Raphael Israeli has a glowing review of Andrew Bostom's new book, The Legacy of Islamic Antisemitism (also reviewed by Bill Warner here) in the Jerusalem Post:

Following the recent publication of his massive compendium The Legacy of Jihad - a breakthrough inasmuch as the enormous task of assembling together all the major sources which govern the holy war in Islam had never been attempted before - this amazingly prolific writer has completed another, no less imposing, collection of sources, Islamic and others, which testify to the long and sorry history of anti-Semitism in Islam. This too had never been undertaken before on such a scale, mainly due to the constrictions of political correctness that posited that Islam, unlike Christianity, had not entertained a systematic persecution of the Jews.

This apologetic for Islam has now been shattered by Andrew Bostom, who painstakingly but thoughtfully collected and collated this documentation that would have been a stunning and innovative undertaking for any scholar of Islam to pursue, let alone for a professional in medicine whose research on Islam has been merely a secondary career.

Appropriately, Bostom begins his volume with a well-tailored survey of the theological, historical and juridical origins of Islamic anti-Semitism, including the Koran, the Hadith and the Sirah, then proceeds to an insightful description of the dhimmis in the main lands of Islam, to test the theory of the cited sources against the practice of Muslim rulers in the entire area spanning the Middle East, North Africa, the Iberian Peninsula (Andalusia) and the Ottoman Empire.

The picture these documents give reverses in a dramatic way many of the ill-conceived and misjudged information that had attempted in the past to ascribe to the lands of Islam a much more benign and idyllic image of their (mis)treatment of the Jews. The coalition between the Palestinian mufti of Jerusalem and the Nazis during World War II is conjured up to conclude this introduction.

Secondly, the author delves in considerable detail into the main sources of Islamic jurisprudence - the Koran and the Hadith, complemented by the Sirah (the earliest pious Muslim biographies of Muhammad), where an abundance of references, usually not complimentary but rather derogatory, are made to Jews, collectively known as Israi'liyyat (Israelites' stories). This is a trove of anti-Jewish stereotypes that have become the Shari'a-based uncontested "truth" about the People of the Book. Those accounts are invariably cited in sermons during Friday prayers, thus assuring their universal diffusion among Muslim constituents and the constant poisoning of the souls of young and adult Muslims alike, something that renders their fundamentally negative attitudes to Jews and Israel unchangeable.

This extremely important collection from the holy sources is supplemented by the thinking and judgment of the most authoritative jurists whose every word has been awaited and avidly digested by Muslim constituencies the world over. The great medieval masters, such as Tabari and Jahiz, are reinforced by more recent ones such as the Egyptian Tantawi and Egyptian-in exile Qaradawi, who represent the two poles of established Islam and popular Islam in our contemporary world...

One can hardly exaggerate the vast importance of this volume, which will henceforth become indispensable for any student of Islam, of Judeo-Islamic relations, of anti-Semitism in particular and of hate-literature in general. The variety of materials assembled here, which makes a fascinating, if disagreeable, reading, for all the splendid and insightful overview offered by this incredibly energetic and imaginative author, will continue for times to come to constitute a mainstay of Muslim sources which will have to be referred to by future researchers, scholars and the general educated public which aspires to comprehend the significance of the new outburst of anti-Semitism, clearly articulated by Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, among Muslims worldwide.

This comes from Islam in Europe (hat tip: Brussels Journal)

Oslo police recently released its 2007 Rape Report. The report shows a marked increase in Somali rapists, generally on account of gang rapes...

At least ten women were attacked and molested by a gang of Somali men at Sofienberg park in Oslo on Saturday evening.

Last year a record-high 161 rapes and 35 rape attempts were reported in Oslo. Over 70% of the rapists were non-Norwegian [ed. ethnically, a majority had Norwegian citizenship].

Lawyer Abid Raja visited a cafe in Grønland in Oslo for Norwegian broadcaster P4. There he met three young men (ages 26, 30 and 35), from Somalia and Senegal.

The men, who refused to have their names published, spoke with P4 about the rape and robbery wave hitting the city.

A: Honestly? Norwegians are horrible!

Q: What are you thinking about?

A: I'm thinking of everything. Not least the food is bad. (He then speaks of the fact that Muslims don't eat pork).

Q: What do you think of Norwegian women then?

A: They're something completely different, he says as his friends laugh.

---

A: But listen now, Norwegian girls complain that foreign boys do this and that, but the reason there are so many rapes is that Norwegian girls go around almost completely naked! That's like saying "come here and fuck me", you understand?

Q: You're saying that Norwegian girls are asking to be raped?

A: Not exactly asking, but when then go out almost completely naked and get completelydrunk in Frogner park or go to a party together with some friend, and then they complain about being raped? It's their fault, says the 26 year old from Somalia.

