From Sarbaz to Lashkar Gah, map

As the proverbial crow flies, Sarbaz to Lashkar Gah.

Flight line from Sarbaz to Lashkar Gah. Click for full size view.

Dr. Daisy BLU-82, where are you?

From Sarbaz to Lashkar Gah

Where is bin Laden?

He won’t be near the explosions.

And after the phony elections, none of the dictator’s men have used the suicide bomb against the citizens who want freedom in Iran.

Suicide bomber kills 29 in attack on Iran Guards
By Fredrik Dahl and Reza Derakhshi

TEHRAN (Reuters) – A suicide bomber killed six senior Revolutionary Guards commanders and 23 other people on Sunday in one of the boldest attacks on Iran’s most powerful military institution…

Citing a witness, state television said Sunday’s attack occurred when senior Revolutionary Guards officers attending a conference in the southeastern city of Sarbaz went to talk to a group of tribes people making baskets…

Citing authorities and experts, a presenter of English-language Press TV said “the finger of accusation is directly pointed at the Jundollah group,” referring to ethnic Baluch Sunni insurgents who have been blamed for previous attacks in the region.

Jundollah, which claimed responsibility for the bombing of a Shi’ite mosque in May that killed 25 people, says it is fighting for the rights of the Islamic Republic’s minority Sunnis.

Some analysts believe that Jundollah has evolved through shifting alliances with various parties, including the Taliban and Pakistan’s ISI intelligence service, who saw the group as a tool against Iran.

Predominantly Shi’ite Muslim Iran has also linked Jundollah to the Sunni Islamist al Qaeda network…

Iran is still not free.

U.S. Marines are in Helmand Province.

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So there are three big questions right now in that part of the world:

1. Where are the U.S. Marines?
2. Where is Usama bin Laden?
3. When will Iran be free?

No wonder the president is taking such a long time to make his play in Afghanistan.

Hide the salami

Karl Rove mentions another piece of hot info from CBO boss Elmendorf, concerning the tax increases built into the Senate health care takeover bill.

Under questioning at a Senate hearing Tuesday, CBO Director Douglas Elmendorf admitted that the $500 billion in tax hikes in the Baucus bill would be passed onto consumers, jacking up insurance premiums. That undercuts the argument that Democratic reforms will make health care more affordable.

- Karl Rove, Wall Street Journal, Obama Hasn’t Closed the Health-Care Sale

However, you cannot find Elmendorf’s actual testimony anywhere. Not on this topic.

Meanwhile, the Senate and White House controllers meet behind closed doors, the Death Überpanel.

WASHINGTON (AP) – White House officials and Senate Democrats are meeting in private to iron out differences on a health care overhaul that could affect every American. In public, they’re united by a common enemy: the health insurance industry.

ERICA WERNER, Democrats work to finalize health legislation
Oct 15, 3:12 AM (ET).

That’s a lot of transparency: yeah, a lot of negative transparency.

These guys are getting to be better than Bill Clinton at playing Hide The Salami.

Medical mayham from Senator Baucus et al.

Obviously, the U.S. Senate is having difficulty getting a harmonious outcome from health care “reform" that, first, does no harm.

Instead, it looks like higher insurance premiums, government efficiency and deficits. That is mayham, my friend.

Famous neurotherapist

Obama wins 16th Annual Arafat Prize

A complete and utter joke.

Obama wins Nobel Peace Prize for ‘extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy’ — OrlandoSentinel.com

“So soon? Too early. He has no contribution so far. He is still at an early stage. He is only beginning to act,” said former Polish President Lech Walesa, a 1983 Nobel Peace laureate.

“This is probably an encouragement for him to act. Let’s see if he perseveres. Let’s give him time to act,” Walesa said.

The award appeared to be a slap at President George W. Bush from a committee that harshly criticized Obama’s predecessor for his largely unilateral military action in the wake of the Sept. 11 terror attacks.

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It is embarrassing. Nobel Peace Prize used to mean something. Those Norwegian voters either

1. are trying to manipulate the USA, or
2. are trying to manipulate the president, or
3. they ate too much lutefisk yesterday.

No other explanation.

One of these days, somebody is going to tell those nudniks in Oslo to go jump in the fjord. Some prize.

