Today's Issue of Bus and Driver

It's an extended and expanded edition today.

He's busy throwing the hard left under the bus by going along with the FISA amendments, despite the pure unadulterated venom from Daily Kos over the possibility that the telecommunications companies might get immunized from lawsuits for cooperating with the government to keep the nation safe by allowing the government to intercept calls into the US from foreign sources.

Obama is also busy throwing the big US media outlets under the bus, causing what will likely be a bigger problem going forward. Obama's flip on public financing of his campaign has caused quite a few heads to turn.

UPDATE:
Consider this a bleg: major kudos to someone who can provide me with a photo edit of a Bus and Driver mockup with Obama's latest seal on the cover.

Thai Islamists Busy Adding To Butcher's Bill

Four more people were murdered by Thai Islamists in the Southern part of Thailand. Five others were wounded by the Islamists fired on a train carrying passengers through Yala Province from Malaysia.

10 people were killed when a military helicopter crashed ferrying forces into the region.

France24 seems to have a problem trying to figure out who exactly is behind all the Islamist violence. It's actually a good question since it throws into sharp contrast the goals and aims of the Islamists worldwide from what most people think as being centered on hatred and venom directed towards Israel. The Islamists want dominion over the Southern Thai provinces, instituting their own law and rules.

This adds to the concerns about the stability of the Thai government, which has been unsuccessful in either attempting to fight the insurgency or appeasing them.

When the People's Power Party took control in February -- after the first elections since a military coup in September 2006 -- many Thais hoped for an end to two years of political turmoil over Thaksin Shinawatra, the controversial former prime minister.

The new government's leaders sought to sustain that optimism, pledging to avoid sensitive political issues in their first six months in power and to dedicate their attention instead to the task of reviving a sluggish economy.

While the rumors of an imminent military coup that swept Bangkok several weeks ago have subsided, many Thais think the government will be short-lived.

On Friday, thousands of protesters laid siege to Government House, where the prime minister's office is located, to press for the government's resignation, pledging to stay until they achieved their goal.

More than 3,000 people have been killed in the insurgency over the past five years, and there's no sign that the fighting will slacken anytime soon.

Mugabe's Defiance Is Zimbabwe's Woe

Mugabe is busy saying that the opposition is lying about the violence perpetrated against it and that the opposition is the one behind whatever violence is going on. This, from the thug who has said that nothing but god will remove him from power.

Mugabe, who has refused to accept the results of the presidential election and demanded a runoff, thinks the opposition is making things up:

Mugabe said the Movement for Democratic Change was compiling names of alleged victims and falsely claiming that their supporters were being beaten up. He faces opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai in the June 27 runoff. Tsvangirai won the first round but not by an outright majority.

"They say this so that they can later say the elections were not free and fair. Which is a damn lie," the state Herald newspaper quoted him as saying at a campaign rally in the western city of Bulawayo.

That's right folks, the fact that opposition leaders and their wives were brutally murdered is just not true.

Mugabe's arrest of opposition leaders continues.

Thousands of people have been displaced by the fighting and Mugabe's goons are busy intimidating the population into silence.

In one bit of good news, a Zimbabwean court has ruled that Tsvangirai's opposition party can hold a pre-election rally. It remains to be seen if that decision will hold, as numerous other rallies have been banned, to say nothing of multiple arrests with trumped up charges.

Some of Zimbabwe's neighbors are finally speaking up about the violence, but South Africa remains mum to its great shame.

I have no doubt that Mugabe will attempt to rig the June 27 runoff election, to accomplish what he was unable to do in the original election despite such attempts. Mugabe's ruinous dominion over Zimbabwe has led to famine, economic collapse, and a racist economic policy that forcibly removed whites from their lands. He's on the record as saying that Tsvangirai's party isn't sufficiently black enough, and the overt racism is astounding.

Zimbabwean journalists have called on Mugabe to stop his war of terror against the opposition.

Responding to Mugabe's recent threats to go to war if he loses to opposition rival, Morgan Tsvangirai, the journalists said: "Evidently, the war has already begun in the form of horrendous beatings and murder of both known and perceived opposition supporters in the entire country.

"Daily news reports emanating from Zimbabwe point to the fact that Zimbabwe is a country at war and findings by both local and foreign observers as well as family and community accounts overwhelmingly point at Zanu PF as the sponsor of the terror that has paralysed Zimbabwe."

UPDATE:
South Africa's actions in defending the indefensible Mugabe is stunning.

UNICEF Insanity

UNICEF, a United Nations organization that provides assistance for children's programs worldwide, is going to boycott a prominent Jewish philanthropist because he's funded construction of housing in the West Bank.

Lev Leviev, a real estate and diamond mogul who is one of the richest men in Israel, has supported UNICEF with direct contributions and indirectly by sponsoring at least one UNICEF fund-raiser.

He is chairman of Africa Israel Investments, a conglomerate whose units include Danya Cebus, which the Arab rights advocacy group Adalah-NY charges has carried out settlement construction, considered illegal by the United Nations.

UNICEF decided to review its relationship with Leviev after a campaign by Adalah-NY and found "at least a reasonable grounds for suspecting" that Leviev companies were building settlements in occupied territory, a UNICEF official said.

"I can confirm that UNICEF has advised Adalah in New York that it will not be entering into any partnerships or accepting financial contributions from Lev Leviev or his corporate people," Chris de Bono, a senior adviser to the executive director of UNICEF, told Reuters.

The UN has this issue wrong in so many respects, but let me clear things up.

Housing - whether you call it settlements or otherwise - are not, and never were the stumbling block for any deal between Israel and its enemies. It's a cover for the real issues, which are the Palestinians and those enemies do not wish for any deal with Israel.

Housing can always be transferred between parties. It's done all the time, and it was indeed done in the Egypt-Israel peace treaty. Israel withdrew from its Sinai settlements and handed them over to the Egyptians. Israel withdrew from its Gaza settlements in 2005 and the Palestinians promptly ransacked them and turned them into terror training camps.

Transferring those housing projects could be done at some time in the future should the circumstances warrant with a peace deal between Israel and its neighbors for those housing projects built or contemplated in the West Bank. But to say that they are grounds for which to treat Leviev as toxic are hilarious considering the wide range of thugs, dictators, and totalitarian regimes that get to dictate UN policy.

To shun money from a wealthy Israeli billionaire who is giving significant humanitarian aid to UNICEF shows just how wretched the UN is. They look a gift horse in the mouth - supporting childrens' aid programs around the world and decline that aid because he also provides housing in a disputed part of the world at the say so of those Palestinian sympathizers who have done nothing for UNICEF or any other UN program except to use them as cover for their terror activities and to suck at the teat of UN largesse.

Another Day, Another Bloomberg Tax Grab

This is getting to be a real habit with Mayor Mike Bloomberg, who seems to be courting the idea of running for Vice President alongside Barack Obama given that he can't run for mayor of New York City again because of term limits. It appears that every substantive pronouncement is a tax and spend policy, particularly when it comes to gas taxes.

His latest pronouncement is his clearest description of what he wants to do - hike gas taxes, although he does approve of the more than sensible idea of drilling for more oil.

"I think he [McCain] and Hillary Clinton couldn't both have been more wrong when they wanted to reduce the gasoline tax during the summer," said the mayor.

Then he added this advice, which is certain to make the average motorist cringe:

"They should be raising the tax and encouraging people to reduce consumption. The anti-tax people don't like that. But using capitalism to encourage the right behavior is exactly the [right] direction of going. Tax policy is the way government uses capitalism."

Taxes are the way government obtains revenue and affects social policy through the tax code. It is an abuse of capitalism since tax policy distorts markets as a means to promote social policy. It's clear that Bloomberg wants to do just that by forcing people to spend more for energy costs. However, it's also clear that Bloomberg hasn't thought it through since those increased energy costs get passed on to the ultimate users when they buy everything from food to airline tickets.

Right now, with gas prices hovering around $4.00 in New Jersey, consumers are already feeling the pinch and are reducing their consumption without the government getting an additional penny. That's bothering the tax and spenders, who have wanted to increase those gas taxes to force social change.

For all the talk in the media about how the economy is in a recession, or is in something like a recession, what would another $.50 hike do to business? It would most certainly push the economy into a recession because we're fast approaching the level of energy prices that people in which they have begun to change their habits. That means spending less on other items - and a modest decrease in driving.

The market forces of supply and demand are a wonderful thing when you let them work unhindered.

The Pat Buchanan Problem

Pat Buchanan continues to get significant airtime on places like Fox News and websites like Townhall.com, despite an ongoing and recurring theme of revisionist history and anti-Semitism.

