Saturday how ya doin’? post

You know, it’s too much to even post cat pictures right now. Maybe tomorrow.

Rahel, I’ll give you a story instead. Yesterday afternoon, I’m working in my office, and I hear what sounds like my windows thumping from, say, a high wind. But the blinds are open, and the wind’s not kicking up that badly, and I don’t see storm clouds. Puzzled, I ignore it, then I hear the noises again. So I get up and walk into the hallway. Well, right on the other side of the wall is my bedroom closet. And it was open a few inches. And when I slid the door open the rest of the way, out came Tig.

Sigh.

He was thumping around, doing what all cats do when they get in your closet: Getting cat hair on my work clothes.

Posted in Cats | 3 Comments

Because it’s been on my mind a lot these days

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Israel, dinosaurs, Amy Winehouse and pathetic shits

So here I was perusing a steamy pile of virtual excrement titled Israel, Dinosaurs, and Amy Winehouse. The link to it was sent by a friend (thanks, friend!), who added a sentence mentioning pathetic shits or something in that vein. Indeed, it was a fitting tribute to this opus and much too kind, as far as I am concerned.

The author calls her/him/them-selves “I4P Writers Group” and declares “We are a team of bloggers we comprise a group of 5 writers in Ireland and 1 in Israel…“.Whatever they comprise, even to my amateur eye English doesn’t look like their mother tongue – notice “over indulgence“, “cause it’s ultimate destruction“, “exept“, starting every second paragraph with “So”, etc. Read this if you are still unconvinced:

So, this brings me to the evil rogue state of israel, which, funnily enough, as it turns out, has quite a lot in common with Amy Winehouse, exept she had a great voice and didnt kill people constantly, they both suffered from the same affliction.

I have seen many a “How I spent my summer” work penned by a better hand. But style, atrocious as it is, takes its hat off and bows deeply to the heinousness of the contents.

A detail of a slight interest: these folks calls themselves “Unrepentant Fenian Bastards” (and Belfast is mentioned), according to their avatar:

Out of idle interest: is their visceral hate of Israel some kind of ersatz for their hate of the past (and, in part, present) occupier? Not that it’s in any way important, but could be a telling detail.

So here I am reading it and otherwise browsing aimlessly, and suddenly I see that Bradley Burston has already got onto that case. What he says, essentially, is expressed in the lede:

There’s cowardice in an opinion piece that uses the dead to sell hatred to the living. The dead deserve better. So do the living.

Yep. Too true, the cheap way of rushing to score a political point or two and dancing on the graves is a popular pastime of cheap scribes. Torrents of propaganda unleashed by the Norway massacre are despicable. And Bradley is right comparing the “I4P Writers Group” opus and its use of Amy Winehouse’ name and fate to the JP editorial (I suspect I could guess its author’s name in a pinch). The editorial, in its more polished way, does its own bit of dancing on the graves, and the impression is not much less ghoulish.

Still, there is one detail Bradley has missed. Or, perhaps, he just has chosen to concentrate on his main thesis. However, the exceptional hate of Israel radiated by the Unrepentant Fenian Bastards and already mentioned, deserves a bit more attention. Bradley quoted this passage along with the other material:

But, guess what? Israel is not ‘God’ and ultimately what killed Amy Winehouse will also kill off Israel as well. All we have to do is wait, and just keep on chip, chip, chipping away at the out of control, over excessive, over indulgent, spoilt brat killer bully that we now know as Israel.

Emphasis mine.

Kill off Israel… I guess we should be grateful to I4P Writers Group for their straightforward no-nonsense attitude. And if anyone wants to persuade me that their fervor is fueled solely by their love of the people of Gaza, he/she is welcome to try, but all the bets are off.

Well, that’s it about this team of Fenians. They  are willing to keep on chip, chip, chipping and I am willing to keep wait, wait, waiting – we, the Red Sea pedestrians, are good at that and have already outwaited few pretty serious bastards. And a pathetic shitty gang of maritime losers is hardly going to impress us. Beyond that I don’t see much need (or purpose) for further discussion of the perfectly odious obvious.

So, here I am, poring over three articles and surfing around some related stuff, when lo and behold:

Op-ed, and not in some provincial rag, but in the august NYT. Now we shall get the gospel, finally the tragic events will be sorted out and explained to us. Oh well, don’t be building your hopes up. The article is a usual bloviating scoring of political points. With a few items wanting a special mention. One, when the term “fellow traveler” is used – by one of the more experienced fellow travelers of the current century. And two other points (at least) in the final paragraph of that article:

Nothing, however, can excuse the widespread condoning of an anti-Muslim racism once reserved for the Jews of Europe. Not on the weekend when Amy Winehouse, a Jewish girl from East London whose artistry would once have been dismissed by a racist and murderous European right as degenerate “cosmopolitan” trash, died. A good way to remember her is finally to confront the latest iteration of a European bigotry that kills.

