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Friday, November 27, 2015

Holiday Humor

I prefer eggnog "with" when I celebrate this auspicious moment:


Since turning 60, with each passing year, I decorate less and less. But I'm not quite as minimalist as the above graphic. Yet, that is.

Thursday, November 26, 2015

PSA: "Microcoft Calling" Scam

We interrupt Thanksgiving to bring you this message: Indian "Tech Support" Scam Catches My Wife. Read it. Now. Don't fall for this scam!

I've gotten this call, and so has former blogger The Merry Widow.

Wednesday, November 25, 2015

Thanksgiving Break

(Please scroll down for other material)


In spite of the grim political situation confronting us both worldwide and on our home soil, we do have much for which to give thanks:

Monday, November 23, 2015

Open Thread


So, what's on your mind?

Please opine on the topic of your choice according to the parameters below:

Sunday, November 22, 2015

Bill Maher On Bad Ideas

Bill Maher makes the obvious point that the phrase "shared values" doesn't apply to certain Muslims. Watch the female moonbat object to what Maher is saying:

Thursday, November 19, 2015

Flashback: Iraqi Refugees In 2011


Likely, Obama will unilaterally open the floodgates to the Syrian "refugees" — never mind that in 2011 he significantly curtailed the flow of Iraqi refugees because of national security concerns.

From the Navy Times back then:
WASHINGTON — The Obama administration has dramatically slowed the resettlement of Iraqi refugees — including former U.S. military translators and embassy workers — in the midst of growing concerns about al-Qaida's potential ties with some asylum seekers, an administration official says.
More information at the Federalist.

So why is Obama so determined to bring in the Syrian refugees even after the recent jihad attack on Paris?  So detemined that he Tweeted this on November 18:
Slamming the door in the face of refugees would betray our deepest values. That's not who we are. And it's not what we're going to do.
An executive order even if Congress passes a refugee bill over Obama's veto?

If so, checkmate.

Wednesday, November 18, 2015

John Kerry's "Rationale"


From CBS News, November 17, 2015:
Secretary of State John Kerry on Tuesday suggested that the "rationale" for the terrorist attack against the satirical French publication Charlie Hebdo, which left 12 people dead in January, is more understandable than any rationale for last week's attacks in Paris.

"There's something different about what happened from Charlie Hebdo, and I think everybody would feel that," he said in remarks at the U.S. Embassy in Paris. "There was a sort of particularized focus and perhaps even a legitimacy in terms of - not a legitimacy, but a rationale that you could attach yourself to somehow and say, 'Okay, they're really angry because of this and that.'..."
The full text of Kerry's statement is HERE at the U.S. Department of State's web site.

This creature is the U.S. Secretary of State?

Monday, November 16, 2015

Steps To The Caliphate

"Arabs, rise as one man and fight for your sacred rights. Kill the Jews wherever you find them. This pleases God, history, and religion. This saves your honor. God is with you.” — Hajj Amin al Husseini on German Nazi radio on March 1, 1944.
Seven steps to the caliphate, from this 2005 article based on material from Jordanian journalist Fouad Hussein, back when Al-Qaida was the primary Islamic threat (hat tip to Infidel Bloggers Alliance):

Friday, November 13, 2015

Jihad In Paris (Timeline Added)

The unfolding of a new model for jihad: striking multiple and proximate soft targets simultaneously.


Islamic terrorism in the City of Lights.

Multiple sites attacked.

Hostages held and being murdered one by one in Bataclan, the concert hall.

National borders closed.

France in a state of national emergency.

Fox News is reporting that a suspect arrested has told the police, "I am from ISIS." He has also said that he is from Syria and is on a mission for ISIS. This is the only arrest so far reported.

More coverage at France 24 and BBC News.

ADDENDUM

Paris terror attacks timeline: What happened where and when on night of terror and confusion in French capital.

Bring 'Em Home!

The video below is a must-watch! Yes, the video is a bit long but worth every minute.  Set down your beverage first, though; otherwise, you will have to buy a new keyboard. Keely Mullen attends Northeastern University.

Thursday, November 12, 2015

Collegiate Tantrums


Have special little snowflakes, ever fretful about microaggressions, taken over the Ivy Leagues.

Student C: It is not about creating an intellectual space! It is not! Do you understand that? It’s about creating a home here! You are not doing that. You’re going against that.
Please watch the following brief video (1 minute, 20 seconds):


Full transcript HERE.

Back story from the YouTube link (hot links added):
On November 5, 2015, students at Yale University gathered on campus to protest an email sent by Associate Master of Silliman College Erika Christakis on October 30. Christakis’ email responded to a separate email from the school’s Intercultural Affairs Council that asked students to be thoughtful about the cultural implications of their Halloween costumes.

Christakis [advocating freedom of expression with regard to Halloween costumes] argued that the council’s email [emphasizing sensitivities with regard to Halloween costumes] was infantilizing and threatened free expression on campus. There was also a concern that because the email was long, detailed, had 13 signatories, and links to acceptable and unacceptable costumes, it would not be interpreted as a suggestion. But rather it had the “color of law” implicit within it.

