the troops home. George Bush? Well, yes - but also a President who looms far larger in American history, Abraham Lincoln...
Related: Dissident President     We Can't Forget the Past or We'll Repeat It     Islamist Protest in N.Y. – 'Mushroom Cloud on Way'

Nothing to Fear But the Climate Change Alarmists
by Mark Steyn
...The mullahs won't get a chance to nuke us because, thanks to rising sea levels, Tehran will be under water. The editor of the New Yorker, David Remnick, says the Earth will "likely be an uninhabitable planet." The archbishop of Canterbury, in a desperate attempt to cut the Anglican Communion a slice of the Gaia-worship self-flagellation action, demands government "coercion" on everything from reduced speed limits to ending cheap air travel "if we want the global economy not to collapse and millions, billions of people to die"...
Related: Arizona's Thirst For Ingenuity

Beyond the News: Weekend Journal  
Salem Radio Network
Criticism of Donald Rumsfeld, threat from Iran, dabate about the book, "Republican Theocracy," scandal surrounding Duke University LaCross team, the status of Israel the recent bombing in Tel Aviv, and more are covered in this week's broadcast.

The Venezuela Connection
by Alexsander Boyd
...As drug shipments originating in Venezuela are increasingly seized by law enforcement authorities the world over, governments would do well in re-examining the role that the Venezuelan State, its Executive, military and officials have on this issue...

War in Iraq - Who Is Telling the Truth?
by Sharon Hughes
...The headlines of major print media, especially online where articles are grouped by topic, could be enough to make the less informed think we are losing the war, that the effort and sacrifice paid already by our troops have been in vain. However, when you read the stories themselves, very often there's little substance to support the headline accusations, once you get past the spin...

Why the American Media No Longer Even Knows How To Report "News"
by Mary Mostert
...According to many, if not most, of their teachers, there is no such thing as fact or truth. It is all someone's opinion. Not only are students totally unable to tell the difference between facts and opinion, their instructors don't know the difference either...

Illegal Immigration Is Not a Civil Right
by Ian de Silva
...it is a shameless travesty of the civil rights movement of the 60s when illegal aliens claim that theirs is the latest struggle in civil rights. This is very much like burglars claiming that having to disarm high-tech alarms and breaking through double-paned windows is the latest struggle in their line of work...
Related: Study: Attrition Through Law Enforcement is Cost Effective

Minuteman Leader Pushes Border Fence
by Arthur H. Rotstein
..."We're going to show the federal government how easy it is to build these security fences, how inexpensively they can be built when built by private people and free enterprise," Simcox said...Surveyors and contractors have offered to help with the design and survey work, and Simcox said some have said they will provide heavy equipment for his Minuteman Civil Defense Corps. to build fencing...
Related: Hidden Risk in the Undocumented Workers Debate       Change to Win and the Immigration Debate

The Shiite Schisms
by Kamran Bokhari
...escalation on the nuclear issue -- which can be viewed as a lever rather than an end in itself for Tehran -- is a sign that a deal might be in the making in other channels. But there is a sticking point that must be resolved before public talks can take place, and that is the political impasse that has delayed the formation of a permanent government in Baghdad...

Parents Rip School Over Gay Storybook
by Tracy Jan
..."My son is only 7 years old," said Lexington parent Robin Wirthlin, who complained to the school system last month and will meet with the superintendent next week. ''By presenting this kind of issue at such a young age, they're trying to indoctrinate our children. They're intentionally presenting this as a norm, and it's not a value that our family supports"...

Lie Down with Strippers, Wake Up with Pleas  
by Ann Coulter
...This is an age in which the expression "girls gone wild" is becoming a redundancy. So even as the bodies pile up, I don't think the message about integrity is getting through. The liberal charge of "hypocrisy" has so permeated the public consciousness that no one is willing to condemn any behavior anymore, no matter how seedy. The unstated rule is: If you've done it, you can't ever criticize it — a standard that would seem to repudiate the good works of the Rev. Franklin Graham, Malcolm X, Whittaker Chambers and St. Paul, among others...

