Churchill "Artwork" Exposed

The above link shows Churchill's piece superimposed over a reversed Thomas Mail piece. Churchill's is quite obviously a mirror image. I suppose he could beat the copyright infringment rap if he argues that adding a blue sky and doing a mirror image makes it a unique piece.

The only reason that this artwork forgery is even in the news is that it adds to the overall impression that Ward Churchill is a fraud. Fradulent heritage, fradulent academic pedigree, fradulent in every way you can think of.

As far as railing against the technocracy, he claims that he works for the students of CU, not the governor, board of regents or anyone else. Technically he's right. However, these students are not studying to be janitors. The very ones who support Churchill hope to become part of the technocracy he despises.

Few Words

I have a friend who is a staunch Democrat. He tells me that he reads GW's speeches because he wants to give him the benefit of really hearing the content without being distracted by Bush's terrible delivery.

I'm not nearly as critical of Bush's speechmaking but admittedly Bush is not the best speechgiver. My friend is also critical of Fox sports. When he came over to watch the Superbowl he made more comments on how poor the telecast was than he did on the game itself. Certainly from a conservative perspective I'd say he can't see the forest through the trees.

I'll grant a few criticisms but eventually you have to say that making speeches is not the only job of a president and watching the Superbowl through Fox Sports doesn't change the game itself.

Bush may not be eloquent all the time (he's certainly had great moments) but he is a man of action. Unlike Reagan or Clinton who seemed always ready for a camera and news crew, Bush seems almost annoyed with reporters much of the time. But I don't frankly care.

In my estimation actions speak louder than words. "Now watch this drive."

She's Smart

I haven't read much by Ann Coulter. Just read her take on Jeff Gannon's White House press pass. Very interesting. Telling that the libs greatest objection to him is that he may be gay.

Allies Resisting as U.S. Pushes Terror Label for Hezbollah

This makes sense to me. Since Lebanon is in such disarray after the assasination, probably aided by Hezbollah, at least not resisted by them, we ought not push them. This is like not giving the bully on the playground detention because he just beat up a kid and you don't want to make him mad right now. So, if Hezbollah settles down and "joins the mainstream political process" then we act to designate them as terrorists? I don't get it.

Bubba Can Paint 

Ed Shultz Doesn't Get It Either

Apparently the talk show circuit isn't as bad as the liberals made it sound some 10 years ago. Now they want to join the party too. It's a little late but I say, go for it, the more the merrier. It used to be that if you wanted to save face around a liberal elite you had to deny listening to the AM dial. Now they seem to be doing everything they can to move into that territory. They even want it to sound like they are the supreme underdogs who just woke up from a 20 year nap to find that someone invented something called "talk radio".

I don't believe they ignored talk radio out of ignorance. I believe they ignored it out of disdain. They couldn't believe that people actually listened or took it seriously. And of course they held all the other major media outlets, CNN, ABC, NBC, CBS, AP, Reuters, NY Times... All the newsmakers were in their palms. It wasn't until the truth actually started to matter, and overtake the ability of any major media outlet to squelch it that they realized they needed to engage the people of the country.

They may blame talk radio, conservatives may bless it. Frankly I think things could have gone on much longer if not for the internet and the blogosphere. That impact on MSM is earthshattering.

So here's the quote from Ed Shulz, relative newcomer to the talk radio scene, from a liberal perspective and new to my area, although I don't think his broadcast will reach me from the People's Republic of Boulder. He'll probably experience a modicum of success being broadcast from there.

"I come in with a list of things that are timely and topical. What do people want to talk about? I get a plethora of information from e-mails. Hell, we're in the news business; we'll take information from anybody." (emphasis added)

And that's the crux of the difference. He thinks he's still in the realm of news, not opinion, and he will take information from anybody. On several levels he's just out of it. He's not in news, he's about spreading his opinion. The cons in radio understand that and are open and honest about it. The libs never seem to realize that their opinions are NOT the news. And second, taking information from anybody is not responsible journalism. A journalist attempts to have emotional and values distance from that which they report, investigate, question, don't trust until confirmed. But they just don't get it.

