THE FOUNDATION: NATIONAL DEFENSE

“[T]o model our political systems upon speculations of lasting tranquillity would be to calculate on the weaker springs of human character.” —Alexander Hamilton

EDITORIAL EXEGESIS

“After three days of screaming headlines about the CIA destroying videotapes in 2005 of the ‘harsh’ interrogation of two terrorists, it now comes to light that in 2002 key members of Congress were fully briefed by the CIA about those interrogation techniques, including waterboarding. One member of that Congressional delegation was the future House Speaker, Nancy Pelosi… Porter Goss, the former chair of the House Intelligence Committee who later served as CIA director from 2004 to 2006 is explicit about what happened in these meetings: ‘Among those being briefed, there was a pretty full understanding of what the CIA was doing. And the reaction in the room was not just approval, but encouragement.’ In all, the CIA provided Congress with some 30 briefings on waterboarding before it became a public issue… One certainly may hold as abhorrent the idea of aggressively interrogating any terrorists ever, either for fear of what they might do to our people, as John McCain does, or because one thinks this violates our values. What one may not do—at least not if one wants the system to function—is assent to such a policy in 2002 and then, when the policy is made public, put up the pretense that one is ‘shocked’ and appalled to learn of it. This is bad faith.” —The Wall Street Journal

THE DEMO-GOGUES

Obscuring the truth: “Those tapes were not shown to Congress. They were not shown to any court. They were not shown to the bipartisan 9/11 Commission. Instead, they were destroyed. What would cause the CIA to take this action? The answer is obvious—cover-up. The agency was desperate to cover up damning evidence of their practices.” —The Blustering One, Ted Kennedy

Life, liberty and… going to the doctor: “We can talk all we want about freedom and opportunity, about life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, but what does all that mean to a mother or father who can’t take a sick child to the doctor?” —Hillary Clinton *“Well, okay, what does ‘all that’ mean to someone stuck in congested traffic? Or annoyed by the price of cable television? What does Mrs. Clinton mean?” —George Will ++ “Hillary Clinton, like so many of us, is not a Johnny-come-lately. She believes health care is a right.”’ —Rep. John Lewis (D-GA)

Romantic ambition: “He was a force of nature. He was the center of most of the attention. I’d never known anybody like him. I just had no frame of reference. But I knew I was getting into something really big, whatever it was, you know, and, therefore, I was hesitant. I never understood how difficult it would be to navigate his political career on my terms.” —Hillary Clinton ++ “I thought she was the most gifted person of our generation… She’s the best non-incumbent I have ever had a chance to vote for. In my whole life I’ve never met anyone like her.” —Bill Clinton

A little self-examination?: “When I talk about the Two Americas, this is what I mean—the very wealthiest and most powerful have manipulated our government for their own ends. They use their wealth and their power to keep themselves wealthy and powerful at the expense of everyone else. And when they do that, they’re holding America back.” —“Man of the People” John Edwards

DEZINFORMATSIA

The CIA is the enemy, not al-Qa’ida: “On the broadcast tonight, was it a CIA cover-up? New fallout after revelations the CIA may have destroyed videotape evidence in the U.S. war on terror.” —NBC’s Brian Williams ++ “Can you think of any reason why the CIA would have destroyed the tapes of those interrogations other than to destroy valuable and incriminating evidence in a possible torture investigation?” —The “Today” show’s Matt Lauer, more concerned with vilifying our guys than the enemy ++ “If you believe that America should torture, fine! Waterboard them! Drill them in the kneecaps. Shoot… their legs off! Whatever you want to do.” —MSNBC’s David Shuster

Keen sense of the obvious: “[W]ith the surge in Iraq and the level of American deaths declining, it is off the front pages.” —NBC’s Tim Russert

Talking down the economy: “Slowing Job Growth Seen as Ominous Sign for Economy” —The New York Times headline reporting 94,000 new jobs in the economy in November and a 4.7-percent unemployment rate