Are Liberals The Worst Bigots of All?
by Alicia Colon
...You may ask: How can that be? Surely, you say, liberals were the ones marching for civil rights in the 1960s, so how can they now be accused of bigotry? Because most of the incidents involve discrimination against blacks, I was tempted to use the word racists, but most of the bigots are also black, so bigotry is the more accurate term...

Chinese Man Admits Plot to Import Missiles to US
Reuters
...When Wu was indicted in November along with another man, Yi Qing Chen, they became the first people charged under a 2004 U.S. law forbidding the import of aircraft-destroying missile systems into the United States, officials said...
So it took 3 years after 9/11 to enact such a law?
Other China-related: British Transplant Surgeons: China 'Selling Prisoners' Organs'     3rd Time in 4 Years: Yahoo Accused of Helping Jail China Internet Writer

Hamas Government To Unpaid Security: Take It Out On Israel
World Tribune
..."Under Hamas, the Interior Ministry has told unpaid security officers that the more attacks against Israel, the more money they would get from Iran and other countries," a Palestinian source said...

Dubai International Capital Deal Evokes U.S. National Security Concerns
Power and Interest News Report
In a deal similar to what led to the U.S. ports furor, Dubai International Capital purchased for US$1.24 billion Doncasters Group Limited, a private British aerospace manufacturer that works on sensitive U.S. weapons programs such as the Joint Strike Fighter (J.S.F.). The Bush administration is currently conducting a security review of the takeover, and then it will present its findings to the U.S. Congress. Many of the same factions that expressed concern over the ports deal are having their voices heard on the Doncasters takeover...

Reports: Terrorists Recruiting 'White Muslims'
by William J. Kole
...the recruitment drive may have begun as long as four years ago, when Arab militants ran up against post-9/11 security obstacles. "They judge that it is high time that their job on this territory should be taken over by new local forces ... people who are born here and live here have an advantage which would make their job easier. By their appearance, they are less obvious," the report reads. Arabs, it adds, "have become too obvious, which has made their job difficult"...

The Sneaky Government & Your Tax Burden
by John Stossel
...we followed St. Louis construction worker Bill Thurston and totaled the little-known taxes he paid daily. It started with the tax on the electricity that powered the alarm clock that woke him. Bill paid two taxes on his toothpaste. He paid a tax on water to get it into his home, and a sewer fee so it would go out. Daring to drive to work cost him more: He paid personal property tax on his truck; he had to pay sales tax when he bought it. And when he bought the gas, there was a county gas tax, a state gas tax and a federal gas tax...

Behold the Simple Virtues of a Fair National Sales Tax
by Leo Linbeck
With millions of Americans once again struggling to complete their federal income taxes, it is a good time to reflect on the profoundly dysfunctional and highly punitive federal tax code that only gets more complicated year after year. The patchwork quilt of tax loopholes, exclusions, adjustments and various forms and schedules that we all struggle to understand is a reflection of the wholesale auctioning off of the tax code over the last several decades into the hands of an army of powerful, well-heeled lobbyists...

All Americans Must See 'United 93'
by Dennis Prager
...The only people likely to object to this film are those who don't want Americans to become aware of just how conscienceless, cruel and depraved our enemy is, or those who think that our enemies can always be negotiated with and therefore object to depicting Americans actually fighting back...

Iran Elected to UN Disarmament Commission
by Julie Stahl
..."The U.N. has long ago forfeited its role as an international body safeguarding international peace and security and this is just the latest proof of why the U.N. doesn't work," Gold said of Iran's election to vice chair the Disarmament Commission...

Walled off Christians
by Robert Novak
...Israeli Foreign Ministry officials asserted to me that Christians in the Holy Land suffer more from Muslims -- a position echoed by Father Pierbattista Pizzaballa, head of the Franciscans minding the Holy Land's religious places. But I could not find another Catholic layman or prelate who complained of anti-Christian bias by Muslims...