His latest pablum, as found on Townhall.com (and may have been subsequently pulled or limited in access - see LGF for the details) is a revisionist history take that claims that Hitler didn't actually intend the Holocaust and the genocide of six million Jews.

People like Sean Hannity give Buchanan ample airtime in which to discuss all manner of political issues facing the country on a daily basis, and yet they do not question him over his odious positions. That has to change.

I would suggest that for those people who are sufficiently upset over Buchanan's prominence in the media to step up and write to those media outlets, specifically Fox, Sean Hannity, and Townhall, to express your displeasure about giving Buchanan an outlet.

His brand of revisionism and hatred has no place in the media:

I am writing to express my extreme displeasure of knowing that you continue to give Pat Buchanan airtime and an outlet for exposure despite his ongoing rewriting of history and anti-Semitic attitudes.

He has repeatedly made statements that are offensive, including that Hitler didn't actually set out to kill the Jews. That couldn't be further from the historical record, which shows that Hitler was very interested in doing just that, and expanded his interests in doing so as he accumulated power and Germany's war machine overran vast Jewish populations in Poland and Russia.

The Holocaust was inevitable because people did not choose to stand up against the evil of Hitler when they had the chance, not because we didn't give in to his demands.

While Buchanan was once a speechwriter and politically connected Republican whose views made him a one-time presidential candidate, he should be rightfully shunned for his anti-Semitic and revisionist history. He has no place in being prominently promoted on your outlet.

Thank you for your prompt attention.

Sincerely,

lawhawk

UPDATE:
I've submitted a version of this letter to Sean Hannity, who frequently has Buchanan appear as a guest, Hugh Hewitt, whose blog appears on Townhall.com, and the folks at Townhall.com. We'll let you know if a response is forthcoming.

UPDATE:
Gateway Pundit lays into Buchanan and those who post his anti-Semitic revisionist rantings. So does IrishSpy.

Dump the Pump

That's a nice catchy line proffered by New Jersey Transit to encourage people to take mass transit instead of driving as the prices at the pump continue to rise. Brochures were distributed on trains yesterday as part of a campaign to get people to use mass transit.

They note that there's capacity on a whole bunch of their trains.

There are two problems with this campaign. The first is that the ad campaign is targeting the wrong people. People using the trains are already on mass transit - you're not getting anyone additional into the system that way. You need to get other people who are not already using mass transit, and an ad campaign that ignores this is going to fall flat.

The second relates to capacity not of the trains, but of the parking lots that feed the trains. There isn't any capacity. If you look at the brochure, you'll see that there's plenty of capacity on the River Line (no one uses it and it's a black hole of debt), and limited capacity on some Main Line train stops, but there's no capacity at any Northeast Corridor, Bergen Line, Morris and Essex and Raritan Valley and extremely limited parking available at nearly all North Jersey Coast, and Montclair-Boonton, and all Pascack Valley Line stations save one.

Where exactly are all those drivers supposed to go and park in order to take the trains? The NJ Transit brochure helpfully points out that commuters should get someone else to drop them off. This is as inconvenient as it gets, and shows just how misguided NJ Transit is in their efforts to get people to use mass transit.

Without sufficient parking at the stops where people want to use the trains, people are forced to commute by car, whether they want to or not. Building new parking in places where there is no demand isn't going to help matters.

NJ Transit will build a park and ride at Secaucus, which could help with congestion going to the Lincoln and Holland Tunnel, but it still requires commuters to drive to Secaucus. It doesn't get those people off the road at their closest stations.

It's a good thing I live close to the Radburn train station to walk, since there's no parking there either. I would have to radically alter my work schedule to get to the station early enough for a spot, and that's not an option for many people. Building additional parking is often opposed by local communities, which also restrict on street parking near the stations to prevent people from commuting. It's a misguided policy that needs serious reconsideration.

New York State Considers Cancer Incidence Map Availablity

This information has been collected by the State Department of Health for years, but a new state proposal would make the database available to the public.

The online map would also plot where industrial facilities like power plants and chemical factories are located.

Cancer awareness advocates and supporters of the plan say they are unaware of any other state that culls and reports cancer data in such a way.

The Health Department already publishes on its Web site, www.health.state.ny.us, maps that depict the number of cancer cases in each county. But the measure approved by the Legislature would require the department to plot cancer cases by census bloc, the smallest geographic entity that the federal government uses to tabulate information for its decennial census. The federal National Cancer Institute also provides county-by-county maps of cancer cases for the entire country going back decades.

Supporters of the maps argue that they provide an essential public service by letting people know whether the area where they live has an unusually high number of people with cancer. But others say that geographical cancer data is too prone to misinterpretation, especially by people without medical training, and that they lead the public to see a cause-and-effect relationship that is not necessarily there.

Senator Thomas W. Libous, a Republican from Binghamton who sponsored the bill in the Senate, said that while not every area with a high rate of cancer has something in the environment causing it, he believes some areas do.

I think this is a very good idea, though I expect some people will come away with misinformation from the data collected - assuming causality where none exists. Then again, some researchers might find that the data is useful in evaluating environmental claims and tracking down possible causes for cancer clusters.

I hope that other states take a cue from New York and release data in a similar fashion.

UPDATE:
Fixed the title to clarify that this was passed by the legislature and still needs to be enacted into law.

Zimbabwean Elections in Doubt

While some reports indicate that the Zimbabwean opposition, led by Morgan Tsvangirai will participate in the runoff elections on June 27 and is urging his supporters to participate despite the threat of violence, some reports are suggesting that he might pull out because even the opposition realizes that this is nothing more than a sham election since Mugabe has no intention of abiding by the results.

Zimbabwe’s main opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) candidate Morgan Tsvangirai is considering pulling out of next week’s runoff presidential election, a party source told Britain’s BBC network Friday. Meanwhile, President Robert Mugabe said he won’t retire until he is sure that “the land is truly and safely in the hands of the black majority,” state media reported Friday.

South African radio said Tsvangirai was citing the escalating violence against his supporters by followers of Mugabe as one reason for pulling out of the runoff election.

Senior MDC leaders were meeting in Zimbabwe’s capital Harare to discuss whether or not to take part in the run-off, the BBC reported. It was not clear if a decision would be taken at the meeting.

More than 70 opposition supporters have been killed since the March 29 presidential and parliamentary elections, the opposition has reported. Mugabe’s ZANU-PF party has held the opposition itself responsible for the violence.

Apparently, Tsvangirai and the opposition isn't sufficient black enough for Mugabe, whose economic policies have included forcible removal of white landowners from their lands and installing his cronies in government positions.

Mugabe's thugs have rolled out all manner of charges and intimidation against the MDC, including claims that they are engaging in treason and subversion and vote rigging, despite the clear evidence that the only group engaging in such activities are Mugabe's own ZANU-PF thugs.

UPDATE:
Added the photo of Tsvangirai.

Broken Promises

It didn't take long did it. Hamas and Israel are supposedly involved in a truce in Gaza, and Hamas has even said that they would act as thought the truce was extended to the West Bank.

How much do you want to bet that this attack in the West Bank that injured two Israelis will not count towards the truce breaking.

Palestinian gunmen opened fire on two Israeli hikers not far from Ramallah.

Two Israeli hikers were wounded Friday in a terror attack in the Binyamin region, northwest of Ramallah.

According to initial reports, a group of four or five hikers was shot at by Palestinian terrorists in a passing vehicle.

The two casualties, who were hit in the upper body, were treated at the scene by a medic, who was apparently one of the hikers.

The hikers alerted rescue and security services who were on their way to the location.

MDA reported that one of the casualties was seriously wounded and the other was in moderate condition, stressing that both were fully conscious.

This report notes three injured in the attack. And Hamas has reported that it will act as though there's a West Bank truce. Right. Stop laughing. I'm serious. They actually said this before the latest terrorist attack by Palestinian gunmen in the West Bank.

Will they claim that this attack was launched by some faction beyond their control? I'm pretty sure that's exactly what they'll do. They'll blame Fatah or another faction to claim that they're undermining the process, even though they fully condone such activities.

And this statement by one of the Hamas thugs tells you all you need to know. The truce is nothing but a sham - a hudna to give the terrorist group a chance to regroup and rearm. Israel and the rest of the world gave it to them, and Israel will suffer more for it.

UPDATE:
Hamas says that they'll continue smuggling in the weapons, equipment, and personnel to fight the war against Israel regardless of the hudna. No kidding. I warned you.

Congress Comes To Agreement On Revised FISA

This is sure to chafe the leftists and left-wing Democrats, but a deal has been struck to revise the FISA surveillance law. It's not a perfect law by any stretch, but not for the reasons that the left complains.

The big problem that has prevented passage related to telecommunications company immunity. Some 40 lawsuits have been initiated against those companies, and this law has to deal with that instance.

