Showing posts with label Benedict Arnold. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Benedict Arnold. Show all posts

Thursday, September 20, 2012

Does 'Innocence of maahslime' meet the free-speech test?



U.S. 1st Amendment rights distinguish between speech that is simply offensive and speech deliberately tailored to put lives and property at immediate risk.

September 18, 2012|By Sarah Chayes
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  • A scene from the 14-minute video trailer for the film "Innocence of Muslims," which has been blamed for inciting violence in Libya, Egypt and Yemen.
A scene from the 14-minute video trailer for the film "Innocence of… (YouTube )
In one of the most famous 1st Amendment cases in U.S. history, Schenck vs. United States, Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. established that the right to free speech in the United States is not unlimited. "The most stringent protection," he wrote on behalf of a unanimous court, "would not protect a man in falsely shouting fire in a theater and causing a panic."

Holmes' test — that words are not protected if their nature and circumstances create a "clear and present danger" of harm — has since been tightened. But even under the more restrictive current standard, "Innocence of Muslims," the film whose video trailer indirectly led to the death of U.S. Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens among others, is not, arguably, free speech protected under the U.S. Constitution and the values it enshrines.
According to initial media investigations, the clip whose most egregious lines were apparently dubbed in after it was shot, was first posted to YouTube in July by someone with the user name "Sam Bacile." The Associated Press reported tracing a cellphone number given as Bacile's to the address of a Californian of Egyptian Coptic origin named Nakoula Basseley Nakoula. Nakoula has identified himself as coordinating logistics on the production but denies being Bacile.
According to the Wall Street Journal, when the video failed to attract much attention, another Coptic Christian, known for his anti-Islamic activism, sent a link to reporters in the U.S., Egypt and elsewhere on Sept. 6. His email message promoted a Sept. 11 event by anti-Islamic pastor Terry Jones and included a link to the trailer.
The current standard for restricting speech — or punishing it after it has in fact caused violence — was laid out in the 1969 case Brandenburg vs. Ohio. Under the narrower guidelines, only speech that has the intent and the likelihood of inciting imminent violence or lawbreaking can be limited.
Likelihood is the easiest test. In Afghanistan, where I have lived for most of the past decade, frustrations at an abusive government and at the apparent role of international forces in propping it up have been growing for years. But those frustrations are often vented in religious, not political, terms, because religion is a more socially acceptable, and safer, rationale for public outcry.
In the summer of 2010, Jones announced his intent to publicly burn a copy of the Muslim holy scripture, the Koran, that Sept. 11. He was eventually dissuaded by a number of religious and government officials, including Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, who called him to say his actions would put the lives of U.S. soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan at risk. On the Joint Chiefs of Staff, where I worked at the time, consensus was that the likelihood of violence was high.
When Jones did in fact stage a public Koran burning on March 20, 2011, riots broke out in Afghanistan, killing nearly a dozen people and injuring 90 in the beautiful, cosmopolitan northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif. Seven of the dead were United Nations employees; the rest were Afghans.
In Afghanistan, and in all of the Arab nations in transition, an extremist fringe is brawling for power with a more pluralistic majority. Radicals pounce on any pretext to play on religious feeling. I could pick out the signs of manipulation in Afghanistan — riots that started on university campuses where radicalized Pakistani students abound, simultaneous outbreaks in far-flung places, the sudden


h/t RUSH Limbaugh

Dems Welcome maahslimes, Prohibit Christian Hospitality in Charlotte!



