Paul Boutin has noticed that the Chinese Google filter only works if you can spell.

Image results for the correct spelling.

Now try Tianenmen, Tienanmen and Tiananman.

Danny Sullivan has side by side pictures of results of searching for Tiananmen on google.com and google.cn.

Jason at Generation Why has a suggested shorter State of the Union address.

“Economy up. Wiretaps work. Adios terrorists. Here comes the veto. Borders will be closed. Thank you.”

LaShawn and Michelle want Bush to address illegal immigration.

The Senate is still voting, but they have crossed the 51 yes votes needed for confirmation.

Does it strike anyone as odd that Muslims can burn synagogues, desecrate symbols of Israel and Judaism, burn the American flag, malign and brutalize Christianity and no one seems to care? Such activity is even applauded.

Does it strike anyone as odd that Muslims can send their young children as bombs to blow up other innocent young children and no one seems to care? Parents even revel in such possibility reaping cash rewards from the likes of Saddam Hussein for enrolling their children as suicide bombers.

Silence… Even at times an apologetic from the liberal media.

Does it strike anyone as odd that Muslims can brutally murder “hostages” they take, torture them on television, and no one seems to care? Just part of the struggle we’re told.

Silence, more silence.

Does it strike anyone as odd that Muslims can shoot up schools full of young children like was recently done in Afghanistan and no one seems to care?

The silence is growing louder.

And yet some cartoons are published in Denmark which in some strange way exposes Islam and the Muslim hierarchy stirs up the masses to, not only protest, but to become violent and destructive. Their behaviour underscores the truth about the current state of Islam.

‘Dare not anyone expose Islam to the world or else,’ so the message goes. The ironic thing is that Muslims, by their behavior, are doing that very thing.

The sad thing, the really tragic thing, is that many, many people wearing the banner of Islam are doing so only because of force, coercion, intimidation, and brain washing. If Islam were true, as its proponents claim, then why are they afraid of other ideas and viewpoints? Why are they afraid of falsehood if their way will prove to be true? Or do they inherently know something else and are petrified of being exposed? Are they afraid their way will not stand up to scrutiny? What is it that explains their strange behaviour?

It would seem to this observer that Islamists are exposing themselves. The media may be intimidated or fooled or willingly blind, but to the average person Islamists appear to be who they are; madmen bent on tyranny. To the observer it seems they will not be satisfied until they have killed or subjugated everyone they consider an infidel. Peaceful co-existence is not in their vocabulary. And if they have to use their own children as bombs to achieve that end they will, and gladly. If they have to desecrate and destroy the icons of others they will do so, and gladly. If they have to maim, torture, and kill innocents in public view to instill fear and intimidate they will do so, and gladly.

But just don’t you dare publish a cartoon that reveals that. Now that is really evil.

*****

UPDATE: Others commenting include:

Mary Madigan: “Muslims armed with assault rifles and grenade launchers rallied outside the European Union headquarters in Gaza City and fired shots in the air, demanding an apology for cartoons that dissed Islam by relating it to terrorism. ”

Radio Free Mike:

Right now Danes and Norwegians and Swedes have to fear for their lives in the Middle East because of something in a “Danish newspaper”; sales of “Danish goods” have all but come to a halt. This is just ignorant nasty nationalism. I don’t care whose religion is offended. (You can look at the cartoons here.) “We call on Muslim nations to boycott all Danish products because the Danish people supported the hateful racism under the pretext of freedom of expression,” Hamas wrote in a statement. It’s hateful enough that these racists are now in charge of a government; even worse that the boycott is working. But western leaders have stepped up to defend our traditions of free speech, right? They won’t let fundamentalists in Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Iraq, the Palestinian territories, Pakistan, or anywhere else dictate what European newspapers publish. Right?

Um, no.

ZombieTime posts an image archive of pictures of Mohammed through the ages. Ian Miller at LiveJournal is scared by this: “Meanwhile pan-Arab organisations have begun efforts to reach a UN resolution, backed by possible sanctions, to protect religions from insults.”

