Yesterday, I wrote about Wikileaks outing of hundreds of Afghan informants, whose lives are now at stake. Early on in the game, Private Bradley Manning was the suspected informant for Wikileaks, having already supplied them with the doctored “Collateral Murder” anti-American propaganda video. Well, it turns out that Manning may indeed be the person who supplied Wikileaks with these classified documents, as there is allegedly evidence to tie Manning to the documents.

Know what that means? it means he’s a traitor.

Investigators have found concrete evidence linking Pfc. Bradley Manning with the leak of classified Afghanistan war reports, a U.S. defense official said.

A search of the computers used by Pfc. Manning yielded evidence he had downloaded the Afghanistan war logs, which span 2004-2009, the official said. It isn’t clear precisely what that evidence is.

… The investigation is also looking at who might have helped Pfc. Manning provide the documents to WikiLeaks, a Web-based group that earlier this week released 76,000 secret reports from Afghanistan.

Alan Murray interviews Floyd Abrams, the legendary first amendment attorney, about the recent WikiLeaks disclosure and its relationship to the Pentagon Papers case.

Because of the focus on civilians who may have aided Pfc. Manning, the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Justice Department have been brought into aid the investigation, which is being led by the Army Criminal Investigation Command.

Defense officials are also combing through Pfc. Manning’s computers in a bid to figure out what other material he may have stolenas they try to anticipate what other material WikiLeaks may have.

WikiLeaks says it has at least 15,000 more Afghanistan documents the group withheld until some details could be redacted.

Military officials said the documents already released contain names of Afghans who have aided the allied force, information that could potentially endanger some of those people.

Manning has endangered the lives of not only hundreds of Afghan informants, but of our soldiers as well. He’s directly aided our enemies in facilitating the release of these documents and of the “Collateral Murder” video. They’ve become a rallying cry for Al Qaeda and the Taliban, who are threatening revenge strikes now.

He should be tried for treason, and if found guilty, face a traitor’s death. He’s aided our enemies and put our troops and our allies in harm’s way. If anyone dies because of these documents, it will be a direct result of Manning’s actions, and he needs to be held responsible.

(3 votes, average: 5.00 out of 5)

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Originally posted at David Horowitz’s Newsreal:

The internet has been buzzing about the story of Jennifer Keeton. She was a student at Augusta State University, trying to get a degree in counseling. An outspoken Christian, Keeton is not supportive of so-called “gay rights”. She was not shy about expressing her biblical perspective on homosexuality both in and out of class, and the university responded by expelling her. They claim that a bias against homosexuality disqualifies her from a certification in counseling, and gave her the option of undergoing a remediation program, complete with gay sensitivity training (read: brainwashing), or expulsion. And so, Keeton sued the school.

According to Keeton’s civil complaint, school officials met with her a number of times this spring to express concern over her open disagreement with gay and lesbian lifestyles in her classes and her writing assignments.

“You couldn’t be a teacher, let alone a counselor, with those views,” a faculty member told her during one meeting, according to the complaint.

The officials outlined a remediation plan for Keeton that would include such things as participating in diversity sensitivity workshops, completing reading and writing assignments on the topic and possibly attending the Augusta Gay Pride Parade, the complaint said.

She refused, writing in an e-mail to Augusta State officials, “[Y]ou are requiring me to alter my objective beliefs and also to commit now that if I ever may have a client who wants me to affirm their decision to have an abortion or engage in gay, lesbian, or transgender behavior, I will do that.

“I can’t alter my biblical beliefs, and I will not affirm the morality of those behaviors in a counseling situation.”

You know, one might think that if Keeton’s religious views on homosexuality made her a bad counselor, that it would be her problem. One might think that if a client had a problem with her views of homosexuality, they could find another counselor. It’s frankly outrageous that a university would force a student to undergo a homosexual brainwashing program because they disagreed with her religious beliefs. There is freedom of religion in this country, after all. Oh, and freedom of speech, too. The university is basically forcing a student to undergo a thought reform program, because they don’t like what her point of view or her beliefs. They’re trying to spin it otherwise, like they don’t mind her beliefs — as long as she keeps her mouth shut and never, ever mentions them. So basically, this university believes that Christians should only be Christian behind closed doors. Thousands of Christians across the country believe exactly the same thing that Keeton believes, so are they not welcome at Augusta State, either? We’re back to Christianity being targeted and attacked, where Christians aren’t allowed to be Christians in the public square. God forbid those poor helpless fragile victims, the gays, be offended!!

