Apr 8, 2004 | Dollars & Crosses
The left devours even itself:
The state of California has declared that many grass-roots environmental conservation efforts are actually illegal. The controversy, which has already halted river restoration projects statewide, stems from the state's "prevailing wage" law. Like many states, California requires that workers on public works projects be paid the equivalent of union wages. A related provision bars the use of a combination of paid workers and volunteers on the same state-funded project.
Last October, the state Department of Industrial Relations ordered a Redding, Calif., environmental organization, the Sacramento Watershed Action Group, to pay a fine of more than $33,000 after it used both students and a subcontractor to help restore an overgrown and obstructed riverbed. The department acted after a complaint from a union-funded watchdog group that presses for strict enforcement of the state's contracting laws. [NYSun]
Apr 7, 2004 | Dollars & Crosses
From Cox and Forkum:
AFP reports: US marines bomb Fallujah mosque.After the insurgents holed up in the mosque struck a humvee vehicle with an RPG, lightly wounding five soldiers, the marines opted for their heavy weaponry.
First a warplane fired off guns, then a Cobra helicopter shot off a Hellfire missile at the mosque and finally an aircraft dropped a laser-guided precision bomb, Byrne said.
The roar of jets shook the city, caught in the midst of a brutal urban battle pitting the marines against the insurgents who have bled the coalition forces for months and ambushed and mutilated four US contractors last week.
Byrne said the marines carried out the raid as precisely as they could because there are people living nearby. Marines also came under fire around a second mosque in the city that the marines had searched the previous day...
The head of the Marines First Division, General James Mattis, defended the attack, warning if rebels used places of worship in their war against US forces, his troops would not hesitate to strike them at sacred sites. "If they barricade themselves inside a mosque, we are not going to care about the mosque anymore than they do," Mattis said. [Emphasis added]
Apr 6, 2004 | Dollars & Crosses
Yvonne Conde writes in the New York Sun about the other prisoners in the Island that contains Guantanamo, the ones you conveniently don't hear about:
The 41-year-old man sits in a filthy 18-by-24-foot cell that he shares with 10 other prisoners. He knows he is fortunate because up to 18 men are routinely squeezed in cells of that size.... The water is rationed and the little that is available is contaminated. His food rations are meager and substandard. He suffers from chronic gastrointestinal conditions, which have worsened since his imprisonment. He now suffers from parasites, high cholesterol, hypertension, and has lost 20 pounds.
Jorge Olivera Castillo is one of the 300 political prisoners inside Cuba's jails, yet the world seems blind to their plight.
There is no international outcry about his living conditions.
No visits from the International Red Cross since 1989.
No congressional delegations or pop-ins from Greek Orthodox patriarchs or Robert Redford, Sean Penn,
Danny Glover, Oliver Stone, or Harry Belafonte.
Nor--even though he is black--any support from the NAACP, whose leader Kweise Mfume visited Cuba in 2002 on a "goodwill mission."
There is no outcry from the National Writer's Union, whose pet prisoner is Mumia Abul Jamal.
Mr. Olivera was arrested on March 18, 2003, during Cuba's greatest crackdown on independent journalists and dissidents, when 75 persons were arrested. This occurred the day after the 59th Session of the United Nations Commission for Human Rights convened in Geneva....
Cuba denies that it holds any prisoners of conscience and says that all inmates described as political prisoners are merely common criminals.
For more on Cuba see www.LibertyforCuba.comApr 6, 2004 | Dollars & Crosses
From Cox and Forkum:
News came yesterday that U.S. forces issued an arrest warrant for radical Muslim cleric Moqtada al-Sadr. Last week, al-Sadr made the news for declaring that 9/11 was a miracle from God and for declaring collaboration with Palestinian terrorist groups. (Via The Command Post).
But WorldNetDaily editor Joseph Farah says the real al-Sadr news is: Iran declares war on U.S.What the other news accounts left out was one significant, but well-established fact: Al-Sadr works for Iran. He is an Iranian agent. His authority comes from Iran. Last April, an Iranian cleric, Kadhem al-Husseini al-Haeri, issued a religious edict and distributed to Shiite mullahs in Iraq, calling on them "to seize the first possible opportunity to fill the power vacuum in the administration of Iraqi cities."
The edict, or fatwa, issued April 8, 2003, showed that Shiite clerics in Iraq are receiving significant direction from Iran. The edict said that Shiite leaders have to "seize as many positions as possible to impose a fait accompli for any coming government." [...] On April 7, the day American troops effectively toppled Hussein's government by seizing its main seats of power in Baghdad, al-Haeri sent a handwritten letter to the city of Najaf, appointing Moktada al-Sadr as his deputy in Iraq. Haeri wrote: "We hereby inform you that Mr. Moktada al-Sadr is our deputy and representative in all fatwa affairs." It added: "His position is my position."
Almost one year ago, Farah also reported that an Iranian-trained army was in Iraq.
More on the al-Sadr/Iran connection:
SMCCDI, an Iranian student group, reports that more trained "pilgrims" to enter Iraq.In reality these so-called [Arba-in] Pilgrims are Iranian Intelligence officers and Arab mercenaries trained, by the Islamic republic regime, with the task of creating more complication for America in its War Against Terror and to avoid the stabilization of Iraq.
