Equal rights for Women in Egypt

What is the Muslim response to other Muslims calling for equal rights for women and for free speech? Ask Kareem Amer:

Kareem has been imprisoned in Alexandria, Egypt, since November, after posting to his website statements calling for equal rights for women and protection of free speech, as well as other statements critical of the Egyptian government. He has been denied bail and faces a long prison sentence if convicted of the charges held against him. The New York group is trying to mobilize the national news media in hopes that increased visibility of Kareem's circumstances will pressure the Egyptian government to act responsibly. (From Michellemalkin.com.)

Religion of tolerance? Actions speak louder than words.

Nancy Pelosi Blunders Continue

Nancy Pelosi vowed to preside over then most ethical Congress ever and to clean up the culture of corruption.

USA Today reports that Pelosi, fourth-ranking House Democrat Rahm Emanuel of Illinois, and Indiana Senator Evan Bayh all failed to disclose they are officers of their family charities. Members of Congress are required by law to file yearly reports on their personal finances, including any positions they hold with businesses or non-profits.

Shades of Bill Clinton.

November 2006 Republican Defeat

In mind, the Republicans have never come to grips with the real causes of the November 2006 election defeat. I hear no acknowledgment that the Republicans became a horrible freespending, earmarking party for which the country has little stomach. The Iraq war didn't help, I suppose. But I do not think that it was the be all and end all of the election.

Personally, I have no interest in voting for the Republicans to regain their majority status. Why should I? What did the Republicans do for the country? About the only thing good, you can say is the Republicans kept the Democrats out of office. But maybe that wasn't so good.

At least with the Republicans as a minority party, they will oppose Democratic spending. As the majority party, the Republicans spent too much and the Democrats were simply egging the Republicans to spend more and more.

The Republicans will not earn my respect until I hear recognition of and hear apologies for their budgetary evils while in office.

But it is not in the nature of political parties to apologize for their evil ways. I guess this goes for any politician. Admitting a mistake seems to be an anathema for them. But hey, people make mistakes. The American people are very forgiving mistakes. Paragraph of the Republicans do not admit that they made mistakes, while they were in the majority, how can we ever trust them to be in the majority in the future? How could we ever assume that they would be any better than they were of the past.

To me it is not enough to say that the Republicans are better than the Democrats. I certainly like the philosophy is that the Republicans espouse as opposed to the philosophies that the Democrats a spouse. But espousing philosophies is not the same thing as translating to action. The Democrats have a dreadful worldview. They need the Republicans to oppose them.

But so far, I have no reason to believe that the Republicans will actually further the worldview that they espouse.

The scary thing is that the Democrats don't seem to understand that there are persons of a certain unnamed religion, call them fundamentalists, call them extremists, who are trying to kill us. That creates a real conundrum in deciding who to vote for at the next opportunity.

Update: Northwest Airlines Unsafe Capitulation

A commenter politely pointed out the following from the Seattle Times, and I have taken a couple of days to further reflect on the situation:

Northwest originally said the pilgrims arrived only 20 minutes before the flight was scheduled to depart, which is outside airline and international rules regarding overseas flights. The pilgrims held a news conference Tuesday in Dearborn where they refuted the airline's claim, saying they had arrived at least 90 minutes before departure — well within the regulations.

The original report was that Northwest airlines said that the Muslims had failed to check-in within 20 minutes of departure, a violation of the rules adopted in response to terrorism. Clearly we have an apples and oranges situation.

The Muslims claim that they arrived somewhere (At the gate? At the terminal?) 90 minutes before departure. Apples. That is not the same thing as saying that they checked in 90 minutes before departure. Oranges. Why didn't they check in?

If they made a mistake in failing to check in, why didn't they just say we made a mistake, please help us? No, instead they held a news conference claiming discrimination against Muslims, because they had "arrived" 90 minutes before departure.

Is this taqqya by half-truth? It is certainly not a "refutation."

With the Northwest Airlines capitulation, I'm certain that no further details will be forthcoming. Northwest blames, "a series of mistakes involving a German travel agency, the baggage handlers for the previous chartered flight from Saudi Arabia and misleading information on a printed ticket that the passengers had received." So who made mistakes? What were the mistakes?

Perhaps the Muslims were totally blameless. But if they were not checked in 20 minutes before departure, the Northwest gate agents were blameless as well.

Without more details, flying Northwest Airlines continues to make me uncomfortable, and I will avoid it.

Northwest Airlines: Unsafe?

On September 11, 2001 extremist Muslim jihadists hijacked four jet airliners and flew them into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon buildings. Ever since, America has been less safe and flying on passenger airliners has been less safe. In response and to enhance safety, the airline industry enacted many new safeguards including an obligation to arrive at least 20 minutes before boarding to be permitted to board an aircraft.

Now Northwest Airlines has made flying Northwest less safe. Northwest Airlines has caved in to Muslim demands. After appropriately denying boarding to a group of Muslims who arrived late under airline rules, Northwest Airlines has now "apologized" and offered compensation. Why? Because CAIR protested.

What message does that send to Northwest Airlines employees who enforce the rules?

What message does that send to Northwest Airlines passengers who follow the rules?

Without Northwest Airlines caving in to this kind of mild pressure, will Northwest employees be reluctant to deny boarding to suspicious Muslim characters in the future?

Debbie Schlussel has revealed the name of the individual responsible for the cave-in: Andrea Fischer-Newman, Vice President of Government Relations for Northwest Airlines. We all have Ms. Fischer-Newman to thank for making Northwest airlines less safe.

As long as Ms. Fischer-Newman is on board at Northwest, I will not be.

CAIR Commits Hate Crime

Using what is apparently the Muslim definition of hate crime (i.e., anything critical of Muslims), the Council of American Islamic Relations (CAIR) recently committed a hate crime by writing a letter to Walmart, urging Walmart to withdraw from its shelves the "Left Behind" video game, apparently because it has a Christian theme. CAIR complains that the game encourages the players as Christians to kill or convert persons from other faiths.

From all reports, though, the game is nothing of the sort. It does not mention Islam or Muslims and it penalizes violence. (Disclaimer: I have not played it.) The players seek to defeat the AntiChrist. Apparently with CAIR, truth is not an option.

On another front, CAIR is almost doing something good. Its website incldue a peititon against violence to be signed by Muslims. Why is it "almost" doing something good? Because the petitiion does not mention the word "jihad," and the petition announcement includes the following fatuous statement:

“We hope this effort will demonstrate once and for all that Muslims in America and throughout the Islamic world reject violence committed in the name of Islam,” said CAIR Board Chairman Omar Ahmad.

Apparently Mr. Ahmad does not follow the news about how Muslims throughout the world have failed to reject violence. What is demonostrated by Muslim actions speak louder than words.

If CAIR were not dissimulating, it would have urged Muslims throughout the world to reject the violence in which they have been engaging.

As written, CAIR urinates on our legs and tells us it is raining (as the saying goes).

CNN's Half Apology

CNN apologizes for mistaken headline

Associated Press

NEW YORK - CNN apologized Tuesday for mistakenly promoting a story on the search for Osama bin Laden with the headline "Where's Obama?"

A spokesman for Illinois Sen. Barack Obama said the apology was accepted.

. . .

"We want to apologize for that bad typo," Blitzer said. "We also want to apologize personally to Sen. Barack Obama. I'm going to be making a call to him later this morning to offer my personal apology."

Shouldn't CNN apologize to Osama, as well?