I've Moved!

I've decided to stop blogging here and have moved to The Enduring Church blog. At this blog, I'll be devoted to making the world aware of the persecution that the Christian Church faces around the world. I hope to encourage fellow believers to support their brothers and sisters who are enduring threats, torture, and imprisonment. The most important form of support is prayer.

Also, I will cover stories of the increasing hostility that American Christians are experiencing, acknowledging, of course, that it is generally nothing compared to the suffering of Christians in other countries.

Please visit and leave a comment or two.

God Bless,

Mike

A Working Strategy

Clifford D. May writes on NRO.com about how General Petraeus' strategy is working in several ways, not the least of which is on a religious level.

The truth, he [Hassan Mneimneh, a scholar and director of the Iraq Memory Foundation] discovered is that most Iraqis, unlike so many Westerners, do blame al Qaeda for the carnage al Qaeda has carried out. And most Iraqis have not embraced al Qaeda’s brand of Islam, with its barbarism — e.g. the murder of children to teach their parents obedience — and ultra-fundamentalism.

What’s more, Iraqis were deeply offended by al Qaeda leaders — almost all of them foreigners — saying their interpretation of Islam is flawed and inadequate, as has been that of their families and clans for generations. Mneimneh reports that Iraqi clerics have responded by calling al Qaeda’s version of Islam “excessive and unfair.”

“Note that the troops taking part in the surge have not been attacked by the Iraqis who live in the neighborhoods where they are now posted,” Mneinmeh said. “On the contrary, those Iraqis have been bringing the troops the intelligence they need to succeed.” Accepting a tactical alliance with such people does not violate Islamic doctrine, Iraqi religious scholars are daring to assert.

“The longer this persists,” Mneinmeh said, “the more Iraqis’ views will be changed. As these new views are expressed, disseminated and reinforced, it becomes less likely that they will be abandoned later.”

Body Counts

Finally, U.S. leadership is announcing the numbers of terrorists killed in Iraq. Hugh Hewitt has the quote from President Bush's speech...

In Iraq, our troops are taking the fight to the extremists and radicals and murderers all throughout the country. Our troops have killed or captured an average of more than 1,500 al Qaeda terrorists and other extremists every month since January of this year. (Applause.) We're in the fight. Today our troops are carrying out a surge that is helping bring former Sunni insurgents into the fight against the extremists and radicals, into the fight against al Qaeda, into the fight against the enemy that would do us harm. They're clearing out the terrorists out of population centers, they're giving families in liberated Iraqi cities a look at a decent and hopeful life.

Doing the quick math, that comes to 10,500 dead terrorists since January (not counting any in August). If the Administration would continue to put these numbers out and if the media would publish them, there would be 2 effects: the American public would start to take heart that we're making progress and the surviving terrorists would become disheartened and lose hope (and maybe prospective terrorists would think twice when faced with the odds of quickly becoming part of the body count.

Newt on Illegal Immigrant Crime at Home

Newt on the failure of Congress and the President to take illegal immigration seriously, in the wake of the execution-style killing of 3 young people in Newark, New Jersey a few weeks ago by an illegal from Peru and the killing of 15-year-old Dani Countryman by 2 brothers illegally here from Mexico...

It’s time for the American people to present Congress and the president with a defining choice: Either Congress and the President want to defend innocent Americans from violent illegal aliens or they don’t.

Either Congress will pass a bill to establish a new system for winning the war here at home and protecting Americans from criminal illegal aliens or Congress will fail to act and we will know we need a new Congress.

Killing For Congress

Ralph Peters from the New York Post has an excellent column about how the latest massacres committed by the terrorists in Iraq are a sign that they're getting desperate and trying to send a message to Congress.

al Qaeda needs to portray Iraq as a continuing failure of U.S. policy. Those dead and maimed Yazidis were just props: The intended audience was Congress.

Al Qaeda has been badly battered. It's lost top leaders and thousands of cadres. Even more painful for the Islamists, they've lost ground among the people of Iraq, including former allies. Iraqis got a good taste of al Qaeda. Now they're spitting it out.