Unfortunately, a federal judge has ruled in favor of another university who did something similar. So, guess what? Christianity is apparently no longer allowed on public universities. Freedom of religion?! Please! The delicate sensibilities of the gays and the politically correct crowd are so much more important than silly things like freedom of speech and religion.

A federal judge has ruled in favor of a public university that removed a Christian student from its graduate program in school counseling over her belief that homosexuality is morally wrong

… U.S. District Judge George Caram Steeh dismissed [Julea] Ward’s lawsuit against Eastern Michigan University. She was removed from the school’s counseling program last year because she refused to counsel homosexual clients.

The university contended she violated school policy and the American Counseling Association code of ethics.

… The case is similar to a lawsuit the [Alliance Defense Fund] filed against Augusta State University in Georgia. Counseling student Jennifer Keeton was allegedly told to stop sharing her Christian beliefs in order to graduate.

Keeton’s lawsuit alleged that she was told to undergo a reeducation program and attend “diversity sensitivity training.”

The American Counseling Association’s code of ethics does not trump the First Amendment. And this judge has now ruled that approval of homosexuality is now mandatory in public universities. The country founded on Judeo-Christian beliefs is now requiring Christians not to express those Judeo-Christian beliefs. This is what “embracing diversity” is all about, after all. Only acceptable kinds of diverse backgrounds and beliefs are allowed. Public universities are, in two separate cases, imposing ideological beliefs onto their students and the kicking them out if they don’t comply.

Christian or not, approve of homosexuality or not, if you value freedom, that should scare you.

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A few days ago, I discussed the Wikileaks document drop, which exposed 90,000 pages of classified documents showing that we were paying Pakistan to aid our enemies. It was unsurprising news, information that anyone with an ounce of common sense could have surmised. What’s come out that is surprising — and disgusting — is that Wikileaks also published the names of hundreds of Afghan informants who are currently risking their lives (and their family’s lives) by helping us. The Taliban is reportedly already considering revenge strikes against the “traitors”.

Hundreds of Afghan civilians who worked as informants for the U.S. military have been put at risk by WikiLeaks’ publication of more than 90,000 classified intelligence reports which name and in many cases locate the individuals, The Times newspaper reported Wednesday.

The article says, in spite of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange’s claim that sensitive information had been removed from the leaked documents, that reporters scanning the reports for just a couple hours found hundreds of Afghan names mentioned as aiding the U.S.-led war effort.

One specific example cited by the paper is a report on an interview conducted by military officers of a potential Taliban defector. The militant is named, along with his father and the village in which they live.

“The leaks certainly have put in real risk and danger the lives and integrity of many Afghans,” a senior official at the Afghan foreign ministry told The Times on condition of anonymity. “The U.S. is both morally and legally responsible for any harm that the leaks might cause to the individuals, particularly those who have been named. It will further limit the U.S./international access to the uncensored views of Afghans.”

One former intelligence official told the paper that the Taliban could launch revenge attacks on “traitors” in the coming days.

Shame on Julian Assange. I’m just curious — does he have any idea the situation these informants are in? The risk they take in working with us? If discovered, they will be murdered. And it’s likely that they’ll see their families murdered, too. It’s such an incredible risk to take, and there’s such bravery in these informants, it makes me sick to my stomach to think that they have been betrayed. Betrayed by one of our own, the very people that they are helping. These people may very well die because of Julian Assange’s little act of treason, and it disgusts me. Even if they survive, it’ll be because they were moved, and they’ll be unable to continue helping us. And who would want to take their places, knowing that our previous informants had been outed?

Wikileaks whined earlier this year about collateral murder, and now, that’s exactly what they’re about to be party to. This is reprehensible, and I’m just curious — exactly how far will Obama allow this man to go before putting a stop to it? These brave Afghans are putting their lives at risk by helping us, because they have the audacity to want a better country than the one they currently have. And Julian Assange just signed their death warrants. I rarely say this, but God — I hope he burns in hell for this. He has blood on his hands, and I swear to God if he is not arrested then there is no justice in this world. Oh, wait, that’s right — he’s in hiding, the miserable little coward, behind the skirts of the Swedish government. So he can do all of this — published classified documents, put the lives of our informants at risk, hamper the war effort in Afghanistan — with no consequences.

Confederate Yankee reports that there’s a familiar traitor that may also be responsible for this.