Q: But even if they go around lightly dressed and get drunk then they're certainly not asking to be raped?

A: No, but many of the foreigners aren't used to this where they come from. They're not accustomed that girls go dressed as they want, then maybe they interpret this a bit wrong, you understand?...

Q: You don't think many will be scared that you have such attitudes if P4 broadcasts this interview on the radio?

A: Just broadcast it, because this is true. That's the way things are - it's the facts. I'm not lying. I've never been with a Norwegian lady, but I've been with many Norwegian girls - they are fairly nice and very skilled in bed.

Baltimore Sun: Dr. Louis J. Cantori, a Middle Eastern scholar, author and former professor of political science who taught at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County for more than three decades, died of heart failure Monday at his Hunting Ridge home. He was 73.

Dr. Cantori was born and raised in Haverhill, Mass., and served in the Marine Corps from 1951 to 1955, where he attained the rank of sergeant. He earned a bachelor's degree in international relations from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst in 1961.

He was a graduate of the University of Chicago, where he earned a master's degree in political science in 1962 and his doctorate in political science in 1966. He continued his education at Al-Azhar University in Cairo, Egypt, where he studied Islamic philosophy.

According to the Global Muslim Brotherhood report, Dr. Cantori was a supporter of the U.S. Muslim Brotherhood:

Omitted from this information is Dr. Cantori’s extensive affiliations with the U.S. Brotherhood. Perhaps the most prominent of these affiliations was serving as a founding board member of the Center for the Study of Islam and Democracy (CSID. Dr. Cantori was also a faculty member of the Cordoba University, headed by Taha Jabir Al-Alwani who has played a major role in multiple U.S. Brotherhood organizations such as CSID, the Graduate School of Islamic Social Sciences, the International Institute of Islamic Thought, and the Fiqh Council of North America. Both Dr. Cantori and Dr. Al-Alwani were also member of the Steering Committee of the Circle of Tradition and Progress (COTP) described as a:

…unique international association was established in 1997 consisting of distinguished Christian and Muslim scholars of conservative or traditionalist inclination committed to a common investigation of the permanent things. The association, the Circle of Tradition and Progress, recently held its second international symposium in London. The objective of the research, conferences and publications which the Circle projects is to reintegrate Mediterranean and Arab Islam within that Western world of which it long constituted an important part.

Members of the COTP Steering Committee included:

Sheikh Youssef Qaradhawi (most important leader of the global Muslim Brotherhood)

Dr. John L. Esposito (Georgetown University academic and Muslim Brotherhood supporter)

Rachid Ghannoushi (Tunisian Islamist associated with Brotherhood networks)

Bashir Nafi (Palestinian Islamic Jihad)

Like Abdul Rahman who had to be judged insane and then spirited out of Afghanistan to avoid the death penalty for converting to Christianity, this student journalist is likewise facing death for "insulting Islam" in the new improved Afghanistan we are fighting to preserve and he will probably endure the same sort of treatment. It would be too embarrassing, there would be too much publicity, if we let the Islamic wheels of justice (a system we helped to instate) roll forward in full view of the world. He will undoubtedly be coming to live with the infidels.

AP: PUL-E CHARKHI, Afghanistan - The prison uniform Sayed Parwez Kambakhsh wears is emblazoned with crudely painted black scales of justice, but the young journalist insists on the eve of his appeal that he has yet to see justice done.

A court found Kambakhsh, 24, guilty on Jan. 22 of distributing an article that questioned the Muslim practice of polygamy. It handed him the maximum sentence on the charge of insulting Islam _ death. ...

The judges found him guilty of handing out a report he printed off the Internet to fellow journalism students. The article asked why under Islam men can have four wives but women cannot have multiple husbands.

Kambakhsh said the article accused Islam of violating women's rights, but he was hesitant to discuss details. He insisted he had no knowledge of it until government officials accused him.

The verdict sparked an international outcry, with a number of organizations demanding that the case be annulled and Kambakhsh set free.

A U.S. State Department spokesman expressed concern that Kambakhsh was sentenced to death for "basically practicing his profession."

Abdul Malik Kamawi, a spokesman for the Supreme Court, said Kambakhsh's case will go before an appeals court in the capital on Sunday.

Bob Dietz, Asia program coordinator for the New York-based rights group Committee to Protect Journalists, welcomed the transfer of the case to Kabul and the defendant's access to legal counsel.

He said CPJ was concerned that Kambakhsh may have been targeted because his brother, Yaqub Ibrahimi, had written about human rights violations and local politics for the Institute for War and Peace Reporting, an organization that trains Afghan journalists.

He hopes Kambakhsh will be acquitted in Sunday's appeal, but added "we fear for his safety in Afghanistan if he is given his freedom." ...