Democrats refused to give the companies immunity despite their critical assistance in enabling the US to listen in on enemy communications into the US from foreign countries. Republicans wanted to give such companies immunity since they were doing so in the best interests of the nation.

So, what is the provision at issue? This:

Notwithstanding any other provision of law, a civil action may not lie or be maintained in a Federal or State court against any person for providing assistance to an element of the intelligence community, and shall be promptly dismissed, if the Attorney General certifies to the district court of the United States in which such action is pending that...the assistance alleged to have been provided by the electronic communication service provider was in connection with an intelligence activity involving communications that was authorized by the President during the period beginning on September 11, 2001, and ending on January 17, 2007.

Well, here's what will probably happen. Leftists will wail and seethe, but they will be able to sue the telecoms. The Attorney General, however, gets the right to essentially waive those actions and bring an end to such suits. All the AG has to do is certify to the court where the action is pending that the surveillance was done subject to the authority of the President in the period at question.

That is a whole lot of power in the hands of the AG, but that's where it's headed. It also reinforces the importance of winning elections since whoever becomes President nominates the Attorney General, and will have the final say on whether such suits will be brought forth.

Those lawsuits may persist in the courts for some time to come, which means the next President will have some influence over the outcome today.

Not an ideal situation to say the least since it becomes a political one rather than a straight legal one (you've either given them immunity or not).

UPDATE:
Here's the full text of the changes at issue for immunity purposes under Section 802:

`(a) Intervention by Government- In any covered civil action, the court shall permit the Government to intervene. Whether or not the Government intervenes in the civil action, the Attorney General may submit any information in any form the Attorney General determines is appropriate and the court shall consider all such submissions.

`(b) Factual and Legal Determinations- In any covered civil action, any party may submit to the court evidence, briefs, arguments, or other information on any matter with respect to which a privilege based on state secrets is asserted. The court shall review any such submission in accordance with the procedures set forth in section 106(f) and may, based on the review, make any appropriate determination of fact or law. The court may, on motion of the Attorney General, take any additional actions the court deems necessary to protect classified information. The court may, to the extent practicable and consistent with national security, request that any party present briefs and arguments on any legal question the court determines is raised by such a submission even if that party does not have full access to the submission. The court shall consider whether the employment of a special master or an expert witness, or both, would facilitate proceedings under this section.

`(c) Location of Review- The court may conduct the review in a location and facility specified by the Attorney General as necessary to ensure security.

`(d) Removal- A covered civil action that is brought in a State court shall be deemed to arise under the Constitution and laws of the United States and shall be removable under section 1441 of title 28, United States Code.

`(e) Special Rule for Certain Cases- For any covered civil action alleging that a person provided assistance to an element of the intelligence community pursuant to a request or directive during the period from September 11, 2001 through January 17, 2007, the Attorney General shall provide to the court any request or directive related to the allegations under the procedures set forth in subsection (b).

`(f) Applicability- This section shall apply to a civil action pending on or filed after the date of the enactment of this Act.'.

UPDATE:
Hot Air wonders how much data was lost due to Congress dithering over the act despite bipartisan support and Senate support for telecom immunity. Good question, and one that we hope isn't answered

Marines Want Another Crack at Lt. Col. Chessani

Despite a judge dismissing the charges without prejudice, the US Marine Corps is looking to reinstate the charges against Lt. Col Jeffrey Chessani in relation to their claim of dereliction of duty.

The appeal was filed, but cited no basis for its appeal. It is almost as though they were going through the motions as the Marine Corps had three days in which to file the appeal.

Chessani, 44, is charged with dereliction of duty and failure to obey a direct order for not launching a war-crimes investigation into the killings.

Folsom ruled that Mattis erred by allowing Col. John Ewers, a Marine lawyer, to attend meetings where the Haditha prosecutions were discussed. Ewers was one of the lead investigators early in the case and most likely would be a key witness if Chessani goes to court-martial.

In its filing with the appeals court, the prosecution did not cite any basis for its appeal. Folsom had given prosecutors three days to appeal his ruling. He also permitted the Marine Corps to refile the charges although he ruled that the refiling would have to be done by a new convening authority not connected to the Camp Pendleton-based Marine Forces Central Command.

Considering that the charges against six of the seven other people indicted in the Haditha incident were exonerated or had the charges dropped, this is likely the only way that the prosecution could hedge its bets to get a single conviction, if any are to be had.

Bang for the Buck

If you think that buying a hybrid vehicle will guarantee your best bang for your pocketbook, you may be surprised to learn that it isn't always the case. This is a combination of both EPA gas mileage and purchase price for the vehicle.

Consumers Reports found that the Honda Fit did better:

Drawing on a price that's under $16,000 and good fuel economy in the low-to-mid 30's, both versions of the Honda Fit we've tested topped the list. That shows that you can pay more for a car with higher gas-mileage numbers (such as the Toyota Prius), but you won't necessarily get better fuel economy for the buck.

If you want a roomier car than the subcompact Fit, several compact cars made the list, including the Mazda3, Honda Civic, and Hyundai Elantra. And, despite their higher cost, three hybrids-two versions of the Toyota Prius and the Honda Civic Hybrid-made the list, based on stellar fuel economy results.

The lowest price per mpg in our analysis came from the Toyota Yaris and Hyundai Accent with manual transmissions ($370 and $425, respectively). But because they scored too low in our tests to be recommended, they didn't make the cut. Which cars are highest? With the Dodge Viper SRT10 and Mercedes-Benz SL550, you'll pay more than $6,000 for every mile-per-gallon. And you'll have to feed these engines requiring Premium fuel, as well.

The car I drive, a Toyota Corolla LE gets very respectable gas mileage, but didn't make the top 10 cut. This all goes to the notion that people think that they can save money by trading in or buying a hybrid, when in fact they may end up paying more out of pocket costs by going to a hybrid than buying a conventionally powered vehicle based on the higher initial costs for such vehicles over their conventionally powered peers.

There are some other factors that aren't necessarily clear from the article - the cost per gallon as figured by Consumers Reports, and whether there is a price point at which it becomes better to get the hybrid. I suspect that we're not quite at that price point yet.

Soft on Terror

Ralph Peters notes just how the media has not only given Sen. Barack Obama a pass on his national security statements relating to the war on terror, but that Obama's statements are stunningly naive.

In fact, I think Peters is pulling his punches here. Obama is not only calling for a return to the law enforcement model that was such a stunning failure in the 1990s, but he thinks that the current war on terror has made the US less safe despite the fact that there haven't been any attacks on the US homeland since 9/11.

The law enforcement model is good for what it does. It brings to justice those that have already committed crimes. Obama points out that the perpetrators from the 1993 WTC bombing were brought to justice. That wasn't entirely true - several did manage to evade arrest or capture, including Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and Ramzi Yousef until years later, and not before they attempted or carried out still other mass casualty attacks.

To defeat terrorists, you need to do more than just wait until the terrorists carry out the attacks and then use forensics to determine who carried them out after pulling the bodies from the rubble.

You need to use all the national security means at your disposal. That means using covert intelligence operations and military operations to attack the terrorists wherever they are operation. It means not relying on law enforcement to prevent attacks because law enforcement works best to apprehend terrorists after the attacks have been carried out.

That's why the US remains in Iraq and why the US engages in air strike operations in places like Pakistan, Yemen, Somalia, and elsewhere in the world. That's where the terrorists of al Qaeda have operated from and continue to operate. Afghanistan is an ongoing problem, which is why the US remains engaged there as well. Abandoning Iraq as Obama has proposed in the past would cede that country to terrorists and those that wish to do harm to the US, our strategic interests, and those of our allies in the region and beyond.

By fighting al Qaeda and degrading their capabilities and leadership, you put them at a disadvantage since they have to spend more time evading detection, capture, and death, rather than plotting more attacks.

So It Begins

The road to ruin for Zimbabwe is now littered with the bodies of opposition leaders and their wives. They were murdered by Robert Mugabe's thugs.

A spokesman for the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) blamed President Robert Mugabe's ZANU-PF party for the deaths, saying they bring to 70 the number of MDC party members killed since a bitterly contested election three months ago.

The body of the mayor's wife, 27-year-old Abigail Chiroto, was found in a mortuary close to the couple's house north of Harare. She had been beaten so severely with rocks and iron bars that her face was almost unrecognizable, said MDC spokesman Nelson Chamisa.

"It's way out of the ordinary. It's callous," he said.

Chiroto was kidnapped, along with her four-year-old son, on Tuesday. Some of her kidnappers wore military uniforms, Chamisa said.