I Hope That's Not a Cloud I See Heading Towards Main Street
by Niall Ferguson
I am by nature and upbringing a pessimist...This is not the American way. Ever since Thomas Jefferson invoked "the pursuit of happiness" as a reason for American independence, optimism has been in the DNA of the USA....So long as Americans keep walking on the sunny side of the street, the global economy will carry on growing. The nightmare scenario, however, is that optimism could suddenly tip over into pessimism...

The Frightening Truth of Why Iran Wants a Bomb
by Amir Taheri
...Bush is an aberration, an exception to a rule under which all American presidents since Truman, when faced with serious setbacks abroad, have "run away". Iran's current strategy, therefore, is to wait Bush out. And that, by "divine coincidence", corresponds to the time Iran needs to develop its nuclear arsenal, thus matching the only advantage that the infidel enjoys...

No Doubt About Easter's True Meaning
by John Kass
...A friend who worked at one of those magazines had a theory about all of the new Jesus news. "Jesus saves--circulation," he said. Surely their numbers don't lie. Casting nagging doubts must drive newsstand sales, or they wouldn't do it...

Decadent World Is In the Grip of Satan, Says Pope
by Malcolm Moore
..."Surely God is deeply pained by the attack on the family," the Pope said. "Today we seem to be witnessing a kind of anti-Genesis, a counter-plan, a diabolical pride aimed at eliminating the family." He also expressed fears about genetic modification, and said it was "insane arrogance" to play with the "grammar" of creation...Bodies are "constantly bought and sold on the streets of our cities, on our television channels, in homes that have become like streets," he said. Accumulating wealth was "robbery" when it "prevented others from living".

And on that last note:

The Secret Behind China's Economy  
Sky News
Sky News has made an exclusive investigation into the sinister secrets behind China’s booming economy. The Chinese government is accused of using police brutality to remove people from their homes and into lives of squalor and poverty.

Author Hammers Congressman Over OKC Bombing Probe
by Ron Strom
...the witness list Rep. Dana Rohrabacher, R-Calif., has proposed for a day and a half-long hearing includes only two people who have any information about an alleged Middle Eastern accomplice to killer Timothy McVeigh. In her book, Davis asserts McVeigh and Terry Nichols were not the lone conspirators but were part of a greater scheme involving Islamic terrorists and at least one provable link to Iraq...

Brown is the New Black
by Ann Coulter
This is the only country on Earth that thinks it's not sporting to consider our own interests in choosing immigrants. Try showing up in any other country on the planet, illiterate and penniless, and announcing: "I've seen pictures of your country and it looks great. I think I'd like to live here! Oh, and by the way, would you mind changing all your government and business phone messages, street signs and ballots into my native language? Thanks!" They would laugh you out of the country...
Related: Krauthammer: Immigrants Must Choose     U.S.: The Limits of Direct-Action Protest

Eliminate the Corporate Gravy Train
by Edwin Feulner
...Last year, Washington spent $53 billion on homeland security -- and $60 billion on corporate welfare. Clearly our priorities are misplaced, and it's time to change that. Corporate welfare comes in many flavors. The biggest such program -- farm subsidies -- is disguised as a measure to help "the little guy." The 2002 farm bill (misleadingly sold to Americans as the "Farm Security Act") will cost taxpayers $180 billion over 10 years. But little of that money actually goes to the traditional family farmer...Another place Washington could trim the welfare spending is the "Advanced Technology Program"...

Idealism, Realism and U.S. Foreign Policy
by George Friedman
There are excellent moral arguments in favor of fighting a war to bring democracy to Iraq. There are excellent moral arguments for never having gotten involved in Iraq in the first place...But first there is the reality that exists now...The United States may well wind up making a deal with Iran over Iraq. Alternatively, a Sunni coalition led by Saudi Arabia might give Washington the opportunity to negotiate with the Baathist guerrillas in the Sunni Triangle. Whichever path is followed, it will be condemned by both left and right for dozens of excellent moral reasons...

Framing the 'Sleeper Cell' Argument
by Fred Burton
...Thus, while there is strong evidence that al Qaeda has contacts within the United States, the only answer to the question of whether it has sleeper agents in place is that we cannot know for sure. However, we tend to discount the possibility for several reasons...