The battle is just beginning in California over same-sex marriage. Helpfully, Mary suggested a compromise based on British law, but I don't think the L.G.B.T. activist groups are willing to compromise on an issue framed as a matter of unfair discrimination quite yet. Personally, I think a compromise is valid, but one is not in the offing, especially not on a national level in the United States.

We should remember, however, a lawyer can easily set up anything homosexual couples desire as far as deposition of property, powers of attorney, living wills and so forth. A legal civil union would simply make a one-size-fits-all legal situation that may or may not be appropriate for everyone. Marriage, on the other hand, is a societal tradition designed to foster child-bearing and child-rearing. It is the primary institution which passes on cultural values from one generation to the next. When the family falls apart as it has, society as a whole also disintegrates. My opinion is that legalizing homosexual marriage would speed the process, at a time when we desperately need to slow it. Here the latest report from New Duranty:

“It’s going to be the largest, most expensive and most hard fought L.G.B.T. ballot measure in the history of the country,” said Geoff Kors, executive director of Equality California, which works on behalf of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgendered people. Both sides say they expect to spend $10 million to $20 million on the campaign, which will officially begin when the secretary of state puts the amendment on the ballot, pending spot inspections of more than a million signatures turned in by groups opposing same-sex marriage.

The amendment would insert 14 words into the California Constitution — “Only marriage between a man and a woman is valid and recognized in California” — a phrase tested with focus groups months before the court’s decision.

Advocates for same-sex marriage have also been planning for this fight well before Thursday, forming campaign committees as early as 2003, when an initial effort to change the Constitution began, but failed.

“We didn’t even have to ask what the next step is,” said Kate Kendell, the executive director of the National Center for Lesbian Rights. “We are in full campaign mode. We need money. We need volunteers. We need to begin mobilizing to protect this incredible decision.”

The latest effort to ban same-sex marriage began in earnest in January, when petitioners fanned out across the state with the help of a variety of national groups, including Concerned Women for America and the Family Research Council, both based in Washington. All told, a coalition of groups called Protect Marriage had spent some $1.8 million on the campaign through the end of March, according to state election documents, though much phone and foot work was done by volunteers from churches and other groups...

Thursday’s ruling, which becomes effective after 30 days, would make California the second state to allow same-sex marriages, after Massachusetts.

Constitutional amendments like the one proposed here are preferred by some opponents to same-sex marriage because they are less likely to be overturned by the courts, said David Masci, a senior research fellow at the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life. And they have been remarkably popular. Voters have approved a ban in 27 of the 28 states that have taken up the issue, Mr. Masci said. Arizona defeated an initiative in 2006.

“There is a concern especially among conservatives that so-called activist judges will see a constitutional right to same-sex marriage,” Mr. Masci said. “Constitutional amendments are seen as a way of stopping that from happening.”

Groups opposed to same-sex marriage say they see several advantages in California, including the somewhat low bar, a simple majority, for changing the Constitution. They also say banning same-sex marriage is an issue that will play well with the state’s large Hispanic population, which tends to hold somewhat more conservative social views.

The state’s electorate seems divided. A 2007 poll by the Public Policy Institute of California found 49 percent of residents opposed to same-sex marriage, and 45 percent in favor.

Gavin Newsom, the mayor of San Francisco, who added to the national debate about same-sex marriage in 2004 when he ordered the county clerk to issue marriage licenses to gay couples, said it would be important to the fall campaign to perform marriages as soon as possible.

Mr. Staver, of Liberty Counsel, said he would ask for a stay of the court’s ruling until voters could decide, but Mr. Newsom is not interested in waiting.

“As we move forward and literally tens of thousands of couples are married, the question to the voters changes,” Mr. Newsom said. “It’s no longer denying something to people that they never had. It’s taking something away that they’ve already enjoyed. And that’s a much more difficult thing to do.”

Some couples are planning to combine their weddings with efforts to make sure their legal unions are not short-lived. Cary Davidson, a lawyer who lives in Los Angeles and is a member of the Equality California board, said he and his partner, Andrew Ogilvie, planned to marry before the November election.

But he said they would ask guests to contribute to the campaign to defeat the ballot measure instead of buying gifts.

“The only thing that matters to us at the moment is to make sure that the rights that we just gained are maintained,” said Mr. Davidson, 53, who has been with Mr. Ogilvie for 18 years. “And that’s the best way to do it.”

There is an interesting contention at work here that says society has no right to discriminate (the word itself is now pejorative) between any human beings for any reason. Which is a horrifying idea if you think about it; that we should all be lumped together in one mass and the hierarchical structure which is the skeleton of society should be removed. Shakespeare put it another way, untune that string and what discord follows. More disturbing still, is that if this decision stands, it is likely a polygamy challenge will follow.

New Duranty: The California Supreme Court, striking down two state laws that had limited marriages to unions between a man and a woman, ruled on Thursday that same-sex couples have a constitutional right to marry.