If one wants to know who has started the violence, look no further than Mugabe. He's clearly stated he has no intention of giving up power and the election on June 27 will be nothing but a sham because Mugabe will not abide by the results, just as he ignored the earlier results.

Zimbabwe is now under control of a dictator.

Injuries Sideline Tiger Woods For Rest of PGA Season

It was simply astounding watching Tiger Woods do everything but crawl around Torrey Pines and win the US Open on the 91st hole of the tournament in sudden death over Rocco Mediate. We saw the limp. We saw the grimaces. We knew that he had just had arthroscopic surgery on his knee and was back sooner than we expected, but what we didn't know is that his medical condition was far worse than he ever let on.

He was playing the tournament with a torn ACL and a double stress fracture of his tibia, which will require season ending surgery and rehabilitation.

Tiger Woods is done for the year, but not without one last major that he said might have been his best ever.

Woods explained why Wednesday when he revealed he will have season-ending surgery to repair a torn ligament in his left knee that he injured 10 months ago.

He also suffered a double stress fracture of his left tibia two weeks before the U.S. Open, ignoring doctors’ advice to take six weeks off to let it heal. And he still won the U.S. Open at Torrey Pines, going 91 holes over five days on a knee that was getting worse.

And he still won.

That, right there folks, is why Tiger Woods is the most impressive golfer on the planet.

Imagine being another golfer competing in a tournament with Tiger and knowing that even on Tiger's worst days - playing with broken bones and a torn ACL, he still beat you. How demoralizing is that?

And the only thing that will keep Tiger from becoming the best golfer in the history of game are injuries such as the one that will keep him from attending a Major for the first time in his career. Still, he remains on a pace to shatter the all time record for majors in a career held by Jack Nicklaus.

McCain Goes Nuclear

Republican Presidential hopeful John McCain has offered up his latest idea for how to improve the energy situation in the US. He proposes the construction of 45 new nuclear power plants across the nation. That would increase the number of plants by 50% to 149. This, a day after his speech in which he called for offshore drilling, hits home the energy policy of doing nothing - which is what Congress and the Administration have done for decades. Even President Bush has come around to call for the end of the moratorium on offshore drilling because of the price of oil.

Watch for Obama and others to complain that nuclear power is not the answer. Sen. Harry Reid has an important say on any nuclear power plant construction since he's blocked the use of the nation's only nuclear waste repository from going live at Yucca Mountain.

Electricity generated by those nuclear power plants would be years into the future, but it would help establish the infrastructure from which other technologies could be rolled out, including plug in hybrids and other vehicles that do not have tailpipe emissions of today's vehicles. The current infrastructure is lacking the capacity to handle widespread plug-in usage.

Nothing that Obama has proposed as an energy policy actually creates one new kilowatt of energy or one additional gallon of oil - the economy on which the world relies. And petroleum is used for more than just heating and transportation. It's used in the creation of thousands of products.

Instead, he focuses on global warming and carbon emissions and taxes - taxing energy companies and using taxes as incentives to engage in research, which may never amount to anything or would go to areas of research that those companies are already engaging in without any incentives. Reducing carbon emissions takes precedence to actually generating power on which the nation relies.

UPDATE:
On cue, the Democrats in the House of Representatives have opened their collective mouths and offered up one of the worst ideas since Marx laid the foundation to communism.

These nitwits want to nationalize the nation's refineries. Yes folks, nationalizing the few remaining refineries in the US will somehow solve the nation's energy woes - the lack of stable supply, lack of domestic production, and the inability to build new refineries within the US.

This is what the Democrats are offering up in spades come November.

UPDATE:
Today's call to nationalize the country's refineries is on the heels of Rep. Maxine Waters suggesting nationalization of the oil industry.

This is all that the Democrats have to offer - socialism.

UPDATE:
Hot Air has the video and more analysis, including that they question why the oil industry was ever in private hands to begin with.

The whole notion of nationalizing the oil industry has been kicking around the ivory towers for a good long time, even though nationalizing has never actually been shown to improve whatever service one examines.

Kim at Wizbang also weighs in on Rep. Maurice Hinchey's (D-NY) comments.

Peddling Fear

The climate change junk science peddlers have moved on from their claims that the polar bears will die off unless we act now. They're now claiming that humpback whales and other whale species could die off unless we act to stop climate change.

Jammie has the details of that.

That follows speculation that colony collapse disorder affecting honeybees was also the result of global warming and the latest craziness from the econuts who think that the salmonella poisoning from tomatoes was due to global warming. Here's a note to the budding environmentalists. Salmonella poisoning is due to a bacteria - salmonella, which is commonly found in feces. Global warming has no part in such contamination. Hygiene does.

Is there anything that cannot be attributed to global warming even though the actual science is razor thin on such endeavors?

Oh wait, there is one thing.

Al Gore has yet to reduce his carbon footprint. Even after claiming to make his home more eco-friendly, it draws more power this year than it did last year. Gore's press flacks say that Gore buys power from alternative green energy sources, as though the kilowatts don't count.

Sorry, but he's still using more than the average American. To be more precise, more than 232 average Americans per year.

In the past year, Gore’s home burned through 213,210 kilowatt-hours (kWh) of electricity, enough to power 232 average American households for a month.

In February 2007, An Inconvenient Truth, a film based on a climate change speech developed by Gore, won an Academy Award for best documentary feature. The next day, the Tennessee Center for Policy Research uncovered that Gore’s Nashville home guzzled 20 times more electricity than the average American household.

After the Tennessee Center for Policy Research exposed Gore’s massive home energy use, the former Vice President scurried to make his home more energy-efficient. Despite adding solar panels, installing a geothermal system, replacing existing light bulbs with more efficient models, and overhauling the home’s windows and ductwork, Gore now consumes more electricity than before the “green” overhaul.

Since taking steps to make his home more environmentally-friendly last June, Gore devours an average of 17,768 kWh per month –1,638 kWh more energy per month than before the renovations – at a cost of $16,533. By comparison, the average American household consumes 11,040 kWh in an entire year, according to the Energy Information Administration.

When Gore gets his usage down to where the rest of us mere pikers on the American energy usage information superhighway, then we'll know just how serious Gore is about global warming (or has he now latched on to climate change as the term of art since the earth is now apparently no warmer today than it was in 1998?).

UPDATE:
Now some are trying to link destructive quakes to global warming? Completely different processes at work, and if there is any explanation for why quakes are deadlier, it may have to do with a larger human population in regions prone to quakes.

And yet, in that kernel of nonsense comes one fact that seems to go completely unremarked upon:

"Increase in the annual energy of earthquakes is the strongest symptom yet of planetary overheating.

"NASA measurements from space confirm that Earth as a whole absorbs at least 0.85 Megawatt per square kilometer more energy from the Sun than it is able to radiate back to space. This 'thermal imbalance' means that heat generated in the planetary interior cannot escape and that the planetary interior must overheat. Increase in seismic, tectonic and volcanic activities is an unavoidable consequence of the observed thermal imbalance of the planet," said Dr. Chalko.

If the sun changes its output by the slightest margins, the entire planet has a different energy reading.

UPDATE 6/20/2008:
CBS has pulled that earthquakes story without comment. Apparently, someone decided to look deeper and realized that Chalko is a glorified loon and the "science" is simply junk.

Is This The Taliban Spring Offensive?

The North Shore Journal wonders whether the Taliban have been busy engaging in a military offensive without actually using its thugs in fights. They've apparently been sending propaganda to media outlets, who report that the Taliban have captured territory in Afghanistan without actually confirming that this is the case.

That isn't to say that the Taliban aren't engaging in terrorism or that they aren't engaging in the annual spring offensive.

Canadian and Afghan forces have swept through areas around Kandahar to attack Taliban assets.

Afghan and Canadian forces moved into villages outside Kandahar on Wednesday to root out Taliban militants, killing at least 23 insurgents, while an explosion elsewhere killed four British soldiers, officials said.

Troops in Arghandab district just outside of Kandahar, southern Afghanistan's largest city, exchanged fire with militants during "a few minor contacts," NATO spokesman Mark Laity said.

The Afghan Defense Ministry said more than 20 Taliban fighters had been killed in Tabin, a village in Arghandab, while three other fighters were killed in second village. Two Afghan soldiers also were killed, the ministry said in a statement.

That's on the heels of last week's prison breakout by hundreds of Taliban thugs from a Kandahar prison. And while there are believed to be several hundred Taliban in the area, the sweeps did not reveal anything:

Afghanistan's Ministry of Defense on Tuesday said between 300 and 400 militant fighters were operating in Arghandab , a lush region of pomegranate and grape fields that lies 10 miles northwest of Kandahar city, the Taliban's spiritual home.