The foreign terrorists slaughtering the innocent recognize that their only remaining hope of pulling off a come-from-way-behind win is to convince your senator and your congressman or -woman that it's politically expedient to hand a default victory to a defeated al Qaeda.

Congress needs to see the big picture--and it's not about the election in 2008. It's about having the intestinal fortitude to finish what we started. To send a message to our allies and enemies that it is a mistake to mess with the U.S. And that we'll stick by our friends, that we can be trusted to stick it out.

Here's how Gen. Petraeus summed it up for The Post on Tuesday: "Right now, we're on the offensive, striving to build on the gains made in the past two months by conducting strike operations to retain the initiative against al-Qaeda-in-Iraq, to address the challenge of the Iranian-supported Shia extremists and to try to reduce further the level of ethno-sectarian violence in Baghdad and other fault line areas."

Al Qaeda down, Iran out and sectarian violence reduced. Sounds like a plan.

Amen, Brother!

One of my brothers-in-arms has created this video clip that is sure to get you fired up and proud to be an American. Hot Air is saying that this clip is 10 months old, but it just made it big today when it showed up on the homepage for Foxnews. God Bless the Marines.

A Good Baseball Story

Dean Barnett, who sometimes fills in for Hugh Hewitt on his radio show, has a great post, contrasting this past week's big story on Barry Bonds hitting number 756 with a story you might not have heard about.

BARRY BONDS, THE NEW HOME RUN KING! Zzzzzzzz. There are a few things that some people may have forgotten about Bonds, or that young people may be unaware of. Back in the early 90’s, Bonds was by consensus the best player in baseball. He could do it all. And even then, he was extremely unpopular. Why? Because he was an arrogant jerk. Back in the day, there was an extremely popular video of Pittsburg Pirate manager Jim Leyland getting in Bonds’ face during spring training because of Bonds’ hideous attitude. Sports fans everywhere enjoyed the image of a righteous manager letting an obnoxious superstar have it with both barrels.


Some players grow out of such immaturity. Bonds instead grew worse. As a young superstar, he was the most insufferable player in baseball. As an old superstar, he has solidified his grasp on that crown. Even if he had never taken a performance enhancing substance, no one would care about Barry Bonds supplanting Hank Aaron because no one feels like celebrating Barry Bonds.


If he had retired before his head swelled up like a beach ball, he would have gone down as one of the best players ever. And you know what? Still, no one would have missed him when he left. In time, people who didn’t have to endure his personality will marvel at Bonds’ incredible accomplishments on the field. I don’t think many baseball fans would mind taking a ride in a time machine to see the even viler Ty Cobb play a few games. But for the contemporary audience, Barry Bonds cannot leave the game soon enough.


NOW THE FEEL-GOOD STORY OF BASEBALL 2007.


Some call it going haywire. Others call it Steve Blass disease. The fashion obsessed and malaprop-prone call it Bill Blass disease. It happens when a major league baseball player or other athlete suddenly loses the ability to do a simple thing that he has done all his life. In pitcher Steve Blass’ case, he couldn’t throw the ball over the plate anymore. When it struck catcher Mackey Sasser, he couldn’t accurately throw the ball back to the pitcher. Second baseman Steve Sax, who had been a great player, could no longer make the short throw to first base.


In all these cases, some sort of mental block triggered the breakdown. When you go haywire, it’s virtually impossible to make it back to normal. Steve Sax once memorably said that people would tell him just not to think about it. He said that’s like telling someone, “Don’t think of an elephant!” When someone tells you not to think of an elephant, what do you do? You think of an elephant.


Perhaps the saddest case of going haywire is the one that hit St. Louis Cardinal pitcher Rick Ankiel. In 2000, Ankiel was a 20 year old prodigy. The St. Louis Cardinals had signed him to a contract that included a $2.5 million bonus a couple of years earlier. Just barely out his teens Ankiel racked up an 11-7 record in the big leagues. He was 9th in the league in E.R.A., and 7th in the league in strikeouts.