The 4-to-3 decision, drawing on a ruling 60 years ago that struck down a state ban on interracial marriage, would make California the second state, after Massachusetts, to allow same-sex marriages.

The decision, which becomes effective in 30 days unless the court grants a stay, was greeted with celebrations at San Francisco City Hall, where thousands of same-sex marriages were thrown out by the courts four years ago.

It was denounced by religious and conservative groups that promised to support an initiative proposed for the November ballot that would amend the California Constitution to ban same-sex marriages and overturn the decision...

“In view of the substance and significance of the fundamental constitutional right to form a family relationship,” Chief Justice George wrote, “the California Constitution properly must be interpreted to guarantee this basic civil right to all Californians, whether gay or heterosexual, and to same-sex couples as well as to opposite-sex couples.”...

“The court was wrong from top to bottom on this one,” said Maggie Gallagher, president of the National Organization for Marriage. “The court brushed aside the entire history and meaning of marriage in our tradition.” ...

Here is Maggie Gallagher's article on the subject.

Oftentimes when reading government reports like the one which arrived in my mailbox this morning, I am reminded of Basil Fawlty and his insistence that he spoke true, "classical" Spanish, not that "strange dialect" spoken by Manuel, the Spanish waiter. Illustrative YouTube here. The following is from the U.S. Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs.

The first hearing on the homegrown threat considered the potential for radicalization in U.S. prisons, including an examination of the activities of Kevin Lamar James, an American citizen. While in prison, James adopted a variant of violent Islamist ideology [read: became a Muslim], founded an organization known as the Assembly for Authentic Islam (or JIS, the Arabic initials for the group), and began converting fellow prisoners to his cause. Upon release, James recruited members of JIS to commit at least 11 armed robberies, the proceeds from which were to be used to finance attacks against military installations and other targets in southern California. James and another member of the group eventually pled guilty to conspiring to wage war against the United States.

The James case is only one example of how the violent Islamist terrorist [read: Muslim] threat has evolved and expanded since the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. Al-Qaeda planned the 9/11 attacks and recruited the hijackers abroad before sending them to the United States to make final preparations for the operation. The 9/11 hijackers were indoctrinated into the violent Islamist [read: Islamic] mindset long before they set foot in the United States. As the James case and others illustrate, however, radicalization is no longer confined to training camps in Afghanistan or other locations far from our shores; it is also occurring right here in the United States.

During the 110th Congress, under the leadership of Chairman Joseph Lieberman (ID-CT), the Committee continued its investigation into the threat of domestic radicalization and homegrown terrorism inspired by violent Islamist ideology [read: Islam].

etc., etc., etc.

Lebanon is being torn apart by the Sunni-Shi'a conflict that began with the succession battle following the death of Muhammad in the 7th Century. The viciousness of the conflict is put down to its being a civil war by this reporter, but this kind of viciousness is typical of Muslim conflicts across time and space. From the BBC:

...The wave of the displaced [Shi'a] washed into the Druze mountains [after the Israeli assault on Hezbollah two years ago], into non-Shia parts of Beirut, and other areas which the Israelis were not hitting. Many people from other communities dropped everything to help.

Haitham Dabbara, a 35-year-old lawyer, mobilised his friends to raise funds and buy supplies, bedding and medicines. He took them to the schools and other public buildings where the Shia refugees were sheltering.

Haitham himself was a Sunni but that did not matter to him. He was an idealist who wanted to help the innocent victims of war.

You have probably noticed by now that I am speaking about Haitham in the past tense.

Last Thursday, just minutes after the Hezbollah chief, Hassan Nasrallah, had finished delivering a fiery television address, his militant Shia fighters unleashed a devastating offensive in the Sunni areas of west Beirut.

One of the worst-hit areas was Ras al-Nabaa, where Haitham's family home was. Haitham and his parents decided to escape to the mountains for safety.

As they crossed a main road controlled by Hezbollah and its allies, a rocket-propelled grenade was fired at his car. It ripped off the back of his head, and that of his mother, Amal. They died instantly.

The bodies were taken to hospital. Haitham's younger brothers, Ra'id and Ayman, were somewhere else at the time. They were told their mother and brother had been hurt, so they tried to get to the hospital.

As they crossed the main road, fighters from a militia allied to Hezbollah checked their ID cards and waved them through. They then opened fire and shot them in the back.

Ra'id was hit in the spine. He may be paralysed for life. Ayman was hit in the stomach. He should recover. They are both in hospital.

There is something about civil war that brings out a viciousness rarely found in conventional combat. And it was not all one-sided.

The Druze leader, Walid Jumblatt, admitted his followers had mutilated the bodies of two captured Hezbollah fighters.

