Captured FARC Documents Link Democrats to Terror Group

GatewayPundit is all over this one, and rightfully so. The bottom line is that we’ve got full-blown Middle East terror pretty close to home. Expect the MSM to bury this. The documents link Democrats in the U.S. to FARC…and FARC to Middle East terror.

In this photo released by Colombia’s Presidency police chief Gen. Oscar Naranjo shows documents recovered from the computer of the senior commander of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, FARC, killed in Ecuador during a press conference at the presidential palace in Bogota, Monday, March 3, 2008. According to Naranjo some files recovered from a laptop owned by the rebel leader known as Raul Reyes, who was killed Saturday in an operation by Colombian security forces just over the border in Ecuador, reveal that the guerillas sent money to Hugo Chavez when he was a jailed coup leader before being elected Venezuela’s president and that Chavez had recently paid US$ 300 million to the FARC. (AP Photo-Cesar Carrion)

What Colombian investigators found on the FARC terror leader’s computer:

– FARC connections with Ecuadorean president Rafael Correa
– Records of $300 million offerings from Hugo Chavez
– Thank you notes from Hugo Chavez dating back to 1992
– Uranium purchasing records
– Admit to killing the sister of former President Cesar Gaviria
– Admit to planting a 2003 car bomb killing 36 at a Bogota upper crust club
– Directions on how to make a Dirty Bomb
– Letter to Libya’s Moammar Gadhafi asking for cash to buy surface-to-air missiles
– Meetings with “gringos” about Barack Obama
– Information on Russian illegal arms dealer Viktor Bout who was later captured
– FARC funding Correa’s campaign
– Cuban links to FARC
…And, more.

Of course, the fact that these twits are in the terror game up to their eyeballs doesn’t make liberals’ fascination with them any less. The anti-war nutjobs are still frothing at the mouth in desire. Idiots.

Technorati Tags: terrorism, FARC, liberal, democrat, obama, clinton

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Captured FARC Documents Link Democrats to Terror Group

GatewayPundit is all over this one, and rightfully so. The bottom line is that we’ve got full-blown Middle East terror pretty close to home. Expect the MSM to bury this. The documents link Democrats in the U.S. to FARC…and FARC to Middle East terror.

In this photo released by Colombia’s Presidency police chief Gen. Oscar Naranjo shows documents recovered from the computer of the senior commander of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, FARC, killed in Ecuador during a press conference at the presidential palace in Bogota, Monday, March 3, 2008. According to Naranjo some files recovered from a laptop owned by the rebel leader known as Raul Reyes, who was killed Saturday in an operation by Colombian security forces just over the border in Ecuador, reveal that the guerillas sent money to Hugo Chavez when he was a jailed coup leader before being elected Venezuela’s president and that Chavez had recently paid US$ 300 million to the FARC. (AP Photo-Cesar Carrion)

What Colombian investigators found on the FARC terror leader’s computer:

– FARC connections with Ecuadorean president Rafael Correa
– Records of $300 million offerings from Hugo Chavez
– Thank you notes from Hugo Chavez dating back to 1992
– Uranium purchasing records
– Admit to killing the sister of former President Cesar Gaviria
– Admit to planting a 2003 car bomb killing 36 at a Bogota upper crust club
– Directions on how to make a Dirty Bomb
– Letter to Libya’s Moammar Gadhafi asking for cash to buy surface-to-air missiles
– Meetings with “gringos” about Barack Obama
– Information on Russian illegal arms dealer Viktor Bout who was later captured
– FARC funding Correa’s campaign
– Cuban links to FARC
…And, more.

Of course, the fact that these twits are in the terror game up to their eyeballs doesn’t make liberals’ fascination with them any less. The anti-war nutjobs are still frothing at the mouth in desire. Idiots.

Technorati Tags: terrorism, FARC, liberal, democrat, obama, clinton

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A New Direction for America… Backwards.

Guest post by Part-Time Pundit.

Today, after months of waiting, the Democrats have come up with an agenda for 2006. First, some noticeably missing items.

Iraq. For as much as the Democrats continue to criticize the President’s mishandling of the war, the peace, or whatever you want to call it, their direction does not highlight any meaningful alternative. How do they believe a free and secure Iraq should be created? Well, if Murtha has his way, apparently by surrendering to Al Qaeda.