The Cardinals made the playoffs that year, and there things went tragically wrong for Ankiel. With the nation watching, Ankiel threw five wild-pitches while allowing four runs in the 3rd inning of the Cards’ first playoff game. The Cardinals nevertheless advanced to the National League Championship Series, and Ankiel’s wildness continued to plague him. He didn’t make it out of the first inning in Game 2; out of the 20 pitches he threw that night, 5 got past the catcher. Ankiel returned to face four batters in Game 5 of that series; he threw 2 more wild pitches and walked two men.


Rick Ankiel never got back to normal. He never even came close He tried for what had to be five painful years until finally surrendering before the 2005 season. But Rick Ankiel is a great athlete, and was determined to make it back to the Major Leagues. He decided to do so as an outfielder.


Having started over as a 26 year old, Ankiel improbably became a very successful minor league outfielder. Last year, Ankiel suffered another setback, missing the entire season due to a knee injury. This year, as a 28 year old, Ankiel led all Triple A players with 32 homeruns.


The St. Louis Cardinals once again brought Rick Ankiel up to the big leagues this week, this time as a power-hitting outfielder with a cannon for an arm. Ankiel made his return to the Cardinals’ lineup last night. Penning yet another unlikely chapter in the Rick Ankiel Story, Ankiel returned with a bang, hitting a homerun in the 7th inning. Cardinal manager Tony LaRussa said that except for winning the World Series, Ankiel’s homerun was the happiest moment he had ever had in uniform. Ankiel called the experience “unbelievable.”


"You almost can't put it into words,” he continued. “I couldn't have written that any better. No way. It felt so good I can't describe it. It's almost ... euphoric."


Ankiel’s homerun wasn’t his first in the big leagues. He hit others as a pitcher back in 2000. But he got the ball back from last night’s homerun, and he’s keeping it. As well he should - that ball didn’t come easy.

A Preventable Murder

This is infuriating. Michelle Malkin tells the story of Dani Countryman, a 15-year old girl who was sexually assaulted and killed by two men who admit that they entered the U.S. illegally about 6 months ago.

As 15-year-old Dani Countryman struggled beneath Gilberto Arellano Gamboa, pinned to the floor with her pants down, he called on his cousin to help subdue the girl. Alejandro Rivera Gamboa responded by stepping on Countryman’s throat until she stopped moving.
That’s how investigators described Countryman’s death in a court document released Tuesday. Evidence outlined in the document included statements by the defendants and a bloody shoe that matched an imprint on Countryman’s chest.
Gilberto Javier “Gabe” Arellano Gamboa, 23, who is also known as Rivera Gamboa, and Alejandro Emeterio “Alex” Rivera Gamboa, 24, were arraigned Tuesday in Clackamas County Circuit Court on charges of aggravated murder. Through a Spanish-speaking interpreter, they acknowledged the charges against them and asked for warmer jail clothes.

It's time to write and call your Congressman and Senators and let them know how sick and tired you are of seeing stories like this because they don't have the guts to get serious about closing our nation's borders to sick and twisted pieces of poo-poo (gotta keep it PG) like these scumbags who have nothing positive to offer our country. Whew, that was a long sentence...

CAIR doesn't care about freedom of speech

Mike S. Adams writes at Townhall.com about a harrassing letter his friend received from an attack dog lawyer representing CAIR--the Council on American-Islamic Relations. His friend, Ron Robinson, is the president of Young America's Foundation (YAF). YAF had invited Robert Spencer to speak at its National Conservative Student Conference. The lawyer, Joseph Sandler, demanded that YAF not allow Spencer to speak at its conference because he was a "purveyor of hatred and bigotry towards Muslims", but failed to back up this statement with any supporting evidence.