The real suspected traitor in this mess is U.S. Army Private Bradley Manning, the analyst who bragged to a white hat hacker that he had stolen over a quarter-million military and diplomatic documents and sent them to WikiLeaks. Manning was taken into custody earlier this year after being fingered by the military as the source of the Apache gun camera footage Assange turned into a propaganda film called “Collateral Murder” that Assange used for fund-raising and not a little self-promotion. Manning is also the primary and obvious suspected leaker of these documents, which may be part of the $250,000 he stole.

I argued back in June that Manning should be charged with treason. If he is found to be the source of those documents, his only choice should be between rope, bullets, or a needle.

I couldn’t agree more. Both Manning and Assange need to be held accountable for the treason they’ve committed.

(3 votes, average: 5.00 out of 5)

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Teachers in Germantown High, in Pennsylvania, have allegedly been stealing federally funded student lunches for poor students. This disgusting practice has meant that a number of students have had to go without food. One brave teacher had the audacity to do everything in her power to put an end to the thefts… and was fired.

SAMENIA MAYER said that she’d always tried to do right by the students she served at Germantown High, where she recruited and trained mentors to keep incoming freshmen on the right path.

So, when she noticed that teachers there were helping themselves to federally funded lunches before their students could get to them during a summer program, she complained to the principal, who ignored her complaints, she said.

Mayer said that the problem became so bad that even when the school ordered more than 100 boxed lunches for about 80 students, up to 20 students still went hungry, an allegation that students backed up last week.

She alerted alumni, clergy and community organizers, about what was going on, but when nothing changed, she called and e-mailed staff at the school district, seeking action. She was told to raise her concerns with the school’s principal, Margaret Mullen-Bavwidinsi, who turned around and fired her, Mayer said. To add insult to injury, the day after she was fired, signs went up around the building warning teachers not to eat the students’ food.

… Mayer was incensed.

“The staff gets paid. They have no right to take that,” she said of the students’ lunches, paid for by a $6.5 million Department of Labor grant. “This is the federal government’s money. You have to do what they tell you to do with it.”

… During a recent parent roundtable, Mayer brought her concerns to Schools Superintendent Arlene Ackerman, whose aides suggested that she inform the principal. A district spokesman said that the district expects to fill the TAP position, but added that a principal is responsible for addressing complaints.

Mayer said that she felt that the teachers she’d seen taking lunches – usually hoagies, chips, fruit, cookies and juice or water – were cheating their students, 83 percent of whom are considered economically disadvantaged, according to district figures.

“Some of [the students] would come to me crying, saying that they haven’t eaten,” she said.

Last week, two teachers leaving the school who didn’t want to identify themselves denied the claim.

“Do you see what the students are fed? Why would I want to eat that?” asked one teacher, while the other added that she buys her lunch from the culinary students.

But incoming freshman Cierra Riley said that she was annoyed after seeing teachers digging in her grub earlier this month.

“For some of the kids, these are their last [meals] for the day,” she said.

Her friend, Kayla Hazzard, also a freshman, said that on several occasions she and at least five classmates she knew didn’t eat.

“A Campus Pal [a high school senior] told us that they ran out of food because the staff was eating our stuff,” she said of one of those instances. One time, “they tried to give me just an apple.”

… But Mullen-Bavwidinsi and Datcher said that Mayer wasn’t innocent. They said that she not only ate the food but also brought leftovers home to her four kids.

“We are not filing a grievance [against the district] because Samenia is not giving you the whole picture,” Datcher said. “Do you think I would jeopardize my career if she got fired because she asked a question? We better have more than that to hang on.”

Mayer scoffed at the accusation.

“Why would I take food that was left out all day to my kids?” she asked. “Why would I go to great lengths to go to 440 [Broad Street, district headquarters] based off of something I was doing too? That’s hypocritical.”

In an e-mail to Mayer sent on July 17, Mullen-Bavwidinsi told her to leave the matter alone.

“Since you are NOT in charge of DOL incentives as part of your charge, I will respectfully ask that you NOT concern yourself with this issue,” she wrote.

When reached at her school last week, Mullen-Bavwidinsi said that teachers are not allowed to eat the lunches and that she didn’t recall sending the e-mail. She declined to comment further.

Can you sink any lower than this? I am just disgusted at the thought of this. It doesn’t surprise me — a school abusing federal funds is hardly news — but to steal food from your students, to where they have nothing to eat for the day is absolutely despicable. It’s unforgivable. I am furious, and I don’t even have children affected by this. I can’t even imagine how these students’ parents must be feeling. And the school is still trying to cover the whole thing up, even though Mayer was able to produce e-mails that seem to prove that she isn’t lying.