Canadian military officials who patrolled through Arghandab over the last day reported "no obvious signs" of insurgent activity. But that didn't mean there were no Taliban there, a NATO news release said. Pentagon officials said reports of hundreds of Taliban in Arghandab were being overstated.

That said, Afghan and NATO forces killed 30 Taliban near Khost. The Afghan military has deployed additional troops to Kandahar in anticipation of a possible offensive although NATO is downplaying such talk (perhaps out of operational security concerns - after all, why telegraph your intentions to the enemy).

Meanwhile, there are reports that the Taliban have captured shipments of US made helicopter components inside Pakistan.

The components of the helicopters arrived in containers at the Karachi Port and were taken by road to Peshawar. The containers then entered the tribal areas for the journey to Afghanistan.

When the containers entered the restive Khyber Agency, Taliban stopped the convoys and took away the helicopter components. Pakistani paramilitary forces tried to confront the Taliban but 'suffered heavy losses due to darkness'.

The incident happened in the same area where Pakistan's ambassador to Afghanistan Tariq Azizuddin was kidnapped in February this year.

A Chinook heavy lift chopper and a Black Hawk multi-role helicopter were captured recently while a Cobra gunship helicopter was hijacked some weeks ago.

Diplomatic sources said a recent US air strike in Pakistan's tribal areas was actually an attack on the location where the components of two helicopters were stored by the Taliban.

When the Taliban first captured the Cobra helicopter, they filmed all the stolen components and supplied a CD to their allies in Afghanistan. Certain people in Farah province of western Afghanistan 'showed an interest in purchasing the Cobra helicopter and subsequently its parts were smuggled to Farah', the report said.

The airstrike scenario makes sense since destroying those helicopter components would be considered a high value target - both for the technologies contained within and the possibility that high level Taliban and/or al Qaeda operatives would be in the vicinity.

It also continues to throw into question the ability of the Pakistani government to secure its military technologies from al Qaeda and Taliban operatives and should make the US rethink how those technologies are transferred to Pakistan.

Honeybees Recovering in New Jersey?

Reports have been warning about the problems with bee colonies being decimated by what scientists were calling colony collapse disorder. They believe that some unknown pathogen was causing bee colonies to die off in mass numbers, and some wondered whether if enough bees died off that it would imperil a multitude of crops.

It appears now that the worries may have been overcome. At least in New Jersey, bee populations are on the rebound due to some favorable climate conditions and a gentle assist from beekeepers.

Swarms form when a colony gets too big, and a colony gets too big when it has healthy bees. Typically, the old queen will leave with half the worker bees that load up with honey and follow her to a new location. General merriment follows, something that's been in short supply in the bee world for decades, said Schuler.

The honeybee population dipped after the 1940s when people moved from rural settings to urban ones and abandoned beekeeping, said Schuler. In the 1980s, a parasitic mite entered the United States and devastated wild colonies. In the last two years a mysterious ailment called Colony Collapse Disorder killed millions of bees and destroyed their colonies.

This year, however, Mother Nature seemed to create conditions that favor bees -- a mild winter and, what Schuler believes, may be a growing immunity to the parasitic mites. While swarming isn't related to Colony Collapse Disorder, the new colonies that form will help replace those that were lost.

As a result, beekeepers have been busy answering calls about honeybee populations that settle down, sometimes in the least desirable of places.

"I have been so busy I can't keep up with calls," said Robert Simonofsky, a beekeeper from Annandale and a member of the New Jersey Beekeepers Association, who has removed swarms in Hunterdon, Warren, Somerset, Mercer and Monmouth counties this year.

One thing to keep in mind is if you do happen to come across a bee infestation on your property, get in touch with a beekeeper, and not a pest exterminator. The beekeeper will not only help remove the bees, but help establish new colonies of these beneficial insects.

This Is What They Mean By Truce

Hamas is supposedly going to engage in a truce starting tomorrow. So, they apparently have no problem firing off as many kassam rockets as they possibly can until then. They're clearly trying to provoke the Israelis into engaging in an airstrike that would come after the truce supposedly goes into effect.

Israel, by falling for this truce, will not improve its security posture because the terrorists will take advantage of the situation to regroup and rearm. They will see this as a major victory over Israel.

Israel is also saying that the truce includes a provision relating to Gilad Shalit, but Hamas has said that Shalit is not part of the deal. I'm not surprised by any of this because Olmert and the diplomats think that they can trust the terrorists, who have no intention of releasing Shalit without serious compensation in return - the release of hundreds of terrorists from Israeli jails.

Olmert says that this truce may bring quiet to Israel's southern communities, but people should know better. Hamas and the other terrorists will still find a way to attack Israel and claim that they haven't violated the truce - including creating "splinter" terror factions to carry out the attacks.

Poll results reported by the Jerusalem Post (and apparently taken by left wing organizations) show that many Israelis think that the government's ongoing policy towards Gaza has not worked and Hamas is stronger now than a year ago. What the poll doesn't offer up is whether Israelis would actually have wanted a stronger military response instead of the one that Prime Minister Olmert provided.

An overwhelming majority - 83 percent - of Israelis surveyed believed that Hamas has strengthened since closure was imposed on Gaza, while 68% said they believe that Israel's security situation had worsened since that time. The closure of the Gaza Strip will not end Palestinian support for Hamas, according to 78 percent of respondents, and 60% said the closure is making life so difficult for Gazans that it is likely to cause more support for Islamic extremism.

Meanwhile, the Knesset is moving closer to passing a bill that would require a referendum and a supermajority to deal away the Golan Heights. The politicians appear to have learned something from the Gaza disengagement, which was that returning land to Israel's enemies is no guarantee of peace.

UPDATE:
Elder of Ziyon notes what happened the last time Hamas and Israel engaged in a "truce." Hamas violated it immediately and fired hundreds of rockets at Israel for six months before Israel finally responded with significant force. Israel endured hundreds of attacks while the government dithered.

UPDATE:
More than 50 mortars and rockets have slammed into Israel since this morning courtesy of the Palestinian terrorists. Yet, we're supposed to believe that Hamas will hold to a truce?

Reversing Course on Drilling

President Bush has reversed course on the disruptive energy policy that prevents exploration and development of offshore oil fields. He now calls upon Congress to lift the moratorium on drilling on the federal Outer Continental Shelf. With gas prices at $4 a gallon, the exploration and development of those resources could bring the price of oil down over time as well as reduce reliance on foreign oil.

Democrats have generally opposed the offshore drilling, as have some Republicans who represent coastal states claiming that they worry about the potential harm to tourism and the economy from spills.

Bush also will reiterate his call for development of oil in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska, Perino said. McCain has opposed drilling in the refuge, maintaining that the pristine areas in northeastern Alaska should be protected from energy development.

On Monday, McCain made lifting the federal ban on offshore oil and gas development a key part of his energy plan. The Arizona senator said states should be allowed to pursue energy exploration in waters near their coasts and receive some of the royalty revenue.

Bush has made clear in recent weeks that the drilling moratorium in coastal waters should end to allow for more domestic oil production and help "take the pressure off the price of gasoline."

Democrats, as well as some Republican senators from coastal states, have opposed lifting the drilling prohibitions, fearful that energy development could harm tourism and raise the risk of oil spills on beaches.

Sen. Barack Obama, the Democratic candidate for president, opposes lifting the ban on offshore drilling and says that allowing exploration now wouldn't affect gasoline prices for at least five years.

Congress imposed the drilling moratorium in 1981 and has extended it each year since by prohibiting the Interior Department from spending money on offshore oil or gas leases in virtually all coastal waters outside the western Gulf of Mexico and in some areas off Alaska.

Obama is somewhat correct that the exploration wouldn't affect prices for at least five years. It would probably take five years or so for oil to come to the market from those locations, but the fact that the US is now drilling and exploiting those oil fields would affect prices because speculators would now have to contend with new reserves coming to market.

Further Obama thinks that drilling is a bad idea altogether. The complaint that it would not affect prices is mere cover for the fact that he doesn't seem to mind the higher prices.

The Democratic Party leadership also opposes the drilling, claiming that this is simply a sham and that the oil companies are behind this latest move to allow drilling. Never mind, of course, that the oil companies are at the mercy of the international marketplace and foreign countries dominate the world's oil supply, not domestic oil companies.

After hearing of Mr. Bush’s proposal on Tuesday night, Mr. Reid affirmed his opposition, saying, “The Energy Information Administration says that even if we open the coasts to oil drilling that won’t have a significant impact on prices.”

And the House speaker, Nancy Pelosi, said, “The president’s proposal sounds like another page from the administration’s energy policy that was literally written by the oil industry: give away more public resources to the very same oil companies that are sitting on 68 million acres of federal lands they’ve already leased.”