And Hezbollah TV showed some bloodcurdling footage, taken on a mobile phone, of Saad Hariri's Sunni followers lynching about a dozen members of a Syrian-backed group allied to Hezbollah in the north of the country.

Not open-ended, not everywhere at the same time, but the flames of political and sectarian strife erupted in one place after another.

As tensions spread, Shias were pitted against Sunnis, Sunnis against Alawites, Druze against Shias, and so on, stirring ancient passions and vendettas, and creating new ones which will be hard to stifle.

The army commander, General Michel Suleiman, who everyone agrees should be the country's next president, circulated a message to his officers, some of whom wanted to resign.

What's happened, he said, is a real civil war that no national army in the world could confront without disintegrating. His army was under massive strain.

He only managed to hold the army together by the huge compromise of having it stand by and watch, as Hezbollah and an unruly collection of allied militias stormed the streets of west Beirut. Hezbollah, he knows, is far stronger than the army or any other faction in the land.

Had he confronted it, not only would he have lost but the army would probably have broken up on sectarian lines, as it did during the civil war of the 70s and 80s...

No mincing words here. The popularity of Hamas must have something to do with their honesty and this honesty must reflect the true feeling of the populace. From the Jerusalem Post:

Hamas leader Mahmoud Zahar said Wednesday that a Palestinian state will be established on all of the land of Palestine and not only on parts of it, and that it will include "Jaffa, Lod and Haifa."

Zahar also reiterated Hamas' unwillingness to recognize the State of Israel and said that the group "will continue to persecute the Zionists wherever they are, after we prove that the Zionist army can be defeated - contrary to what was believed in the past, that it is impossible to beat the Zionists."

Speaking in the Gaza Strip, he went on to affirm Palestinian right of return, claiming that the "right of return of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians is closer than ever."

"After we defeat the Zionists we will persecute them… we will persecute them to eternity, and the sun of the freedom and independence of the Palestinians will burn all of the Zionists," he continued...

Osama bin Laden, whatever else may be said about him, speaks honestly and forthrightly about the imperatives of Islam. Here is his latest message brought to us by MEMRI:

On May 16, 2008, the Islamist website Al-Ikhlas posted an audio message by Osama bin Laden titled "The Reasons for the Conflict: Commemorating 60 Years Since the Emergence of the Occupying Israeli State."
  
In the message, bin Laden accuses the West of consistently taking Israel's side in the conflict. He also blames the West, and more particularly the U.S., for what he calls its double standard, which he says is manifested in the fact that it commits crimes against Muslims around the world but at the same time speaks about moral values. 
  
Bin Laden further states that the celebration of Israel's 60th anniversary indicates that "Israel did not exist 60 years ago, and only came into existence on the stolen Palestinian land, by military force... This is clear proof of the truth of our claim that Palestine is our land and that Israelis... must be fought against."
  
Bin Laden accuses the Western media of "distorting the truth," by "presenting Israelis always as the victims... while depicting the Palestinians as terrorists..." and, more generally, for creating a distorted image of Muslims which allows Western countries to wage war against Muslims. He adds that Western leaders' participation in the celebration of Israel's 60th anniversary is strong proof that "the West assists the Jewish... occupation of our land, and that it has put itself in the Israeli [military] trench against us..."
  
Bin Laden concludes his message by promising that as long as one living Muslim remains in the world, "they will not relinquish even one inch of Palestinian land."

As if Muslim prayers weren't robotic enough already, this new robot rug will correct every deviation from form.

Islamonline: CAIRO — Using modern technology to serve Muslims better perform their religious rituals, a fourth-year PhD computer science student has designed a high-tech prayer rug equipped with sensors, lights and a Qur'an display screen.

"It will increase their understanding of the scriptures and the quality of the prayer," inventor Wael Aboulsaadat told the Toronto Star on Thursday, May 15.

Aboulsaadat, studying for his PhD at the University of Toronto's computer science department, has designed a prayer rug with built-in sensors that can detect the worshipper's posture.

If the user makes an error, such as missing or adding a step in the prayer sequence, the sensors will vibrate in alert...

It also features a compass – complete with a 3D model of the holy mosque in Makkah – so the worshipper can find Ka`bah direction wherever he/she may be...

The digital rug has lights that can be used in case the worshipper is in a dark place.

It is also equipped with a digital screen enabling the worshipper to follow the Quran verses recited during the prayer.

"You can customize and choose which [verses to read in the] prayers," says Aboulsaadat, 36...

Wow, you mean choosing a fixed verse to stick into a fixed verse? That seems like a dangerous amount of freedom to me.

He says the prayer eRug is just a prototype that can be further enhanced to fit all major religions.

Aboulsaadat hopes to work on the invention so that people of all faiths could use it in their religious activities.