The really sad thing? As outraged and angry as I am that this happened, I’m also not surprised. There’s a reason that more and more Americans don’t trust public education. It’s because more and more public schools are proving to be untrustworthy, thanks to the teachers unions. Bad teachers are rewarded and given a lifetime pass, never held accountable for their actions or the bad education they dole out to their students. The state of education in America today is horrific, and it’s easy to see why homeschooling is becoming more and more appealing to parents.

As for the so-called educators at Germantown High, there’s only one thing that needs to happen here. That principal needs to be fired, like yesterday, and any teachers found to have stolen food need to be fired as well, along with any other teachers who may have covered up the fraud. Of course, it probably won’t happen. The school district is already saying that the claims are unfounded, despite students who went without food backing up Mayer’s claims, despite e-mails between Mayer and the principal about this matter. Pathetic, isn’t it? But it’s typical of our schools. Teacher screws up, and the school district circles the wagons to protect them, no matter how bad it is.

Hat Tip: Hot Air

(2 votes, average: 5.00 out of 5)

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How often do I actually applaud RINOs? Usually, they’re the scourge of the GOP, going across the aisle for the worst legislation and doing nothing but stabbing their constituents — and their party — in the back. Our two RINOs from Maine are the immediate examples that come to mind, Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins, although you also have to be wary of Scott Brown, Lindsey Graham, and John McCain. Just hearing their names sends an angry little shiver down my spine! However, this week they pulled through, and so, bravo to them for finally doing the right thing.

Harry Reid was trying to force the DISCLOSE Act through the Senate this week before Congress recesses. And what exactly is the DISCLOSE Act? Well, it’s basically the only thing that Reid, Pelosi, and Obama had to pacify their radical liberal constituents, who are furious right now. We sent more troops into Afghanistan. Gitmo is still open. Gay marriage has not been legalized. There wasn’t a public option in Obamacare. Yeah, liberals are pissed, and while conservative voters are rallying, liberal voters are at home pouting. They thought their savior was getting elected, and that they had their dream Congress. And so far, it’s been a disappointment to them. Reid was throwing the liberals a bone, and it failed. Boo-hoo. DISCLOSE would have punished grassroots organizations, while unions and large establishment groups would be able to get around its limitations. It was the usual Democrat pandering to the unions, and thank God it actually failed. The unions need to be taken down a notch.

Reid’s liberal dream didn’t come true, thanks to a united GOP front, and the bill failed 57-41. Hot Air has the rundown of how Reid’s dream crumbled. First, Reid lost the support of Susan Collins, who announced Sunday that she wouldn’t be voting with Reid. Then he lost not only Lindsey Graham and Scott Brown, but Joe Lieberman as well, who didn’t even attend the vote. The last hope for Harry Reid was Olympia Snowe, who said no as well — and apparently, Reid had lost Dianne Feinstein’s support, too!

This bill was a typical Democrat disaster. As usual, it was shrouded in secrecy, rammed through in closed-door committee hearings, and catered to pander to unions, left-wing lobbyists, and extremist liberal voters. Thank God that, for once, the RINOs in the Senate actually did the right thing.

Oh, but let’s not celebrate too much yet. Chuckie Schumer is vowing to bring this Frankenstein back to life.

(3 votes, average: 5.00 out of 5)

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President Barack Obama is the honorary chairman of the Boys Scouts of America. The Boy Scouts have given millions of hours in volunteer service, and have helped to make strong, accomplished leaders out of millions of boys over the last hundred years. Many of our nation’s presidents have been involved with Boy Scouts, including George W. Bush, Jimmy Carter, Gerald Ford, Lyndon B. Johnson, John F. Kennedy, and Franklin D. Roosevelt. Scouting builds character, encourages leadership, and instills strong, traditional values that many children lack growing up today. The last three presidents — George W. Bush, Bill Clinton, and George H.W. Bush — all spoke at Boy Scout Jamborees while serving in office. This year is the Boy Scout 100 Year Anniversary Jamboree, but will Obama be attending? Nope, he’s got more important things to do… like rub elbows with the ladies of The View. Priorities, people, priorities.

President Barack Obama, the honorary chairman of the Boy Scouts of America, will not speak in-person before the group on Wednesday at Fort A.P. Hill in Virginia, as part of the organization’s 100th anniversary celebration. However, the president is sending a videotaped message to the scouts for Wednesday, the same day he will be in Manhattan to tape an appearance for ABC TV’s talk show “The View.”