  
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The Connecting Link
Never Forget 9/11
 by Rev. Austin Miles
CHARLOTTE,North Carolina (9/11/12) When the DNC came to Charlotte, area churches, 100 of them, offered hospitality, not knowing how much the Dems hate God and would actually boo God at the convention. They had no idea how that hatred would be directed at them and their churches.
The Sunday before the DNC, over 9000 people had come together to pray for the convention. Then, wanting to extend hospitality to the visitors to their city, 56 of the churches set out to “Adopt-a-Delegation.”
They put together gift baskets featuring Carolina Pralines and a letter welcoming them to the city and offering assistance in transportation, childcare or spiritual matters.
According to writer, Todd Starnes, The DNC banned the churches from distributing the gift baskets to delegates because, DNC said, the congregations hold values that are contrary to the party platform.Read that carefully.
David Benham, one of the organizers of the outreach said, “We were just trying to display Southern hospitality.” DNC officials, however, conveyed to city leaders that the Christians would not be allowed to present their gift baskets.
Even the Charlotte Mayor’s office jumped in to tell the churches not to participate, saying that their views on women’s rights are contrary to the platform. That’s right….the same platform that booed God later.
Benham then asked if they could send welcome letters to the delegates. Again, the DNC refused, because, they said, “The churches hold pro-life values.”
The baskets did not contain a single political or pro-life message. They just wanted to give them regional candles and a welcome letter. The DNC refused to return numerous phone calls seeking comment.
But it gets worse. When a gathering of 200 Muslims showed up to pray for the convention, the Dems welcomed them with open arms and the liberal media gave extensive national coverage.
It is ironic that this day, in the shadow of that Islamic prayer event, we commemorate the greatest tragedy in American History, when Muslims attacked America on September 11, 2001, brutally killing thousands.of innocent people.
Muslims who publicly state their hatred of our country with fierce determination to kill us all and put America under Sharia Law, are welcomed by the Democratic Party while Christians are pushed out of sight like criminals because they respect life and hold family values.
These are the same Democrats who want you to vote them into office to direct the United States of America and every life from beginning to end. It is obvious that we must not let this happen.
Our thanks to Rev. Ed Berkey (retired) who alerted us to this story.


h/t JO

The caliph خليفة Benedict Arnold Campaign's Racial Slander Strategy

“Political correctness” and liberty are antithetical.  The purpose of “political correctness” is not – and never has been – to foster civility.  Its purpose has always been to shut-up – by smear and intimidation – those holding views different from those in the “political correctness” mob.