Amazing, ain’t it? First of all, that “anti-Muslim racism” idiocy – from a luminary of NYT, no less. And then poor Amy Winehouse again – will the point scorers leave her alone, I wonder?

So, what can one do after all that? Do you know what: let’s follow Bradley’s advice and listen to that piece by Amy Winehouse:

And try to cheer up after all that crap…

Cross-posted on SimplyJews

Posted in Gaza, Israel Derangement Syndrome, Media Bias | 4 Comments

Friday briefs

So how’s that outreach working for you, Obama? Iran is helping al Qaeda murder people all over the world. Awesome. Maybe Obama might want to put some preconditions on talking to Iran now, like, say, “Stop funding international terrorist organizations that murder Americans and westerners”?

Hariri’s killes named; no further action required: Don’t worry. Hezbollah won’t hand over the killers, plus, they’ve already blamed Israel for it. Expect the rest of the Arab world to follow suit. Well, except for Hariri’s son.

Actually, he has a point: Ehud Barak says that Israel should apologize to Turkey:

“I’m not talking about an apology for the blockade or an apology for the flotilla, but about saying that if any errors were made during the operation – we regret them,” he explained.

Of course, the real question is: Is Turkey worth saving? I don’t think the head of the Islamist government is going to be an ally of Israel anymore, regardless of how scared Syria’s turmoil is making him. He’s been going down the anti-Israel road for some time now. On the other hand—somebody stopped the IHH from taking part in Gaza Flotilla 2. And let’s face it, it’s true that errors were made. The biggest error, of course, was underestimating the IHH terrorists.

Oh, look: Another Times op-ed that entirely misses the point. The New York Times found an Israeli Jew to say that Israel doesn’t know how to define a Jewish state, therefore, Netanyahu’s demand that the Palestinians recognize Israel as the nation-state of the Jewish people doesn’t make any sense. Oh. Wait. He never used the phrase “nation-state of the Jewish people.” That would entirely negate his argument. Shorter Meryl: You’ve been pwned.

Posted in Iran, Lebanon, Media Bias, Middle East, Turkey | 1 Comment

Your Tuesday morning briefs

And yet, there are no worldwide calls for a UN investigation of Syria: Nearly 3,000 people have gone missing in Syria since the protests began, and that’s on top of the 1,600 Syrians murdered by Assad’s soldiers (with the ample help of Hezbollah and the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, and possibly even some Palestinians). Can you say, “Israeli Double Standard Time?” I knew you could.

Because they’re not teaching the kids to hate Israel: A UN summer camp was vandalized in Gaza. Gee. I wonder why? Of course, it could simply be the (gasp!) mixing of the genders.

Another rocket in Israel, another yawn by the world media: If a rocket falls in a country and it doesn’t kill anyone, did it really fall? Not according to the mainstream media, apparently.

Say, did you know there was a famine in Somalia? Of course you didn’t. The media are too busy flogging every little issue in Israel rather than paying attention to children dying of starvation in Africa—again. There’s a horrible picture of a starving child at that last link. You can count his ribs.

Posted in Gaza, Hamas, Israel Derangement Syndrome, Syria, United Nations, World | Comments Off on Your Tuesday morning briefs

What I’ve been doing during my blogging retirement

My first Pajamas Media article:
The ‘Erase’ to Condemn Israel
Meryl, thanks for the nudge and the excellent advice!

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A little AP media bias to get your day going

The AP editors made an interesting change in a story yesterday. Note the difference.

The first version:

Hezbollah warns Israel against ‘stealing’ gas
Hezbollah’s leader is warning Israel against “stealing” Lebanon’s natural oil and gas resources.

A dispute is building between the two arch enemies over their maritime border and huge natural gas and oil reserves beneath the sea.

The leader of Lebanon’s Shiite Muslim Hezbollah group on Tuesday warned Israel against trying to steal Lebanon’s maritime resources and said it would retaliate against any Israeli attack on the country’s oil and gas installations.

Lebanon has submitted its own sea boundary proposal to the U.N., and Israel’s government earlier this month approved a conflicting proposal that it sent to the world body.