"...we demand that YAF cancel the subject session (at which Spencer is speaking), or else take steps to ensure that false and defamatory statements are not disseminated at that session. Our clients have instructed us to pursue every available and appropriate legal remedy to redress any false and defamatory statements that are
made at the session. Please let us know by the close of business today whether you intend to comply with these requests. Joseph E. Sandler, sandler@sandlerreiff.com, (202) 479-1111"


This notion of preventing “offense” by forcing people to relinquish their First Amendment Rights is itself offensive. Certainly, when one of my Muslim friends offends me - by forcing his wife to leave the room without speaking as soon as I come over - I just let it go. But maybe I shouldn’t. Maybe I should start my own organization called CAIRS, The Council Against Islamic Repression and Sexism.

Adams then provides a list of actions that we can take to help Mr. Sandler see the light, including faxing an image of our extended middle finger to the lawyer's firm.

Barry Bonds, please retire tomorrow

Well, Barry Bonds finally hit number 756, surpassing Hank Aaron on the all-time home run list. I must confess I missed it, but when we turned the TV on tonight, the DVR happened to be tuned to ESPN, so we were able to rewind about a half-hour to the moment he hit the homer. It was just a bit underwhelming. I've seen plenty of amazing sports moments that will be remembered for a long time, like Tiger Woods' amazing chip-in from off the green at Augusta, or Michael Jordan's numerous super-human efforts to win a handful of championships. Many of those moments have brought me to tears because I knew how hard those athletes had worked to get there and they were able to pull out a miracle when they had to. Hard work and amazing talent. Gets me every time.

Didn't feel that watching Barry hit 756. There's just something about his possible/probable cheating to get this far that really bugs me. The guy obviously has great talent. Even with extra, illegal power, it still takes skills to hit a little ball traveling 90 mph with a skinny stick. To me, it's a character flaw that he felt he needed to get a little boost to get the record. Cheapens the record in my mind.

This whole season for the Giants has been focused on Bonds breaking Aaron's record. In the meantime, the Giants are at the bottom of the NL West--by a whole lot o' games. Isn't that the story of Bonds' career? It's always been about him. But what has he done for his team? Not much this year.

So I wish Barry would retire tomorrow so the record would stop at 756 and give the next big slugger a better chance of breaking the record sooner. And then Barry could fade away.

We Just Might Win

You know something is going on when even the New York Times runs an opinion piece that doesn't spout the Democrat rallying cry--"We've Already Lost in Iraq!" Michael O'Hanlon and Kenneth Pollack recently visited Iraq and their opinion of the progress being made can be summed up quite nicely:

Here is the most important thing Americans need to understand: We are finally getting somewhere in Iraq, at least in military terms.

That sounds like the complete opposite of what the Democratic leadership is saying every time there's a camera and a microphone within reach. After unanimously confirming General Petraeus, they've done a complete flip-flop and undermined his leadership during the surge. Far from being demoralized as the anti-war portrays them, our armed forces are motivated, kicking butt, and taking names.

After the furnace-like heat, the first thing you notice when you land in Baghdad is the morale of our troops. In previous trips to Iraq we often found American troops angry and frustrated — many sensed they had the wrong strategy, were using the wrong tactics and were risking their lives in pursuit of an approach that could not work.

Today, morale is high. The soldiers and marines told us they feel that they now have a superb commander in Gen. David Petraeus; they are confident in his strategy, they see real results, and they feel now they have the numbers needed to make a real difference.

In summary...

Viewed from Iraq, where we just spent eight days meeting with American and Iraqi military and civilian personnel, the political debate in Washington is surreal. The Bush administration has over four years lost essentially all credibility. Yet now the administration’s critics, in part as a result, seem unaware of the significant changes taking place. . . .As two analysts who have harshly criticized the Bush administration’s miserable handling of Iraq, we were surprised by the gains we saw and the potential to produce not necessarily “victory” but a sustainable stability that both we and the Iraqis could live with.

Kerry Says Minimum Wage Hike Will Help Small Businesses

Tuesday, the federal minimum wage increased 70 cents to $5.85. It's scheduled to go up another 70 cents next year. And another 70 cents the following year. And John Kerry, the chairman of the Committee on Small Business and Entrepreneurship, says that small businesses will benefit from this increase. Huh? CNSNews.com tries to explain his logic.