He contends that a Catholic learning catechism, a Buddhist wanting deeper meditation, a Jew studying the Torah could benefit from a digital device that would remind, correct and allow for customization. 

Could a Torah rug contaminate a Muslim rug if they accidentally touched? Will there be adequate precautions?

Jack Cafferty:

The Tennessee Republican Party has set its sights on Michelle Obama – the wife of Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama.

A new web video highlights her controversial comment earlier this year, saying she was proud of America “for the first time in my adult life.” Obama later clarified the remark saying she meant she was proud of how Americans were engaging in the political process, and that she was always proud of her country.

Nonetheless, the GOP video replays her remark six times and mixes in commentary by people who live in Tennessee on why they’re proud of America. The party says it’s always been proud of this country, and it requested that state radio stations play patriotic music in honor of Michelle Obama’s visit there yesterday.

The Obama campaign calls the attack “shameful”. It says that the Republican Party’s “pathetic” attempts to use similar smear tactics have already failed in elections in Mississippi and Louisiana, and will fail again in November. The campaign calls on the Tennessee Republican Party to address Senator Obama directly next time, instead of going after his family.

That, unfortunately for Barack Obama, is not all. Matt Lewis writes at Townhall blog:

Rumor has it that there is video of Michelle Obama "railing against 'whitey' at Jeremiah Wright's church."

If this is true, it could be lethal.  It's one thing to distance yourself from your pastor, but quite another thing to distance yourself from your spouse.

Might Rev. Wright be the one leaking the video?

Be warned:  Again -- this might be just be a rumor.  Or it might be big -- if it's true.  Stay tuned ...

Update:  I talked to Larry Johnson, the blogger who has this story.  I don't personally know Johnson, but his bio seems pretty credible.  He was once considered a "darling of the Left," but has become somewhat of a "bad guy" since turning against Obama.

He speculates the goal is to hold onto the video till August. 

At a minimum this rumor is out there.

A rabbit was run over in the road in front of our house this morning and before long, four fat buzzards arrived and made short work of the remains. I thought about Robert Penn Warren's poem "Pondy Woods" and dug it out of the book pile. This is not his poem, for liberties have been taken. I have changed a few words and omitted some parts;  these buzzards are unfashionable birds.

The buzzards over Pondy Woods
Achieve the blue tense altitudes
Black figments that the woods release,
Obscenity in form and grace,
Drifting high through the pure sunshine
Till the sun in gold decline.

(...)

By the buzzard roost Big Jim Todd
Listened for hoofs on the corduroy road
Or for the foul and sucking sound
A man's foot makes on the marshy ground.
Past midnight, when the moccasin
Slipped from the log and, trailing in
Its obscured waters, broke
The dark algae, one lean bird spoke,

(...)

"[Big Jim] your breed ain't metaphysical."
The buzzard coughed, His words fell
In the darkness, mystic and ambrosial.
"But we maintain our ancient rite,
Eat the gods by day and prophesy by night.
We swing against the sky and wait;
You seize the hour, more passionate
Than strong, and strive with time to die --
With time, the beaked tribe's astute ally.

"The Jew-boy died. The Syrian vulture swung
Remotely above the cross whereon he hung
From dinner-time to supper-time, and all
The people gathered there watched him until
The lean brown chest no longer stirred,
Then idly watched the slow majestic bird
That in the last sun above the twilit hill
Gleamed for a moment at the height and slid
Down the hot wind and in the darkness hid.
[Big Jim], regard the circumstance of breath:
Non omnis moriar, the poet sayeth."

Pedantic, the bird clacked its gray beak,
With a Tennessee accent to the classic phrase;
Jim understood, and was about to speak,
But the buzzard drooped one wing and filmed the eyes.

At dawn unto the Sabbath wheat he came,
That gave to the dew its faithless yellow flame
From kindly loam in recollection of
The fires that in the brutal rock one strove.
To the ripe wheat he came at dawn.
Northward the printed smoke stood quiet above
The distant cabins of Squiggtown.
A train's far whistle blew and drifted away
Coldly; lucid and thin the morning lay
Along the farms, and here no sound
Touched the sweet earth miraculously stilled.
Then down the damp and sudden wood there belled
The musical white-throated hound.

In pondy Woods in the summer's drouth
Lurk fever and the cottonmouth.
And buzzards over Pondy Woods
Achieve the blue tense altitudes,
Drifting high in the pure sunshine
Till the sun in gold decline;
Then golden and hieratic through
The night their eyes burn two by two.

USAToday: WASHINGTON — Thefts and illegal exports of advanced military night-vision gear are rising sharply, and U.S. officials say some of the devices have reached enemies in Afghanistan and Iraq, where they could erode the edge U.S. troops have in after-dark combat.

The government has prosecuted more than two dozen businesses and individuals over the past 18 months for stealing night-vision gear or skirting prohibitions on foreign sales, according to a USA TODAY review of federal documents and public records.