Outrageous Churchill

Ok, this is pretty close to home for us here in Colorado. Seems we can't get away from this guy if the news is on for any legth of time. I'm getting less and less impressed with this guy over time. Today in the Denver Post there are records brought out by CU investigations (pretty simple investigations it seems to me, these things were in his university file). Several hostile contacts are documented, here's one:

"Carol Standing Elk was leaving the Press Club when Marie Annette Jaimes brutally attacked and injured her," Deborah J. Cruze wrote in a letter to Middleton in Churchill's file. "Then, as Ms. Standing Elk was trying to recover from the attack, she was spit on by Ward Churchill."

Sounds like he and his wife are two peas in a pod. Unfortunately I think many people are reading his 9-11 diatribe and taking it as a serious point of view. I heard a man on the ski lift a couple weeks ago tell me that I ought to read it (I hadn't at that point) because it was "interesting". He didn't necessarily say he agreed with it, but aparently felt it was worth interacting with on an intellectual basis. After hearing Churchill speak in Boulder, reading the news reports lately and especially this account, I don't think I can take this guy seriously, other than hearing him as a ranting, angry man. But it gets even worse, check out this quote from his attourney when the above confrontation was mentioned:

"Maybe she needed to be physically attacked," he said. "Maybe his wife acted in self-defense. Maybe she needed to be spit on."

Great.

Does anyone care about the NHL?

So, I can see the argument for why sports players ought to make more than the national average in salary. Their careers are less than half that of an ordinary American. It's an elite club that takes great talent and they ought to be compensated for the entertainment value they bring to the country. Arguably they provide incentive for us all to work a little harder to afford those season tickets and sports paraphernalia which contributes to the GNP.

But let's be honest, is anyone going to cry for the NHL players this season? Much as they may need help, especially the ones on the lower tiers of the payroll, I can't imagine any campaign being started to raise funds for needy NHL stars. And when we consider the possibilities of next year, I wonder if the NHL can ever really come back from this. They seem to talk like a next year is expected but on what basis? Everyone I talk to seems to blame the players, they are fed up with million dollar crybabies. And the NHL was already number 4 in terms of sports in the USA. I think the true fans have already turned to college hockey.

And my spellchecker for this blog didn't even know NHL. Prognosis: they just turned off life support.

Take 'em down

So the bloggers strike again. I guess Eason Jordan and Dan Rather can start a club now. The unfortunate thing in both their resignings or retirings or whatever they want to call it is not that they are gone, but that MSM still refuses to admit the reason they are gone. In fact CBS seems completely content to leave Rather in there so he can save face by "retiring", which he supposedly was going to do anyway. These guys are out because they said things and told stories that were proved false, not that they were mistaken but that they went out of their way to actually create false stories.

Rather sticks to his "the documents may be phoney but the story is still true". It reminds me of Anita Hill, "the seriousness of the accusations is all that's important", remember that one?

I Thought It Was Al Gore

The real creators of the internet finally got their due.

"the Association for Computing Machinery plans to announce Wednesday that
Vinton G. Cerf and Robert E. Kahn will receive the 2004 A. M. Turing Award,
widely considered to be the computing field's equivalent of the Nobel
Prize."

Ward Churchill

So I've been busy lately. I haven't had time to actually read this guys essay. Now that I have I'll say two things. First, he presumes a lot. He presumes to know the thinking of the 9-11 terrorists. He presumes to know the reasoning behind their tactics and their abilities. He says that they have far greater abilities and means than they used and presumes that they actually used restraint. He presumes that they have thought as rationally about their actions as he has. He presumes that there were no religious tones in their actions. I could go on, but that's it for now. Second, he's right about one thing - nobody is innocent.

Terrorist Tears 

Nothing Wrong?

"Ms. Stewart was convicted on two counts of conspiring to provide material aid to terrorists, by making the views and instructions of Mr. Abdel Rahman available to his followers in the Islamic Group, an organization in Egypt with a history of terrorist violence. She was also convicted of three counts of perjury and defrauding the government for flouting federal prison rules that barred Mr. Abdel Rahman, a blind Islamic cleric, from communicating with anyone outside his federal prison in Minnesota except his lawyers and his wife. "

And yet she claims she did nothing wrong. I'm not a lawyer so I don't know how exactly the attorney-client privilege works but somehow I think smuggling instructions to terrorists and lying to the US government doesn't fit in there.

Who Does Hamas Represent?