Collission Commentary adds: “It’s simply part of life in a globalised world that other people have an opinion about you. Western countries get their fair share of critisism (much of it deserved), and most have learned to deal with it. Why should there be an exception for the Arab World? There are good reasons for critisism against the region that’s the worlds prime exporter of religious violence and hate. ”

Otto Praline: “It is certainly not the paper’s fault that irrational devotees of Islam have taken it upon themselves to speak for their entire faith and threaten death to those who drew the cartoons and demand that their countries and citizens boycott Danish goods. […] Our politically correct sensitivity sours the vigor of our ideals and gives the impression that anyone can demand that we shut up because their feelings get hurt.”

Winds of Change: “All of [the cartoons are] more innocuous than the typical editorial cartoon about Ariel Sharon, back when he was the most hated politician in the world.”

Michael at BlogActive appears to be publicly blackmailing a Senator.

Mr. Senator:

Tomorrow you will be faced with a vote that may have the longest aftereffects of any other you have cast in your Senate career.

Tomorrow you will decide if your political position is worth more than doing what is right for others like you. For others like you, Mr. Senator, who engage in oral sex with other men. (Although, Mr. Senator, most of us don’t do in the bathrooms of Union Station!) Your fake marriage, by the way, will NOT protect you from the truth being told on this blog.

How does this blog decide who to report on? It’s simple. We report on hypocrites. In this case, hypocrites who vote against the gay and lesbian community while engaging in gay sex themselves*.

When you cast that vote, Mr. Senator, represent your own…it’s the least you could do.

Michael Rogers
blogACTIVE.com

*While votes on many matters are considered, votes “FOR” either the Alito nomination and the Federal Marriage Amendment are enough to qualify legislators for reporting on this site.

Ian Schwartz responds: “Michael Rogers at BlogActive is gay himself and here I thought that gays wanted people to be tolerate of their lifestyle. Oh wait, that’s only if you’re a gay liberal. My bad, sorry. ”

Adam Graham, of Adam’s Blog, observes: “Subversion, blackmail, and deceit is all that’s left to the unhinged left.”

Daniel at The Mechanical Eye rants:

… brilliant, man. The Democrats were accused of being bullies armed only with smear tactics during Judiciary Committee hearings. So, in making a final stand, the activists are… bullying, armed only with smear tactics.

I mean, make an argument! Tell us why Alito is so wicked, how he’ll send children back into the coal mines and burn gay men at the stake and force women back into the kitchen and make the menfolk sandwiches.

UPDATE: Some readers may be curious as to what the legal definition of “blackmail” is. Section 22-3252 of the D. C. Code defines blackmail as containing the following elements.

1. The defendant threatened to accuse another of a crime or to expose a secret or publicize an asserted fact, whether true or false, tending to subject the other party to hatred, contempt, or ridicule or to impair the reputation of the other party;

2. The defendant did so with the specific intent to obtain property of another or cause another person to do or refrain from doing any act.

Is what Mr. Rogers is doing criminal? Maybe, unless the whole thing is a big hoax designed to draw traffic to his blog. If that’s the case, it’s working. If it’s not a joke and he actually has sent such a letter, he will likely find himself in legal hot water for this stunt. Of course, the catch 22 of it is that by definition, the target of the blackmail is never one who wants to provide evidence and press charges.

UPDATE 2: Others are wondering about the legality, or lack thereof, of Michael Rogers’ actions.

Rob at Say Anything (via Lime Shurbet) says: “Don’t look now, but this gay witch hunt may well be against the law.”

NRO’s John Podhoretz: “I’m not a lawyer, so I don’t know if threatening an unnamed person constitutes blackmail. But it could…”

Kerfuffles: “The legal question is … is blackmail of a United States Senator legal? If not, can we expect “BlogActive” to receive a not so friendly visit from the FBI?”