September 19, 2012

The Obama Campaign's Racial Slander Strategy

By J.T. Hatter
Barack Hussein Obama has always run his political campaigns to exploit racial, economic, religious, and political divisions.  After nearly four years of Obama, the nation is furiously divided, and the political scene is positively treacherous.  Everyone expects this campaign to be the ugliest and dirtiest in our nation's history.  It is certainly shaping up that way.
The most poisonous aspect of this race is the Democratic Party political tactic of racial slander.  The Democrats can't campaign on Obama's stellar accomplishments as president, and they can't attack Romney's qualifications.  Most Americans agree with Romney's policies.  So the progressives are playing the race card.
To the Democrats and the mainstream media, this is war.  They now have the political power to advance their leftist ideology and they will stop at nothing to keep it.  The progressives aren't merely playing the race card.  They are deploying the entire deck in a scorched-earth policy.  If you oppose the Democrats, then you are a racist.
Republicans and conservatives are now regularly smeared as racists.  Their history of being the party and ideology that freed the slaves, overturned the Jim Crow laws, and fought for racial equality is being deliberately distorted.  The progressive left is waging their race hate campaign against the American people as a whole -- not just against the Republicans.  The Democratic Party/mainstream media narrative is that virtually all Americans are racist, except for the enlightened ones who make their home in the Democratic Party.
America's Race Card Media
The mainstream news media are reveling in their role as race hounds for the Democratic Party.  Chris Matthews of NBC leads the pack of race howlers.  In a recent Morning Joe show, Matthews viciously attacked Reince Preibus and accused candidate Romney of playing the race card.  Matthews reviled the Republican for using the term "work requirements" when discussing welfare reform.  That's racist, you know.  On his Hardball show on MSNBC, Matthews regularly accuses Romney of leading a racist campaign.  He hears Republicans "dog-whistling" racial code words all the time -- in practically every speech or announcement.  He recently set up Cynthia Tucker, an über-liberal Atlanta Journal-Constitution columnist, to declare of the Romney campaign that "[t]his is the Southern Strategy writ large. This is all about appealing to racially resentful whites."
I've got news for Matthews and Tucker.  There aren't enough "racially resentful whites" to matter.  They represent the tiniest fraction of the American population.  Then why are the Democrats and their media stooges woofing so loudly on these racialist hate themes?  They continue to play on rapidly disappearing "white guilt" over slavery, which ended a century and a half ago, and racism, which will never end, according to liberals.
The critical voting demographic for Obama is the white male professional.  They are the target.  How many of these people will flee to the embrace of the Democrats for fear of being labeled as racist, and to secure the badge of racial enlightenment?  Enough to matter, perhaps.  That's what the Democrats are counting on.  Their underlying strategy is to neutralize this demographic since they can't possibly win it.
The Racial Stink Brush
Americans as a people are fairly free from racial prejudice.  This is certainly true when Americans are compared to people living in the rest of the world.  But you would never know that, and certainly wouldn't believe it, if all your information came from American television.
There are few real racists in our country, relatively speaking.  They are considered wackos, out of mainstream thought and belief.  We Americans believe that all men are created equal.  We Christians are commanded to love one another as brothers.  The only way we can reunite this nation is through brotherly love.
And that is exactly why the Democrats are raising the specter of racism in this political race.  The only way they can gain political power is through exploiting social division.  Right now the Democrats and the mainstream media are vigorously conducting a broad-spectrum campaign of racial division across America.
The current mainstream media propaganda sound bite lineup is as follows:
  • Voter ID and poll-watching equal suppression of minority votes.  Shades of Jim Crow.
  • Racist code words uttered by Republicans will be regularly discovered and interpreted by the media.
  • Racist remarks and actions by Democrats do not exist.  And those that do will be ignored.
  • Attacking President Obama is racist by definition.
  • Supporting or voting for Romney is racist by definition.
This list will grow as we approach November 6.  The mainstream media will repeat these racist political attack themes over and over again.  Repeat the lie often enough, and people will believe it.
The media is also carefully parsing every word of every statement made by Republicans.  The mainstream media are desperately searching for racial slips, inferences, and "code words" they can amplify and wield.  Just ask George Allen how this works.  Allen lost the 2000 Virginia Senate race to Democrat political newcomer Jim Webb by only 10,000 votes -- after an intense media campaign brushing him with racist stink paint.  The racist slander worked, and the media won the race for the Democrats.
The mainstream media will discover racist intent even if they have to fabricate it, as NBC did when it edited the George Zimmerman 911 recording in order to make him appear to be the racist killer of an innocent black boy.  Think about that.  NBC was willing to misrepresent the facts to make the Hispanic man (initially represented as white) appear racially motivated to kill a black man.  No innocence until proven guilty.  NBC convicted Zimmerman in the digital courtroom in which it is judge, jury, and executioner.  Why did NBC violate Zimmerman in this way?  To stir up racial division to enhance the leftist political paradigm.
The media has been doing this for a long time.  Remember the Tawana Brawley rape that never happened -- the one that launched Al Shapton's political career?  How about the Duke lacrosse rape that also never happened?  False accusations of rape against nine white men and a charge of murder against a Hispanic man.  What the media are doing now is not merely a "tragic rush to accuse."  It is a deliberate political strategy.  Think what the mainstream media are willing to do for Obama.
The Ethics and Morality of Race Slander
The political racial attacks are being coordinated between the Democratic Party and the mainstream media.  Debbie Wasserman Schultz, the Democratic National Committee Chair and Florida congresswoman, accused the Republicans on television of wanting to "literally [sic] drag us all the way back to Jim Crow laws and literally and very transparently block access to the polls to voters who are more likely to vote for Democratic candidates than Republican candidates." 
This is pure political deception.  It is an outright lie.  Wasserman Schultz neglected to mention that it was the Democratic Party that wrote and enforced the Jim Crow laws in the first place.  It must have slipped her memory that it was the Republican Party that did away with those and other laws that discriminated against black people.
At a recent campaign rally in Danville, VA, Vice President Joe Biden said, with a newfound Southern twang, that if Republicans won the election, "they gawn' to put y'all back in chains."  The vice president of the United States was telling black people that if the Republicans win the election, slavery will return.  What a scurrilous remark.  How low can you get?
According to the Daily Caller, Matthew "Mudcat" Arnold, national campaign manager for the liberal super-PAC CREDO, told supporters in Aurora, CO that calling Republicans racist was a more effective tactic than criticizing their policies.
Americans will pay the price for the racial hatred being incited by the Democrats and their media shills.  The price will be steep and paid in blood.  In playing the race card, the Democrats show that they have no moral scruples whatsoever.  To the progressive, the end always justifies the means.  It is a dishonor and a sin to bear false witness against your neighbor.  But this is the political party that booed God out of the DNC party platform three times before the chair ignored the majority and allowed the Almighty to return.  And this was done cynically to avert political fallout and a possible loss of votes in November.  Even God is a political calculation for Democrats.
There are no moral or ethical constraints on the Democrats or their progressive ilk in the media.  Race-baiting is a strategy they believe will work for them.  We can expect a hellish campaign in the run up to November 6.  If you plan to vote for Romney, be prepared.  The Democrats will call you a racist.  And they won't think twice about doing it.
JT Hatter is the author of Lost in Zombieland: The Rise of President Zero, a political satire on the Obama administration.  JT can be reached at jt@jthatter.com.