"There was an immediate reminder of the fragility of those declarations when spokesmen for the radical Palestinian group Hamas said the truce was not binding on them."

Of course this truce is not binding on a radical group of extremists. They merely have "spokesmen", no actual leader with whom to make a truce. Abbas has his work cut out for himself. At least he seems willing to make the attempt, Arafat only encouraged the militants.

Tolerance is a means to an end

I just read about the tolerance of Dutch society. Powerline blog has mentioned the impact that Muslim extremists are having there.

I think the reason for this is that tolerance has become an end in itself. People uphold it as a banner as though waving it ought to inspire admiration and honor in our hearts. But tolerance is not an end in itself, it is a means to an end. It should be upheld as a tool, one among many, for the free exchange of ideas.

Waving the flag of tolerance is as meaningless as passing out hammers to curb homelessness. It becomes a weapon rather than a tool. Tolerance without the ability to interact and discern that some ideas are more valuable than others becomes a weapon co-opted by the terrorists.


Tolerance has been misunderstood to mean "uncritical". People have become defenseless in the face of illegitimate truth claims. One truth has as much right to be heard and "tolerated" as another. Rather than do the hard work of examining, criticizing, and learning about the truth claims of each other, we are told to simply "tolerate" one another. But in the face of murderous truth claims, tolerance is inadequate.

Incompetence

Death threats? If you say so.

Frankly I have a hard time imagining anyone bothering to even make such a threat. People are calling Ward Churchill's comments outrageous, inflammatory, offensive and repugnant. Why get so emotional over them? He's ignorant. This is a cause for removal of tenure due to incompetence.

Let's not remove Churchill because his statements bother us, let's not call for his ouster because his thoughts are "repugnant". While those things may be true, they are not a reason for him to resign as chairman of the Ethnic Studies department.

The real reason for him to be removed is because, while ideas ought to be allowed equally, not all ideas are equal. If a professor wanted to argue that the moon is made of green cheese, he ought to be allowed to argue that, but he should also be removed for incompetence.

We continue to set precident for intolerance when we attack with emotion rather than reason.

Reaping the Whirlwind

Let's all think about this for a minute. What are kids taught in school?

I know the rhetoric is that school is the place to teach tolerance. But what that translates into in actual fact is not real tolerance at all. If someone has an unpopular view, that view is suppressed because it is seen as intolerant. Instead of real tolerance, students are taught to conform.

In a culture of conformity of ideas freedom of the press is dangerous. Freedom of expression is seen as intolerance. Freedom of religion becomes freedom from religion. Assembly is only a positive thing if it expresses the views of the majority.

Students today are not taught to interact with opposing views in a spirit of tolerance. In fact the call for tolerance creates intolerance because it is based on this inability to truly interact.

Is it any wonder that students don't feel the first amendment is very important?

Dems Can't Handle Good News

It's almost like they just don't know what to do with it. A few months ago the Democrat wisdom was that we needed to send more troops to Iraq. We didn't have enough there and those on the ground were getting tired and wanted to come home. Of course none of that was evident from the ACTUAL troops but that's what the Dems seemed to be saying. Every time the bloodthirsty hate-mongers (insurgents) would attack some liberal would say it was due to their hatred of the occupation forces, someone else would say it was due to the lack of troops and others would say it was the incompetency of the leadership. Now that there's good news, they don't seem to know what to do with that either.

Ted Kennedy calls for the immediate withdrawl of 12,000 troops. Why that number? Why not more? Why not all?

Pelosi and Reid are both calling for a "real and understandable plan" and an "exit strategy". I think the real and understandable plan is what we are currently doing, training Iraqi people to defend their newly won freedom while we continue to protect them as best we can. The "exit strategy" is to leave when the job is done.

Even Allawi, the interim president of Iraq, said it would be utter nonesense to ask foreign troops to leave.

The Sunnis concur - "There were some mistakes" in the occupation "but to be fair ... I think all in all it was positive, the contribution of the foreign forces in Iraq," al-Yawer said. "It was worth it."

The irrelevance of many Democrats is increasing. Their cries for pulling out of Iraq prematurely are increasingly falling on deaf ears. The job is getting done, no thanks to them. The more they talk the more they make it clear that they don't even understand the job, much less how to get it done.

Iraqi women give the finger.