I've decided to stop humoring the lunatic fringe - both the liberal ones and the conservative ones.  They're two peas of a pod.  I am deeply conservative in my politics, but not that deep.  I'm not liberal phobic either.   Some of my best friends are liberals (in the classical sense). Actually the term "liberal" used to mean one who believed in the equality of all men and that human beings had inalienable rights like life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. That is very different from the "progressive" socialist or the manic facist right-winger who believe there are special people endowed by their genes with special privileges, among which are the right to tell everyone else what to do, the right to being richer than the rest of us and the right to take for themselves anything they think they need to in order to manage the rest of us. I even leave that stuff up if they want a nice clean debate. I'm talking about the slavering paranoid racist supremists that try to sell themselves off as "real" liberals or conservatives and only make us people with sense look like idiots.

What I find particularly distasteful is the rise of the new antisemitism, particularly when it comes from Europeans who ought to know better.  I've seen a spate of attacks recently on Jews that trouble me. They are disturbingly familiar in theme, dwelling on Jewish conspiracies, Jewish bankers and alleged stealth-Jews in positions of power.  These new attacks claim the poor innocent Muslims are victims in all the recent unrest and not in any way the cause of it, despite the overwhelming amount of in-your-face evidence to the contrary.

The only Muslims I see as being victims in Europe or anywhere else are those who actually do seek peace and freedom (and there are plenty). Unfortunately, jihad is built into traditional Islam and it is VERY dangerous for any right-thinking Muslim to speak out against them. If you are a "good Muslim" you're a dead Muslim in many Islamist dominated countries. 

The Jihadis I have no sympathy for. The guys like the one in London that took off the head of a British soldier and then rambled on about on camera telling us how the guy deserved it and threatening to bring this down on the rest of us if we didn't submit to Islam was evil. And that seems to me to be the real threat. 

I believe there's a shell game going on here that relies on moral cowardice to be successful. It's easy to accuse the Jews of all sorts of evil. I've not seen crowds of Jews drag someone out of their car and behead them in front of their family because the weren't Jews. It's easy to blame it on Tea Party members. Have you seen the old geezers who show up for those.  They even stick around to pick up their trash afterward. These are not people to fear, unless you're afraid they might not watch your TV channel or they might vote you out of office.  I've not seen Jews OR Tea Party folk attack or kill people because of their race, religion or political opinion.

I have seen Muslims do just that and do it with malice aforethought. It's little wonder people are afraid to say anything negative about them. Poor old Salman Rushdie has had to spend the rest of his life in hiding because he wrote something  Islamic sensibilities because an Iranian mullah put out a Fatwah (death order) on him. It troubles me that any religion would even have a special word for "death order).

Muslim rebels in Syria have exterminated whole villages of Christians just in the past few months and we remain silent about it. We don't even talk about it on the mainstream news channels. Muslim Brotherhood supported groups have attacked and murdered Coptic Christians in Egypt. We are silent. We even had Muslims kill a couple of Coptic Christians here in the US and chopped them up in parts. Not a word on the ten o'clock news. The Boston Marathon bombing was the work of Muslim terrorists. They killed a nine year-old kid. Jews didn't do that. But the news and the president tried to blame it on Tea-partiers, mysterious homegrown terror groups and George Bush until it became obvious it was an Islamic terrorist act. Then they went silent.

It's as if we hope that if we don't criticize Islamic terrorist outrages or if we blame all the trouble on someone else and we show the Muslim fanatics that we also hate Jews (and, by the way, all the conservatives who criticize Islamists), then we think that somehow, maybe they won't hurt us. The Jews are under attack by people who want them dead and gone and the sooner the better. The Jewish people have decided not to go quietly. I applaud that, even when they get a little testy with me. You can hardly blame them for seeing a growing threat to them in this increasingly antisemitic world.

If we don't wake up to the fact that Islam has declared war on the rest of us, we're going to wind up precisely where we were in the Autumn of 1939. The Poles of all people should remember how that went and who their friends were and yet there are increasing rumblings against Jews even in the land that saw the horror that was Auschwitz built on their own soil by the Nazis.

13 year old girl, gang-raped by Muslim males,
is stoned for "fornication"

The guys I've started boycotting are the folk are largely those whose constant, unremitting claim is that the Jews are to blame for how people treat them. It's like saying to a woman, if you were raped, it must have been your fault. And that IS is common practice in Muslim countries. A woman who is raped and complains about it can wind up stoned to death. I've seen the video. What I want to know is where in the world is the moral outrage about that????

If a conservative had denied the same woman the right to an abortion, you could have heard the howls of outrage across the planet. It would have been the subject of special news reports on the network channels and a flurry of new laws designed to put an end to the Tea Party menace. This solves two problems for our cowardly ruling class.  It allows you to attack people who are not likely to strike back by blowing you up or kidnapping and beheading you and at the same time appeases people who WILL blow you up or kidnap and behead you.