From the Clinton Cheerleaders: “Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton is sending Bill Clinton to South Carolina on Saturday, the day before Oprah Winfrey arrives. The former president has spoken here often on behalf of his wife and has proved enormously popular with South Carolina voters.” —New York Times reporter Katharine Seelye *“That’s like saying George W. Bush ‘has proved enormously popular’ with New York voters. Bush got 40.1% of the New York state vote in 2004, slightly more than Clinton’s 39.9% in South Carolina in 1992.” —James Taranto

Newspulper Headlines: We Blame Global Warming: “Ski Resorts Warmed by East’s First Big Snowfall” —Lexington (KY) Herald-Leader ++ “First Snow Prompts Schools to Close Early” —WTOP-AM Web site (Washington) ++ “Snow Sets More Records in Grand Forks, Fargo” —Associated Press ++ “Portland Ties 1890 Snow Record” —Portland (ME) Press Herald ++ “Coldest Winter in Years, Environment Canada Warns” —CTV.ca ++ “Record Home Foreclosures Cause Snow Removal Problems” —KSTP-TV Web site (Minneapolis)

Bottom Story of the Day: “Gore Gets Nobel, Warns of Ominous Threat” —Associated Press (Thanks to The Wall Street Journal’s James Taranto)

UPRIGHT

“Now [the U.S. intelligence community] conclude that the Iranians have shelved their nuclear weapons program. Two years ago they concluded the opposite. ‘Across the board,’ the bipartisan Robb-Silberman commission found in 2005, ‘the intelligence community knows disturbingly little about the nuclear programs of many of the world’s most dangerous actors.’ Considering their track record, that sounds about right.” —Jeff Jacoby ++ “Last week the Bush Administration released a portion of a document known as the National Intelligence Estimate—NIE. Note, it contains the word ‘Estimate.’ It is not titled ‘National Intelligence Certainty.’… There is always the nagging doubt—as a former US Secretary of Defense once famously stated—that ‘we don’t know what we don’t know.’ And when it comes to Iran, we should be very aware that we don’t know a great deal.” —Rich Galen

“Five members of the Senate are Mormon. Are there any intimations that the Mormonism of Harry Reid, Orrin Hatch, Gordon Smith, Michael Crapo or Robert Bennett corrupts, distorts or in any way diminishes their ability to perform their constitutional duties? Mormonism should be a total irrelevancy in any political campaign. It is not. Which is why Mitt Romney had to deliver his JFK ‘religion speech’.” —Charles Krauthammer

“Raising taxes on capital formation reduces the rate of capital formation. Raising taxes on income reduces incentives to work. Unfortunately, because so many Americans buy into the politics of envy, politicians have a leg up in enacting measures that cripple economic growth.” —Walter Williams

“I practice charity regularly. I believe in sharing. But when government takes our money by force and gives it to others, that’s not sharing.” —John Stossel

INSIGHT

“The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits.” —Albert Einstein

“Little progress can be made by merely attempting to repress what is evil; our great hope lies in developing what is good.” —Calvin Coolidge

“Liberty is the hardest test that one can inflict on a people. To know how to be free is not given equally to all men and all nations.” —Paul Valery

“Nothing is as terrible to see as ignorance in action.” —Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

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Semper Vigilo, Fortis, Paratus, et Fidelis!

Mark Alexander

Publisher

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“Let us therefore rely upon the goodness of the Cause, and the aid of the supreme Being, in whose hands Victory is, to animate and encourage us to great and noble Actions.” —George Washington

VILLAGE IDIOTS

Sometimes they get it right: “I’d like somebody to get rid of the death tax. That’s what I want. I don’t want to get taxed just because I died… If I give something to my kid, I already paid the tax. Why should I have to pay it again because I died?” —Whoopi Goldberg, who took Rosie O’Donnell’s spot on “The View”