Could these possibly be Muslims and Muslim-owned businesses?

In at least five cases, prosecutors linked shipments to terrorist groups, such as al-Qaeda and Hezbollah. A few others were headed to Iran and Taliban forces in Afghanistan, court records show; several were destined for China and Japan.

"It's extremely serious — you're talking about adversaries of the United States getting equipment that we make to give our soldiers an advantage in the field," says Charles Beardall, the Pentagon's deputy inspector general for investigations....

Pelak and Beardall say some night-vision gear has reached enemies in Iraq and Afghanistan but won't discuss how much. "Night-vision goggles of some generation have been found" on foes and in weapons caches, Beardall says, but details are "very sensitive." The implications are serious because U.S. troops often launch riskier missions after dark to exploit their night-vision advantage.

"If you look at cases where groups like the Taliban are trying to get this stuff, that's how they want to use it, for night operations to kill our troops," Pelak says.

Lower-grade night-vision devices are sold commercially, but military versions are far more sensitive and can include features that identify U.S. troops by infrared tabs on their uniforms. Sales and exports of that equipment are restricted by law.

Since 2001, the government has charged more than 40 individuals or businesses with theft or illegal exports of night-vision technology, based on a USA TODAY review of public records and reports from Justice, Commerce and the Pentagon. Besides the two dozen cases prosecuted since late 2006, the newspaper also identified at least eight more under investigation.

In one case, Syed Hashmi, a U.S. citizen, awaits trial on charges that he obtained night-vision goggles and other military devices for associates who moved the equipment to al-Qaeda affiliates for use against U.S. forces in Afghanistan.

In another case, Shahrazad Mir Gholikhan, an Iranian, was sentenced this month to 29 months in prison for her role in a plot to send 3,000 night-vision systems to Iran, which the United States accuses of supplying Iraqi insurgents.

A U.S. citizen and and Iranian - what could they possibly have in common? Whatever it is, USAToday isn't telling.

This Financial Times editorial is typical of people who blame Israel for being under seige by the Arabs when it is in fact Islam that makes this reality inevitable.

The Republican congressional candidate lost in a special election in Mississippi Tuesday leading to some soul searching among Republicans and raising fears about November. They are looking at ways to distance themselves from Bush mainly on the economy while ignoring immigration and Iraq - the twin millstones McCain willingly placed around his own neck. Here's New Duranty:

But Mr. McCain’s advisers said the Mississippi race underlined his intention to distance himself as much as possible from Congressional Republicans. Mr. McCain has already been openly critical of some of President Bush’s strategies.

The level of distress was evident in remarks by senior party officials throughout the day.

“This was a real wake-up call for us,” Robert M. Duncan, the chairman of the Republican National Committee, said in an interview. “We can’t let the Democrats take our issues. We can’t let them pretend to be conservatives and co-opt the middle and win these elections. We have to get the attention of our incumbents and candidates and make sure they understand this.”

Representative Tom Davis, Republican of Virginia and former leader of his party’s Congressional campaign committee, issued a dire warning that the Republican Party had been severely damaged, in no small part because of its identification with President Bush. Mr. Davis said that, unless Republican candidates changed course, they could lose 20 seats in the House and 6 in the Senate.

“They are canaries in the coal mine, warning of far greater losses in the fall, if steps are not taken to remedy the current climate,” Mr. Davis said in a memorandum. “The political atmosphere facing House Republicans this November is the worst since Watergate and is far more toxic than it was in 2006.”...

“The Republican brand is down, and it is going to be hard to get it back,” said Representative Devin Nunes, Republican of California....

Scott Reed, a former chief of staff to the Republican National Committee, said the defeat would dampen fund-raising. “Republican leadership needs to really take a good look in the mirror,” Mr. Reed said. “They’re taking the party off the cliff.”...

Obama is looking less like George McGovern and more like Jimmy Carter all the time.

Cinque Henderson explains why he is one of the 10% of black Democrats who are not Obama supporters in TNR:

...It's worth remembering that the majority of blacks still think O.J. Simpson is innocent. And, in times like these, when a black man is out front in the public eye, black people feel both proud and vulnerable and, as a result, scour the earth for evidence of racists plotting to bring him down, like an advance team ready to sound an alarm. Barack needed only a gesture, a quick sneer or nod in the direction of the Clintons' hidden racism to avail himself of the twisted love that rescued O.J. and others like him and to smooth his path to victory, and, therefore, to salvage his candidacy. After Donna Brazile and James Clyburn started to cry racism, Barack was repeatedly asked his thoughts. He declined to answer, allowing the charge to grow for days (in sharp contrast to how he leapt to Joe Biden's defense a month earlier). But, while he remained silent about the allegations of racism, he gave speeches across South Carolina that warned against being "hoodwinked" and "bamboozled" by the Clintons. His use of the phrase is resonant. It comes from a scene in Malcolm X, where Denzel Washington warns black people about the hidden evils of "the White Man" masquerading as a smiling politician: "Every election year, these politicians are sent up here to pacify us," he says. "You've been hoodwinked. Bamboozled."