National security. Apparently terrorism is not a problem because the polar ice caps are melting. Perhaps we were mistaken, it wasn’t planes that flew into the World Trade Center on 9/11, it was chunks of ice from the North Pole. So while they are ignoring national security, they’re stumping for Gore’s movie.

Immigration. Millions of immigrants took to the streets in protest in recent months. Millions more legal residents have also made their views known. No matter where you stand, this is one of the most charged and important issues on the minds of the people, and on this issue the Democrats are silent.

Moving on to some of the core items of the Democrats platform from items that simply haven’t been on the public radar to making current problems worse…

Raising minimum wage. Despite the fact that every time the minimum wage has been raised unemployment has gone up; they believe that having no job is better than being paid some less than some arbitrary number. There are more intelligent ways to get people earning enough to provide for their families, raising the minimum wage isn’t one of them. There is a finite amount of money in circulation, those wage increases need to be paid for somehow. It ends up being either lay offs, cut benefits, higher prices (and cost of living), or a combination of all three.

Price gouging. Who isn’t against price gouging? However, for as much as that legal term has been thrown around, there has not been any evidence provided to support that it is happening. After about two years of hearing that companies are breaking the law to stick it to Joe Consumer, I’d expect that someone would be able to prove it to nail their ass to the wall for it. However, after two years of complaining they haven’t found any evidence, it is doubtful that giving them a majority will accomplish anything except more hearings with legislators bloviating on TV so it looks like they are “doing something”.

Fiscal responsibility. One of the most appealing parts of the platform is restoring fiscal responsibility, however, the likely way of doing this will be to increase income to the treasury, not reducing spending. One of the key items to pay attention is that they specifically reference the fiscal discipline of the 90s… i.e. when Congress was run by Republicans. Cutting taxes is one thing, you have to cut spending along with it. At least on this point the Democrats are intellectually honest. They’ll at least raise taxes to pay for their spending. If we want to talk about fiscal responsibility, let’s start with earmark reform.

Slash student loan costs. This is pandering at its worst because student loans are almost essentially free. I know, because I have them. My wife’s student loans are consolidated for an APR of 1.65%. In other words, I could take the money, put it in a savings account, and use the interest to pay off the loan and still turn a profit on the loan. I know students who take student loans for the express purpose of using that money and investing it earning 8%+. Student loans are an incredible deal. Inflation is about 3%, which makes those loans essentially trivial interest. The only thing that could be done to make those loans cheaper would be to pay students interest for taking them out.

Stop tax giveaways for outsourcing. If by tax-giveaways you mean that other countries don’t tax the crap out of companies like we do, than you’re right. However, how exactly are you going to start taxing companies that aren’t in the US? Tariffs? Bring the entire world under the United States tax structure? No one is paying businesses to leave the US and outsource, it’s simply far cheaper to hire labor overseas in some industries.

Stop wasteful subsidies, Support stem-cell research. These two items are directly at odds. If there are wasteful subsidies, by all means eliminate them. However, funding stem-cell research (particularly embryonic which is what they are talking about) is in itself a wasteful subsidy. Adult stem cell research is curing people, it works. Private money is coming in hand over fist for adult stem cell research. Embryonic stem cell research does not work, which is why they have no investors and need a handout. While it might give the Democrats yet another chance to kill millions more babies and start treating people less as human beings and more as crops to be cultivated for parts, it remains that this science doesn’t work.

The Democratic platform here doesn’t address most of the issues important to Americans. The three top issues are Iraq, gas prices, and immigration for Congress. Health care is low on the list. Social security is absent. Stem cell research is absent. The minimum wage is absent.

Once again, we’re faced with a party unwilling to tackle the big issues that Americans care about. It would be nice in 2006 to have a real choice between candidates, and it looks like the Democratic party has deprived us once again.

John Bambenek is an academic professional at the University of Illinois. He’s a columnist for the Daily Illini and blogs at Part-Time Pundit.

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MORE!!! Border Patrol Informing on U.S. Citizens to Mexico

And they are not border state Minutemen, as if that weren’t bad enough!  They are citizens from interior states.  What on earth is going on around here???!! 

