Bollocks Du Jour

Palestinians say they don't want Kerry to fail

Jimmy Carter's Default Setting: When In Doubt, Blame the Jooos

When asked why he thought it was that Barack Obama never solicits his opinion/guidance, Jimmy Carter 'splains it's because he is seen to be a supporter of the Palestinian cause.

The author of Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid is so clueless/delusional that it doesn't occur to him that the reason his opinion is never sought is because he was such a crappy POTUS.

Spinoza Knows

Remember that "Moses Supposes" number from the movie Singing in the Rain? I've adapted it in keeping with this, from Steynonline:

Suppose a Spinoza
Arose to oppose a
Contingent of bros pushing orthodoxy?
Spinoza he knows a
Free speech show exposes a
Woeful, gross label--it's his "blasphemy."

 

Update: More raging rhyming, this time a parody of an American song classic:

 

Blasphemy,

Why not speak blasphemy?

Can't you see

There's no free speech without it?

Islamists

They hate how it's sounding:

"'Slamophobes" deserve a big pounding.

Climate dudes

Don't like your attitudes--

Dissin' sticks; replete with "denial."

And right on cue

Say the problem is you.

So stifle your blasphemy.

 

Innovation Stagnation

Does America still have what it takes?

The Passover Plagues Plot

An Egyptian newspaper columnist is demanding that Israel pay retroactive reparations to Egyptians for those Biblical plagues--all ten of 'em.

How To Effect a De Facto Palestine

Get the UN to do it by rubber stamping your manifold letters of solicitation:

2 April 2014 – The United Nations confirmed today that Palestinian Authority officials have presented letters for accession to 15 international conventions and treaties. 

UN spokesperson Farhan Haq told reporters that the documents had been presented to Robert Serry, the UN Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process. “Once we receive the letters at Headquarters, we will be reviewing them to consider the appropriate next steps,” Mr. Haq said.

He added that the Palestinian leadership, including President Mahmoud Abbas upon signing the accession letters on Monday night, has repeatedly emphasized that it wants to continue the negotiations with Israel that resumed in July 2013 under United States auspices.  

“We hope that a way can be found to see negotiations through until the scheduled end of the nine-month timeframe set to expire on 29 April. The goal remains to arrive at a substantive basis for negotiations towards a comprehensive peace agreement on all final status issues.” 

Mr. Haq went on to say that the UN is in contact with the sides to emphasize the need to manage current developments responsibly and act with restraint...

Best of luck with that, Mr. H.

The Guardian's Animus Toward Israel Seeps Into Movie Review of "Noah"

The reviewer slams Israel for its "land grabs" (because, as every bien pensant knows, the trouble with Israel is that it's too damn big).


Israel's "land grabs"--in context.

Oh, Well. They Say He Was a Terrific Community Organizer

Someone who fell hard for Obama admits that the hopeychanger isn't up to the demands of the job (and needs "a better" one--as if he didn't fail in the office; as if the office failed him):

I feel bad for President Barack Obama. Here is a decent, intelligent, articulate man who had all the qualities to be a brilliant candidate but somehow ended up in the wrong job. As I see him running out the clock on his second term, gamely trying to appear in control but clearly in over his head, I think back to the days when my then-8-year-old daughter fell in love with Candidate Obama. 

It was my daughter’s fascination with Obama that fed my own. We would sit together at night and watch his speeches, moved by his ability to inspire us.  

Because his delivery and persona were so mesmerizing, we couldn’t help but absorb his message. And what a grand message it was: Unity. Opportunity. Hope. Renewal. Optimism. A more perfect union. A more perfect world. 

At a time when America was feeling down on itself, Obama came along to boost our morale, to remind us that there’s nothing we can’t do — a message he himself embodied through his remarkable rise. 

But while fate dealt Obama a perfect storm of circumstances to help him shoot to the top, it also dealt him a perfect mess of crises that greeted him as soon as he walked into the Oval Office. 

The magnificent candidate inherited a trifecta of disasters: Two of the dumbest wars in U.S. history in Iraq and Afghanistan (my definition of a stupid war: squandering trillions of dollars and thousands of lives on a country that doesn’t say thank you), combined with an economic and fiscal crisis the likes of which we hadn’t seen in decades. 

On top of those disasters came a problem of his own making: He made us expect too much. This is the side effect of being a transcendent candidate. You make people dream. You get carried away with your promises. You don’t manage expectations. 

Eventually, crummy hand or not, Obama had to own up to his record. For a while, his eloquence and self-confidence made many of us overlook his failings. But as the problems and scandals piled up, as the “jobless recovery” became the new normal and as the Obamacare launch turned into an infamous mess, the Obama magic waned. 

His words were still strong and upbeat, but they could no longer cover up the failures...

That people like this writer invested so much into a man with such a thin resumé says a lot more about them--their hopes, and, I'm sorry to say, their delusions--than it does about a man who, realistically speaking, could never deliver on his "grand" (and grandiose) message.

Update: What could "a better job" possibly be? I know--he could become the Secretary General of the United Nations and, at the time of Putin on the move, Iran on the cusp of nuclear capability and an ongoing bloodbath in Syria, waggle his forefinger at us re our failure to lick global warming.

That sounds like a fun (and easy peasy) job, doesn't it?

Update: Now that Dave's retiring, how about Late Night With Barack Obama (instead of, not in addition to, being POTUS)?

Kooky Muslim Clerics Decare Chicks' Existence "Un-Islamic"

Fun guys:

Islamabad - Sharia Correspondent: The Council of Islamic Ideology (CII) concluded their 192nd meeting on Thursday with the ruling that women are un-Islamic and that their mere existence contradicted Sharia and the will of Allah. As the meeting concluded CII Chairman Maulana Muhammad Khan Shirani noted that women by existing defied the laws of nature, and to protect Islam and the Sharia women should be forced to stop existing as soon as possible. (bold added) The announcement comes a couple of days after CII’s 191st meeting where they dubbed laws related to minimum marriage age to be un-Islamic. 

After declaring women to be un-Islamic, Shirani explained that there were actually two kinds of women – haraam and makrooh. “We can divide all women in the world into two distinct categories: those who are haraam and those who are makrooh. Now the difference between haraam and makrooh is that the former is categorically forbidden while the latter is really really disliked,” Shirani said.

Good to know.

"If You Read Only One Book About the Middle East This Year, It Should Be Caroline Glick’s"

Spengler gives it a rave review here.

Happy 90th, Doris Day!

On the auspicious occasion, Mark Steyn pens a lovely tribute to the perennial all-American girl.

Personally, I've always loved her voice--my dad had several of her record albums that I played again and again when I was a kid--and think she's one of the most underrated and underappreciated of American singers.