THE FOUNDATION

“Civil liberty can be established on no foundation of human reason which will not at the same time demonstrate the right to religious freedom.” –John Quincy Adams

INSIGHT

“Virtue is bold, and goodness never fearful.” –Shakespeare

“Courage is what it takes to stand up and speak; courage is also what it takes to sit down and listen.” –Sir Winston Churchill

“The best political community is formed by citizens of the middle class.” –Aristotle

“We have a country as well as a party to obey.” –James K. Polk

“He serves his party best who serves his country best.” –Rutherford B. Hayes

“The belief that public opinion or international public opinion, unbacked by force, had the slightest effect in restraining a powerful military nation in any course of action … has been shown to be a pathetic fallacy.” –Theodore Roosevelt

“Law not served by power is an illusion; but power not ruled by law is a menace which our nuclear age cannot afford.” –Arthur J. Goldberg

“There is nothing that makes more cowards and feeble men than public opinion.” –Henry Ward Beecher

“Political language – and with variations this is true of all political parties, from Conservatives to Anarchists – is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable.” –George Orwell

“What is the use of being elected or re-elected unless you stand for something?” –Grover Cleveland

“It is sad that being a good patriot often means being the enemy of the rest of mankind.” –Voltaire

“Duty, Honor, Country. Those three hallowed words reverently dictate what you ought to be, what you can be, what you will be.” –Gen. Douglas MacArthur

“We do not admire a man of timid peace.” –Theodore Roosevelt

“Take calculated risks. That is quite different from being rash.” –George S. Patton

“Self-government means self-support.” –Calvin Coolidge

“After each war there is a little less democracy to save.” –Brooks Atkinson

“The nearest approach to immortality on earth is a government bureau.” –James F. Byrnes

“You know how Congress is. They’ll vote for anything if the thing they vote for will turn around and vote for them. Politics ain’t nothing but reciprocity.” –Will Rogers

“If crime and disease are to be regarded as the same thing, it follows that any state of mind which our masters choose to call ‘disease’ can be treated as a crime; and compulsorily cured.” –C.S. Lewis

UPRIGHT

“The law of the Constitution is illuminated by the philosophy set forth in the Declaration of Independence, so the two documents are properly read together.” –Joan Aylor Kirby

“A strong case can be made that the First Amendment has never been more threatened than it is now by those in American public life who seek to silence opponents by gutting their constitutional right to think, believe and say as they please.” –Mark Tapscott

“Wartime always brings expansions of state power, together with erosions of moral and constitutional standards.” –Joseph Sobran

“Now that there’s a real war on, isn’t it time to tell the truth? The United States military exists to win our wars, not to serve as the tool of a bunch of noisy feminists.” –Mona Charen

“Now that a real war is going on, this is no time to try to appease the unappeasable Clinton feminists in their perennial pursuit of an androgynous military.” –Phyllis Schlafly

“The president has over 80% approval, largely due to the support from America’s veterans, from World War II, Korea, and Vietnam, who love this president.” –Rush Limbaugh

“The ‘lesson of appeasement’ is not that appeasement is futile. Appeasement is not futile, it is dangerous…. Appeasement doesn’t merely fail to prevent catastrophe, it provokes catastrophe.” –David Gelernter

“The war on terror is a clash of civilizations. This is a hard and unpleasant truth, but one that we will learn, one way or the other.” –Wesley Pruden

“It’s time for the American people to reassert their democratic right to control their fate. Immigration policy is national destiny.” –Don Feder

“Human beings are never going to be infallible, whether spouses, jurors or anyone else.” –Thomas Sowell

“Guilt presupposes free will.” –Charles Krauthammer

“In our postmodern, post Christian, post objective truth generation, celebrity equals credibility. Celebrities have replaced God. When they speak, some people think the rest of us should listen.” –Cal Thomas

“…[C]ommon law, common sense, history and science all tell us that the very nature of a homosexual relationship deprives a child of the emotionally stable environment that he or she requires.” –Armstrong Williams

EDITORIAL EXEGESIS

“The enemy in this war is not ‘terrorism’ – a distilled essence of evil … – but militant Islam. The enemy has an ideology, and an hour spent surfing the Web will give the average citizen at least the kind of insights that he might have found during World Wars I and II by reading ‘Mein Kampf’ or the writings of Lenin, Stalin or Mao. Those insights, of course, eluded those in the West who preferred – understandably, but dangerously – to define the problem as something more manageable, such as German resentment about the Versailles Treaty, an exaggerated form of Russian national interest, or peasant resentment of landlords taken a bit too far. In the reported words of one survivor of the Holocaust, when asked what lesson he had taken from his experience of the 1940s, ‘If someone tells you that he intends to kill you, believe him’.” –Wall Street Journal

DEZINFORMATSIA

From the “Say Again” Files: “Well, you’ve heard our news reports, now what are the facts concerning Anaconda?” –ABC’s Sam Donaldson to Gen. Tommy Franks

This week’s “Leftmedia Eco-Theology” Award: “Gas-guzzling SUVs and light trucks were big winners on Capitol Hill today, but there’s concern tonight the environment could be the big loser here.” –Brian Williams lamenting the rejection by the Senate of the econuts’ gas-efficiency bill

This week’s “Quid Pro Homo” Award: “And nine former members of the statehouse, who had supported the law long ago, have said, ‘We now realize that we were wrong. This discriminatory law prevents children from being adopted into loving, supportive homes – and we hope it will be overturned’.” –Diane Sawyer on Florida law barring homosexuals from adopting children.