 I found this info on the heels of my earlier rant on our Border Patrol reporting the Minutemen to the Mexican government - first at the MinutemanHQ (linked in our sidebar) and then at Malkin’s.  I am not sufficiently calmed down enough to discuss this matter.  Read it for yourself:

Sara Carter, a reporter with the Inland Valley Daily Bulletin, reports today that she found documentation on Mexican government websites that show higher ups in the United States Border Patrol have been tipping off the corrupt Mexican government as to the locations of the Minutemen along the border.

This article does not report information told to the MCDC media offices that the Border Patrol chiefs have also been passing along intelligence reports to the government of Mexico on the activities of Minutemen not only at the borders, but in locations such as Utah, Nevada, Illinois, Massachusetts and Tennessee. Perhaps a follow-up story is coming tomorrow or an over-zealous editor took the info out?

Part of a report distributed last August to the Mexican government from Border Patrol bureaucrats read over the phone to the MCDC media offices contained not only numbers (estimated chapter membership) of Minutemen in Illinois, but a statement on their activities and that they didn’t seem to know any politicians there, indicating that the Illinois Minutemen didn’t yet have any political clout.

That is not a report on the location of Minutemen at the border, but political intelligence from our government to a foreign nation about the activities of American citizens petitioning our own government for redress of grievances.

The Minuteman Civil Defense Corps media offices will contact the reporter to inquire about copies of the documents and the timing on a follow-up story with the reports to the Mexican government of activities of Minutemen in INTERIOR states, as if reports of our locations in the border states weren’t bad enough.

UPDATE:   Tancredo Rips Government’s Spying of Minutemen

 

[Read more]

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Tommy Franks Defends Port Deal

I’m puttin’ up the links as fast as I can find ‘em folks. We got a tip in comments that the UAE deal may be less about business and more about military advantage (ie: an important military base in Dubai). Hey, I’m all about more American hardware in the Middle East, if ya know what I mean, but I am still incredibly skeptical of the motivations of the UAE, for the cultural/diplomatic reasons I’ve already outlined in this comment.

From NewsMax:

Former CENTCOM commanding general Tommy Franks said Wednesday that the Bush administration was right to approve a deal for a United Arab Emirates-based company to run six major U.S. ports.

“We have more U.S. Navy ships using the port in Dubai, Jebel Ali, than any other port outside the United States,” Franks told Fox News Channel’s “Hannity & Colmes.”

The former Iraq war commander explained U.S. reliance on the Dubai port facility by saying, “We know he difference between an enemy and a friend.”

“The Emirates is a friend,” Franks aid. “That is the best run port that I’ve ever seen.”

Gen. Franks said the Dubai company had three essential qualities that commend it for the task of running U.S. ports: The capacity to handle the job, the inclination to do it right and security, which he noted “will remain, in any case, in the hands of the United States Coast Guard.”

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More Reasons Why An ME Company Is Held To Different Standards

H/T: Kender via email

Excerpt from Nealz Nuze:

Bush pretends .. and it has to be pretending .. not to see why people are so worked up over this. On the one hand he suggests that this is all about anti-Arab prejudice. Please, Mr. President. Give us a bit more credit than that. Then Bush says: “I want those who are questioning it to step up and explain why all of a sudden a Middle Eastern company is held to a different standard than a [British] company.”

OK … where do we start. As you read through this list keep this fact in mind: Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Company, the company selling the American ports operations to Dubai Ports World, is a private company. Peninsular is not owned by the government of Great Britain. Dubai Ports world is a state-owned company, owned by the United Arab Emirates. So, what we have here is a private company selling its rights to operate these six ports in the Untied States to a government … an Islamic government. (96% Muslim) So, to answer Bush’s question as to …why all of a sudden a Middle Eastern company is held to a different standard than a [British] company.” let’s start with this correction. It’s a Middle Eastern government that’s being held to a different standard than a British company. Governments often use deadly force to accomplish their goals. Private companies do not. There, President Bush is your reason No. 1 for a different standard. Now that we’ve established that rather important difference … let’s move on to compare Great Britain to the UAE.