Lebanon called it a violation of international laws and the country’s sovereignty.

Now the update:

Hezbollah warns Israel against ‘stealing’ gas
The leader of Lebanon’s Shiite Muslim Hezbollah group on Tuesday warned Israel against trying to steal Lebanon’s maritime resources and said it would retaliate against any Israeli attack on the country’s oil and gas installations.

A dispute is building between the two rival nations over their maritime border and huge natural gas and oil reserves beneath the Mediterranean Sea. The countries are longtime enemies and do not have diplomatic relations.

Lebanon has submitted its own sea boundary proposal to the United Nations, and the Israeli government earlier this month approved a conflicting proposal that it also sent to the world body. Lebanon called the Israeli proposal a violation of international law and Lebanese sovereignty.

It’s interesting that they toned down and explained the “arch enemy” language, but in the end, it matters very little. Note that the angle is almost exclusively from the Lebanese point of view, leading the reader to believe that Israel is, indeed, trying to steal Lebanese gas fields. There is not a single reference to an earlier piece of information, which even the AP noted that Israel’s Leviathan fields are not in contention at all.

I have to admit, the AP just plain sucks. Anti-Israel bias? Yeah, they’ve got that.

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A word of advice

If you drop a box of Junior Mints on the floor of your car in this weather, stop at the first opportunity and clean them up, even if you’ve got the air conditioning on.

Trust me on this one.

Posted in Life | 1 Comment

Why yes, it’s another busy day

Why do you ask?

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Your July 25 software Facts of the Day

Because I know these things, and so many people do not:

The F5 key will refresh your browser page.

Control-y (holding down the control key while pressing the y) is a keyboard shortcut that you can use to repeat tasks that take multiple keystrokes. For example, let’s say you want to delete five rows in an Excel spreadsheet. The first time, you highlight the rows, go to the appropriate menu, choose “Delete rows”, press enter. The second time, you highlight the rows, type “control-y”, and it deletes the five rows. This can be used throughout many programs. I use it in Dreamweaver as well.

Right-click is your friend. Repeat after me: Right-click is your friend. Right-click anywhere, in any program, in different places, and watch what happens.

I could probably make a living teaching people things like this.

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Monday briefs

The Arab Spring brings weapon fall: Wonderful. The chaos in Arab nations is feeding Hamas bigger and better weapons. But hey, not to worry, because after the Arabs get democracy, they’ll all be friends of Israel, right? Oh.

So happy we poured billions into Iraq for this: Iraq and Syria signed a deal to import Iranian gas. Awesome. Thousands of Americans gave their lives so Iraq can help Iran become our number one enemy since the Soviet Union. Say, you think Obama might be able to find a reason to actually call for Bashar al-Assad’s removal yet? No? In spite of the fact that the protests are getting bigger even as media coverage is getting smaller?

The maid speaks out: The maid who says she was raped by DSK is coming out in public to counter the media reports that essentially called her a lying opportunist who had sex with DSK and cried rape because she wants money. We report. You decide. (I still think he’s guilty.)

Israel to PA: You go to UN, we revoke Oslo. Works for me. Not so much for the Palestinians, who of course, are pissed.

Now they’re smuggling weapons from Jordan: Funny how the AP article never mentioned exactly where the smugglers were coming from. The Ynet article does.

Posted in Hamas, Israel, palestinian politics, Terrorism, World | Comments Off on Monday briefs

The anti-Israel media bias, Turkey edition

Let’s take a quick look at the AP News Values and Principles, as stated on their website.

That means we abhor inaccuracies, carelessness, bias or distortions.

Now let’s take a look at the story the AP sent over the wires this weekend, on the Turkish Prime Minister’s speech about the Mavi Marmara incident.

Turkey’s prime minister on Saturday ruled out a normalization of ties with Israel unless the Jewish state “officially apologizes” for its deadly raid on a Gaza-bound flotilla last year.

Recep Tayyip Erdogan said relations cannot be improved unless Israel also pays compensation to the families of nine Turkish victims and lifts its embargo on Gaza. Israeli officials were not immediately available for comment

Nice excuse. So instead of, say, writing the history of the incident accurately, and pointing out that Israel’s Turkel Commission found that the IDF had acted legitimately, and that the UN itself is releasing a report that is said to blame the “activists” on the IHH (and Turkey itself) for the incident, instead, we get nothing but the Turkish side of events, and the incendiary language of the currentl Israel-hater-in-chief. Even when the AP pretends to strive for balance, the deck is stacked against the Israeli side of the story.