The Congressional moratorium was first enacted in 1982, and has been renewed every year since. It prohibits oil and gas leasing on most of the outer continental shelf, 3 miles to 200 miles offshore. Since 1990, it has been supplemented by the first President Bush’s executive order, which directed the Interior Department not to conduct offshore leasing or preleasing activity in areas covered by the legislative ban until 2000. In 1998, President Bill Clinton extended the offshore leasing prohibition until 2012. One person familiar with the deliberations inside the White House said that Mr. Bush was briefed on Tuesday by his top aides, including Joshua B. Bolten, the chief of staff, and that the aides recommended lifting the executive order.

On Capitol Hill, Republicans are proposing several bills to undo the ban. They differ on how close to shore drilling could begin, but all would give states a veto on oil exploration within 100 miles of their coastlines. Ms. Perino said Mr. Bush believed Congress should pass one of the bills, so the federal government and the states could work together to share revenues from exploration.

The issue does not fall entirely along party lines. One prominent Republican opponent of drilling, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger of California, does not intend to change his stance, a spokesman said Tuesday. In Houston, meanwhile, Mr. McCain, who has long been at odds with Mr. Bush on another environmental issue, climate change, tried to distance himself from the White House.

The Democrats are squarely pushing the notion that higher prices are acceptable, and that the way to solve the problem is through taxing those same oil companies even more as though that will somehow encourage them to make more oil or reduce the price of oil.

The ongoing "policy" by Democrats reeks of a failure to understand Economics 101 and supply and demand. The failure to drill and produce oil domestically does affect the prices - sending them higher. It does increase reliance on parts of the world that are volatile and sends billions of dollars to regimes that are antithetical to the US and Western interests.

By standing in the way of drilling, the Democrats expose themselves for what they are - no interest in lowering prices except through demagoguery.

Lawsuit of the Day

I'm curious how this actually happened. A woman claims that she was putting on her Victoria's Secret Sexy Little Thing V-string panties, when a metallic piece flew off the panties and hit her in the eye causing injury.

Just so we know the item we're talking about, I've provided a handy dandy link.

This woman has decided to sue Victoria's Secret on that injury claim. She's suing under a products liability action, and claims loss of wages, medical costs, and general damages.

Good luck with that suit because according to The Smoking Gun:

Patterson's lawyer, Jason Buccat, told TSG that a "design problem" caused the decorative piece to come loose and strike Patterson in the eye, causing damage to her cornea. He added that the eye injury, which caused Patterson to miss a few days of work, will be "affecting her the rest of her life." Patterson is a traffic officer with L.A.'s Department of Transportation. Prior to the lawsuit's filing, Victoria's Secret officials asked to examine the garment and the decorative piece, but that request was rejected by Patterson's counsel.

Mental images of how this accident occurred are being developed as I write.

Another Haditha Marine Set To Be Cleared? UPDATE: Cleared

Someone get Rep. John Murtha (D-PA) on the line because his claims that the Haditha Marines engaged in cold blooded murder appears to be nothing more than a libel and bluster meant to intimidate and cow the Marines into taking disciplinary actions for a regrettable incident where civilians lost their lives in the middle of a warzone.

Six Marines have already been cleared. Two remain in the legal spotlight, SSgt. Frank Wuterich and Lt. Col. Jeffery Chessani and Chessani's case is being moved up today for a one hour hearing later today:

Officials with the law center today said Col. Steven Folson, the military judge assigned to the case, “informed counsel that the hearing in the Chessani case, originally scheduled for three days, June 16-18, has been changed to only one hour on Tuesday, June 17, 2008, at 9 a.m. PST.

“Col. Folsom indicated that the only business he will address is his ruling on the defense motion to dismiss Lt. Col. Jeffery Chessani’s case because of unlawful command influence,” the law center said.

Chessani was charged with dereliction of duty in failing to report the incident, which is absurd considering that he not only reported the incident up the chain of command, but provided a powerpoint presentation for the report highlighting the issues involved.

It is quite likely that Chessani's case will be dismissed with prejudice today, which sets the stage for Wuterich's case to be dismissed thereafter. So, after all of the bluster and anti-war and anti-Marine rhetoric, not a single charge stuck. Color me surprised at this - the investigation turned up no wrongdoing. The deaths of the civilians is certainly regrettable, but doesn't rise to the level of criminal homicide given the circumstances of the incident as it unfolded.

I'm awaiting Murtha's heaping serving of crow, but I sincerely doubt that he'll ever be held accountable for his statements. (HT: Let Freedom Ring)

UPDATE:
The charges have been dropped without prejudice, but the Marine Forces Central Command is barred from future involvement. For intents and purposes, Chessani was cleared of wrongdoing.

UPDATE:
When will we get Sen. Barack Obama's apology for trusting in Murtha's mad rush to judgment to convict and sentence the Marines involved before an investigation was even complete?

An Instructive Anniversary

I'm not talking about the Battle of Bunker Hill (even though it was fought mostly on Breed's Hill), though that is certainly to be celebrated today.

No, I'm referring to the 10th anniversary of the indictment of Osama bin Laden by the US Southern District of New York for engaging in terrorism against the United States.

How exactly did that indictment keep the country safe? Consider that the attack on the USS Cole, the Khobar Towers, and the African embassies all occurred after the indictment.

Sen. Barack Obama took the opportunity yesterday to highlight his ongoing ignorance or refusal to accept the facts such as they are in a speech yesterday:

What we know is that, in previous terrorist attacks — for example, the first attack against the World Trade Center, we were able to arrest those responsible, put them on trial. They are currently in U.S. prisons, incapacitated.

And the fact that the administration has not tried to do that has created a situation where not only have we never actually put many of these folks on trial, but we have destroyed our credibility when it comes to rule of law all around the world, and given a huge boost to terrorist recruitment in countries that say, “Look, this is how the United States treats Muslims.”

So that, I think, is an example of something that was unnecessary. We could have done the exact same thing, but done it in a way that was consistent with our laws.

Khalid Sheikh Mohammad was involved in the 1993 WTC bombing, and yet he was captured only after the US went to war in Afghanistan and flushed him out. Other terrorists implicated in the pre-2001 attacks remained at large because they were able to avoid the law enforcement approach. Still others worked their way to Iraq, where they were able to find sanctuary under Saddam Hussein.

Khobar Towers resulted in no indictments, no arrests, and no justice for the 19 Americans murdered by al Qaeda. The same goes for the USS Cole, in which the terrorists have managed to avoid justice due to the revolving door of Yemeni courts and law enforcement there that turns a blind eye to Islamic terrorists.

The Rebuilding of Ground Zero, Part 35

Well, once again, the future of the Freedom Tower is in doubt. The Port Authority, already behind schedule and watching costs soar, is looking to unload responsibility for the Freedom Tower on some developer.

Steve Cuozzo reports that Brookfield Properties and Related Cos., have both been approached to take over the construction.

PA Chairman Anthony Coscia and Executive Director Chris Ward have recently had talks with Related Cos., the Stephen Ross-led giant that created the Time Warner Center and has been chosen to develop the West Side rail yards.

Earlier this year, sources said, the PA, advised by Deutsche Bank, made a similar pitch to Brookfield Properties, the publicly traded company that owns the World Financial Center. Reps for Related and Brookfield did not return calls.

With Brookfield, a source said, "The PA was a bit vague as to how it would work, but they basically wanted to privatize the Freedom Tower. But Brookfield didn't regard the project as economically viable."

PA officials declined comment. But insiders said the agency wants a developer to form a "partnership" that would reduce its risk while bringing in a company "fully knowledgeable in their core business of real estate development."

Because the PA owns the land, a transfer would likely take the form of a long-term lease.

It was understood that any developer jumping in would not start from scratch, but complete the $3 billion tower as it's currently designed.

You know, there is one guy who will probably step forward and get the job done, though he goes relatively unmentioned in the Cuozzo article. He's the same guy who the Port Authority ousted from that job even as work was starting to get underway.

That would be Larry Silverstein.

So far, he's the only one to get anything permanent built downtown on Ground Zero land. He built 7WTC, which is highly regarded, and is still awaiting the Port Authority to turn over land so that he can build 2, 3, and 4 WTC along the Eastern side of Ground Zero.

Watch for Silverstein to come to the rescue once again.

Some Still Paying Attention in Israel

While the politicians are pushing the notion that a fragile ceasefire between Israel is possible and that it would benefit Israel's strategic security posture, the IDF is doing what the IDF must - they are not only preparing for a Gaza operation, but are continuing to attack Hamas terrorists who are plotting and/or carrying out attacks on Israel.