McGehee comments over at OTB: “The man is a walking Godwin’s Law violation.”

Ian Schwartz, at his newly repainted blog ExposeTheLeft, has the video of Ted Kennedy losing it on the Senate floor yesterday.

Jenni Vinson will be hosting an interview with General Sada on Wednesday morning from 8-9am with 1440 KEYS AM Radio in Corpus Christi, TX. Check it out. I’m not sure yet if this show will be streamed live, but if you’re in the area you should be able to tune in even if it’s not broadcast online.

He is the author of Saddam’s Secrets, which we discussed a few days ago.

UPDATE: Hannity & Colmes had Sada on few days ago. The video can be viewed here.

Can this be true?

According to Senator Kennedy, more kids have asthma in this country thanks to air and water pollution. Which is something that may or may not be true, but what I found interesting was the way Kennedy wound down his tantrum, asking in a sincere and breathless tone just what Alito would do, as a Supreme Court Justice, to stem this asthma scourge.

Can it really be possible that someone who has been a U.S. Senator for decades is this patently obtuse when it comes to the role of the Supreme Court in American government? Because the last time I checked Supreme Court Justices didn’t write environmental policy. Instead, they rule as to whether or not laws written by state and federal legislators are, in fact, in keeping with our Constitution.

I don’t know about the rest of you, but this is something I learned in the sixth grade.

LifeTrek thinks that Kennedy may in fact be part of the problem. If you haven’t read “Help! Mom! There are Liberals Under My Bed” you need to. It dovetails perfectly with LifeTrek’s comment.

According to the OSU Daily Baramoter the number is quite high.

According to a press release issued by the Women’s Center, 2,000 rapes occur every five minutes.

But Eugene Volokh found the source:

About 2,000 rapes are committed daily at the rate of about one every 5 minutes.

And then he checks the math (via Insty).

2,000 rapes every five minutes. That would mean 2000 x (60/5) x 24 x 365 = 200 million rapes a year (presumably in the U.S.). Many people underestimate the frequency of rape. Still, one would hope that it doesn’t happen 200 million times a year; at least a little bit of multiplication should have alerted the writer and the editor that something was wrong.

…

Not 2,000 rapes every five minutes, it turns out, but 2,000 rapes daily, or one every 5 minutes. Off by a factor of 300 (5 x 60) from how the newspaper rendered it.

But wait! A “rate of about one every 5 minutes” would be about 300 daily ((60/5) x 24), not about 2000 daily. The Women’s Center press release was also mistaken (on at least one of the statistics, and maybe both); and again a little multiplication would have helped catch this.

In the comments section on his post, Eugene is getting some heat for his observation, as some readers are inferring that he is indicating that rape is not a serious problem. I think his point is that sloppy reporting and the lack of critical thinking can lead to false statistics which can discredit the validity of the reporting and in fact undermine the severity of the problem through transparently inflationary reporting (whether intentional or not).

The Washington Post reports on a study of hidden biases. In particular, Bush supporters are biased against blacks.

Michelle Malkin notes that they know something of hidden biases, exposing the political contributions of the authors of the study (sourced here).

KOS is keeping track of the committed and iffy cloture votes. To date, committed to voting no on cloture (supporting fillibuster) are:

Barbara Boxer (D- CA)
Dianne Feinstein (D- CA)
Christopher J. Dodd (D- CT)
Richard J. Durbin (D- IL)
John F. Kerry (D- MA)
Edward M. Kennedy (D- MA)
Paul S. Sarbanes (D- MD)
Debbie A. Stabenow (D- MI)
Harry Reid (D- NV)
Hillary Rodham Clinton (D- NY)
Charles Schumer (D- NY)
Ron Wyden (D- OR)
Russell D. Feingold (D- WI)
Barack Obama (D-IL)
Joe Biden (D-DE)

And liberal “Republican” Lincoln Chafee will be voting against Alito (but presumably not voting no on cloture).