"In order for America to remain truly competitive in a global economy, we must invest in our workforce to stimulate small business growth. Small businesses create two-thirds of all new jobs in this country, and the vast majority of them are paying their new workers higher than the minimum wage," Kerry said Thursday in a news release.

Huh? What point is he really trying to make? If the majority of small business owners are already paying their new workers higher than the minimum wage, why raise the minimum raise? This increase doesn't really help the workforce like he says it does. Why can't Kerry leave it up to the market to determine what wages should be? If an employer can't pay what his competitors pay, he's not going to last long in that market. Increasing the minimum wage decreases the amount that business owners can re-invest in their businesses. Walter Williams has a great column which has some more thoughts on the issue.

Place yourself in the position of an employer and ask: If a worker costs me, say, $7 in wages, plus mandated fringes such as Social Security, unemployment compensation, sick and vacation leave, making the true hourly cost of hiring a worker $9 an hour, does it pay me to hire a worker who's so unfortunate to have skills that enable him to produce only $5 or $6 worth of value per hour? Most employers would conclude that doing so would be a losing economic proposition.
There are a couple other villains in the piece that force employers to respond to increases in wages that exceed a worker's productivity. If he did hire such workers, he would earn lower profits. Soon, investors would abandon him and put their money where returns are higher.
There's another villain -- the customer. If the employer retained workers whose wages exceeded their productivity, to cover his costs he would have to charge you and me higher product or service prices. I don't know about you, but I prefer lower prices to higher prices, and I'd switch my patronage to those firms who adjusted to the higher labor cost.
Congress can easily mandate higher wages, but they cannot mandate higher worker productivity or that employers hire a particular worker in the first place. Those of us who truly care about the welfare of low-skilled workers should focus our energies on helping them to become more productive, and a good start would be to do something about the rotten education that many receive.

A Return to Modesty?

UPDATE: Mona Charen also wrote about Wendy's new book at National Review Online.

The good news is that a small but significant backlash is underway. Eleven-year-old Ella Gunderson became a minor celebrity when she wrote to Nordstrom complaining that she could not find a pair of jeans that didn’t show her underwear. Sixteen-year-old Taylor Moore travels the country advising girls to follow their dreams. She tells them, “There’s nothing wrong with being a good girl . . . . You put yourself in a position of being a girl who’s classy and having dignity, and eventually people will treat you as such.” The “Girlcotters,” a group of Pennsylvania teens, pressured Abercrombie & Fitch to pull T-shirts with sayings like, “Who needs brains when you have these?”

You wouldn't know it living out here in Southern California, with the motto of the beaches being "Less is More" and all the fuss over Brittany, Paris, and Lindsay, but seems there might be a trend towards more modesty in our culture. At least that's what Chuck Colson said in today's Breakpoint Commentary.

Eight years ago, a young writer named Wendy Shalit took the culture by storm with a radical book called A Return to Modesty: Discovering the Lost Virtue. While many people embraced the idea of a return to modesty—especially the young women whose struggles and aspirations Shalit wrote about—others were appalled. “I knew that my arguments . . . might be challenged,” Shalit recalls now, “but nothing prepared me for the tongue-lashings I would receive from my elders. . . . [Feminist writer] Katha Pollitt called me a ‘twit.’ . . . The Nation solemnly foretold that I would ‘certainly be embarrassed’ and regret my stance ‘in a few years.’”

Well, it’s now been a few years, and Wendy regrets nothing. On the contrary, she has a new book out, Girls Gone Mild: Young Women Reclaim Self-Respect and Find It’s Not Bad to Be Good. As the title proclaims, Shalit is still convinced that true strength and happiness come not from deadening one’s emotions and having sex for fun, but from practicing modesty and self-restraint.

AND

As Shalit studied trends like modest fashion shows and boycotts of sexually explicit T-shirts, she discovered that for every girl who’s bought into the cultural myths about sexuality, there’s another who is refusing to go along. While acknowledging the negative, anti-woman forces in this sex-obsessed culture, she focuses refreshingly on the women who choose to protect their own “dignity” and “vulnerability.”