The Road to Bankruptcy
by George Will
...Bankruptcy -- seeking judicial permission to shred contracts improvidently entered into -- should be so costly that it cannot become a routine management tool for private-sector welfare states. And America's welfare state cannot seek what is called "bankruptcy protection." Detroit today is having what Washington will eventually have -- a wrenching rendezvous with promises that seemed compassionate, or at least convenient, when originally made but that cannot be kept without ruinous consequences.

Illeagal Immigration and the English Language
by Victor Davis Hanson
...It is time that open-border advocates use honest vocabulary and discuss the problem as a legal issue apart from race. When illegal alien protestors wave the flag of Mexico, or dictate proper policy to their hosts, the debate is Orwellian enough without distorting the English language as well.
Related: Guest-Worker Hopes Spark Rush To Border     Illegals' Amnesty Could Cost $60 Billion a Year

North Korean Slaves
by Alain Devalpo
North Korea, for all its nuclear ambitions, is close to economic disaster, and is short of food, fuel and the simplest material goods. To pay its debt to Russia (which Moscow will not cancel), it exports a migrant labour force to be cruelly exploited in Russia’s far eastern wild west...

U.N. Finds That 25% of Married Syrian Women Have Been Beaten
by Katherine Zoepf
..."As it is now, there are still no mechanisms to report violence against women," Mr. Abdul Salam said. "We hope that this study will soon lead to practical action on the ground."

Why Taxes Are Too Complex
by Robert Samuelson
...The larger political obstacle is that people don't want to surrender the concrete tax breaks of a complex system for the abstract advantages of a simpler system...
Related: Are Americans Overtaxed?

The Democrats Sell Out Latinos
by Ruben Navarrette
Who killed immigration reform? The autopsy shows it was Senate Democrats...The moral: Marches and Mexican flags don't equal power. Labor uses millions of dollars in political contributions to take care of Democrats, and so Democrats take care of labor...After the bill died, Democrats rubbed salt in the wound by insisting that Latinos had no choice but to stay on the liberal hacienda...
Related: Nationwide Rally Organizer Tied to Marxist Party

Army Surpassing Year's Retention Goal by 15%
by Tom Vanden Brook
...The Army has met or exceeded its goals for retention for the past five years, records show. It was 8% over its goal for 2005, and 7% ahead of its targets for 2004. The number of re-enlistments has exceeded the Army's goal by a larger margin each year since 2001. Soldiers like the Army, “and the war is not causing people to leave,” says Lt. Col. Bryan Hilferty, an Army spokesman...

Company Finds Clinton Useful, and Vice Versa
by Mike McIntire & Raymond Hernandez
...since Hillary Rodham Clinton was elected to the Senate in 2000, Corning and its mainly Republican executives have become one of her largest sources of campaign contributions. And in that time, Mrs. Clinton has become one of the company's leading champions, delivering for it like no other Democratic lawmaker...

Drugs Companies 'Inventing Diseases to Boost Their Profits'
by Mark Henderson
...“Disease-mongering turns healthy people into patients, wastes precious resources and causes iatrogenic (medically induced) harm,” they say. “Like the marketing strategies that drive it, disease-mongering poses a global challenge to those interested in public health, demanding in turn a global response”...

Sorry Everyone, but Iraq DID Go Uranium Shopping in Niger
by Christopher Hitchens
...Iraq in 2001 was cash-rich through the oil-for-food racket, but you may if you wish choose to believe that a near-bankrupt African delegation from a uranium-based country traveled across a continent and a half with nothing on its mind but shopping for oil. Interagency feuding has ruined the Bush administration's capacity to make its case in public, and a high-level preference for deniable leaking has further compounded the problem...

The French Make Law in the Streets, Here Congress Does It
by Peter Brown
...That's the only conclusion available after the French political system caved to political pressure from massive demonstrations and shelved a plan to attack the nation's 20-plus percent youth unemployment rate...By caving to the protests, Chirac bowed to pressure to retain the French system of worker protections that has made double digit unemployment overall a way of life there...Meanwhile, as advocates for immigrants in America have assembled impressive numbers of people at their marches, the U.S. Senate last week went home unable to agree on what to do about immigration reform...