UPDATE: Alexandra at All Things Beautiful has a big roundup of this story. The left wing bloggers are going all out on this issue, including urging readers to make repeat calls to offices which do not take details such as names and addresses.

That is, go through the “Urge Abstention” list twice, at least for those offices that don’t take detailed caller info like names and addresses.

Captain Ed aptly says: “If your cause boils down to tactics such as these, then everyone associated with it should be embarrassed by the connection. Hopefully, an intrepid news crew will wait outside of Walter Reed to see any Democrats inclined to endorse methods such as those urged by this blogger.”

Gateway Pundit has come out in an early sign of support, urging fellow bloggers to support Cindy Sheehan’s run for the Senate.

Cindy has been to Washington DC before, but the US Senate needs Cindy now more than ever:

* To distribute wealth evenly
* To help set up a Department of Peace
* To set up a Department of History where Cindy will be the first Secretary!
* To get the occupiers out of New Orleans
* To fight the perverse, murderous, genocidal, immoral empire
* To build a world in which the human being is really human
* To stop concealing torture camps in other countries allied to the empire
* To stop our government and corporatism from impoverishing or killing innocents
* To stop an invasion of Venezuela
* To stop US President George W. Bush of “terrorism against the world”
* To sing communist hymns with fists raised
* To teach our troops that “Hajis,” the brown skinned people of Iraq who clean their toilets, showers, and wash their clothes are NOT less than people

CindyForSenate. And Michelle Malkin picks Cindy and Hugo hugging as the picture of the day.

Taylor Marsh, who bills herself as “the antidote to Right-Wing talk,” thinks Cindy Sheehan has lost her mind.

She should have stuck to her anti-Iraq war platform and left the celebrity politicking to Sean Penn. But announcing a challenge to Senator Diane Feinstein, from Venezuela? This is weird in so many ways it’s impossible to recount them all.

…

Any reader of this blog knows that I’m not a fan of our pathetically incompetent president, but let’s get serious. George W. Bush “the biggest terrorist in the world”? Unfathomable. To say so is preposterous, not to mention that it blows Ms. Sheehan’s credibility out of the water. It’s impossible to take anyone seriously who uses this type of language against the president of the United States. You also don’t bash your country’s leadership, especially in a foreign country. I’m old fashioned that way. When on foreign soil you don’t denigrate your country or the president, regardless of who it is or how you feel, period.

But again, threatening to challenge Diane Feinstein while in Venezuela? Words escape me, almost.

Ms. Sheehan evidently believes in Chavez’s “21st Century Socialism,” as do a lot of other righteous far left activists. However, I completely disavow any association with this type of rhetoric, philosophy, or political goal. In my humble opinion, it is against everything on which the Founders built this republic, everything.

…

The last thing I want to see is a cat fight between Sheehan and Feinstein, which would be a political fodder fight of the first order. Since the most committed always wins, you’ve still got to wonder which of these women would have the most loyal supporters. The unknown answer to that question terrifies me.

Yes, a Senate run by Cindy Sheehan would be the best thing to happen to conservative politics in a while.

James Blake Miller, the marine made famous by the photo in which he was dubbed Iraq’s “Marlboro Man,” has come home. The San Francisco Chronicle has a bio of Miller and a discussion of the details of that day. There is one thing that jumped out at me, which I’ve emphasized below.

As Miller remembers that day, he was on a rooftop taking fire and calling for support on his radio - a 20-pound piece of equipment that he had to lug around along with nine extra batteries, hundreds of extra rounds of ammunition, and a couple of cartons of cigarettes.

As insurgent bullets from a nearby building pinged off the roof, a horrified Miller heard footsteps coming up the stairs behind him. He raised his rifle — and barely had time to halt when he saw it was embedded Los Angeles Times photographer Luis Sinco.

Miller returned to his radio, guiding two tanks to his position. When they opened fire, he said, the thunder left his body numb — but the building housing the attackers had collapsed. Later, he said, they would find about 40 bodies in the rubble.