If a redneck Tea Party Patriot had showed up at Fort Hood and shouted "Praise Jesus" and started shooting people, the government would have had 500 conservatives arrested by sundown and we'd still be seeing Michael Moore documentary retrospectives on how terrible the Tea Party is to this day. Instead, the Fort Hood shooter, a Muslim psychiatrist who went into an area crowded with soldiers, shouted "Allahu Akbar" and gunned down 35 people, was arrested and to this day sits in jail, still drawing his full military pay ($275,000 to date).  He isn't even scheduled for trial.  And his crime has been reclassified as "workplace violence" to boot.

Now that gets my attention. 

The fact that there are some bankers out there who are Jewish bothers me not at all.

Tom King
(c) 2013

Ron Paul Openly Courting the Muslim Vote

Photoshopped caricature*

Ron Paul has for some time been rolling up the anti-Semitic vote with his libertarian flavored stance on Israel. Dr. Paul states clearly that he is not anti-Semitic and I believe him, even though he has done a fairly poor job of distancing himself from his overtly anti-Semitic supporters. I don't think he's an actual anti-Semitic. I just think he's wrong on Israel.  Dr. Paul has kept his chastisement of his lunatic fringe following to the gentle side. He is careful not to offend the conspiracy theorists and anti-Semitic in his legions lest his poll numbers drop by half. What politician would bite the hand that feeds him after all?

And Dr. Paul is, after all, a politician. Paul's actual vote-getting numbers in the primaries so far have puttered along in the 9% range no matter what the polls or Paulestinians might say. He's done better than Newt Gingrich in a few places, but unlike Gingrich has not won a single state.

Now Ron Paul supporters are actively courting the Muslim vote.  The talking points to Muslim Voters are:

1. Ron Paul supports a non-interventionist stance in the Middle East
2. Ron Paul wants to remove US support for Israel

I am puzzled as to why this makes sense to ANYBODY, but then, I have a bad habit of reading history. The wave of Muslim immigration to this country has been largely from areas threatened, not by evil western imperialists, but by brutal middle-eastern regimes like those of such lovable tyrants as Assad, Quaddafi, Saddam Hussein, the Taliban and their ilk. It really doesn't make sense for a refugee, after he or she escapes persecution, poverty or whatever else drove them to leave their homeland, to come to the US and then turn around and oppose efforts by the United States and its allies to stop the very people who committed violence and oppression against them in the first place. It seems illogical at the very least and wondrously selfish at worst to say, "I got out, but screw the rest of you people back home."

If the Ron Paul people are counting on some level of Muslim antisemitism to drive the Muslim vote to Dr. Paul, that's just shameful.  Ronald Reagan showed that you win presidential elections by appealing to the best in people and not the worst. Unfortunately, that's precisely what some Paulestinians are doing in the Muslim community - poking the antisemitism beast hoping to garner votes for their boy and again confirming my opinion that there are a lot of folk in the Ron Paul camp who are only in it for the legalized pot.

Me, I'm looking for a candidate that would like to see a peace in the middle-east that doesn't involve one side killing everybody on the other side. That does NOT look very much like the Ron Paul plan to me. I don't think stepping back and letting radical Muslim nations drive Israelis into the sea is going to give us peace - only a little quiet before the storm.

I keep hearing that we shouldn't be the world's policemen. Is that so? Well then tell me. Who SHOULD be the world's policemen?  Somebody's going to do it if we don't and I can tell you a couple of groups that would like the job that I'd rather not hand it over to.

How about you?  Scream at me from the comments box.  I can take it.

Tom King

(that's my real name and I don't care who knows it)

* The photo above is a Photoshopped caricature (I can't draw worth shucks) - as far as I know Dr. Paul never wears a turban, even while campaigning in Detroit!

Mention Israel and These Guys Come Crawling Out of the Woodwork

Have you noticed how all you have to do is mention Israel in any kind of favorable light and the "I'm not anti-Semitic, but I hate Israel" folks come crawling out of the woodwork.  My last encounter called Israel "imperialistic" and suggested that Israel had picked a fight with its neighbors for the express purpose of having and excuse to seize more land from the poor mistreated Palestinians.

These guys remind us that unreasonable racial hatred is alive and well in the world. 

I'll be honest with you, I'm sympathetic with the Israelis for taking some land.  Take the Golan Heights, for instance.  If you live in the valley and your enemy takes the heights above you and starts lobbing artillery at you, does it not make sense for you to take those heights in order to protect yourself and stop the artillery from cutting you to ribbons.  Every Israeli expansion has come at the end of an unprovoked attack by its neighbors.

"Wait a minute!" the closet anti-Semites protest. "How can you say it was unprovoked?"

"Oh, I forgot, they are Jews after all and how provoking is that?"

Look, the area that is now Palestine was part of Jordan before Israel took it.  There wasn't a Palestinian homeland. The whole thing's a mess. Whatever else happens, until everyone else lays down arms too, Israel will hang on to its precarious hold on its territories and will do so by aggressively defending its territory. They are too small to "absorb" the kind of abuse a large nation like the U.S. can absorb. Look what happened when they gave up the Golan Heights. Hamas set up missile launchers up there and started lobbing them at schools and markets. How do you EVER learn to trust people like that? Everything the Israelis give up, they get punished for by the people that they gave something up to by treaty.