Israeli forces continue to make arrests of Palestinian terrorists in the West Bank as well. That never receives nearly as much press as it should, but then again, it's a daily occurrence. It fades into the background and doesn't get nearly the attention that it should. The Palestinians have not given up the ghost of defeating Israel, and a ceasefire would mask those intentions and lull the world into a false sense of security.

So, what would this supposed ceasefire look like? Well, expect lots of gunfire, mortars, and kassams, because the IDF expects it to be transitory and fragile. The latest iteration of a ceasefire proposes three phases, and none of them involve the release of Gilad Shalit. What a surprise [that's extreme sarcasm folks].

The London based, Arab-language newspaper Al-Hayat reported Tuesday that the future truce between Israel and the militant groups in Gaza will include three stages: First, a six-month truce will be declared in Gaza Strip. Three days after the truce is announced, Israel will open the Karni and Sufa crossings.

Second: The week after, Israel will left the ban places on many of the raw materials needed in the Strip, with the exception of several materials believed to be of use for rockets and launchers manufacturing, such as metal pipes and certain chemicals.

Following that, there's going to be discussions on opening the Rafah crossing.

So, Israel once again must make the most concessions since it has to open its borders to the possibility of infiltration via the crossings, and Hamas has to do what? Say that it will stop its own kassam and mortar attacks, but outsource that job to other terror groups operating in Gaza who wont abide by the truce? That's what has happened in the past, and will likely happen here.

We'll find out soon enough as the "truce" is supposed to start on Thursday.

UPDATE:
Aboo-hoo-hoo at LGF offers his own take on the three stages of the ceasefire. None actually involve the cessation of the Palestinian war on Israel.

Jammie notes that the truce will start Thursday, and will end later Thursday. Well, I agree, but the diplomats and everyone will attempt to ignore the ongoing violence unless and until Israel responds with airstrikes. Then, the media and the Palestinians will wail and seethe about Israel violating the ceasefire.

Meryl Yourish points out that the terrorists can crow about victories over Israel when Israel provides them on a silver platter by not responding to the terror attacks but instead retreating under fire.

UPDATE:
The truce wont take effect until Thursday. However, 4 kassams slammed into Israel again today. And the mortar crews were busy too.

The Mets Midnight Massacre

Even though you could sense that it was coming, the way the Mets organization handled the firing of Mets manager Willie Randolph seems downright odd. The Mets fired him and his pitching coach and first base coach two hours after winning the game against the Los Angeles Angels last night.

In a bizarrely timed housecleaning, Minaya fired Willie Randolph, pitching coach Rick Peterson and first base coach Tom Nieto shortly before midnight West Coast time (3 a.m. in New York) after all three had just returned from a 9-6 win here over the first-place Angels.

Why fire them at that point, and not the week before after losing six of seven games? Why fire them when the Mets showed signs of turning things around?

Those are the kinds of questions that will keep the sports talk radio busy for the rest of the summer. In the interim, bench coach Jerry Manuel will manage the team until a permanent replacement is found.

UPDATE:
Dueling press conferences later today. Willie goes first at 2PM, while Mets General Manager Omar Minaya goes at 5PM. Expect plenty of fireworks from the reporters, who are pissed that they had to find out about this via a press release.

Anonymous emailer points out that the Sports Hernia blog has a list of 13 ways in which the Mets could have handled the firing better:

“Hit Willie over the head with a steel chair while he makes a pitching change; then spray paint ‘F-I-R-E-D’ on his back,” as well as, “Drive him to the woods so Silvio can chase him down and shoot him in the back.”

It certainly ranks up there in the list of bizarre firings.

Utter disgrace.

WFAN and ESPN 1050 are both going to have an earful on what the Mets did. Look, most Met fans wanted Willie gone, but I think it's pretty near unanimous that people don't like the way the Mets did it. Classless comes to mind. Cowardly. Inane. Stupid.

UPDATE:
This is just pathetic. Minaya says that logistics prevented the Mets from firing Willie before the road trip.

Mets general manager Omar Minaya said there was no way to avoid firing Willie Randolph in California, on the first day of a six-game trip, because of "logistics."

What logistics in particular? The inability to find someone before 3:14AM EDT to inform Willie he's been fired? Sorry, but we can't fire you until after you're on the West Coast because your bags were already loaded on the plane? We wanted to make sure that your uniform was in the laundry?

The Stability Fallacy

The peace process. Negotiations between Hamas and Israel. Conflict avoidance. All are undertaken in the name of seeking stability in the Middle East.

Since when is stability a good thing in a region where all too many regimes seek to do the US (or Israel) harm?

Since when is stability a good thing in a region where those decisions to stabilize matters means that terrorist groups end up having a veto over the democratic government in Lebanon?

Since when is stability a good thing when a terrorist group gets to set up shop on the border with Israel and continues a war of attrition?

Stability is now the name of the game since President Bush has only months left in his term as President. So, that's why we get Secretary of State Condi Rice peddling stability as an end unto itself. She now says that power-sharing in Lebanon between Hizbullah and the other political factions is necessary.

U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Monday she welcomes a new power-sharing arrangement in Lebanon even though it increased the power of Hezbollah militants at the expense of U.S.-backed moderates.

"Obviously in any compromise there are compromises," Rice said during a surprise visit to meet Lebanon's new consensus choice for president. The election of former army chief, Michel Suleiman, last month is the clearest sign that Lebanon stepped back from the brink and that the deal with Iranian-backed Hezbollah is taking hold.

Hezbollah's ascendancy is a bitter pill for the U.S., which is worried that Iran's influence is spreading in the Middle East and had spent millions backing the Lebanese government for three years.

Rice's blessing is a sign that the Bush administration has accepted that Western-backed democratic leaders who helped Lebanon throw off three decades of Syrian domination could not govern the country alone. Lebanese politics operate on ambiguity and consensus, and in this case that meant giving veto power to Hezbollah, a militia and political force that the United States lists as a terrorist group.

Where does one start with this muddled mess that supposedly passes as analysis by MSNBC?

Syria is still in charge in Lebanon, precisely through its proxy force in the face of Hizbullah. They are still pulling the strings. The Syrians might not have their armed soldiers roaming the streets, but Hizbullah has enabled them to retain control and expand the sphere of influence for both Syria and Iran. Millions of Lebanese will suffer more for it.

The compromise that made the situation in Lebanon a reality came about because the March 14 lost its will to stand up for what it believed in and the belief that accommodation with Hizbullah would prevent a bloody civil war. Never mind that Hizbullah already engaged in a destructive war with Israel and seeks to do so once again. By deciding to cave now, the likelihood for an even more destructive war in the future is all too real. Hizbullah hasn't changed its motivations, and by controlling what happens in Lebanon, it can game the system wholly to its benefit.

And that means that the Lebanese lose. Israel loses. And the notion of stability loses.

Stan Winston Dies of Cancer at 62

If that's not a name that sounds familiar to you, then perhaps his work does.

The Wiz. Predator. Terminator. Jurassic Park. Aliens.

He was the man behind the special makeup effects that gave Arnold Schwarzenegger his menace in Terminator and brought all manner of creature to life in countless movies. For his achievements and advancements in technology, he won four Academy Awards.

"The entertainment industry has lost a genius, and I lost one of my best friends with the death Sunday night of Stan Winston," Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger said in a statement. "Stan's work and four Oscars speak for themselves and will live on forever. What will live forever in my heart is the way that Stan loved everyone and treated each of his friends like they were family."

Winston won visual effects Oscars for 1986's "Aliens," 1992's "Terminator 2: Judgment Day" and 1993's "Jurassic Park." He also won a makeup Oscar for 1992's "Batman Returns."

Winston was nominated for his work on "Heartbeeps," "Predator," "Edward Scissorhands," "Batman Returns," "The Lost World: Jurassic Park" and "A.I." He last worked with director Jon Favreau on "Iron Man."

At the time of his death, Winston was in the process of transforming his physical makeup and effects studio into the new Winston Effects Group with a team of senior effects supervisors. Winton's most recent projects included "Terminator Salvation: The Future Begins," "G.I. Joe," "Shutter Island" and Cameron's "Avatar."

His lasting legacy in the industry is perhaps matched by the great Ray Harryhausen, who was a great source of inspiration.

Obama To Get The Critical Gore Endorsement

That's right folks, it's official. Former Vice President Al Gore has determined that the time is right to endorse Barack Obama for President.

What a way to make a principled stand. He waited to see who might win the nomination in the fight between Hillary Clinton and Obama, and didn't throw his support behind either candidate until the race was over.

How exactly does that help Obama? It certainly doesn't help with timing. Had Gore thrown his support behind Obama a month or two ago, it might have hastened Clinton's departure from the race and therefore made it easier to heal the wounds within the Democratic party.