“I was never so happy in all my life to take that handset away from my head,” Miller said. “I lit up a f — cigarette.”

His ear was bleeding from the sound of the tank firing — Miller still can’t hear out of his right ear. His nose bled from a nick he took when his rifle scope and radio got tangled up midfire. He looked at the sunrise and wondered how many more of those he would see.

He was vaguely aware that elsewhere on the rooftop, Sinco was taking pictures.

Many would applaud the bravery of Luis Sinco, risking his life to report from the thick of the battle, to bring news of the war front to those back home. Indeed, Mr. Sinco took a striking photo that day. But look at what really happened, as Miller recalls it.

Miller was taking enemy fire, directing two tanks into position to take out the building from which the enemy was firing, and he had to stop and turn around to defend himself from what turned out to be an embedded reporter. He then went back to the business of directing the tank into position and they opened fire, collapsing the building and killing the insurgents.

That photographer could have cost him his life. Mr. Sinco could have, in fact, caused those two tanks to not be able to get into position, to not take out that building, and to leave those insurgents to come and fight and kill our soldiers another day.

Sure, we like to get news in real time. Sure we have an insatiable desire for information and images, which drives up ratings and encourages brave reporters like Sinco to risk their lives like this. But is it worth the risk? Is our desire to know worth the chance that a reporter will cause death and damage the war effort in a very real and measurable way? Are embedded reporters really a good idea? This anecdote would indicate that it may be something to think about.

This is an interesting article on Christianity’s influence on the history of science.

The same pattern continues today, the columnist goes on: “The conflict of religion and science sounds all too familiar. Darwin still has trouble getting past creationist gatekeepers in some school districts.”[5]

The story of conflict does sound familiar, because it is the standard interpretation of history taught all through the public education system. In fact, it is so widely accepted that often it is treated not as an interpretation at all, but simply as a fact of history. Yet, surprising as it may sound, among historians of science, the standard view has been soundly debunked. Most historians today agree that the main impact Christianity had on the origin and development of modern science was positive. Far from being a science stopper, it is a science starter.

One reason this dramatic turn-around has not yet filtered down to the public is that the history of science is still quite a young field. Only fifty years ago, it was not even an independent discipline. Over the past few decades, however, it has blossomed dramatically, and in the process, many of the old myths and stereotypes that we grew up with have been toppled. Today the majority view is that Christianity provided many of the crucial motivations and philosophical assumptions necessary for the rise of modern science.[6]

It goes on to discuss Polytheistic Religions, Eastern Pantheism and Classical Greek Philosophy and concludes with this:

Today the majority of historians of science agree with this positive assessment of the impact the Christian worldview had on the rise of science. Yet even highly educated people remain ignorant of this fact. Why is that?

The answer is that history was founded as a modern discipline by Enlightenment figures such as Voltaire, Gibbon, and Hume who had a very specific agenda: They wanted to discredit Christianity while promoting rationalism. And they did it by painting the middle ages as the “Dark Ages,” a time of ignorance and superstition. They crafted a heroic saga in which modern science had to battle fierce opposition and oppression from Church authorities. Among professional historians, these early accounts are no longer considered reliable sources. Yet they set the tone for the way history books have been written ever since. The history of science is often cast as a secular morality tale of enlightenment and progress against the dark forces of religion and superstition.

Stark puts it in particularly strong terms: “The ‘Enlightenment’ [was] conceived initially as a propaganda ploy by militant atheists and humanists who attempted to claim credit for the rise of science.”[22] Stark’s comments express a tone of moral outrage that such bad history continues to be perpetuated, even in academic circles. He himself published an early paper quoting the standards texts, depicting the relationship between Christianity and science as one of constant “warfare.” He now seems chagrined to learn that, even back then, those stereotypes had already been discarded by professional historians.[23]

Today the warfare image has become a useful tool for politicians and media elites eager to press forward with a secularist agenda on abortion, embryonic stem cell research, various forms of genetic engineering, and so on. When Christians raise moral objections, they are quickly discredited as reactionary, and the old “religion-versus-science” stereotype is trotted out. It has become more important than ever for thoughtful people to educate themselves on the latest findings in the history of science. Between now and the next election, a formative truth needs to become embedded in the cultural matrix: That Christianity is not a science stopper, it is a science starter.