AllahPundit featured an number of links of the subject including this from Global Security:The loyalty of many of [Grand Ayatollah Muhammad Sadiq al-Sadr] supporters has now passed to another son, Hojatoleslam Muqtada al-Sadr, a mid-level cleric about 30 years of age. Unlike his father, Muqtada has no formal religious standing to interpret the Koran, and relies for religious authority on an Iran-based Iraqi exiled cleric, Ayatollah Kazem al-Haeri.
And this from Asian News: Imam Muqtada Al-Sadr threatens to launch Intifada.Several months ago Al-Sadr visited Iran where he was warmly received by the Ayatollah Khamenei and Hashemi Rafsanjani. According to Arab sources, Khamenei probably compared Al Sadr to Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of the Lebanese Hezbollah, when wishing him luck in kicking out American forces in Iraq "like the Hezbollah did to Israel in Lebanon".
Meanwhile, InstaPundit reports how unpopular al-Sadr and his militia thugs are among Iraqi Shiites: ABCNews Poll.Shiite Arabs in Iraq express relatively little support for attacks against coalition forces such as those that occurred Sunday. And while most do express confidence in religious leaders and call for them to play a role in Iraq today, most do not seek a theocracy, and very few see Iran as a model for Iraq. A nationwide poll of Iraqis conducted in February for ABCNEWS also found that very few Shiites express support for Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, whose militia mounted the deadly attacks against the U.S.-led occupation.
It is noteworthy that not all Shiites are calling for a theocracy. However, the poll questions are worded in a way that leaves me wondering exactly what kind of government they do want. Though "Democracy" is apparently preferred over "Islamic State," the polls indicates that Shiites also overwhelming support a "a Government Mainly of Religious Leaders."
AllahPundit has still more on the Iran's machinations in Iraq, including this from David Johnson via Iran Va Jahan:On the Iraqi front, Iran's mullahs have stepped up their campaign to increase their influence in that country. Tehran has two main objectives in Iraq: to create a client regime there and to rid itself from its Iraq-based main opposition, the Iranian Mujahedeen-e Khalq (MEK). Since coming to power in 1979, the mullahs have considered Iraq the ideal springboard to export "Islamic Revolution" throughout the region. They view a pro-Tehran Iraq as a counterweight to the advancement of democracy in the Middle East. Clearly, a secular democratic Iraq would be a strategic blow to Tehran. For now, US policy makers should expect Iran to address the threat it perceives from the US in Iraq with terrorist violence. The Tehran regime has mounted an increasingly sophisticated, multi-phased and multi-faceted campaign in Iraq.
CNN reports: Coalition battling al-Sadr supporters in Najaf.In the holy city of Najaf in southern Iraq, al-Sadr's militia was in control of government, police and spiritual sites, a coalition source said. Al-Sadr also was busing followers into Najaf from Sadr City, a Baghdad neighborhood, according to the coalition source, who said that many members of his outlawed militia, Mehdi's Army, were from surrounding provinces. Al-Sadr -- who is wanted on murder charges in connection with the killing of a rival last year -- reportedly has taken refuge in the Imam Ali mosque in Najaf, one of Shiite Islam's holiest shrines. A posting on al-Sadr's Web site said he has called for a general strike.
Apr 4, 2004 | Dollars & Crosses
Writes David Holcberg of the Ayn Rand Institute:
Once again Microsoft is being attacked for its success. This time the perpetrator is not the U.S. government but the European Union, which is demanding that Microsoft remove Media Player from Windows and pay a fine of $600 million. This is another unjustifiable assault on Microsoft's property rights. Microsoft, like any other company, should have the right to decide what features should or should not be included in its products.
The alleged justification for the European Union's assault on Microsoft is that it "has abused its virtual monopoly power" and engaged in "unfair" competition by making its Media Player an integral part of its operating system. But there is nothing abusive or unfair in taking advantage of one's earned market share to offer customers a better deal than the competition. In fact, the only thing that is abusive and unfair in this case is the government's use of force to penalize one company in order to help its less efficient competitors.
Apr 3, 2004 | Dollars & Crosses
A few weeks ago John Kerry was saying foreign leaders supported him, but he wouldn't say who. Small wonder:
U.S. Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry has attacked Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez as a dubious democrat hostile to U.S. interests, delivering a slap in the face to the leftist leader who had portrayed Kerry as a potential friend. The Kerry statement on his Web site made front-page news in Venezuela on Monday, nearly two weeks after Chavez had publicly praised the Democrat contender, hailing his health care plans and likening him to assassinated U.S. President John Kennedy.
And if that wasn't enough, what about this one:
Former Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad endorsed Democratic contender John Kerry in the U.S. presidential race Thursday, saying he would keep the world safer than President Bush. "I think Kerry would be much more willing to listen to the voices of people and of the rest of the world," Mahathir, who retired in October after 22 years in power, told The Associated Press in an interview. "But in the U.S., the Jewish lobby is very strong, and any American who wants to become president cannot change the policy toward Palestine radically," he said.
The Kerry campaign rejected this endorsement too:
"John Kerry rejects any association with former Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad, an avowed anti-Semite whose views are totally deplorable. The world needs leaders who seek to bring people together, not drive them apart with hateful and divisive rhetoric. "This election will be decided by the American people, and the American people alone. It is simply not appropriate for any foreign leader to endorse a candidate in America's presidential election. John Kerry does not seek, and will not accept, any such endorsements."
One thing, though: If it's not appropriate for any foreign leader to endorse a candidate, then why was Kerry vaunting such endorsements?