Bob Dries, chairman of national news and media at the Boy Scouts of America Jamboree – a gathering that happens every four years and attracts thousands of scouts from around the world – told CNSNews.com that the organization was told on Monday that the president had scheduling conflicts and would not be speaking in-person at the week-long event.

The BSA had scheduled its Wednesday arena program to include remarks by the president at 11 a.m. in front of the more than 45,000 scouts who will be in attendance.

Now, I could understand Obama not attending if he was doing some actual, you know, governing. But he isn’t. He’s blowing off the Boy Scouts — 45,000 American boys — in favor of the women of The View. And it isn’t even a live appearance, it’s a taped appearance. You’re telling me there’s no way he could have rescheduled his pre-taped appearance on The View to make time for the organization that has built the character of millions of American boys? I don’t know. Maybe Obama would just feel uncomfortable around thousands of boys who genuinely love God and country. And Lord knows, he might be worried about the competition with his Hitler Youth Brigade.

Of course, this isn’t all that shocking. We call Obama the Campaigner-in-Chief for a reason, and this is just another one. He loves the perks of the job, he loves his celebrity status, but he doesn’t actually want to do anything. He’d rather hang out with celebrities than honor 48 Medal of Honor recipients. He’d rather go to parties and play golf than clean up the oil spill in the Gulf. And he’d rather play celebrity on The View than attend the Boy Scout 100 Year Anniversary Jamboree.

(5 votes, average: 4.20 out of 5)

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So, let’s say you’re a Marine in Helmand Province in Afghanistan. You go 6 – 9 months separated from your loved ones. You go weeks without doing laundry or getting a shower. Some days you don’t have time to eat. Some days you don’t have time to sleep. You have no reliable phone or internet, so the only lifeline you have to your family are the precious few letters and care packages you receive from home. You’re constantly on the lookout for sniper fire and IEDs. Every single day, you worry about whether or not you’ll get to hug your mother again, if you’ll ever kiss your wife, if you’ll get to meet the baby you’ve never seen before. You’re under more pressure than you’ve ever been under in your life.

You know what’s just like that? Being a member of Congress! Well, according to Barbara “Call Me Senator” Boxer, anyways.

At a campaign event over the weekend in Inglewood, California, Democratic Sen. Barbara Boxer seemingly equated being a politician to serving in the military –- and an Iraq War veteran supporting Boxer’s November opponent is calling on her to apologize.

“We know that if you have veterans in one place where they can befriend each other and talk to each other. You know when you’ve gone through similar things you need to share it. I don’t care whether you are a policeman or a fireman or a veteran or by chance a member of Congress,” the California senator said. “[Democratic Rep.] Maxine [Waters] and I could look at each other and roll our eyes. We know what we are up against. And it is hard for people who are not there to understand the pressure and the great things that go along with it and the tough things that go along with it.”

“Barbara Boxer’s disrespectful comments underscore just how out of touch she has become after her 28 years in Washington,“ Veterans for Carly Coalition Co-Chairman Lt. Commander Paul Chabot said in a press release, in response to Boxer’s comments. “Equating the experiences of members of Congress with those of brave soldiers who have fought to defend our country is just the latest example in a failed career marked by disrespect for our men and women in uniform.”

Chabot added, “Barbara Boxer owes an immediate apology to all members of America’s armed forces.”

Out of touch is an understatement. How arrogant and self-righteous must you be to compare being a politician to being a police officer, a firefighter, or a soldier? Look, I get her point — she considers being a senator to be a high-pressure job. But, really? I don’t think it’s quite as stressful as, I don’t know, fighting for your life defending our country in Afghanistan.

Interestingly, Boxer has a history of being rude and arrogant towards the military, as Yid With Lid points out. She was one of the 25 Senators to vote against condemning Moveon.org’s notorious “General Betray Us” ad. And who can forget her mouthing off to a brigadier general who called her ma’am — she snootily replied that he needed to call her senator. Class? Respect? Must not be part of her job description.

So when you take these remarks in context, I guess it’s unsurprising. After all, how can you empathize with the difficulty of the job the military does when you have no respect for the military whatsoever?

(3 votes, average: 4.67 out of 5)

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The internet is abuzz with the document drop at Wikileaks. We’ve been giving Pakistan $1 billion a year in aid, and in return… they’ve been helping our enemies kill our troops. Smart diplomacy, people. Smart diplomacy.