Let's work to encourage our daughters to exhibit their modesty for the world to see, not their bodies.

IOC siding with China on protests

Looks like China's continuing to prepare the world for its lack of respect for human rights, including the right to protest. The Australian Broadcasting Company is reporting that political groups will not be welcome at the Beijing Olympics next year. And the IOC is China's messenger.

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) has warned political groups not to use next year's Bejiing Olympics as a vehicle to promote their various causes.

The IOCs Hein Verbruggen has warned that political groups are already using the Beijing Olympics to promote their causes.

He said Beijing's Olympic organisers, must "take steps to negate these agendas".

Human rights groups have threatened to use the Games to protest against China's detention without trial, political imprisonments and widespread use of the death penalty.

Happy Belated Birthday!

Happy Independence Day!!!

In honor of the 4th of July, let's read through the Declaration of Independence:

IN CONGRESS, JULY 4, 1776.
THE UNANIMOUS
DECLARATION
OF THE
THIRTEEN UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.
WHEN, in the Course of human Events, it becomes necessary for one People to dissolve the Political Bands which have connected them with another, and to assume, among the Powers of the Earth, the separate and equal Station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's GOD entitle them, a decent Respect to the Opinions of Mankind requires that they should declare the Causes which impel them to the Separation.
We hold these Truths to be self-evident, that all Men are created equal, that they are endowed, by their CREATOR, with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these Rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just Powers from the Consent of the Governed, that whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these Ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its Foundation on such Principles, and organizing its Powers in such Form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate, that Governments long established, should not be changed for light and transient Causes; and accordingly all Experience hath shewn, that Mankind are more disposed to suffer, while Evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the Forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long Train of Abuses and Usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object, evinces a Design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their Right, it is their Duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future Security. Such has been the patient Sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the Necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The History of the present King of Great-Britain is a History of repeated Injuries and Usurpations, all having in direct Object the Establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid World.
HE has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public Good.
HE has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing Importance, unless suspended in their Operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.
HE has refused to pass other Laws for the Accommodation of large Districts of People, unless those People would relinquish the Right of Representation in the Legislature, a Right inestimable to them, and formidable to Tyranny only.
HE has called together Legislative Bodies at Places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the Depository of their public Records, for the sole Purpose of fatiguing them into Compliance with his Measures.
HE has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly Firmness his Invasions on the Rights of the People.
HE has refused for a long Time, after such Dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative Powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining, in the mean Time, exposed to all the Dangers of Invasion from without, and Convulsions within.
HE has endeavoured to prevent the Population of these States; for that Purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their Migrations hither, and raising the Conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.
HE has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers.
HE has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the Tenure of their Offices, and the Amount and Payment of their Salaries.
HE has erected a Multitude of new Offices, and sent hither Swarms of Officers to harrass our People, and eat out their Substance.
HE has kept among us, in Times of Peace, Standing Armies, without the Consent of our Legislatures.
HE has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power.
HE has combined with others to subject us to a Jurisdiction foreign to our Constitution, and unacknowledged by our Laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:
FOR quartering large Bodies of Armed Troops among us:
FOR protecting them, by a mock Trial, from Punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:
FOR cutting off our Trade with all Parts of the World:
FOR imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:
FOR depriving us, in many Cases, of the Benefits of Trial by Jury:
FOR transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended Offences:
FOR abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an arbitrary Government, and enlarging its Boundaries, so as to render it at once an Example and fit Instrument for introducing the same absolute Rule into these Colonies:
FOR taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:
FOR suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with Power to legislate for us in all Cases whatsoever.
HE has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection, and waging War against us.
HE has plundered our Seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our Towns, and destroyed the Lives of our People.
HE is, at this Time, transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to complete the Works of Death, Desolation, and Tyranny, already begun with Circumstances of Cruelty and Perfidy, scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous Ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized Nation.
HE has constrained our Fellow-Citizens, taken Captive on the high Seas, to bear Arms against their Country, to become the Executioners of their Friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.
HE has excited domestic Insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the Inhabitants of our Frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known Rule of Warfare, is an undistinguished Destruction, of all Ages, Sexes, and Conditions.
IN every Stage of these Oppressions we have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble Terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated Injury. A Prince, whose Character is thus marked by every Act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the Ruler of a free People.
NOR have we been wanting in Attentions to our British Brethren. We have warned them, from Time to Time, of Attempts by their Legislature to extend an unwarrantable Jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the Circumstances of our Emigration and Settlement here. We have appealed to their native Justice and Magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the Ties of our common Kindred to disavow these Usurpations, which would inevitably interrupt our Connexions and Correspondence. They too have been deaf to the Voice of Justice and of Consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the Necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the Rest of Mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.
WE, therefore, the Representatives of the UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, in GENERAL CONGRESS Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the World for the Rectitude of our Intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly Publish and Declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be, FREE AND INDEPENDENT STATES; that they are absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political Connexion between them and the State of Great-Britain, is, and ought to be, totally dissolved; and that as FREE AND INDEPENDENT STATES, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which INDEPENDENT STATES may of Right do. And for the Support of this Declaration, with a firm Reliance on the Protection of DIVINE PROVIDENCE, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honour.
John Hancock.
GEORGIA, Button Gwinnett, Lyman Hall, Geo. Walton.
NORTH-CAROLINA, Wm. Hooper, Joseph Hewes, John Penn.
SOUTH-CAROLINA, Edward Rutledge, Thos Heyward, junr. Thomas Lynch, junr. Arthur Middleton.
MARYLAND, Samuel Chase, Wm. Paca, Thos. Stone, Charles Carroll, of Carrollton.
VIRGINIA, George Wythe, Richard Henry Lee, Ths. Jefferson, Benja. Harrison, Thos. Nelson, jr. Francis Lightfoot Lee, Carter Braxton.
PENNSYLVANIA, Robt. Morris, Benjamin Rush, Benja. Franklin, John Morton, Geo. Clymer, Jas. Smith, Geo. Taylor, James Wilson, Geo. Ross.
DELAWARE, Caesar Rodney, Geo. Read.
NEW-YORK, Wm. Floyd, Phil. Livingston, Frank Lewis, Lewis Morris.
NEW-JERSEY, Richd. Stockton, Jno. Witherspoon, Fras. Hopkinson, John Hart, Abra. Clark.
NEW-HAMPSHIRE, Josiah Bartlett, Wm. Whipple, Matthew Thornton.
MASSACHUSETTS-BAY, Saml. Adams, John Adams, Robt. Treat Paine, Elbridge Gerry.
RHODE-ISLAND AND PROVIDENCE, &c. Step. Hopkins, William Ellery.
CONNECTICUT, Roger Sherman, Saml. Huntington, Wm. Williams, Oliver Wolcott.
IN CONGRESS, JANUARY 18, 1777.
ORDERED,
THAT an authenticated Copy of the DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCY, with the Names of the MEMBERS of CONGRESS, subscribing the same, be sent to each of the UNITED STATES, and that they be desired to have the same put on RECORD.
By Order of CONGRESS,
JOHN HANCOCK, President.
BALTIMORE, in MARYLAND: Printed by MARY KATHARINE GODDARD.

God Bless America!

The Immigration Bill is Dead!

CNSNews.com reports on how grassroots organizations are claiming the credit for influencing 18 senators to switch and vote against cloture on the Senate's immigration bill.

"The days of shoving legislation down the throats of the American people are over," Jessica Echard, executive director of the conservative Eagle Forum, said in a release. "Grassroots America, talk radio and a handful of senators stood toe to toe with our nation's elite power class, and we won!

"It's time for our elected officials to drop this push for amnesty, once and for all," Echard said. "America would be better served if senators used their August recess to travel down to the border and help build the fence they passed last year."

In the nearly 48 hours between the Tuesday cloture vote and the vote Thursday morning, opponents of the bill inundated Senate offices with phone calls, faxes and email encouraging senators to vote against cloture. The Senate's chief information officer announced that the "moderate increase in call volume" caused the office phone system to fail.

