Writes Allen Forkum:

From FoxNews: Report: Al Qaeda Claims Riyadh Bombings.

The latest al-Ablaj e-mail addressed criticism that Saturday's strike hurt Arabs and Muslims, not Americans, saying Al Qaeda also believed "working with Americans and mixing with them" was forbidden.

Yet also reported is that Saudi Attack Shocks Arab World. The shock is apparently that Al Qaeda takes more seriously the militant Islamic fundamentalism preached by the Saudis than the Saudis do themselves. What is shocking is this quote from the article:

"If any good can come of such horror ... it is surely that no one who now hears the name Al Qaeda will have any image in their mind other than one which truly reflects what the organization stands for: Innocent men and women being rushed to hospital dripping blood or trying to comfort their terrified children," the Saudi newspaper Arab News said in an editorial Tuesday.

Oh really? Did the Arab News not get that image on September 11, 2001? The name Al Qaeda didn't sound so bad when Americans were being murdered by the thousands? But now it does? What better way to illustrate how their Islamic sympathies have blinded them to the evil of Al Qaeda until they themselves are viciously attacked. Not that they'll blame their Islamic fundamentalism...

UPDATE: OUCH! We thought this idea was very original. But we noticed today a cartoon by Mike Thompson at American RealPolitik. How many Saudi-eating plant cartoons can there be?

A new child's textbook has sketches of boys and girls together -- normal classroom fare in many countries but criticized by extremists here as a government scheme to teach children to rebel against the precepts of Islam. One Islamic Web site, in attacking the book, displayed a drawing of girls in a classroom and declared: "To show this to male students is a problem. ... A boy could remove it at every opportunity he has, kiss it and return it to his desk's drawer." As Saudi Arabia moves cautiously to reform its religious establishment, education and media, extremists are saying even these small steps go too far and will corrupt the birthplace of Islam...

The BBC has appointed a "Middle East policeman" to oversee its coverage of the region amid mounting allegations of anti-Israeli bias.

...The BBC has also been the target of Downing Street accusations that it toed a pro-Baghdad line over the Iraq war and that it influenced the Today programme's handling of the dossier story that is the subject of the Hutton Inquiry.

...The [BBC's World Service] Arabic Service has been singled out by some critics as the most anti-Israeli source of the corporation's Middle East output. The BBC denied that the appointment amounted to an admission that it had "got its coverage wrong"...  ["BBC appoints man to monitor 'pro-Arab bias'", November 11, 2003]

Then why did the Baghdad Bob Corporation appoint someone in the first place?

Dear James:

You write yesterday that Gen.Clark reaches new heights of incoherence in explaining why he approves of our having fought in Kosovo but not in Iraq. But Clark's position, while wrong, is not incoherent.

Leftists support military action when it does nothing to increase American power or advance American interests; they oppose it when America benefits. Our action in Kosovo was purely "humanitarian," altruistic, self-sacrificial--since we sought no gain for ourselves, they are all in favor. Invading Iraq, on the other hand, was self-interested--and therefore wrong in their eyes.

When Democrats accuse the president of waging war under "false pretenses" or of spilling "blood for oil" these are left-wing code words for what they really object to: America's unapologetic assertion of its own interests.

Sincerely yours,

Paul Blair
Manhattan

Writes Allen Forkum:

The Nov. 11 New Yorker editorial -- Getting Warmer -- is a typical example of global warming advocacy. It starts out sounding very certain about global warming with sentences like this:

[T]he evidence that human activity is changing the planet's climate has continued to mount, as has evidence of the consequences.

But later, when discussing criticism of the theory, you get less certain sentences like this:

Though it's impossible to determine exactly how much of the current warming trend is the result of atmospheric changes wrought by man and how much is caused by natural climate variation, the vast majority of credible studies in fact point to the former as the more significant factor.

Scientific certainty is crucial because there's nothing uncertain about the freedoms environmentalists propose to take away from us. Without scientific certainty, the alleged global warming can never be curtailed by government action, only mankind will be curtailed. And that is the real goal of environmentalists.

Here's what is being said about some of those "credible studies." From a National Post article by Tim Patterson, Kyoto debunked:

The growing number of scientists who dispute the treaty's scientific foundation [regarding global warming] have become increasingly vocal, regularly pushing their case in the media as groundbreaking studies continue to be published that pull the rug out from under Kyoto's shaky edifice.

Of these, none may have the long-term impact of the paper published yesterday [Oct. 28] in the prestigious British journal Energy and Environment, which explains how one of the fundamental scientific pillars of the Kyoto Accord is based on flawed calculations, incorrect data and a biased selection of climate records.

(Hat tip: Adam Ierymenko, via HBL)

One of those vocal scientist is S. Fred Singer, whose group, The Science & Environmental Policy Project, is known for debunking the "science" of environmentalism. In a recent press release, Singer commented on global warming and the Climate Stewardship Act:

"The UN-IPCC science panel, which is most often cited by supporters of this proposal, based its conclusions on three major claims. And although widely publicized, none of them pass muster. They have been or are being disproved by actual data."

But just to cover their bases, environmentalist scaremongers have a new doomsday scenario: Global warming could trigger a new ice age.

"The war in Iraq has done nothing to quell terrorism," Brook said. "We must grind [terrorists] to dust until victory is achieved." Since 9/11, Brook has been advocating a more aggressive American response to terrorism

...he explained that the U.S. has not eradicated terrorism because it has not been sufficiently brutal. He asserted that the U.S. response must target not individual terrorists, but rather, must fight against militant Islam and the states that sponsor it. "Our enemy is not terrorism," Brook said. "Our enemy is militant Islam. To stop them, we must kill or capture their leaders -- military and spiritual. The states that support militant Islam must be the first targets."

...He also indicated that he would not preclude the use of nuclear weapons in the United States' current war. "War is about destroying the enemy," Brook said. "I'm willing to do whatever it takes to win, and I would not rule out nuclear weapons."

..."The talk was excellent," Drexel student Andrew Sternberg said. "He made me see things much more clearly and helped me realize that there's an alternative to the liberal anti-war ideas." [Daily Pennsylvanian, "Speaker: U.S. Not aggressive enough", November 07, 2003]

Recommended Reading: End States That Sponsor Terrorism