Americans fighting the war in Afghanistan have long harbored strong suspicions that Pakistan’s military spy service has guided the Afghan insurgency with a hidden hand, even as Pakistan receives more than $1 billion a year from Washington for its help combating the militants, according to a trove of secret military field reports made public Sunday.

The documents, made available by an organization called WikiLeaks, suggest that Pakistan, an ostensible ally of the United States, allows representatives of its spy service to meet directly with the Taliban in secret strategy sessions to organize networks of militant groups that fight against American soldiers in Afghanistan, and even hatch plots to assassinate Afghan leaders.

Taken together, the reports indicate that American soldiers on the ground are inundated with accounts of a network of Pakistani assets and collaborators that runs from the Pakistani tribal belt along the Afghan border, through southern Afghanistan, and all the way to the capital, Kabul.

Much of the information — raw intelligence and threat assessments gathered from the field in Afghanistan— cannot be verified and likely comes from sources aligned with Afghan intelligence, which considers Pakistan an enemy, and paid informants. Some describe plots for attacks that do not appear to have taken place.

But many of the reports rely on sources that the military rated as reliable.

While current and former American officials interviewed could not corroborate individual reports, they said that the portrait of the spy agency’s collaboration with the Afghan insurgency was broadly consistent with other classified intelligence.

There are even allegations that Pakistani intelligence is working alongside Al Qaeda to plan attacks. And Pakistan has allegedly been allowing Al Qaeda terrorists to cross the border into Pakistan safely, refusing to fire on or arrest them.

The White House has swiftly chimed in to dismiss the leaks as irresponsible.

White House National Security Adviser James Jones issued a statement that begins: “The United States strongly condemns the disclosure of classified information by individuals and organizations which could put the lives of Americans and our partners at risk, and threaten our national security.

“Wikileaks made no effort to contact us about these documents – the United States government learned from news organizations that these documents would be posted. These irresponsible leaks will not impact our ongoing commitment to deepen our partnerships with Afghanistan and Pakistan; to defeat our common enemies; and to support the aspirations of the Afghan and Pakistani people.

“The documents posted by Wikileaks reportedly cover a period of time from January 2004 to December 2009. On December 1, 2009, President Obama announced a new strategy with a substantial increase in resources for Afghanistan, and increased focus on al Qaeda and Taliban safe-havens in Pakistan, precisely because of the grave situation that had developed over several years.”

An administration official went further in an e-mail to reporters: “I don’t think anyone who follows this issue will find it surprising that there are concerns about ISI and safe havens in Pakistan. In fact, we’ve said as much repeatedly and on the record.”

Here’s a question: if the White House has all of these security concerns with Pakistan, then why are we paying them $1 billion a year?? We’re basically funding Pakistan’s collusion with the Taliban and Al-Qaeda.

Of course, these are despicable acts by Wikileaks that shouldn’t be applauded. They take pride in releasing classified documents that do nothing but jeopardize the mission in Afghanistan. And there are some curiosities about the documents, as Jammie Wearing Fool points out.

The last thing I observed is I find it funny that there were no jokes, no reports of successful actions or heroic acts being reported as being contained in the documents. Don’t you think that in 90,000 pages there would be at least account of bravery or a successful turn around in a village or completion of a civics project like a school or a hospital?

We may not be able to completely trust Wikileaks, but it doesn’t mean that we should trust Pakistan… or be giving them $1 billion a year. Pakistan undoubtedly has some ties to terrorism, and just last week Hillary Clinton accused them of knowing where bin Laden is. This was the day after she had promised even more aid to Pakistan. The document drop from Wikileaks isn’t anything new or shocking. The Washington Post reports that there are three main things to take from this: that Pakistan’s intel forces are continuing to support the Taliban, that the war is under resourced, and that the Taliban has heat-seeking missiles capable of attacking our helicopters. (What, you mean that NATO helicopters haven’t just been crashing out of thin air?! Shocking!) None of the news in the Wikileaks document dump is particularly new, but it begs the question: why are we giving our enemies money?? Once upon a time, that would have been called treason.

What will it take for the Obama administration to do something about Pakistan — and finally do what it takes to win this war in Afghanistan?

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Well, this was just a matter of time. After 18 months of incompetence and a total lack of leadership, voters are beginning to have buyer’s remorse, thinking that maybe things would have been better off if McCain had won.

Democrats will be gulping this morning at the Quinnipiac Poll’s latest results. For the first time in the survey’s history, Americans believe by a 48% to 40% margin that President Obama doesn’t deserve re-election. Almost as stinging, a plurality believe the country would have been better off if John McCain had beaten Mr. Obama in 2008.