1. Great Britain is not an Islamic Nation. The de facto state religion there is Anglican, the Church of England. My extensive research shows that the Anglican Church has never, at least in modern times, committed an act of terror against the United States. Nor has the Church of England demanded that Israel be wiped off the face of the earth. Additionally, the Anglican Church has not announced it’s intention to subjugate the entire world under Anglican rule.

2. The UAE IS an Islamic Nation. Review Item No. 2 above.

3. The 9/11 hijackers did not use Great Britain as an operational and financial base for the planning and funding of their attacks on the United States.

4. The 9/11 hijackers DID use the United Arab Emirates as an operational and financial base for the planning and funding of their attacks on the United States.

5. None of the 9/11 hijackers came from Great Britain.

6. Two of the 9/11 hijackers came from the United Arab Emirates

7. Great Britain did not recognize the Taliban as the legitimate government of Afghanistan. The Taliban, you may remember, provided the operational base for the operations of Al Qaeda.

8. The United Arab Emirates DID recognize the Taliban as the legitimate government of Afghanistan. Good move.

9. Great Britain recognizes the government of Israel.

10. The UAE does NOT recognize the government of Israel.

11. Supporters of this move will tell you that there are already foreign companies already running most of American port operations.

12. We’re not talking about a foreign company here. We’re talking about a foreign government.

There just must be something here under the surface. Something unseen. Something undisclosed. The Bush White House just can’t be this blind to the legitimate concerns of the people and of those in Congress who are concerned about this move.

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NY Post Op Ed - Why A Middle Eastern Company Is Held To A Different Standard Than A British Company

DUBYA JEOPARDY (subscription required for access, so the entire article is posted below from Hannity.com.)

February 22, 2006

At last: A uniter, not a divider.

There stood President Bush yesterday, vowing to veto legislation that would prevent a company owned by the United Arab Emirates from taking operational control of six of the nation’s ports — including New York and New Jersey.

Arrayed against him: Elected officials of both parties, including solid blocks in Congress, officials from states potentially put at risk by the deal — and Mayor Bloomberg.

On Bush’s side: Jimmy Carter, all by his deservedly lonesome self. (”The overall threat to the United States and security, I don’t think it exists” said the man who so famously failed to prevent the fall of Iran to Islamic fundamentalism.)

That alone should give Bush serious second thoughts, about:

* The indefensible deal entered into with the UAE company; and,

* The fundamentally foolish position the administration has taken in its wake.

What is the president thinking?

Does George W. Bush really mean to use his first veto, after more than five years in office, on a bill that has Republicans and Democrats marching in lock-step — on national-security grounds?

Especially since there’s an excellent chance the veto would be overridden?

We confess that we’re as perplexed as everyone else at Bush’s determination to allow Dubai Ports World to take control of the nation’s key seaports.

To Bush, this is all a matter of anti-Arab profiling: “I want those who are questioning it to step up and explain why all of a sudden a Middle Eastern company is held to a different standard than a [British] company,” which last week was sold to the UAE firm.

With all due respect, Mr. President, here’s why:

* The UAE — and, specifically, Dubai — has been a breeding ground for terrorism.

* Its banking system — considered the commercial center of the Arab world — provided most of the cash for the 9/11 hijackers.

* It continues to stonewall the U.S. Treasury Department’s efforts to track al Qaeda’s bank accounts.

* Some of the operational planning for 9/11 took place inside the UAE.

* It exchanged ambassadors with the Taliban when the latter subjugated Afghanistan.

* And it trans-shipped weapons to Iran.

Nor does it matter, as Bush said yesterday, that port security still would be controlled by the U.S. Coast Guard.

Security at the ports is already lax enough; there’s no need to bring in another compromising element to what has been America’s most vulnerable point of entry, post-9/11.

Which is why protests yesterday reached a bipartisan tidal wave. Indeed, this isn’t just partisan posturing or Bush-bashing.

Not surprisingly, congressional Democrats are against the contract.

But so are the Republican governors of New York and Maryland, George Pataki and Bob Ehrlich.

And the Republican leader of the U.S. Senate, Bill Frist.

And the Republican Speaker of the House, Dennis Hastert.

And the GOP chair of the Senate Homeland Security Committee, Susan Collins of Maine.

