Islamists Target African Christians
Posted on | December 26, 2012 | 8 Comments
Boko Haram “has killed hundreds in its campaign to impose Sharia law” since 2010, the BBC reports, describing the latest attacks:
The violence comes on the same day that the Pope — as part of his Christmas Day address — prayed for harmony in Nigeria, lamenting what he called “savage acts of terrorism” that frequently target Christians.
The head of the Christian Association of Nigeria in Yobe, Idi Garba, told AFP that many worshippers at [Evangelical Church of West Africa] “are still missing”.
“I have been informed that six bodies have been recovered,” Mr Garba said.
At least 12 people died in northern Nigeria when attackers raided two churches during Christmas Eve services, police said.
One assault occurred at the Church of Christ in Nations in Postikum, in Yobe province. Gunmen attacked worshipers during prayer, killing six people, including the pastor, and setting the building on fire.
Worshipers also were attacked at the First Baptist Church in Maiduguri, in Borno state. A deacon and five church members were killed.
They were the latest strikes against Christians in the region. More than 30 people died in a wave of Christmas Day attacks in the north last year, blamed on Boko Haram, a militant group that has targeted Christians and Muslims it considered insufficiently Islamist.
When America is weak, evil is strong. Evil worldwide has been emboldened by the weakness of the Obama administration’s policies.
Greedy Corporate Swine at Starbucks Cleverly Market Altruistic Image
Posted on | December 26, 2012 | 46 Comments
Perhaps you’re not old enough to remember the 1999 “Battle in Seattle,” when mostly peaceful demonstrators dangerous anarchists exercised their First Amendment rights went on a violent rampage in downtown Seattle during a meeting of the World Trade Organization.
What the rioters were allegedly protesting was “globalization,” which at the time was the trendy new left-wing code word for capitalism, in much the same way that Obama now talks about the “middle class,” instead of proletariat. (They update the language, but the ideology never changes.) Anyway, amid the senseless destruction wreaked by the rampaging anarchists, they smashed the windows at a Starbucks.
This was ironic symbolism, considering that Starbucks is a Seattle-based company which supports progressive political causes and has always cleverly marketed itself as concerned with environmentalism and other lefty “issues.” But this signifying jive didn’t fool the Black Bloc radicals, who despise all capitalist greedheads, no matter how much trendy progressive camouflage their marketing departments may deploy.
Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz made more than $65 million last year peddling his company’s left-wing brand and — displaying his shrewd marketing savvy — endorsed Obama, because nothing says Hope and Change quite like $4-a-cup Arabica. So now, Howard Schultz is hustling bipartisan cooperation on the “fiscal cliff”:
There are moments in our lives when we have an opportunity to ignite tremendous positive change—not just in the lives of the customers and communities we serve every day, but in our country. This was evident in the outpouring of support in the wake of the tragedy at Sandy Hook Elementary that claimed 26 innocent lives, including one of our partners (employees), Lauren Rousseau.
This spirit of connectedness and humanity is powerful; so powerful that if we unleash it, we can make a difference on a much grander scale. . . .
As many of you know, our elected officials in Washington D.C. have been unable to come together and compromise to solve the tremendously important, time-sensitive issue to fix the national debt. . . .
Rather than be bystanders, we have an opportunity—and I believe a responsibility — to use our company’s scale for good by sending a respectful and optimistic message to our elected officials to come together and reach common ground on this important issue. This week through December 28, partners in our Washington D.C. area stores are writing “Come Together” on customers’ cups.
It’s a small gesture, but the power of small gestures is what Starbucks is about! Imagine the power of our partners and hundreds of thousands of customers each sharing such a simple message, one cup at a time.
Screw you, Howard Schultz. Screw you and your phony “progressivism,” your bogus idealism-for-profit image-mongering, while you cash in on the National Public Radio-listening MSNBC-watching fools who buy your product because they think it’s a way to “make a difference.”
Next time there’s a riot, I hope the Black Bloc trashes all your stores.
(Via Memeorandum.)
The Bloody Mess at FreedomWorks
Posted on | December 26, 2012 | 33 Comments
Memeorandum today features two stories on the ugliness:
FreedomWorks Feud: War Inside
Tea Party Group Gets Nastier
— David Corn, Mother Jones
FreedomWorks tea party group nearly falls
apart in fight between old and new guard
— Amy Gardner, Washington Post
The latter article tells this story:
The day after Labor Day, just as campaign season was entering its final frenzy, FreedomWorks, the Washington-based tea party organization, went into free fall.
Richard K. Armey, the group’s chairman and a former House majority leader, walked into the group’s Capitol Hill offices with his wife, Susan, and an aide holstering a handgun at his waist. The aim was to seize control of the group and expel Armey’s enemies: The gun-wielding assistant escorted FreedomWorks’ top two employees off the premises, while Armey suspended several others who broke down in sobs at the news.
The coup lasted all of six days. By Sept. 10, Armey was gone — with a promise of $8 million — and the five ousted employees were back. The force behind their return was Richard J. Stephenson, a reclusive Illinois millionaire who has exerted increasing control over one of Washington’s most influential conservative grass-roots organizations. . . .