Why the Low Jobless Rate Challenges Left & Right
by Dennis Prager
The latest jobless rate -- 4.7 percent -- is at a five-year low. Yet, despite this and other good economic news, the Left is frantic to repeal the Bush administration's tax cuts. In fact, even if every single economic indicator were better than at any time in American history, the Left would still want to repeal the tax cuts. The reason is that the essence of the Left is ever bigger government for the purpose of controlling ever more of the economic and social life of society...

There IS a Problem with Global Warming...It Stopped in 1998
by Bob Carter
...Consider the simple fact, drawn from the official temperature records of the Climate Research Unit at the University of East Anglia, that for the years 1998-2005 global average temperature did not increase (there was actually a slight decrease, though not at a rate that differs significantly from zero). Yes, you did read that right...

Muslims Muzzling Memphis
by Brigitte Gabriel
...It is a sad state of affairs when any speaker on any American University campus has to be surrounded by police officers to protect their freedom of speech and person from intimidation and menace. America is the country where free speech is protected under our constitution. Who would have expected that in the home of the Beale Street Blues, W.C. Handy and Elvis, I would be confronted by Muslims trying to muzzle my free speech and perhaps all of us?...

No Easy Answers on Immigration Conundrum
by Mark Steyn
...Think about that. From undocumented illegal alien in the 7-Eleven parking lot to lawful resident of the State of Virginia in just a couple of hours [to crashing a plane into the Pentagon two weeks later]. Wow. Say what you like about [fake ID broker] Luis Martinez-Flores, but he runs one efficient operation. By comparison, say you've got two kids under 5, and you'd like to bring over a nice English nanny to look after them. Name of Mary Poppins. Good references, impeccable character. If you apply now, there's a sporting chance the process may be completed before your children's children are in college...
More: Immigration Reform Can't Forget Security
Compare and Contrast: Mexico: Land of Real Anti-Immigrant Bigotry

Theocon Moment
by Ross Douthat
...Religious conservatives have moved from a seat at the GOP table to a place near its head; now they need to find a way to carry their ideas into the American middle, tempering their own bigotries and bad habits along the way, and mixing the innocence of doves with the political wisdom of serpents. And if they succeed, there's a good chance that the "theocons"--like the Progressives or the civil-rights reformers before them--will some day be able to look back over the patient work of decades and see a nation transformed by their labors.

Beyond the News: Weekend Journal  
Salem Radio Network
This week's broadcast covers the resignation of Tom DeLay, immigration reform, response to a scientist who said 90% of the Earth's human population should be exterminated, playing the race card, the price of oil, and more.
Related story item: Scientist Proposes to Eliminate 90% Human Population, Receives A Plaque and Standing Ovation

McKinney Flap Unleashes a Flood of Stupid
by Leonard Pitts Jr.
...And you had Harry Belafonte and Danny Glover backing McKinney at a press conference - not, said Glover, to judge the facts of the case, but ''to support our sister.'' Because you know, even if she were found smoking crack with Osama bin Laden, you still have to support a sister...
More: McKinney's Non-apology and this reality check: Apologies Today Mean You Never Have to Be Sorry

Menace in Europe
Interview of author Claire Berlinski
..."In brief: Europeans are lazy, unwilling to fight for anything and willing to surrender to anyone; they are fascinated by decadence; they favor the bureaucracy over the corporation; they are unable to assimilate their immigrants; they no longer have children; they no longer produce much of cultural or scientific significance; they have lost their religious vocation and they no longer hold their lives to be meaningful"...
Related: The French Disease