From the “Department of Corrections”: “House OKs Fetus Protection Bill: The House voted Tuesday to define a fetus that is fully outside a woman’s body as having been ‘born alive,’ which would give the fetus legal protection.” –Associated Press headline and news report’s first sentence, refusing to call a living newborn human person a “baby” or an “infant” or a “child.”

From the “Chattering Class Warfare” Files: “…[M]oderates like myself.” –Fox News contributor Susan Estrogen (AKA Susan Estrich), offering a “fair and balanced” perspective on the political field. **This, from the woman who thought card-carrying ACLUer Michael Dukakis looked macho in a tank!

…. Runner-up: “There is a definite sense of patriotism in the American media since Sept. 11….I think people are afraid of challenging the administration….I think the Bush administration is getting a lot of cover from us willing to censor ourselves.” –CNN’s Christiane Amanpour

SOCIOCRATS

From the Lord High Executioner-Democrite: “If we have a filibuster, we’re going to do it around the clock, beginning on Wednesday, because I need to get this done by Friday. And I believe we will get it done, either the easy way or the hard way, but it will be done by Friday.” –Senate Demo Leader Tom Daschle, who “needs to get it done,” referring to the “Incumbent Protection Act” (AKA “campaign finance reform”).

This week’s “Non Compos Mentis” Award: “This is like a war. This is worse than being in Vietnam. This is a full-out war against me. …I kept the lights on. And this sounds a little presumptuous, but I think I should get a round of applause. I don’t get squat. …If I didn’t panic, you wouldn’t be able to put out your paper. I saved this friggin’ paper. I kept the lights on in this state. Do you understand that? I kept the lights on. …You’re probably looking at the last governor of California who is not a billionaire.” –California’s Demo Gov. Gray Davis addressing the San Diego Union-Tribune editorial board. **Regarding this outburst, we might say seems like for the governor, the lights are on, but nobody’s home….

From the “Swamp Gas” Files: “From cradle to grave, Bush’s budget hurts women and minorities…. I thought the Republicans had shut down the Office for Strategic Influence. It looks like they just relocated it to Capitol Hill.” –DNC Politico-Sociocrat-In-Chief Terry McAuliffe

From the “Bolshoi Bureaucracy” Files: “It’s to make for harmony in our schools as best we can. We want to make sure that none of our students feels left out.” –Ann Stephens, a spokeswoman for the Kecoughtan High School administration in Hampton, Virginia, on demanding that the student group Warriors for Christ strip “Easter” from the name of the club’s yearly food drive and call it the “Spring Canned Food Drive.”

“I will veto any new taxes and any increase in existing taxes.” –Minnesota Gov. Jesse Ventura who swept into office in 1998 as the Reform Party candidate. **Apparently, having just signed a huge state tax increase, he has been “reformed.”

VILLAGE IDIOTS

“What happened in 2000 did as much damage to the pillars of democracy as terrorists did to the pillars of commerce.”–Alec Baldwin on election 2000.

This week’s “Village Victimitis” Award: “What was most hurtful was to be so invisible at the funerals and memorial services. The officials giving the eulogies would talk about ‘firemen,’ the ‘brothers,’ the ‘men.’ After 20 years, it was tough to take.” –Lt. Brenda Berkman, of the New York City Fire Department, who sued to gain entry to a firefighter position, now claiming “victim” status because women were “invisible at the funerals and memorial services.” (FDNY is over 99.75% male, and the 343 department members who died on 9-11 were all firemen.) OpinionJournal.com ripostes: “Maybe she should bring a right-to-die suit.”

This week’s “Village Success Story”: “I hated to do it, but with no Indian support, I was fighting a losing battle. I found out that a lot of the activists are no better than white oppressors.” –South Dakota “Native American” activist Betty Ann Gross, on withdrawing five civil rights complaints with the U.S. Department of Education against schools using Indian nicknames, mascots and imagery. Ms. Gross further laments that other Indian community activists were “emotionally, mentally and psychologically” indifferent toward her efforts. **Perhaps they are already fans of “The Fighting Whities”!

From the Village Academia Files: “The Bill of Rights becomes meaningless in a time of war…Dissent is stifled as people become afraid to speak up.” –Harvard lecturer Howard Zinn, who in spite of all his academic prowess seems not to realize that his statement is self-referentially incoherent – if it were true, his criticism of the war on terrorism would earn him an all-expensed-paid vacation to Camp X-Ray for the duration.