Yawn: “The climate crisis is real… It is the eleventh hour… We must quickly find a way to mobilize our worldwide civilization with a sense of urgency and shared resolve that has previously been seen only when nations have mobilized for war.” —Al Gore accepting his Nobel Peace Prize ++ Re: Al Gore: “Climate change is a non problem. The right answer to a non problem is to have the courage to do nothing. The UN conference is a complete waste of our time and your money and we should no longer pay the slightest attention to the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change).” —UK climate researcher Lord Christopher Monckton

Death and taxes: “Every newborn baby in Australia represents a potent source of greenhouse gas emissions for an average of 80 years, not simply by breathing, but by the profligate consumption of resources typical of our society. Far from showering financial booty on new mothers and thereby rewarding greenhouse-unfriendly behavior, a ‘Baby Levy’ in the form of a carbon tax should apply, in line with the ‘polluter pays’ principle.” —Australian academician Barry Walters calling for a tax on parents for the carbon emissions of their children

This week’s “Non Compos Mentis” Award: “Bill [Clinton] is every bit as black as Barack [Obama]. He’s probably gone with more black women than Barack.” —former UN ambassador and civil rights “icon” Andrew Young in a campaign appearance for Hillary

SHORT CUTS

“According to The Washington Post, [Nancy] Pelosi may have been joined by Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-WV) who is now the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee [for briefing on waterboarding]. SIDEBAR: Although, the juxtaposition of the name ‘Jay Rockefeller’ and the word ‘Intelligence’ has caused many thousands of dollars worth of beer to be wasted on Capitol Hill as it came spurting out of the noses of generations of Senate staffers of both parties.” —Rich Galen

“The United Nations Global Warming Conference got underway on the island of Bali. It’s located in the Indonesian archipelago. Who else but the United Nations would go to a tropical island in December and then complain about warm weather.” —Argus Hamilton

“Algore ‘shunned the traditional airport motorcade in favor of climate-friendly public transportation’ when he went to pick up his Nobel Peace Prize. Well, big deal! Whoop-de-doo, how did he get there, on a magic carpet, or on a private plane?” —Rush Limbaugh

“My feeling is we’ve bowed too far to the idiots. This is true in politics, journalism, and just about everything else.” —Peggy Noonan

“Every silver lining, it seems, comes with at least a little bit of cloud.” —Ed Feulner

“Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said it best himself in Monday’s Roll Call: ‘Have we stopped the war in Iraq? No. Have we gotten health care? No. Have we improved education? No. But we have been able to do what we’ve done. We’ve done a lot of things.’ If I were a netrooter, I’d be so frustrated that I might post a really, really angry comment on a blog in ALL CAPS.” —Jonah Goldberg

David Letterman: From “Top Ten Contest” while Hollywood writers are still on strike—“Top Ten Signs the Political Candidates are Tired of the Debates”: Podiums replaced by La-Z-Boy recliners (Montreal, Canada); McCain is only answering questions via a hand puppet named Spanky (Andover, KS); All candidates have to chug a beer every time Rudy mentions 9/11 (Chicago, IL); Romney only able to sustain insincere smile for first 30 minutes of debate (Denver, CO); Switch from YouTube questions to Trivial Pursuit: 80’s Edition (Dayton, OH); Notes on Hillary’s podium are really latest Lane Bryant catalog (Beaverton, OR); Two words: Strip debating (Barrhaven, Canada); Romney has requested that all questions asked at next debate come from that week’s “Dear Abby” column (Las Vegas, NV); Rudy takes calls from all of his wives (Bend, OR); They’re letting Bill answer a few questions (Phoenix, AZ).

Veritas vos Liberabit—Semper Vigilo, Fortis, Paratus, et Fidelis! Mark Alexander, Publisher, for The Patriot’s editors and staff. (Please pray for our Patriot Armed Forces standing in harm’s way around the world, and for their families—especially families of those fallen Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, Marines and Coast Guardsmen, who granted their lives in defense of American liberty.)