Time for Thorns

Kathy Shaidle explains rationing in terms that Americans who don’t remember it can grasp — LONG wait times.    Those who didn’t suffer through the infuriating Jimmy Carter-created gasoline lines in the 70’s may think camping out for two days to buy the latest Blackberry is nifty,  but will have scant tolerance for the delays single-payer health care imposes.

The Washington Times has a nice piece on calling rationing by other names.     This matters because Obama is a double-speak master,  skewing plain meanings and assigning new meanings to words and phrases  — and when necessary,  to flat-out lie about what he actually said.     Of course, he is always happy to lie about what others have said.

Ed Whelan has kindly collected his primary postings on State Dept. top lawyer Harold Koh, here.    And you may as well read what Kathy Shaidle says on Koh as well, since he has been voted out of committee with only 1 Republican vote.

You ought to read the ones you’ve missed,   because  His Oneness has just said he’s reviving military commissions,  and yet he hasn’t pulled the nomination of a man unalterably opposed to them.   Curiouser and curiouser,   said Alice.

The WaPo obediently reports that Obama’s “new” commissions will correct all the flaws in Bush’s (approved by Congress in 2006),  but it’s a flat-out lie.   They will be exactly the same.   The WSJ explains the proposal for indefinite detention now being floated.

You’ll soon see various claims about improvements and corrections, but here, as detailed by Andy McCarthy at The Corner,  are some of the protections for war crimes defendants provided under the Bush military commissions:

• the presumption of innocence;

• the imposition of the burden of proof on the prosecution;

• the right to counsel—both to a military lawyer provided at the expense of the American taxpayer and to a private attorney if the combatant chooses to retain one;

• the right to be presented with the charges in advance of trial;

• access to evidence the prosecution intends to introduce and to any exculpatory evidence known to the prosecution;

• access to interpreters as necessary to assist in understanding the proceedings;

• the right to a trial presumptively open to the public (except for portions sealed for national defense or witness security purposes);

• the free choice to testify or decline to do so;

• the right against any negative inference from a refusal to testify;

• access to reasonably available evidence and witnesses;

• access to investigative resources as “necessary for a full and fair trial”; and

• the right to present evidence and to cross-examine witnesses.

DC City Councilman, and former mayor/drug abuser/tax cheat Marion Barry caused a stink by predicting there would be a “civil war” if DC endorsed gay marriage legislation,  which it now has.  Kathy Shaidle looks at the suddenly public attacks by gays on blacks,  who voted against “gay marriage” at a rate of 70% in California.

This is a long-standing division among liberals which has been pretty successfully hidden until now.   It’s rapidly becoming not only public, but openly acrimonious.

Another in Kathy Shaidle’s marvelous series.

Another in Kathy Shaidle’s enlightening series about Islam in America.

Muslims have been using lawsuits in many places besides Minneapolis, and it has proven effective.

Combined with the UN’s resolution against religious “defamation”,  this is a concerted effort to kill free speech.

As part of her series  on Islam in America,   Kathy Shaidle looks at converts to Islam in the US prison population.

Check out the first part of  “Muslims in America”, a series by Kathy Shaidle.

You should also check out her blog,  Five Feet of Fury,  where she REALLY tells you what she thinks about any and every thing.   To give you a hint,  she was one of the bloggers caught up with Ezra Levant and Mark Steyn in the Canadian Human Rights Commission case brought by Muslim activists who are not proponents of free speech anywhere.

And in connection with a Muslim in America who wanted to promote a true picture of Islam,  see Michelle Malkin and Ed Driscoll.