h/t DM

"Man" (The caliph خليفة Benedict Arnold) of the world



September 18, 2012 | 8:00 pm 
384Comments
Photo - President Barack Obama waves as he arrives on Air Force One at John F. Kennedy International Airport, Tuesday, Sept. 18, 2012, in New York.  (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)
President Barack Obama waves as he arrives on Air Force One at John F. Kennedy International Airport, Tuesday, Sept. 18, 2012, in New York. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)
In 2007 and 2008, Barack Obama ran for president as a world citizen, multiracial and multicultural, created by nature and the Almighty to bring healing and peace to the world.
Muslims, Andrew Sullivan said, would see in his face a different America: "A brown-skinned man whose father was an African ... who attended a majority-Muslim school as a boy, is now the alleged enemy. If you wanted the crudest but most effective weapon against the demonization of America that fuels Islamist ideology, Obama's face gets close."
Flash forward to 2012, and his brown face is being incinerated in effigy on several continents, while mobs of hysterical Muslims shout death to his African name. George W. Bush never saw such an outbreak of fury. If an Iraqi once threw a shoe at President Bush, this is an entire store full of footwear. The man of the world found the world turned against him. What in the world had gone wrong?
What could and did was foretold in his 2008 speech in Berlin, when he told the hysterical crowds in attendance that the Wall had come down when (and because) "the world stood as one." But the world was never as one, then or ever: The world was as two, and the Wall had come down because one world (that led by the United States and the Atlantic Alliance) had, through force, threats of force and several hair-raising near-clashes, forced the communist world to its knees.
It was in the failure of this man of the world to embrace his role as the leader of one part of the world against the more dangerous other that the seeds of his failure were planted. Instead of raising the West, he has tried to merge the two sides and make them seem equal, stressing the flaws of the West and its allies, not taking democracy's side.
From the start, he went out of his way to stiff the democracies, dissing the Anglo-American alliance, returning a bust of Winston S. Churchill to sender, giving a DVD of his speeches as a most thoughtful gift to the Queen. He dissed the Poles when they felt under threat from the Russians, treated the Israelis as the moral equivalents of the people who threaten them and pulled out of Iraq before the training wheels were off of the bicycle, endangering those who helped us get rid of al Qaeda and putting their lives there at risk.
Most of all, he gave the back of his hand to the Iranian dissidents in 2009 who came so close to deposing their leaders, trusting instead in his mythical powers to coax the fanatics in power to reason. Now that he's failed -- and who could have guessed it? -- his refusal to stand with Israel in the face of Iran's threats to destroy it make a unilateral Israeli attack on Iran that much more likely. And when violence broke out on Sept. 11, Obama's response was to arrest an American citizen who had made a tacky film about Muslims, not much worse than those made about Catholics by many Americans, transgressing the man's constitutional right to free speech.
Disliked and distrusted by those in his world, he isn't respected by those in the other, who express their contempt without reservation. A "Barack Obama" with his name and his skin who was in his heart more like Reagan or Kennedy might have won these worlds over.
He wasn't. He didn't. He had his chance, and he blew it. And now he should go.
Examiner Columnist Noemie Emery is contributing editor to TheWeekly Standard and author of "Great Expectations: The Troubled Lives of Political Families."