… Mr. Obama’s approval rating continues to slide, and is dragging his party down. While last July Mr. Obama had a 57% positive rating, Quinnipiac now pegs him at just 44% approval — a number below President Bill Clinton’s approval rating just before his party lost control of Congress in 1994. When asked which party they plan to vote for this November, likely voters in the Quinnipiac survey picked Republicans by 43% to 38%. This was despite an expressed lack of confidence in the ability of Republican leaders in Congress to tackle the nation’s problems.

Smitty wonders if we’d still have the tea parties, or if voters would be so energized to take the country back had McCain won instead of Obama. He’s probably right in that we wouldn’t. Only Obama’s brand of sheer destruction and incompetence could have done that. I still would just love to know where these people were in 2008 when they saddled us with the clown.

Better late than never, I guess.

(5 votes, average: 5.00 out of 5)

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One of the most terrifying experiences a woman can undergo is surely to become pregnant while still in high school. You’re afraid of getting in trouble, of getting shunned by your friends. You worry that you won’t be able to finish high school, that your future is ruined. You wonder if you can take care of a baby and if you’d even be a good mother. It isn’t surprising that teenage girls find abortion so appealing — it’s a quick solution to a problem they feel like they have no way out of, and if they go to the right place, their parents never even need to know. And, as Live Action has repeatedly documented, abortion clinics are there waiting with open arms to exploit and manipulate these young girls into getting an abortion. After all, who is there to tell the scared, confused young girl that she can do this? That it won’t ruin her life? Or that there are other options besides having an abortion if you can’t have the child?

This was the situation my maternal grandmother found herself in at 14. Instead of having an abortion, she gave my mother up for adoption, and my mother was adopted by wonderful, loving parents and got a great family. Had my biological grandmother chosen to have an abortion, my mother would not be here — and neither would I. We do not have a relationship with her, but she chose to give my mother a life. I’m proud of her for that.

Apparently, rapper/actor Nick Cannon’s mother was in this exact situation. She got pregnant at 17, and was going to have an abortion. She ultimately changed her mind, giving birth to her son, Nick. He wrote a song thanking her for her decision and the sacrifices she made entitled “Can I Live?” (lyrics here). Here is the touching music video:

Chloe at Feministing found this video, and proceeded to blast it as “anti-woman”… and cruelly mocked it, sneering that his mother chose life and ended up with a “C-grade celebrity”. I guess if babies don’t grow up to become A-list celebrities, then they aren’t worth the hassle — in Chloe’s world, anyways.

Adult-with-the-voice-of-a-fetus Cannon’s argument is that not would his mother be killing someone were she to get an abortion, but she’d be killing him, Nick Cannon, the “Oprah-bound” “star” of Drumline. Drumline, guys.

It’s interesting that this is part of her argument. If he had been the star of, oh, Avatar, would she still be mocking him? Is it about the level of celebrity for her? I’m pretty sure that Cannon’s mother doesn’t love her son just because he’s a celebrity, and the point Cannon makes is a good one, whether a parent is considering an abortion or not. All parents wonder what their child will grow up to be, and how far they might go in life. And while Nick Cannon might indeed be a C-grade celebrity, he’s still more well-known than Chloe is, so does she really have much room to be sneering at him for his lack of fame?

And, believe it or not, even babies destined to grow up to be C-grade celebrities deserve a chance to live. I wonder if Chloe would be willing to tell her mother that she wished she had been aborted, if it was what was best for her at the time. And if Nick Cannon is such an inconsequential celebrity, then why is she getting so upset about him professing his pro-life views?

If this were just a rap to thank his mother for the sacrifices she made for him, it would be really sweet. And I understand that the knowledge that your mother very nearly aborted the pregnancy from which you resulted might color your view of abortion, but Cannon’s not just thanking his mother here. He’s calling on women, all women, who find themselves in a similar situation, to make the same decision she did. There is no other possible way to interpret the message “if your baby could speak, it would beg you not to have an abortion.”

… This video isn’t just about “telling the story of his life,” it’s about encouraging other women to make the same decision his mother did. It’s about telling people that no matter what sacrifices it requires of her, a seventeen-year-old woman who gets pregnant should keep the pregnancy, even if she has to drop out of high school, go to night school and depend on government welfare programs. Even if she has dreams other than the ones in which she sees her baby (“you see me in your sleep, so you can’t kill your dreams”? Really, Nick?). And what’s his reasoning? Because that baby might end up being a C-grade celebrity who will thank you for your strength and sacrifice years later, in the form of a poorly-written rap with a barely-concealed political agenda!