Instead, we see Gore's political savvy shine through, which is to say that his timing is once again off.

Talk Is Cheap

We're hearing plenty of news reports these days about talks between Hamas and Israel and Hizbullah and Israel. The talks revolve around all of the same contentions from two years ago, and resolution still remains wholly in the hands of the terrorists since they are the ones holding Israeli soldiers after capturing them in infiltration operations designed to force Israel to release hundreds of terrorists from Israeli jails.

First, there's the talk of Hizbullah releasing Regev and Goldwasser. Regev's father has been told that a prisoner swap is receiving serious consideration. Why would Israel do such a thing considering that Hizbullah will see this as nothing more than an opportunity to attempt yet another infiltration operation to capture still more Israelis with the intent of emptying Israeli jails of the terrorists that it has previously captured. In this instance, the talk is that Regev and Goldwasser would be released in exchange for the traitor Samir Kuntar.

Then, there's the ongoing talk about Gilad Shalit. While Hamas says that ceasefire talks and the talks about Gilad Shalit are separate, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to know that they are clearly connected. Shalit will not be released unless Israel releases Hamas terrorists from its jails.

None of this is really news, and yet the Israeli media is dutifully reporting what Hamas and Hizbullah are saying.

All of this is taking place even as the rockets continue slamming into Israel.

One man was lightly-to-moderately wounded after an upgraded Qassam rocket landed in the Old Muslim Cemetery near Ashkelon’s city market on Monday. The wounded man evacuated himself independently to the Barzilai Hostpial for treatment. MDA paramedics treated several people at the scene for shock.

Other Israeli communities came under fire as well. The most dovish of Israeli politicians, Yossi Beilin, who helped orchestrate the Oslo Accords, continues pushing a ceasefire, despite the fact that it would put Israeli security on the backburner. He thinks that not engaging in a ceasefire would give Hamas the advantage.

That's a wholly misguided position given the facts on the ground. Hamas took advantage of a ceasefire in 2007 when it took over Gaza after Israel's unilateral disengagement in 2005. They took over Gaza and have used it ever since to fire thousands of rockets at Israel. Any ceasefire will only enable Hamas to regroup and rearm for the next round as they have no interest in peace at all.

The one tact that has not even been attempted is to defeat Hamas and destroy it once and for all. Half measures have enabled the group to limp along and regroup over time, claiming victory for surviving. Israel's leadership continues to be paralyzed into inaction and half measures.

UPDATE:
The upheaval in the Israeli Knesset is reaching the level of absurdity. It's taking the Arab members of the Knesset to save Olmert from being tossed on the ash heap of history. They know that a no confidence vote would mean the ascendancy of Likud, and they'd lose their sway over the premiership.

And the Arab MKs are sounding a bit like Democrats who were busy protecting the likes of William "Cold Cash" Jefferson:

"The fact that the prime minister is under investigation shouldn't necessarily mean he must resign," MK Talab El-Sana (United Arab List – Ta'al) told Ynet on Monday.

McClatchy Cuts 10% of Workforce

For those who aren't familiar with McClatchy, they're a major newspaper publisher. Or perhaps one should clarify that by saying that they were once a major newspaper publisher.

They continue hemorrhaging money, so the company has decided to lay off 10% of the workforce to try and improve the balance sheet.

McClatchy (MNI:
McClatchy Newspapers, Inc. MNI 8.19, +0.04, +0.5%) said it will cut jobs through both voluntary and involuntary separations, as well as managed attrition, involving about 1,400 full-time positions.

"The effects of the current national economic downturn -- particularly in real estate, auto and employment advertising -- make it essential that we move faster now to realign our workforce and make our operations more efficient," said Gary Pruitt, McClatchy's chief executive, in a statement.

Pruitt added that he's "sorry" to have make such a "painful announcement."
In May, McClatchy's advertising revenue fell nearly 17% from the same month a year ago, the company reported Monday. Classified ad revenue plunged 27.4%, reflecting a 38% drop in real estate, a 39% fall-off in help-wanted, and a 15% decline in automotive.

It's a lame excuse to blame the economy for all of the paper's woes. The problems go well beyond the economy and directly to the heart of the industry in general. They have failed to take the Internet into account and people have found that they can get news from multiple sources at the same time that local papers aren't providing local news, which should be the bread and butter for those local papers.

Nelson Muntz has it just about right:


UPDATE:
I've adjusted the headline to reflect that the 10% reduction includes layoffs and attrition.

Paterson Slams Bloomberg

In this battle, there are no winners. Taxpayers lose no matter what. Gov. Paterson correctly notes that Mayor Bloomberg has no interest in taxpayers, who are getting hit with tax and fee increases at every turn by Bloomberg, who was thwarted in his most aggressive and grandiose plan - to impose congestion pricing taxes on anyone entering Manhattan's central business district.

The spat between Bloomberg and Gov. Paterson erupted over the weekend following the need to work out a plan to bail out the city's OTB operations. Never mind that we're talking about the government failing to turn a profit on a gambling operation.

Mayor Bloomberg is a nasty, untrustworthy, tan trum-prone liar who "has little use" for average New Yorkers - like the 1,500 workers who would have lost their jobs had OTB closed, a furious Gov. Paterson has said privately.

"He appears to be self-destructing," the governor said.

According to a source with firsthand knowledge of Paterson's comments, the governor said that during talks last week on OTB's future, Bloomberg threw the same kind of bizarre tantrums that disgraced former Gov. Eliot Spitzer had been known for.

"He has the same kind of anger that reminds you of Spitzer," Paterson said. "I think he's starting to be concerned that he can't get anything done."

The governor charged that Bloomberg has repeatedly misrepresented the facts to the point that "you can't trust him."

It's surprising to hear this kind of statement from Paterson, since these kinds of comments are usually kept behind closed doors. However, it looks like Paterson is trying to show Bloomberg a lesson in overt power and Paterson is clearly about the only person who can tell Bloomberg to stick it because it's Bloomberg who is in no position to dictate what happens with the OTB deal since the state is bailing out city.

Bloomberg, who has long been used to getting his way as the founder and head of a multibillion dollar corporation, has been beset by several high profile failures during his tenure as Mayor because he simply didn't get the politics - he lost the West Side Yards project, the 2010 Olympics, and most importantly, the congestion pricing tax.

This rift between the mayor and governor may have a lasting effect on other projects, including the ongoing mess at Ground Zero, which has overlapping jurisdictions.

Mugabe Running Headlong Towards Dictatorship

As I've been reporting for some time now, Robert Mugabe has been running headlong towards turning Zimbabwe into his personal dictatorship. He's destroyed the economy, threatened and murdered opposition leaders and their relatives, and has outright stated that he will not abide by the results of the June 27 runoff elections with Morgan Tsvangirai should the opposition win.

Some countries are trying to get Zimbabwe's neighbors to pressure Mugabe into accepting the results of the runoff elections should Mugabe lose, but that's going to be tough given that South Africa is running interference for Mugabe and is providing him with sufficient support so as to make it impossible for anyone to accept that the elections will be held fairly and openly.

The US and British governments want Mugabe to allow international monitors to oversee the elections, but that's not likely to go anywhere despite what British Prime Minister Gordon Brown had to say:

"In recent weeks, under Robert Mugabe's increasingly desperate and criminal regime, Zimbabwe has seen 53 killings, 2000 beatings, the displacement of 30,000 people, the arrest and detention of opposition leaders including Morgan Tsvangirai," Brown told a joint news conference after talks with U.S. President George W. Bush.

"This is wholly unacceptable. Mugabe must not be allowed to steal the election."

"That is why we call for Zimbabwe to accept a United Nations human rights envoy to visit Zimbabwe now and to accept international monitors from all parts of the world who are available to ensure that this is a free and fair election," Brown said.

Mugabe is also quite busy pulling a page from the Burmese junta - claiming that aid groups operating in Zimbabwe to provide humanitarian aid including food and basic services that his government cannot and will not provide are conspiring against him.

So what does Tsvangirai think of these ongoing developments? Well, he's got a fatalist streak tempered with a misplaced hope that the international community will come to his nation's aid, that's for sure. It's hard not to, considering that his fellow opposition leaders are being hounded incessantly and the population is being cowed by Mugabe's thugs who are relentlessly engaging in violence against those who are standing in the way of Mugabe retaining power indefinitely. So, while you get the President Bush and PM Brown calling on the international community to take a stronger stand, nothing gets done and Mugabe continues to tighten his grip on the country.

UPDATE:
This sums up how Mugabe and his thugs view elections:

"We shed a lot of blood for this country. We are not going to give up our country for a mere X on a ballot. How can a ball point pen fight with a gun?" the Herald, a government mouthpiece, quoted Mugabe as saying.