Hidden Bombs in the Immigration Bill
by Kris W. Kobach
...Like that surprise hidden on page 302 - which would replace the country's entire bench of experienced immigration judges with pro-immigration advocates...[and inserted at the last minute was the] "DREAM Act" as an amendment:...It repeals a 1996 law that prohibits state universities from offering in-state tuition rates to illegal aliens...[and then there's] what the bill fails to do. The measure envisions a massive amnesty for illegal aliens now in the country - but doesn't give the Citizenship and Immigration Service (CIS) the personnel or infrastructure to implement the amnesty [widening already huge gaps that allow fraudulent cases to sneak through]...In 1986, the terrorist Mahmud "The Red" Abouhalima fraudulently got amnesty...which he later used as one of the 1993 World Trade Center bombers...
You bet it's related: Amnesty Creep: Solidarity Between Mexican and Islamic Radical Groups
Tell Congress What You Think

Dubya Can't Leak--And the Info was Already Public
by John Podhoretz
...A "leak" is the unauthorized release of government information...Constitutionally, the authority to declare documents "classified" resides with the president. So, under the terms of an executive order first drafted in 1982, he can declassify a document merely by declaring it unclassified...

How Corrupt Is the United Nations?
by Claudia Rosett
...The founding purpose of the UN was to bring peace and prosperity to the globe. As to the former, the UN in the age of terror has been in most ways useless and in some ways positively dangerous...The lesson that Saddam Hussein quickly grasped was that the UN lends itself to money-laundering...Now the UN, in contravention of its own charter, is rapidly evolving into something larger, more corporate, and more menacing: a predatory, undemocratic, unaccountable, and self-serving vehicle for global government...

Black Flight
by Michael Strong
...While pundits and academics argue away, the quiet sucking sound you don't yet hear are African-American families leaving our public schools when allowed to do so...For more than a decade, inner city African-Americans have supported school choice at a much higher rate than have suburban whites...

The Congresswoman and the Admiral
by Victor Davis Hanson
...So, what can we learn from the McKinney moment? Slandering someone as racist and sexist is now supposed to do for Democrats what the old wealth and power purportedly did for Republicans - give them an unfair advantage and allow them to evade the rules. Progressives once gained credence because they insisted merit should outweigh class, money and connections. These days they are losing credibility when they insist race and gender should trump merit and facts...

Liberal War on Terrorism Heats Up: Delay Finally Captured
by Ann Coulter
...When Democrats are accused of wrongdoing, it's usually something more like what most people think of as a crime, say, punching a Capitol Hill policeman. Or perhaps by being captured on tape in hotel rooms stuffing wads of cash into their pockets from Arab sheiks — as Democrats were during the Abscam investigation. This was back when Democrats controlled Congress. Consequently, Congress responded to this shocking proof of criminality by their colleagues by investigating the FBI for investigating members of Congress...Conservatives live under a jurisprudence of laws, but they get prosecuted under liberals' jurisprudence of epithets.

Cuba Declares Its Candidacy for UN Human Rights Body
by Patrick Goodenough
...Cuba is one of 34 countries whose candidacies for the 47-seat HRC have been made public by the U.N. as of early Thursday. Others that have raised eyebrows because of their often-criticized human rights records include Iran, Pakistan and Algeria...According to the watchdog group Freedom House, Cuba is one of the world's 18 "most repressive" regimes...

Sandy Berger tries to ‘Anchor Aweigh’ Curt Weldon
by Judi McLeod
...Obviously Berger didn’t want someone to see the documents he tried to spirit out of the National Archives. Weldon, on the other hand has been downright pesky in wanting the American public to know that someone suppressed the intelligence of Able Danger who were trying to flag the White House that terrorists were taking flying lessons a year before they struck the World Trade Center and the Pentagon...

Nuclear Jihad
by David Frum
...What we do know is that the current path is working very well for the rulers of Iran. They are moving steadily toward a bomb while impressing the most radical constituencies within their own society. The present path, however, is signally failing to work for the West. We are watching Iran move closer to nuclearization--and our restraint is making us no new friends. Is it not past time to try something new?

Back to Federalism: The Proper Remedy for Polarization
by David Gelernter
...Wilson lists several causes of today's profound polarization. He mentions the divided, politicized press, one-issue pressure groups, the polarizing effects of higher education, and the rise of ideological parties in place of the old-style sectional coalitions Americans are used to. There is another cause too: the collapse of federalism. The Founders designed a vast garment for America that hugs where it should hug and stretches where it should stretch; each state creates its own society, and the Constitution stitches them all together into a comfortable, sensible union suit...