And the GOP chairman of the House Committee on Homeland Security, Rep. Peter King of Long Island.

Meanwhile, taking Pataki’s lead, New Jersey’s Democratic Gov. Jon Corzine yesterday announced plans to move against the deal in both state and federal courts.

More power to him.

True, the president — backed by Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and Gen. Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff — insisted that the deal has been properly vetted and all security concerns have been met.

But the details of that vetting remain classified.

Moreover, Chertoff has insisted that the UAE contract is part of a “balancing of security . . . with the need to maintain a real robust global trading environment” — hardly cause for reassurance.

President Bush insists that blocking this deal “sends the wrong message” to a country that is trying to help the U.S. fight terror.

But it sends an even worse message to Americans who wonder how safe they will be when their ports are controlled by a country that is — at best — a late convert to that cause.

Speaking of messages, Rep. King — as staunch a friend of the president as there is in the House — was asked by The Post’s Deborah Orin whether there are enough votes in Congress to override a veto on the ports.

King, reports Orin, “took a deep breath and said: ‘Yes.’ ”

That’s a message Bush needs to hear.

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Dump Chertoff!

First, Homeland Security Director Michael Chertoff denied that the Mexican military incursions are any cause for alarm. He claimed that the heavily armed and hostile Mexican military was “lost” (just conveniently several miles on the wrong side of the border) and ignored the previous couple of hundred times the Mexican military got “lost” and/or shot up our Border Patrol.

Now, Chertoff is defending the international shipping deal that would allow an Arab-owned firm to take over port operations in six major American ports.

Chertoff on Sunday said the U.S. Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, or CFIUS, had carefully reviewed the Dubai Ports World purchase of London-based Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Co., which runs commercial operations in New York, New Jersey, Baltimore, New Orleans, Miami and Philadelphia.

“We make sure there are assurances in place, in general, sufficient to satisfy us that the deal is appropriate from a national security standpoint,” Chertoff told ABC’s “This Week.”

Well, pardon me for not buying it. In fact, Chertoff’s “general assurances” aren’t sufficiently worth squat. He’s already proven that he’s not serious about our national security.

DP World is owned by the government of the United Arab Emirates, a loose federation of seven emirates on the Saudi Arabian peninsula. The State Department calls the UAE an ally in the War on Terror, but critics note that the Arab nation had ties to the terrorists prior to Sept. 11, 2001, and one terrorist, Marwan al-Shehhi, was born in that country.

Opponents of the deal also argue that the FBI found that the UAE’s banking system filtered much of the money used for the operational planning before the Sept. 11 attacks, and many of the hijackers traveled to the United States through the UAE. On top of that, the UAE was an important transfer point for shipments of smuggled nuclear components sent to Iran, North Korea and Libya by a Pakistani scientist.

Here are the reasons Chertoff thinks Arabs with ties to terrorism are totally OK to have unprecedented access to the Achilles heel of our homeland security - our notoriously unprotected ports:

1. Chertoff said the UAE-owned firm is “well-known to the United States. Several top executives in the agency are American-born.” [Well, that makes me feel oh-so-much-better about it.]

2. Chertoff said the review by the 12-member CFIUS, which is chaired by Treasury Secretary John Snow and involves members from the departments of Defense, Justice, Commerce, State and Homeland Security, gave a thumbs up. [That makes it A-OK.]

3. Chertoff said that even though the decision was made in secret, the process is designed “to be rigorous and to make sure we properly take into the account of security when we approve any transaction.” [This from the same guy who thinks armed Mexicans 3 miles inside America taking pot shots at our Border Patrol are merely "lost".]

4. Chertoff said DP World “should not be excluded from operating the U.S. ports just because it is based in the UAE.” [We can't leave them out, because it might hurt their widdle feewings.]

The bottom line is that even though DP World would not be responsible for cargo screening, which is performed by the Department of Homeland Security, the port operator would handle security for cargo coming in and out of the port and the hiring of security personnel. That’s kind of letting the fox guard the henhouse!

Chertoff is an idiot. He’s morally bankrupt and has reneged on his sworn oath to pretect America. We need to dump his sorry ass.

FIRE CHERTOFF!!

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