It’s quite clever, really, to focus on what the baby might become, on what the world might have missed out on if someone’s life had never come to pass, whether that person is Nick Cannon or Tim Tebow or you, the person watching this video. It’s clever because it forces us to acknowledge that even if we don’t believe a fetus is a person, it undeniably has the potential to become one. That might feel like a victory for anti-abortion forces, but in fact, it reveals a crucial weakness in the approach of those who argue for restrictions on abortion.

The focus on the baby’s potential life lays bare exactly where pro-life priorities lie, and it’s not with women. Women don’t matter here. Babies, fetuses and the potential they represent are all that matters. What women want, what women need, none of those things are important compared to the potential future life of the fetus. And if a woman has goals that would be impossible to achieve if she had a baby, or if she doesn’t want to make the enormous sacrifices that might be required of her, she’s weak. The admirable women are the ones who are “strong” enough to “make the right decision” even if it’s completely against their interests.

The focus on what the baby might grow up to be reveals just how anti-woman the anti-choice stance really is, despite the lauding of women like Cannon’s mother as strong and admirable. Because, as Cannon’s video demonstrates beyond a shadow of a doubt, we’re meant to care more about the potential for the fetus’ life than the woman’s. We’re expected to care more about a being that merely possesses the potential to become a fully-fledged person with thoughts, hopes, dreams and accomplishments, than we do about the woman who has already fulfilled that potential.

So just remember, ladies, even though it’s your body and your life, it’s not about you. You don’t matter. What matters is that the next generation of human life not be denied the glory, the greatness and the genius that will be Drumline 2.

The overall theme of this post is common for the pro-abortion fanatics. They love to claim that if women cannot have abortions, it means that they have to give up their entire lives — and call this anti-woman. Is it not, though, anti-woman to assume that women are such victims, incapable of living and working while pregnant? While mothers? Feminists look at pregnancy as something crippling, as if being pregnant somehow means that you aren’t able to function. It’s as if in their world, pregnancy turns women into blind-deaf crippled retards who somehow cannot continue to go to school (you can’t learn when you’re pregnant or something), you cannot keep working (it’s too rough on your fragile pregnant body), and your life is completely over (because obviously you’ll have no future if you have a baby). And, as usual, the idea of adoption is never mentioned. I just can’t quite understand how making women out to be these fragile, weak little victims who can’t handle sacrifices or hardship somehow makes women more empowered.

And while the pro-abortion crowd likes to pretend they only care about the life of the woman, it’s simply not true. Pro-abortion feminists like Chloe don’t care about women at all. They care about abortion. It’s why they are against pre-abortion ultrasounds and laws requiring clinics to give medically accurate information. (They know that if a woman sees an image of her child, or knows that the baby already has a heartbeat, they’ll be much less likely to go through with the abortion.) It’s why they try to drown out the post-abortion trauma women face — from increased health risks (like breast cancer) to higher incidences of miscarriage, they don’t want women to know about it. They also don’t want women to know about the emotional trauma many women face. Post abortion, many, many women are stricken with feelings of guilt, regret, and sorrow. Pro-abortion radicals do not want women to know about any of these things, yet they trumpet themselves as pro-woman. What they actually are is pro-abortion.

I don’t think Nick Cannon’s song is genius or even that good. The video has touching moments, though, especially the scenes of mother and son together at the end. While feminists might like to pretend that women who choose life over abortion will regret it their entire lives (remember, pregnancy is a life-ruiner), I’d suspect the opposite. Many, many parents struggle when they’re first starting out, and especially teenage parents. There will be many, many sacrifices to make, and life will inevitably be harder. But I’d be willing to bet that most of the parents who make these sacrifices for their children ultimately say it was worth it in the long run. They love their children enough that they are willing to sacrifice, willing to work harder, to give their children the chance to have a better life. And it’s because they love their children. Feminists like Chloe, though, would have parents miss out on that love just because the road might be a little bit harder. Because, you know, Heaven forbid life be anything but easy. If you can’t do what you want, when you want to, as much as you want, then it’s not fair! They can’t seem to understand that hard work pays off in the end, and a little sacrifice can be very rewarding in the long run. A life of sacrificing for your children does not mean you somehow love your children less, but pro-abortion feminists can’t understand that, can they?

(10 votes, average: 4.10 out of 5)

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