The Mother Jones story quotes a memo that FreedomWorks president Matt Kibbe wrote earlier this month, accusing Armey and Armey’s allies of having abandoned the Tea Party grassroots in favor of Republican Establishment insiders:
As it turns out, the fight for lower taxes, less government and more freedom is all well and good until it is Republicans — “old friends” — that are the ones needing to be held to account.
What’s the real deal here? I dunno, but this “reclusive millionaire” angle intrigues me. How does one get introduced to a reclusive millionaire?
Do reclusive millionaires read blogs? Because I’m thinking I could provide a lot of online content for $8 million.
Other than that, I guess it’s a lesson in how quickly the Young Turks become the Old Guard, and how dangerous it is to turn your back in D.C.
UPDATE: The shortage of reclusive millionaires among our blog readers reminds me of a fundamental problem I identified last year and explained in the form of a Venn diagram:
There is no intersection between Set A and Set B. Whatever is going on with the Important People Who Really Matter — and certainly reclusive millionaires fit that description — they’re definitely not reading this blog, because I sure as heck haven’t seen $8 million in the tip jar.
UPDATE II: Matt Welch at Reason remarks:
I know Dick Armey, am friends with Matt Kibbe, and have zero insight into the conflict, other than knowing through experience that the way these things look from the outside are often deceiving, particularly when viewed through the lens of a mainstream media instinctively allergic to billionaire non-Democratic political donors.
Meanwhile, I continue exploring the most important question raised by this controversy: “What’s in it for me?”
For $8 million, I could write a book, “Reclusive Millionaires Are Sexy” theothermccain.com/2012/12/26/the… Just sayin’ …
— Robert Stacy McCain (@rsmccain) December 26, 2012
NBC: Nothing But Criminals
Posted on | December 26, 2012 | 15 Comments
America’s least-trustworthy news organization and its most dishonest “journalist” have gotten themselves caught red-handed:
The Washington Metropolitan Police Department is investigating whether any city laws were violated when NBC’s David Gregory displayed what appeared to be a 30-round gun magazine on NBC’s “Meet the Press” on Sunday . . .
“The Metropolitan Police Department is investigating this matter,” said police officer and spokesman Araz Alali in an interview Tuesday. . . .
“There are D.C. code violations, D.C. code restrictions on guns, ammunition. We are investigating this matter. Beyond the scope of that, I can’t comment any further,” he said.
On Sunday, in an interview with the National Rifle Association’s head, Wayne LaPierre, Gregory displayed what appeared to be a 30-bullet gun magazine. He pushed LaPierre on the question of whether fewer children would have died during the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre this month had the gunman had access to fewer bullets.
NBC is stonewalling Professor William Jacobson:
My multiple attempts last Sunday to obtain a response from NBC News as to whether the magazine was real were met with stone cold silence. None of the three senior communications executives with responsibility for Meet the Press responded.
Video of the Meet the Press segment in which David Gregory says “here is a magazine for ammunition that carries 30 bullets”:
Meet the Press is recorded in D.C., where possession of a 30-round magazine is a crime. If David Gregory was telling the truth — if that was indeed an actual high-capacity magazine — then he and NBC News broke the law. Alternatively, if Gregory was lying and the “magazine” was just a phony prop, then NBC News deliberately deceived viewers.
Clearly, David Gregory must be prosecuted to the full extent of the law, and NBC should be declared a terrorist organization by the Department of Homeland Security, so that everyone associated with the network is subjected to hands-on searches by TSA agents at airports.
OK, maybe that’s going a little overboard. But clearly NBC News as an organization is hostile to Americans’ constitutional rights.
World’s Youngest Blogger, ‘Phrenologist At Large’
Posted on | December 25, 2012 | 10 Comments
At least, that’s what Steve Burri called me on FaceBook. . .

Obama Scrooges Christmas
Posted on | December 25, 2012 | 5 Comments
Re-elect Obama, the tax-hiking enemy of a free-market economy — hey, that’s got to be great for the holiday retail season, right?
Confidence among U.S. consumers dipped to its lowest point in December since July amid rising economic worries, according to a monthly index released Friday.
Marshal Cohen, chief research analyst at NPD Inc., a market research firm with a network of analysts at shopping centers nationwide, estimates customer traffic over the weekend was in line with the same time a year ago, but that shoppers seem to be spending less. . . .
All that spelled glum news for retailers, which can make up to 40 percent of annual sales during November and December.
Via Erika Johnsen at Hot Air, who adds:
The pervasive worries over the fiscal-cliff, combined with continued high unemployment and slackening economic indicators across all sectors, have punctured even Americans’ reliably robust Christmas spirit. But hey, I’m sure it’s all those dang Republicans’ fault, right?
Christmas Greetings From A Leader
Posted on | December 25, 2012 | 13 Comments
by Smitty
Positive, respectful, inclusive without selling his own viewpoint out.
Sure wish that other dude would take lessons from Bibi.
2012 The Best Year Ever?
Posted on | December 25, 2012 | Comments Off on 2012 The Best Year Ever?
by Smitty
A fine Trifecta outing:
It’s useless to judge the quality of the year as it ends. We’re too close to the details. We know that all of the numbers get adjusted down later. And the Big Doom will like arrive in 2013, though it will be labelled as ‘reform’, one predicts.