By uttering this famous phrase, Obama told his black audience everything it needed to know. He was helping to convince blacks that the first two-term Democratic president in 50 years, a man referred to as the first black president, is in fact a secret racist. As soon as I heard that Obama had quoted from Malcolm X like this, I knew that Obama would win South Carolina by a massive margin.

I'm part of an Internet group of black people who yammer on about politics. You could extrapolate from polling data that I would be the lone Clinton supporter in the bunch. And, indeed, I am. A member of the group posted the following anecdote after Barack's now famous race speech:

Last week, I was sitting in a lobby chatting with the woman next to me. All of a sudden, she grabbed my hand as if she realized at that moment that I was black. She asked, do you go to church? I responded in the affirmative. Then she asked, do you go to a black church? I said yes. She said, I'm so glad that I met you. I have been really wanting to discuss this with someone. Is it true what they are saying about what goes on in the black church? I smiled and we had a lovely chat about pastors, Obama, civil rights and all things colored. She looked so relieved and really wanted to understand.

This story broke my heart. As the son of a Baptist minister, I can attest that Wright is and was an extreme aberration from how the overwhelming majority of black Christians worship. In church, black people hear about Peter, Paul, Mary, and how to get into heaven. How to forgive. How to love. Not how to vote.

But here was Barack suggesting that Wright's behavior was commonplace in black churches: "I can no more disown him than I can disown the black community." He generalized Wright's ridiculousness to distract from his individual choice to worship under a buffoon for two decades. I have a cousin who attended Wright's church for three weeks and then left, never to return. She had no interest in hearing his nonsense from the pulpit.

Barack obscured the true nature of black religious life because, to do otherwise, he would have had to answer the question, "Why are you a member of a church that is this racially divisive and such a sharp aberration to how the rest of black people worship?" When Barack beautifully suggested that the beliefs pronounced from the pulpit of Trinity in Chicago are not uncommon, he was feeding us garbage. But Barack needed to protect his reputation as a race-healer and unifier, so he told a lie about black religious life to help keep the glow of his own reputation alive. And now the evidence suggests that Barack didn't, in the end, break with Wright over his outrageous racial claims, but over his suggestion that Barack is just a politician.

That so many people have a stake in ignoring these real concerns is troubling. At least the Hillary supporters I know seem to be aware of her more unsavory traits: that she carries a knife with her that she could pull out at any minute. Not so with Obama's fans. It's nearly impossible to get them to admit any wrong in him. Given the choice, I prefer to side with the group that knows their candidate can be a jerk, rather than the group that believes their candidate is Jesus.

MSNBC has an interview with Senator McCain in which he reveals he is just as stupefied about Islam and just as blinded by wishful thinking as the most hopeful we-are-the-world liberal. The Republican Party, and his candidacy, are doomed if McCain doesn't get out from under his kagans, kristols, boots, and other advisers determined to cling to what Hugh Fitzgerald has called "Tarbaby Iraq." He needs to see that effort as a squandering, with goals that "are both wrong and unattainable." It is easy to see Obama running with this all the way to the White House: "McCain wants us to endure another 2-3 trillion dollars in expense, another 4,000 dead, another 50,000 wounded.  And for what? How does this make us safer?" The fact that Obama may be against the war for all the wrong reasons -- and certainly not in order "to exploit the fissures, and divide and demoralize the Camp of Islam"-- won't matter. What will matter is he wants us out, and McCain keeps mindlessly talking about "winning" a war without being able to explain the nature of that "winning."  

McCain, running in the November election to succeed Bush in 2009, described a scenario he thought he could achieve within his first four-year term.

By January 2013, America has welcomed home most of the servicemen and women who have sacrificed terribly so that America might be secure in her freedom," McCain said in prepared remarks he was to deliver in Columbus, Ohio.

"The Iraq war has been won. Iraq is a functioning democracy, although still suffering from the lingering effects of decades of tyranny and centuries of sectarian tension. Violence still occurs, but it is spasmodic and much reduced," McCain said.

The Republican senator said that although the United States would still have a troop presence in Iraq, those soldiers would not need a "direct combat role" because Iraqi forces would be capable of providing order.

McCain also predicted that al Qaida leader Osama bin Laden would be captured or killed within four years and the militant group's presence in Afghanistan would be reduced to remnants...

The administration won't be able to blame this sticky wicket on Ambassador Bremer who got out while the gettin' was good after the official transfer of sovereignty. The rest of the military should have been