The world just keeps getting stranger and stranger. First dodgeball, now raising hands in class to answer questions.

A school in London has banned children from raising their hands in class and teachers from calling on students with their hands raised.

…

Buck said the same children often wave their arms in the air, but when teachers try to involve less adventurous pupils by choosing them instead, it leads to feelings of victimization, the Daily Telegraph reported Saturday.

To spare embarrassment of the students who do not know the answer, the school has incorporated a “phone a friend” system, allowing one child to nominate another to take the question instead.

Dawn Eden links to a creative eBay entry today.

I’m a 22-year-old Atheist from Chicago. I stopped believing in God when I was 14. Currently, I am an active volunteer for a couple different national, secular organizations. For one of them, I am the editor of a newsletter that reaches over 1,000 Atheist/Agnostic college students. I have written several Letters to the Editor to newspapers in and around Chicago, espousing my Atheistic beliefs when Church/State issues arose. My point being that I don’t take my non-belief lightly. However, while I don’t believe in God, I firmly believe I would immediately change those views if presented with evidence to the contrary. And at 22, this is possibly the best chance anyone has of changing me.

So, here’s my proposal. Everytime I come home, I pass this old Irish church. I promise to go into that church every day– for a certain number of days– for at least an hour each visit. For every $10 you bid, I will go to the Church for 1 day. For $50, you would have me going to mass every day for a week.

My promise: I will go willingly and with an open mind. I will not say/do anything inappropriate. I will respectfully participate in service, speak to priests, volunteer with the church if possible, do my best to learn about the religious beliefs of the church-goers, and make conversation with anyone who is willing to talk. (Though I do reserve the rights to ask the person questions about the faith.)

I will record my visits through a journal, pictures, or whatever other method of proof you’d like– I will uphold my promise.

Will I become religious? Well, I don’t know. I really do have an open mind, but no one has convinced me to change my mind so far. Then again, I have also never attended a real church service. Perhaps being around a group of people who will show me “the way” could do what no one else has done before.

If the Irish Church doesn’t work for you, we’ll just find some other place local to me. I’ll go to any place of worship– a Christian Church, a Catholic Church [revision: I realize a Catholic Church is a Christian Church… so let me rephrase. By Christian, I mean Protestant], a Mosque, a Synagogue, etc. They’re all nearby. Makes no difference to me, but perhaps it’s your faith that could change the mind of this Atheist.

I also assure you that if you bid on this, I will write an article about my experiences in the newsletter mentioned earlier. The article would reach over 1,000 college students who share my current views. Even if you don’t end up changing my mind, perhaps you can change theirs.

If you have any questions about this auction, I’d be glad to answer them.

At least that’s what James Seif said.

PoliPundit points out today that with the commitment of five of the Democratic Senators not to support a filibuster, Alito’s confirmation is now pretty much assured. The five Senators are: Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), Ben Nelson (D-NE), and Mary Landrieu (D-LA), Senator Ken Salazar (D-CO) and Senator Tim Johnson (D-SD).

I personally don’t trust a politician’s commitment until the actual vote happens, but there’s a good case to be made that Alito will now sails smoothly to confirmation.

(Via Ace)

UPDATE: Add Robert Byrd to the list, per the Congressional Record 1/26/2006.

UPDATE 1/27/2005: Feinstein changed her position today on the filibuster. (Via Hinderaker)

Bloomberg reports on the flip flop.

California Democrat Dianne Feinstein, who had previously said a filibuster against Alito wouldn’t be justified, today said in a statement she would vote against shutting off debate.