Obama’s French Lesson by Charles Krauthammer

Obama?s French Lesson by Charles Krauthammer on National Review Online
Do the tally. In return for selling out Poland and the Czech Republic by unilaterally abrogating a missile-defense security arrangement that Russia had demanded be abrogated, we get from Russia . . . what?
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Withdraw consent

Withdrawal of consent is how this movement will make changes happen. Just ask Charter 77.

Withdraw consent.

We hold these truths to be self evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these rights are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, that to secure these rights governments are established among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.

89 and 68

A Former Radical Goes Back to the Future at the 9/12 March

Super article from an experienced protester who dates back to the 1960s. It’s graceful and links to many photos she captured from among the marchers.

A Former Radical Goes Back to the Future at the 9/12 March

In 1967, I was the radical Alinsky wrote the rules for. On the political cutting edge, I’d been arguing with fellow students and coworkers for years about Vietnam, and my growing disgust with my country led me down many winding roads of anti-American thought. I was counterculture before there was a name for it, skipping my prom and graduation as “bourgeois,” going barefoot, braless, and unshaven, and collecting tattoos at the only place in town those days — a crummy hole-in-the-wall next to downtown D.C.’s Greyhound station.

…On the morning of September 12, I left for the march with my camera. Since every picture’s worth a thousand words, I thought that would be the easiest and fastest way to communicate what really took place.

But what was going to take place? How many people would show? Though in my gut — with the latest victories of the new media over the old (Van Jones, ACORN) — I felt momentum building, I was really just one person going without a group, a strategy, or a plan…

All seemed informed and concerned, but cheerful and optimistic. I knew this feeling from before — it begins when you move from concern to action.
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The best sign in the gallery

Something I noticed from her photos: There were no black bloc of people wearing the black garb and black masks.

Afghans and drugs picked up in bin Laden’s stomping ground

There is news from the western part of Usama bin Laden’s stomping grounds. The US Marines are to the east near Lashkar Gah in Helmand province.

Police Seize 236kg of Drugs in Eastern Iran

TEHRAN (FNA)- The Iranian Law Enforcement Police seized over 236 kg of opium in daylong operations in the country’s eastern province of Southern Khorassan, a provincial police commander announced on Sunday.

Commander of Nahbandan police forces Gholam Hossein Parsa said that the police anti-drug squad was dispatched to a mission after receiving information about an illicit drug cargo in the province.

The commander noted that Nahbandan police discovered 146.1 kg of opium from a van during a patrolling operation, and also seized 62.4 kg of opium from a truck which was bound for Kerman in central Iran.

Meantime, the police forces seized another 28.2 kg of opium at a checkpoint near Nahbandan.

Parsa also announced that his forces had arrested 48 Afghan nationals for illegal entry into Iran.

I presume that Afghans sneaking into Iran is not unusual these days. Why is it news for the Fars News Agency?

We continue to wait for the US Marines to sweep up Osama bin Laden in their Helmand operations or push him across the border into the Sistan and Baluchistan province of Iran.

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Grand Ayatollah Ali al Sistani and the Death Spiral of the Islamic Republic

Michael Ledeen links to a YouTube of Iran government coverup of freedom activists death, and he reports two valuable pieces of information on freedom in Iran, viz.

The Death Spiral of the Islamic Republic II

Supreme Leader Khamenei has received secret messages from Grand Ayatollah Sistani in Najaf, Iraq, criticizing the bloodthirsty behavior of Khamenei’s people…

"Mistakes have been made, laws have been violated and crimes have been committed. The perpetrators have to be treated with a hard fist…"

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Both of these items seem important for freedom in Iran.

1. Khameini makes public admission of mistakes.
2. Ali al-Sistani communicates to Khameini secretly, as reported by an Iranian in the West;
   Cf., earlier blurbs on al Sistani
   1. June 17, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani says… what?
   2. June 23, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani on the move?

But we still have not completely identified the leadership of the freedom movement, other than maybe Mousavi. Ledeen has his eye on this last question. Good.

Haniff Mazroee of Norooz website:

Clueless goombah Moe Greene senators

These goombah representatives and senators duck the town hall meetings. Advanced cluelessness. They do not see that the town hall is the exact antidote to what troubles the President’s health care takeover plans.