DOJ Fast-and-Furious Report: WH Aide Declined Interview With IG; 'White House Did Not Produce Any Internal White House Communications'



border
(AP Photo/Michael Chow)
(CNSNews.com) - The report on Operation Fast and Furious released today by the Justice Department's Office of Inspector General says a member of the White House National Security staff declined to be interviewed for the inspector general's investigation and that the White House itself did not produce internal documents for the investigation because the White House said it was "beyond the purview" of the inspector general.
The report said that gun traffickers purchased more than 2,000 weapons during Fast and Furious and that U.S. law enforcement officers eventually only recovered about 100 of these because "of a strategy jointly pursued by ATF and the U.S. Attorney's Office that deferred taking overt enforcement action against the individual straw purchasers while seeking to build a case against the leaders of the organization."
Two AK-47 rifles purchased by one of the traffickers ended up--11 months after their purchase--at the scene of the murder of U.S. Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry.
The report said that an official with the White House National Security Staff declined an interview with the inspector general's office about his communications with Wiliam Newell, who the report said was the Special Agent in Charge of ATF’s Phoenix Field Division.
"We also sought to interview Kevin O’Reilly, an official with the White House National Security Staff, about communications he had in 2010 with Special Agent in Charge William Newell that included information about Operation Fast and Furious," says the IG report. "O’Reilly declined through his personal counsel our request for an interview."
"We sought to interview O’Reilly in light of e-mail communications he had with Special Agent in Charge Bill Newell in 2010," the IG report said in a footnote.
"Newell told us that he had known O’Reilly during previous field office assignments and that the two shared information about firearms trafficking issues relevant to their geographic areas of responsibility," the report said. "According to Newell, O’Reilly was also friends with ATF’s White House Liaison and through that relationship O’Reilly would be included on some information sharing between Newell and the ATF Liaison about ATF’s efforts on the Southwest Border, and that O’Reilly eventually communicated with Newell directly.
"Newell told us that he did not have direct contact with the White House other than through O’Reilly," said the report. "We requested from the White House any communications concerning Operation Fast and Furious during the relevant time period that were sent to or received from (a) certain ATF employees, including Special Agent in Charge Newell, and (b) certain members of the White House National Security Staff, including Kevin O’Reilly. In response to our request, the White House informed us that the only responsive communications it had with the ATF employees were those between Newell and O’Reilly. The White House indicated that it previously produced those communications to Congress in response to a similar request, and the White House provided us with a copy of those materials.
"The White House did not produce to us any internal White House communications, noting that 'the White House is beyond the purview of the Inspector General’s Office, which has jurisdiction over Department of Justice programs and personnel,'" said the report.
"The records the White House produced did not contain any communications between Newell and O’Reilly that referred to Operation Fast and Furious by name, and the communications that referred to the 'large OCDETF case'--which was Operation Fast and Furious--did not include any information about the case strategy or the tactics agents were using to conduct the investigation.
"We were unable to further investigate the communications between Newell and O’Reilly because O’Reilly declined our request for an interview," said the IG report.
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