The Israelis can't afford to take the approach Obama has chosen as a response to terrorism and "absorb the attacks" and hope the terrorists get tired of blowing up things one day? Ain't going to happen.

For one thing, the Israelis know their enemy. Unlike our ideology-driven leadership here in the U.S., Israel can ill-afford to delude themselves that their enemies are "not really that bad after all".  The Israelis know that the moment they lower their guard, their enemies will drive them into the sea.

As long as the Arab world is an oligarchy of strong men whose policies impoverish their people, these men will continue to blame Israel and the United States for the misery they themselves have created and their poor and distressed people will swallow the bull and strap bombs to their bellies to lash out at people who aren't poor and miserable because someone has convinced them that if someone is rich and you are poor its because they took that wealth from you.

Piffle!

And the spoiled unhappy children of our nation who loathe their own land and carry irrational guilt because they live in the most peaceful, secure society on planet Earth, give aid and comfort to our nation's enemies for no better reason than that someone forgot to teach them the Golden Rule. They choose sides against their own because it's cool and because it upsets the little old ladies in church that used to point their bony fingers at them and tell them they were naughty.

Our country's heritage is deeply Judeo-Christian. What better way do these guys have to get back at your ancestors for the sin of giving you wealth and comfort without introducing you to He who is the source of our pleasant lives.

It amazes me that one can look at the governments of the world and draw the cock-eyed conclusions they do. Which of those countries produce the highest levels of wealth and happiness for their people? Is it the democracies with free markets or is it the governments where power is centralized in the hands of an elite. Which populace winds up being exploited?

The richest people in communist or totalitarian countries are the leaders. The poorest are the workers. The richest people in democracies are people who work. Our leaders draw a salary commensurate with their work if they were in business. Is this not better than semi-feudal tribal government that abuses its people, sends them out with bombs to blow up people shopping for their supper.

I believe that if the Muslim world would stop trying to kill the Israelis, the sane people over there would soon create an economically healthy middle east. Arabs themselves are business people by nature without all the hatred of their religion lathered on. The Israelis are business people. The western democracies are business people.

It's not all about religion (before all the closet anti-Semites and militant atheists out there start blaming it on religion). Power hungry would-be kings always blame it on religion while manipulating religion to serve their own power. Remember the 'divine right of kings' - a doctrine not found in scripture. The thugs and bullies of the Earth are always trying to use religion, patriotism or prejudice to accumulate power for themselves.

Why can't we seem to understand that human gods are dangerous. The best we can do is stick to the one God and take care of our own little corners of the world and do a little good where we can. The government that governs best is that which governs the least. People can either be trusted to care for themselves or they can't.

No human is smart enouigh to control anything as vast as an economy, a culture or a religion. When they try they just cock it up. Rule by strong man is always a mistake - whether the strong man is a Democrat, Republican, Socialist, Communist or Mullah.

God sends us the occasional strong leader when we need it.  In our country's history, we've been blessed at our darkest hours with leaders who laid down the mantle of power when they were done.  Washington, Lincoln, Reagan (The Revolution, The Civil War and the Cold War) all walked away when their work was finished.  Lincoln would have had he not been martyred. Even FDR and Wilson who were powerful, albeit dangerous, leaders during the great world wars, did served their nation well. Notice one thing, though.  When the wars were done, however, both men died before they could do any more damage (League of Nations, burgeoning socialism). Wilson had a stroke.  FDR died just before the end. Had this not happened, I fear we would be farther down the road to socialism than we are already and based on the history of those two men, I fear we'd have been far less supportive of Israel, given the subtle anti-Semitism that has always been an undercurrent of the progressive movement.
As Forest Gump would say, "That's all I've got to say about that."

I suspect the only response I'll get from my friend who wrote me, rapping my knuckles for my "stupid support of Israel"  will be long on "Oh, yeah?" and short on substance. For the record, I actually pointed out the Anti-Semitic tone of my friend's post. And it is anti-Semitic or at least Anti-Israeli, which is, of course, a Semitic country.

I'm not anti-Muslim before any of you go there. I am anti-totalitarian. I am violently opposed to any group of people who believe they have the right to meddle in the day to day lives of ordinary people. I believe in freedom. You should work as you please, worship as you please, live as you please. The only legitimate function of government is to help us do what we cannot do ourselves (defense against powerful enemies, building roads and highways, protecting our right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness - that sort of thing. If we can do it ourselves, we shouldn't be giving a responsibility to the government simply because it's more convenient.

Why? Because there are always human parasites hanging about ready to latch onto any means to power that is possible. It is an evil thing that religion seeks to root out. Remember the Golden Rule. If everybody did, it would be a merrier world indeed.

I hope as we go to the polls this week that we send to Washington, the state house, the county courts and city governments across our land, people who understand the full implications of the Golden Rule for politicians.

I'm just telling you what I think.

Tom King - Tyler, TX