Illegal Immigration Reaches Critical Mass
by Cinnamon Stillwell
...America is no longer asked to give refuge to the poor, huddled masses but to allow itself to be overrun by them...If the unholy alliance of business interests, labor unions, liberal elements of the Catholic Church and other clergy, Hispanic organizations, civil rights groups and leftist organizations has its way, America as we know it will be a thing of the past...
Ed Koch: On Immigration, Don't Be Afraid to Do What's Right

Italy: Muslims Told to Vote Communist
ADN Kronos International
...The leader of UCOII said that Diliberto's willingness to accommodate the needs of the Muslim community was a good reason to vote for his party - even placing at the end of his email the logos of the Party of Italian Communists and its allies at the Senate, the Greens, both members of the center-left coalition...

Borderlands and Immigrants
by George Friedman
...One way to lose control of a borderland is by losing control of its population. In general, most Mexicans cross the border for strictly economic reasons. Some wish to settle in the United States, some wish to assimilate. Others intend to be here temporarily. Some intend to cross the border for economic reasons -- to work -- and remain Mexicans in the full sense of the word. Now, so long as this migration remains economic and cultural, there is little concern for the United States. But when this last class of migrants crosses the border with political aspirations, such as the recovery of lost Mexican territories from the United States, that is the danger point...

Who Hates the Other More - Liberals or Conservatives?
by Dennis Prager
...I am comparing the typical passionate liberal with the equally passionate conservative. If you don't believe me, try my car test. And send the repair bill to the Democratic National Committee.

Iran Finds 7,000-year-old Liquor Habit is Tough to Break
by Nazila Fathi
For 27 years, Iran's Islamic regime has faced an uphill battle to cleanse the country of bootleg liquor. But even after a recent law increased the punishment for drinking to 74 lashes, a hefty fine and imprisonment of three months to a year, drinking is widespread...

Desperate Mothers Throw Away 20 Babies a Week as Zimbabwe Starves
by Christina Lamb
...The dumping of babies, along with what doctors describe as a “dramatic” increase in malnourished children in city hospitals, is the most shocking illustration of the economic collapse of a country that was once the breadbasket of southern Africa...

Cooler Heads Needed on Global Warming
by George Will
So, "the debate is over." Time magazine says so. Last week's cover story exhorted readers to "Be Worried. Be Very Worried," and ABC News concurred in several stories...[yet 30 years ago we were told to be] worried, very worried, about global cooling. Science magazine (Dec. 10, 1976) warned of "extensive Northern Hemisphere glaciation." Science Digest (February 1973) reported that "the world's climatologists are agreed" that we must "prepare for the next ice age"...

Study: Sexually Charged Media Push Kids into Having Intercourse at a Younger Age
by Michael Conlon
...In general it found that the highest exposure levels led to more sexual activity, with white teens in the group 2.2 times more likely to have had intercourse at ages 14 to 16 than similar youngsters who had the least exposure...
And they needed a to do a study to figure this out?

Civil Rights? How About Lawlessness?
by Joe R. Hicks
...Now, many Latino immigrant-rights organizers and their sympathizers seem to be saying that there is some inherent right being expressed when people sneak into the country, thumb their noses at the law and make fools out of those who wait patiently in foreign lands for visas to come to the United States. It is quite clear that many of those participating in the demonstrations have adopted the stance of the beleaguered victim, perceiving frustration about illegal immigration as racism. Some comments have been painfully ignorant. One protester said: "I'm here to make sure that Mexicans get their freedom, their rights"...
Your tax dollars at work: Immigration Bill Proposes In-state Tuition for Illegals. Is this to ensure they won't remain an economic underclass? Consider: Is Amnesty a form of American Dhimmitude? It should be clear that Guest-Worker Programs Are a Dead End. Finally, contrary to the "illegals fill jobs Americans don't want to do" rhetoric, a new study shows Immigrants Displace American Workers

Marginal Reforms
The San Diego Union-Tribune
...The only good news here is the likelihood of more bad news on the congressional scandal front, which will revive public pressure on Congress to clean up its act. A few more indictments and a bribery conviction or two, and we just might finally see lawmakers deny themselves the golf trips, private jets and $300 meals they so enjoy...