Explaining Town Hall Protests (John C. Goodman)
…there is no way the kind of spontaneous outpouring we’ve witnessed could be bought or organized by anyone.

Why are they so angry? The reasons are manifold, but the single biggest reason is the arrogance of our elected officials in Washington. Think about it. For the past seven months a small group of politicians has been meeting behind-closed-doors with powerful special interests to decide whether you will be able to keep your current insurance, where you will be directed to get new insurance and at what price, what fines you and your employer will have to pay if you don’t conform, and how they’re going to get your doctor to change the way he or she practices medicine. In the process, they never asked you what you thought about anything. If you are not mad about this, odds are you don’t understand the situation.

If they could work through the town hall meeting process, with as many town hall meetings as they can squeeze in, and stay late after each meeting to talk to every last voter that wants to, they would modulate a lot of the anger people feel. That is the way it goes on the street.

Do you know who I am?

But these guys are suits, not street-level activists.

They have that Moe Greene outlook:

You don’t talk to me, I talk to you! Do you know who I am? I am Senator Barbara Boxer. Do me a favor, say "senator" instead of "ma’am." I made my own latté to get that title.

Meet Rahm Emanuel’s Brother: Dr. Zeke the Bleak

Tom Blumer gives a good rundown on Ez. Emanuel’s charnel house, including the oxymoronic "whole lives" ethical system, the fig leaf to be used by these guys for rationing.

Meet Rahm Emanuel’s Brother: Dr. Zeke the Bleak
Zeke recently embarked on a reputation rehab tour and now squeaks that he’s no longer so bleak. You can tell that the administration knows it has a serious problem on its hands, because the doctor even found time in his interview rounds to get with the lefty-despised Washington Times.

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Another telling detail is the emergency visit to the Washington Times by Ez. Emanuel for an interview. Highly unlikely in fat times, but necessary this month.

President’s new pain pill

PainCor-B

There is an announcement on http://www.conversation.gov just minutes ago, introducing the new federal pain pill recommended by your president.

Here are some specs:

Trade name: PainCor-B
Generic name: I-taxubeyonddeathformyjet

Once you have been Pelosified in this way, and Nancy gets into your head, your aches and pains will disappear and you will finally believe everything you read in the news papers.

So forget about the pacemaker your doctor wants for you. Just go with the red pill.

Do it for Nancy.

What is the Mahdi’s exit strategy?

Recent science experiment in Utah, led by Dr. Daisy BLU.

I do not like to misunderestimate the Ledeen operation, but one has to question this letter. Is it really from the Mahdi and not some goombah from Detroit? I have questions.

That’s because gathering information in such a difficult location as Iran presents unique opportunities and challenges. Read this letter and see if it looks kosher.

Faster, Please! The Mahdi Replies

On July 12, the Iranian news agency ISNA published a letter written by Chief of Staff Hassan Firouzabadi to the Shi’ite Messiah, the Hidden Imam… Thanks to highly-placed sources in the armed forces, I [Michael Ledeen] have received a copy of the Hidden Imam’s reply to Firouzabadi, which follows here, without comment.

My Dear Hassan,

To tell you the truth I had given up on you. THIRTY YEARS since your last letter? Is that what passes for filial piety nowadays in the Islamic Republic? The very visible Imam himself, the beloved Ayatollah Khomeini, spoke to me frequently. It didn’t matter if things were going well or badly, he stayed in touch. And Ahmadinezhad, who has his qualities, arranged to have all members of his government swear loyalty to me, and had the signed document delivered to me in my well. But not you! I only hear from you when you’re in a jam.

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My additional questions:

1. Is this really the Mahdi or the chief of staff’s mother-in-law? Sounds like every infallible mother-in-law I know of.
2. 

   Mr. GBU-12 flying aboard the friendly skies.

   If this is the Mahdi, why does he have to hide from Mr. GBU-12 at the bottom of a well?
3. He is supposed to leave the well at some point. Good. What is the Mahdi’s Exit Strategy?

Readers, have some fun and leave your own question in a comment.

Matt’s meditation on banality of evil men.

Following the line of Betsy McCaughey and others, including my own log entry a few days ago, Matt looks down the dark road at Ezekiel Emanuel.