Michael Yon--Drilling for Justice

Michael Yon gives a great update on the progress of Arrowhead Ripper, the operation to free Baquba of the presence of Al Qaeda of Iraq (AQI).

For security reasons, the Iraqi Army (IA) was not included in the initial planning of Arrowhead Ripper, yet with each succeeding day the IA has taken a larger role in the unfolding attack. The Fifth Iraqi Army Division is considered an increasingly competent group of fighters, and from the limited scope of 5th IA that I personally witnessed, that judgment seems correct. The 5th is committed to battle. Whereas the Iraqi Army is coming into the fight, and playing increasingly critical roles, the local police force is less impressive.

Yon provides a great example of why AQI is failing in Iraq.

Other AQI edicts included beatings for men who refused to grow beards, and corporal punishments for obscene sexual suggestiveness, defined by such “loose” behavior as carrying tomatoes and cucumbers in the same bag. These fatwas were not eagerly embraced by most Iraqis, and the taint traveled back to the Muftis who sat in supreme judgment. Locals, who are increasingly helpful in pointing out and celebrating the downfall of AQI here, said that during the initial Arrowhead Ripper attack the morning of the 19th, AQI murdered five men. Townsend’s men found the buried corpses behind an AQI prison, exactly where they’d been told to look for the group grave. Locals also directed Townsend’s men to a torture house. Peering through a window, American soldiers saw knives, swords, bindings and drills. AQI is well-known for its macabre eagerness to drill into kneecaps, elbows, ribs, skulls, and other parts of victims.

Terror Suspect on the Loose!

Authorities are on the lookout for a terrorist who has served as al Qaeda's spokesman for the past few years. Incredibly, this person has been living in the United States the entire time and was last seen terrorizing a small handful of women who normally just get together to gossip. Authorities say this person should be considered loud and obnoxious. If spotted, you are urged to run away or you might get hit by a Tickle Me Elmo doll.

Tribal Leaders Turning on Al Qaeda

Eli Lake, reporting in The New York Sun, tells of how tribes that had previously allowed Al Qaeda to operate in their area are now beginning to turn on the terrorist group.

For those officers overseeing the new tribal diplomacy, signs are emerging that Iraq's deepest social networks — its tribes — are withdrawing their tacit acceptance of Al Qaeda and are becoming more willing to cooperate with American authorities to combat the terror network.

The plan is inspired by some successes that the Marines and the Army had with tribes in Anbar province, but it is still in the early stages. While the military and CIA have tried to reach out to Iraq's tribes since before the war, those efforts yielded mixed results. The majority of Sunni tribes cut deals with Al Qaeda for cash — between $30,000 and $40,000, according to sheiks here — to turn a blind eye to Al Qaeda's activities. That arrangement is starting to fall away.

"I see what I think is becoming a national trend, especially in areas influenced by Al Qaeda, where they have made inroads, and even in places where you see other forms of religious extremism, such as Jaish al-Mahdi, you have it from the South. It's coming, it's there," Lieutenant Colonel Richard Welch said in an interview. Colonel Welch, a public prosecutor in Ohio, spends his days meeting Iraqi tribal chiefs as he oversees tribal and religious outreach for the Multi-National Force in Baghdad.

Sheikh Hussein al-Tamimi, whose tribe has been friendly to American forces since the invasion, agrees that many of his fellow chieftains have changed their position on Al Qaeda in recent months. "I think the motivation behind the change is to protect their interests," he said in an interview. "They lose business."

Sheikh Hussein, as well as other sheikhs interviewed for this piece, said the turning point for the tribes was in September when Al Qaeda in Iraq declared the formation of the Islamic State of Iraq, a shadow state that in pockets of the country has established Islamic sharia courts and tried to provide some social services. The declaration was a direct challenge to the centuries-old tribal system that has prevailed in most of Iraq. As a result, the terrorists once seen as allies against the American invaders have also come to be seen as invaders.

The entire article is well worth the read.