Are We Really a Nation of Immigrants?
by Lawrence Auster
...Since every nation could be called a nation of immigrants (or a nation of invaders) if you go back far enough, consistent application of the principle that a nation of immigrants must be open to all future immigrants would require every country on earth to open its borders to whoever wanted to come. But only the United States and, to a lesser extent, a handful of other Western nations, are said to have this obligation. The rule of openness to immigrants turns out to be a double standard, aimed solely at America and the West...

Hometown Jihad
by Patrick Poole
...My neighbor Sultan and his buddy Qaradawi also serve together on the European Council for Fatwa and Research. This organization has as its goal the establishment of sharia as the operating legal system in Europe and asserts itself as the ruling government of Muslim’s living in predominately non-Muslim areas. Among the more famous of its fatwas was issued in 2003 during an annual conference organized by the council in Stockholm, Sweden, which declared that jihadist killings and suicide bombings were not to be identified as “terrorism”...I have to confess that I never would have expected that my hometown of Hilliard, Ohio would have ever become a haven for an international apologist and recruiter for Islamic-sponsored terrorism. But it’s true...

Beyond the News: Weekend Journal  
Salem Radio Network
This week's broadcast covers Illegal immigration and public demonstrations made to order; Barry Bonds, the Baseball Hall of Fame, and steroid abuse; accuracy in Iraq war coverage; the true history of the Crusades, and more.

'It Takes a Lawyer to Raze a Village'
by Ronald A. Cross
...The lawyers want people to see cereal or hamburgers or colas as time bombs cleverly disguised as food and drink, packaged to make them irresistible to kids. Not only are the food and drink makers responsible for what kids want, they're also responsible for parents giving in to our children. That's the theory behind the lawsuits...[but] No party to this process - not the judges, the lawyers, or the interest groups - can decide what is right for us and for our children, nor can they know the consequences of substituting liability for those who produce our food and drink in place of personal and parental responsibility. We should all be clear that it takes a parent - not a lawsuit - to raise a child.

The World is Waking Up to New Era of Power Politics
by Daniel Yergin
The institutions and policies set up after the 1973 Arab oil embargo can no longer meet the needs of energy consumers or producers...All of these problems have provoked new fears that the world is running out of oil. But global output has actually risen 60 per cent since the 1970s, the last time the world was supposedly running out of oil...

Blacks Need a Culture War
by Errol Louis
...Specifically, we need aggressive, concerted action by members and institutions of the respectable black middle class to do open combat against the rise of an ancient enemy: a bold, seductive street culture that exalts lawlessness, addiction and anti-family behavior like pimping, sexual promiscuity, ignorance and personal selfishness...

Mexico Prefers to Export Its Poor,Not Uplift Them
by George W. Grayson
...Mexico's power brokers have failed to make the difficult decisions necessary to use their nation's bountiful wealth to benefit the masses. Washington and Ottawa have every right to insist that Mexico's pampered elite act responsibly, rather than expecting US and Canadian taxpayers to shoulder burdens Mexico should assume.

Something to Worry About
by Nick Schultz
...so blinded are the alarmists that they are largely ignoring potentially beneficial initiatives. One such effort is the Asia-Pacific Partnership for Clean Development and Climate Change (AP6) which is backed by the governments of the United States, India, China, South Korea, Japan and Australia. The AP6 is designed to permit the robust economic growth that the developing world so badly needs while beginning to address concerns over pollution, energy efficiency and emissions...

Tackling Tehran
Investor's Business Daily
The U.N.'s toothless response to Iran's defiance on nuclear weapons tells Iran it can do what it wants with no consequences...Let's start with the fact the statement is "nonbinding"...