Ezekiel Emanuel, banality of evil.

The Administration and its supporters have vilified the concerns of many about end of live panels, and yet this is a fact of life in the UK already. Somewhere far removed, bureaucrats make life and death decisions based on the numbers. With all of its faults, our current system values life much more highly. One of the chief theoreticians they seem to be listening to, Dr. Ezekiel Emmanuel, the White House Chief of Staff’s brother, has openly discussed the “life value” of infants and the elderly, noting that a child is not really self aware until the age of two. This is a very, very dangerous discussion

Thanks for speaking up, Matt.

Helmand, Lashkar Gah and purple fingertips

old timey stoplight

Afghanistan elections start in a few days. Can the US Marines and friends use the event to view the movement of people to polling places as well as people not moving to polling places? A lovely problem solving task.

People of Afghanistan, time for freedom and purple fingers.

GO GO GO!

Laura Ingraham and Amanda Carpenter Smack Down Noted Sexist Matthew Littman

More protest against noted sexist Matthew Littman. May it become a tsunami.

Laura Ingraham and Amanda Carpenter Smack Down Noted Sexist Matthew Littman

…Littman proved that he is still incapable of having a rational and non-sexist discussion about Governor Palin.

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HEAP_GC /’Matthew Littman’

Matthew Littman’s Double Standard
Does Matthew Littman think it’s acceptable to treat women like dogs?

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Obviously, the answer is YES. I sure hope he never shows up in Fox News Channel again.

Ditto(Moms for Sarah Palin: Why I’m not a Democrat…)

Moms for Sarah Palin: Why I’m not a Democrat…

Ok, there are loads of reasons but one that really stands out is that they are just hateful people. Matthew Littman easily makes my point.

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I viewed this Matthew Littman guy on Fox News Channel Saturday early. Man, what a complete jerk that guy is! Moms for Sarah Palin expressed it a few weeks ago. With guys like that in the Dem. party, with no conscience, how can a normal person stay a Dem.? Impossible. You either continue to look your family in the eye or you sell your conscience to Mephistopheles for political power.

Ezekiel Emanuel and his charnel house

Ezekiel Emanuel’s infamous advocacy of death panels, under color of a "complete lives ethical system," results in a decision curve that the death panel would likely have in mind as they decide our health care rationing choices. Here is the lone figure from a recent article by Emanuel in the British journal The Lancet. It is a decision curve for the death panel, displaying their age-based priority for receiving scarce medical interventions under the complete lives system.

Dworkin's curve. Click image to view full size.

● We recommend an alternative system—the complete lives system—which prioritises younger people who have not yet lived a complete life, and also incorporates prognosis, save the most lives, lottery, and instrumental value principles…

● Rather than saving the most lives, prognosis allocation aims to save the most life-years. This strategy has been used in disaster triage…

● We consider several important objections to the complete lives system.

The complete lives system discriminates against older people. Age-based allocation is ageism. Unlike allocation by sex or race, allocation by age is not invidious discrimination; every person lives through different life stages rather than being a single age. Even if 25-year-olds receive priority over 65-year-olds, everyone who is 65 years now was previously 25 years. Treating 65-year-olds differently because of stereotypes or falsehoods would be ageist; treating them differently because they have already had more life-years is not…

article summary and subscription link to The Lancet
Figure, cf. RM Dworkin, Life’s dominion, Knopf (1993).

Back-of-the-envelope estimate of national health cost per age group

What the authors, Ezekiel Emanuel, Alan Wertheimer and Govind Persad leave out of their article is a curve that expresses the relative fraction of the national health care bill that each age group generates. It might look something like this back-of-the-envelope estimate (at left). We all know that a large fraction of health care costs go to helping our seasoned citizens …perhaps not 65% as shown but still a relatively large percentage.

This large percentage is what the complete lives system targets for elimination. This curve is what motivates the intellectual gymnastics of the complete life rationing system, and it will surely be on the table at the meeting of each death panel convened by the Health Choices Commissioner, which will use both curves to decide which health care choice you get.

The Emanuel article claims as an advantage his "intuition that death of adolescents is worse than that of infants or elderly."

That is the intuition of a charnel house.

I do not consent to that intuition. I am a humanist, advocating the incomparable value of every human person.