Israel has insisted its soldiers acted in self-defense after being attacked by activists when they boarded the Turkish ship, Mavi Marmara. But a Turkish investigation revealed that two activists were killed before commandos boarded the ship and another died “execution-style” as he lay injured.

The Turkish investigation was utterly discredited. Not that that matters to the AP writer and editor who put out this story. The above in bold is, quite plainly, a lie put forth by the “activists” on board. And then, because the writer has not slammed Israel nearly enough, he continues for three more paragraphs.

The commando raid sparked condemnation worldwide and led to an easing of Israel’s blockade on the coastal territory. It further damaged already strained relations with Turkey, formerly one of Israel’s closest allies in the region.

Erdogan has also voiced support for the recognition of a Palestinian state and accused Israel of using excessive force against the Palestinians.

The Turkish prime minister also criticized the United Nations and the United States for turning a blind eye to Israel’s “spoiled practices.”

Note that there is not a single Israeli rebuttal of the charges above. Just a vague statement about how Israeli officials couldn’t be reached. As this story went out on a Saturday, one has to wonder: Did the writer deliberately try to contact Israeli ministry offices on the Jewish Sabbath, knowing full well that religious Israel shuts down from mid-Friday to after sundown Saturday?

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Fluffy kitty pictures

Your Caturday pictures.

Miss Gracie:

Gracie

Mr. Tig:

Lazy Tig

Shabbat Shalom.

Posted in Cats | 4 Comments

Briefly

Even MORE gas in the Tamar field: Yes, Israel is going to be energy self-sufficient. And yes, terrorists will try to blow up the pipeline.

And in other minor news, 1 million Syrians can’t be wrong: That’s how many came out against the Dorktator in Syrian cities on Friday. I love how the world media flooded the zone with the border incursions on Israel, but they just put out the yawn-of-the-day news about yet another demonstration, yet another murder of civilians by Iranian Hizbollah Syrian soldiers. And as long as the world refuses to speak up firmly (and maybe actually help the rebels), the Dorktator will remain.

Awesome. UNIFIL does the sea: Because UNIFIL is so helpful on land, they’re trying to set up some kind of UNIFIL “naval security strip“. Guess what happens the next time a Gaza flotilla arrives? Oh, this is going to be so much fun!

UN tells Lebanon they’re years behind Israel in energy exploration: What, only seven years behind Israel? Gee, if only they’d concentrated on something besides destroying Israel, maybe they’d have their own gas fields to work. But then, the “resistance” is all. Just ask Hassan Nasrallah, if you can find him in one of his many safe house hidey-holes.

One for the Rebel Alliance: Looks like one of Darth Vader’s big boys was killed by the rebels. Oh, wait. Translated: Kurdish rebels took out a big shot in the Iranian Revolutionary Guards. Go, Kurds!

Posted in Iran, Israel, Lebanon, Middle East, Syria, United Nations | 2 Comments

Terror hits Europe, again

The government buildings in Oslo were hit by two massive explosions today—in classic terrorist fashion.

Two explosions rocked government buildings in Oslo, Norway, on Friday, state TV and witnesses said.

Windows in several buildings had been blown out, and people were in the street bleeding, state TV broadcaster NRK said on its website.

A first explosion was followed by a second, a reporter for Norwegian state broadcaster NRK told CNN on Friday.

One explosion happened near a government building housing the office of Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg, said the reporter, Linda Reinholdsen. Another hit near the Norwegian parliament, she said.

What, exactly, has Norway done to piss off Islamists?

The blast comes as the Scandinavian country has grappled with a series of homegrown terror plots linked to al-Qaeda, and six years after an uproar over cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad in neighboring Denmark.

Last week, a Norwegian prosecutor filed terror charges against an Iraqi-born cleric for threatening Norwegian politicians with death if he’s deported from the Nordic country.

In other words: Nothing out of the ordinary.

Al Qaeda is digging the grave of Islamism with each attack on Europe. Mark Steyn to the contrary, Europe has a very, very bloody past, especially concerning people who aren’t “European” (despite having been in the country for generations). I am in the minority on this, but I believe there will be massive retaliatory attacks on Europe’s Muslims if this keeps happening. And the oh-so-politically correct Europeans won’t be stopping to differentiate between innocent and guilty. The backlash they keep writing about happening in America? It’s not going to be here. It’s going to happen there.

Update: Apparently, it’s a home-grown nutjob. I was wrong. And he was despicable. He murdered 80 children at a summer camp while dressed as a police officer.

Posted in Terrorism, World | 5 Comments