Georges Sada’s book, Saddam’s Secrets, is out.

Michelle Malkin links to a New York Sun article.

The man who served as the no. 2 official in Saddam Hussein’s air force says Iraq moved weapons of mass destruction into Syria before the war by loading the weapons into civilian aircraft in which the passenger seats were removed.
The Iraqi general, Georges Sada, makes the charges in a new book, “Saddam’s Secrets,” released this week. He detailed the transfers in an interview yesterday with The New York Sun.

“There are weapons of mass destruction gone out from Iraq to Syria, and they must be found and returned to safe hands,” Mr. Sada said. “I am confident they were taken over.”

Mr. Sada’s comments come just more than a month after Israel’s top general during Operation Iraqi Freedom, Moshe Yaalon, told the Sun that Saddam “transferred the chemical agents from Iraq to Syria.”

Rick Moran has lots of analysis, and concludes with this:

While the information is certainly intriguing, it hardly qualifies as “smoking gun” evidence that Syria has the missing WMD.

That said, if the government were aware of Syrian collusion with Iraq to hide their stockpiles of WMD, why wouldn’t they announce it?

First of all, it would be very difficult to prove without revealing “sources and methods” that the CIA would rather remain a secret.

The second reason would be diplomatic. If we accused the Syrians and offered proof, then we would have to do something about it. This would complicate our efforts to effect regime change in Syria that right now are at a very delicate point. The UN is beginning to put more and more pressure on Baby Assad as the investigation into the assassination of Lebanese nationalist Rafiq Hariri continues to implicate high level Syrian intelligence and political figures. Eventually it is thought that the elites in the military and the government will see Assad as the dead weight that he is and get rid of him. After that, all bets are off and the US government may in fact start inquiring about what was transferred from Iraq to Syria prior to the war.

Next week, General Sada will meet with members of the Senate Armed Services committee. It should be interesting to see what might come out of that meeting although, don’t hold your breath for any bombshells. The last thing the White House wants at this point – even though it would permanently blunt some criticism about the war – is to make Syrian complicity in hiding Iraq WMD an issue.

Mac’s Mind thinks Senator Rockefeller is in trouble, going back to a November, 2005 interview he gave on FNS.

SEN. ROCKEFELLER: No. The — I mean, this question is asked a thousand times and I’ll be happy to answer it a thousand times. I took a trip by myself in January of 2002 to Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Syria, and I told each of the heads of state that it was my view that George Bush had already made up his mind to go to war against Iraq — that that was a predetermined set course which had taken shape shortly after 9/11.

John over at Powerline thinks a bit more evidence is needed.

Lorie Byrd, though, thinks it’s a whole lot more likely than the alternative: “For those leftie trolls who “LOL” at reports that point to Syria as the recipient of Saddam’s WMD, how is that scenario any less believable than the idea that Bush lied about WMD and invaded a country knowing that none would be found? Or, for that matter, how is it any more believable than the crazy conspiracy theories that Diebold elected Bush or that Karl Rove is coordinating with Osama? ”

Sister Toldjah reminds us that this lines up with what UNSCOM inspector Bill Tierney speculated.

The terrorist organization Hamas, which has advocated the destruction of Israel, has won democratic elections.

Bush is holding the line.

“I have made it very clear, however, that a political party that articulates the destruction of Israel as part of its platform is a party with which we will not deal.”

Captain Ed says “Welcome to War.”

Unless someone can show widespread voter fraud on behalf of Hamas, the Palestinians should be judged by the choices they have made this week. They have chosen war and the annihilation of Israel over the two-state solution favored publicly (if not fervently) by Fatah. Europe and the United States need to wake up from their delusional dreamland of a situation where both sides in this conflict want a peaceful conclusion and a world without hatred for their children and grandchildren. Clearly, the Palestinians want war, and they have made no secret of using their children and grandchildren as bomb fuses in order to perpetuate it.