Send this to any misguided friends or family who have unfortunately heard only the negative, cynical and partisan "reporting" (agenda pushing) the MSM has provided.  We have got to accelerate putting the MSM out of busness, before they completely brainwash and destroy our country. Their isn't even a semblance of objectivity anymore. Just Liberal Rhetoric.

Do We Have a Strategy in the War?
Yes, and a multifaceted one, at that.

By Victor Davis Hanson

It is often said that the United States has neither a long-term strategy in this larger war against terror nor an immediate one in Iraq.

At the end of Sunday's 60 Minutes, Andy Rooney expressed bafflement over why anyone would worry about a nuclear weapon in the hands of a communist tyrant: “I don't understand why we think it's okay for us to have a nuclear weapon, but it isn't okay for some other countries to have any.” And he went on to assert a very naive and dangerous view: “I don't think any country should have nuclear weapons. And that includes ours.” Noting how many “are in a tizzy” over North Korea's nuclear weapon test, Rooney rued that “we're a little late getting exercised about this. North Korea has always been more of a threat to world peace than Iraq ever was and if we were going to attack someone three years ago to make the world safer, we should have attacked North Korea, not Iraq.”

He then rationalized how “it's not hard to understand why North Korea wants the bomb. If we Americans lived in North Korea instead of here, do you think we'd be in favor of our little country having it? You're darn right we would.” Rooney acknowledged that the UN has “been an ineffectual organization,” but contended that's why “we've got to give it more power and the way to give it more power is to give it more responsibility,” so though a minute earlier he suggested the U.S. should have attacked North Korea instead of Iraq, he argued “the UN should take the bomb away from North Korea; we should not.”

On this weekend's Fox News Watch on FNC, liberal panelist Neal Gabler, rejecting the Media Research Center's contention of liberal bias in coverage of North Korea's nuclear test, damned the MRC with faint praise in ridiculing the MRC's mission: "MRC can find a needle in a hay stack. We ought to sic them to find Osama bin Laden because they always find what they're looking for, and liberal bias is what they're looking for." Host Eric Burns had set up the lead segment: “The Media Research Center, a conservative watchdog group, charges that some American news organizations are, to an extent, defending the action [atomic test] because North Korea is worried about an attack from the United States and hopes the bomb tests will be a deterrent.” Conservative panelist Cal Thomas pointed out how “ABC's Mark Litke made this point on World News Tonight.” Indeed, an October 10 MRC CyberAlert article, posted the night before as a NewsBusters item, “ABC: North Korea Has Rational 'Historic Fear' of U.S. Worsened by Bush's 'Axis of Evil,'” detailed Litke's October 9 story.

US Navy welcomes the USS Bill Clinton

The US Navy welcomed the latest member of its fleet today.

I experienced an eerie sense of déjà vu this morning while reading an AP article entitled "Iran Blames U.S. for N. Korea Nuke Test." I could swear that I had already read this same blame-America analysis somewhere else. That sent me scrambling back to my report on the piece by LA Times columnist Rosa Brooks, "A Good Week for the Axis of Evil" contained in my NB item of yesterday [but please don't read just yet]. And sure enough, I found language there that closely tracked the statement from Tehran.

So, let's have a little fun. I'll set the two statements out below, and you try to guess. Which was issued by the Men of Mahmoud, and which by a homegrown member of the Blame America Brigades? Answer below.

Since the Mark Foley page story first broke, there have been many articles discussing the double standard in which Republican and Democrat sex scandals are handled by Congress and the media. No finer example of such hypocrisy has been demonstrated than by the Associated Press on Saturday, October 14, which had nothing but high praise for the now deceased former Rep. Gerry Studds while it continued to heap scorn on Foley.

For example, an article entitled “Studds, first openly gay person elected to Congress, dead at 69,” spoke glowingly of the former Congressman who, unlike Foley, actually had a sexual encounter with a seventeen-year-old male page in 1973. In fact, the AP suggested that this was an important moment in history for gay rights:

 “Gerry often said it was the fight for gay and lesbian equality that was the last great civil rights chapter in modern American history. He did not live to see its final sentences written, but all of us will forever be indebted to him for leading the way with compassion and wisdom,” said his husband, Dean T. Hara, 49, in a statement.

The article included some glowing praise from a current member of Congress:

On Late Edition with Wolf Blitzer today, Howard Dean said that he had been watching UN ambassador "Josh Bolton" on all the morning shows talking tough about the UN resolution on North Korea that the Chinese have already said they're not going to fully enforce and he said it shows that the Bush administration is "toothless" when it comes to national security. When it came time for Blitzer to follow-up, he corrected Dean on what Bolton's first name really is but Blitzer failed to ask Dean the obvious question: how would he or other Democrats have gotten anything better out of the UN?

Video available here.

If you are considering not voting in the upcoming election I have a  suggestion for you. Between now and Nov. 7  listen to Air America , watch Keith Olbermann or Chris Matthews daily. They represent what you will be allowing to get elected.

SARASOTA, FL. (NS/IAFF2546/BuchananForCongress) –

Suncoast Professional Firefighters and Paramedics endorsed Vern Buchanan for Congress today... 

“Firefighters from Manatee, Sarasota, and Charlotte Counties unite behind Vern Buchanan in his bid to be elected to Congress,” said Suncoast Professional Firefighters and Paramedics President Michael Stephenson.  “His actions have shown us he has sensitivity to public safety issues and how they impact the public. We trust Vern Buchanan to address tough problems like balancing the budget, the immigration crisis, favorable legislation for small business’ and making America a better place for our families. We urge you to join us in supporting Vern Buchanan for election to the 13th Congressional District.”

Is PBS too conservative? Is it "too balanced"? The radical leftists at Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting have produced another stilted study of the NewsHour with Jim Lehrer accusing the show of presenting "virtually the same voices as corporate media, voices that overwhelmingly represent those in power rather than the public PBS is obliged to serve."

This study can be picked apart in many ways, but let’s start close to home, where they’ve made at least one obvious factual error. Authors Steve Rendall and Julie Hollar complain about the exclusion of "public interest groups" from the debate: "such groups, which ranged from progressive groups like the NAACP and Greenpeace to the conservative Federation for American Immigration Reform and Media Research Center – provided just 4 percent of NewsHour’s guests." MRC did not appear on the NewsHour in FAIR’s study period. We checked Nexis to double-check, even adding the Parents Television Council and CNSNews.com into the mix to see if our related groups were interviewed. No.

Gerry Studds had to die for NBC Nightly News to inform viewers of how the former Democratic Congressman had a sexual relationship with 17-year-old male congressional page, misconduct for which the House in 1983 censured him, but did not prompt Democratic House Speaker Tip O'Neill and other leaders to force his resignation -- nor raise calls for O'Neill's resignation. Despite the Democratic hypocrisy given their current calls for Speaker Hastert's resignation and investigations of who knew what and when about Mark Foley, Saturday night -- two weeks into the media-fueled scandal -- was the first time, according to Nexis, any NBC News program mentioned Studds' name. Anchor John Seigenthaler, who called Studds “Gary,” relayed how “from Massachusetts comes word of the death of former Democratic Congressman Gary Studds, the first openly gay Member of Congress.” Seigenthaler then gave the gentlest of descriptions as he avoided the word “sexual” in his one sentence on the matter: “In 1983 the House of Representatives censured Studds for his relationship with a teenage page.”