SHORT CUTS

“If nearly two-thirds of the Arabic world believe that Arabs were not involved in September 11, why should any American believe anything that two out of three people from that region say?” –Victor Davis Hanson

“To put it in philosophical terms, why not nuke the bastards? Why should American lives be sacrificed in land battles if this terrorist cancer could be treated with a little radioactive therapy?” –Paul Greenberg

“Presumably, that’s why America is merely on Yellow Alert: It’s OK, folks, the federal government is issuing visas to terrorists, but only dead ones. If the federal government were issuing visas to live terrorists, you can bet that America would be on Red Alert. …How much faith should Americans have that the INS can spot living, potential terrorists when they can’t even spot world-famous dead terrorists?” –Mark Steyn

“What do we need to see, a green card for Osama bin Laden, before we take serious action?” –Immigration attorney Spencer Eig

“Putting a libertarian in charge of the INS is like asking Gloria Steinem to take over all of the anti-abortion efforts in the United States.” –Rep. Tom Tancredo

“Why not just tear down barriers, build a one-way, eight-lane highway from Tijuana and have the border patrol hand out fruit baskets to new arrivals?” –Don Feder

“One Nation And Divisible: Any immigrant may at the start/ Want to hold his own heritage to heart,/ But beware of the vulture/ That is ‘multiculture’:/ It’s clawing our country apart.” –F.R. Duplantier

“As long as Russia didn’t back the Arabs, Saudi Arabia could be occupied in about five minutes. By Papua-New Guinea, the Boy Scouts, or three Marines.” –Fred Reed

“Can anyone remember a single meaningful phrase Clinton ever uttered? His most famous lines are laugh lines.” –Ann Coulter

“Dodge ball is now in the crosshairs of American liberals because it hurts children’s feelings and their self-esteem.” –Rush Limbaugh

“America has become one huge circle in which everyone is pointing the finger of blame at someone else…. We now have so many addictions that the total accounts for well over one hundred percent of the American population.” –Psychologist Paul Vitz

“All issues are second to getting…campaign finance reform done. All issues, including my marriage.” –“Straight Talkin’” John McCain **Now there is a great family values quote for his next presidential bid!

“Debate: What you load de question with to catch de opponent.” –Johnny Hart in the comic strip “B.C.”

Jay Leno…. Tipper Gore is going to run for Senate in Tennessee. When Hillary Clinton found this out she said, “I didn’t know you were having marriage problems.” …. Everyone keeps talking about the Enron CEO, Kenneth Lay. Kenneth Lay – wasn’t that Bill Clinton’s Secret Service code name? …. Speaking of Bill Clinton, he was in L.A. the other day to give a speech. He got a record amount, $200,000, for the speech. You know Clinton, though – there was probably more under the table. …. Tom Ridge issued an alert today – to be on the lookout for idiot INS workers! I’m sure you’re following the story of the dead terrorists now getting their visas approved. It took so long because the INS was busy performing a thorough background check. They found the men responsible for the mistake at the INS – they are now going to work in airport security.

David Letterman…. Top Reasons I Joined The Marines (from enlisted personnel): I always loved jumping off landing craft and hitting the beach under heavy fire; Couldn’t stand one more day of waking up later than 5am; My mama was a Marine; I’d always heard great things about Afghanistan; It was either this or beauty school; I happen to look great in camouflage; Army movies star Pauly Shore, Marine movies star Jack Nicholson; To serve my country and fulfill patriotic duty, and shoot some big-ass weapons; Every Spring we go to Daytona to establish a beachhead; Give me that eagle, globe and anchor.

Argus Hamilton…. Osama bin Laden … no longer controls a country and has no place to train terrorists. In fact, Osama bin Laden is this close to opening a political consulting firm with James Carville. …. The Immigration and Naturalization Service approved student visas for two of the World Trade Center bombers. What a security breach. Now the whole world knows which branch of the government has been in a cave since September 11th. …. President Bush lauded U.S. troops who routed al Qaeda in the Shah-e-Kot mountains. The enemy emerged from their caves firing machine guns, grenade launchers, and anti-tank rockets. Only Rosie O'Donnell made more noise coming out in the last week. …. President Bush said … he has no respect for Saddam Hussein after the man used poison gas on his own people. He said it three times. The idea is to do commercials for his brother’s campaign against Janet Reno as subtly as possible. …. Mike Tyson passed a hearing to fight in Washington D.C. this June. The panel overlooked his sexual misconduct, his questionable mental state and his arrest record and allowed him to box in the nation’s capital. The feeling was, when in Rome. …. ABC News president David Westin declared that ABC News must prove its value to corporate bosses now. They were all very nearly thrown out of their offices and replaced by a comedian. Only George Bush(41) can say he’s been there.