FIRE President and CEO Greg Lukianoff was on Yale’s campus during the protests on November 5 and captured this footage on his cell phone of Christakis’ husband, Nicholas, meeting with the protestors. By the time Lukianoff arrived on the scene, Nicholas had been speaking with the protesters for about an hour.

The Washington Post reports that students have begun to organize formal demands for the resignation of Christakis and her husband.
Additional reading (worth your time):

(1) The Coddling of the American Mind: In the name of emotional well-being, college students are increasingly demanding protection from words and ideas they don’t like. Here’s why that’s disastrous for education—and mental health (from the Atlantic)

(2) Mizzou And Yale Show Why It’s Time To Burn Universities To The Ground (from the Federalist).

Tuesday, November 10, 2015

Veterans Day 2015

(Discussion thread for the GOP Debate of November 10, 2015, is HERE)

The Fourth GOP Debate

Parse the Fox Business Network event — live or later — in the comments section of this blog post.

Pre-debate comments are also welcome.


Please adhere to the following parameters:

Monday, November 9, 2015

Not Worthy Of Trust

Hillary's record speaks for itself:


From ABC News:
Former President Clinton and his wife, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, have sent $28,000 worth of household goods back to Washington after questions arose over whether the items were intended as personal gifts or donations to the White House.

“We have been informed that it is being shipped back, and the National Park Service is ready to receive it, take possession of it and take custody of it,” Jim McDaniel, the National Park Service’s liaison to the White House, said Wednesday.

“The property is being returned to government custody until such time that the issues can be resolved. It may well turn out that that property is rightly the personal property of the Clintons.”

Giving Back

After they were criticized for taking $190,000 worth of china, flatware, rugs, televisions, sofas and other gifts with them when they left, the Clintons announced last week that they would pay for $86,000 worth of gifts, or nearly half the amount.

Their latest decision to send back $28,000 in gifts brings to $114,000 the value of items the Clintons have either decided to pay for or return.....
Read the rest HERE.

Once a thief always a thief.

Nevertheless, many of the electorate want the Clintons to move back into the White House and will support Hillary for President — no matter what.

Recent video filmed in Alexandria, Virginia:

Sunday, November 8, 2015

Friday, November 6, 2015

Thursday, November 5, 2015

Your Interpretation, Please

Photo from police-car dash cam

From the Dallas Morning News:
Dorothy Bland: I was caught ‘walking while black.’

Police chief: No, officers were doing their jobs.
Please read this link and watch the video.


The Washington Post calls the video a racial ‘Rorschach test’.

Your interpretation?

Wednesday, November 4, 2015

Obama's DOJ Invades The Girls' Shower

Perhaps most ironic of all is this statement from the Chicago Tribune article cited in full below the fold: The student...does not want to be identified for privacy reasons!

Apparently, this one student's privacy concerns trump the privacy concerns of all the other students.



It's now the law of the land — a civil right — that transgenders who have male genitalia must be given full access to the girls' showers and the girls' locker rooms in a public school.

From the Daily Caller:
The U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights has ordered a taxpayer-funded school district in the suburbs of Chicago to allow a male transgender student who dresses like a girl and otherwise identifies as female to use the girls locker room and shower on school premises.

The feds delivered the edict against Township High School District 211 in Palatine, Ill. on Monday [November 2, 2015], the Chicago Tribune reports.

The Department of Education has given the school district one month to let the student use the girls locker room. If the district does not capitulate, it risks losing federal funding....
The complete Chicago Tribune article is below the fold. Emphases mine.

Monday, November 2, 2015

Russian Airbus A321

(Two posts today. Please scroll down)

Wreckage from Russian Airbus A321

Terrorism is no longer being ruled out — as first was the case.

According to Russian airline official rules out technical error as cause of crash, a Washington Post article dated November 2, 2015:

Ancient Wisdom

There is nothing new under the sun:


Partisans are a plague upon the land. They are incapable of considering evidence.

To discuss...Is there a remedy for this problem? If so, what is that remedy?

Related reading at Free Thinke's blog: FORMER CONGRESSMAN [TOM TANCREDO] "I’M QUITTING GOP."

Sunday, November 1, 2015

Reminder For Today

Today marks the return to Standard Time for most time zones in the United States. Did you remember to set your clocks back an hour?

Another reminder:

Friday, October 30, 2015

Musical Interlude For Halloween Weekend

The Memento Mori Dance of Death (1493) by Michael Wolgemut, from the Liber chronicarum by Hartmann Schedel

Franz Liszt's Totentanz (Dance Of Death):


About the composer Franz Liszt and the symphonic poem Totentanz (from Musical Musings):

This Week On The Gathering Storm

(For other material, please scroll down)

If you have an interest in the migrant crisis in Europe, listen to The Gathering Storm Radio Show, hosted by WC and me at noon Pacific Time EST, on October 30, 2015, when our guest is UK author and blogger Mark Alexander of A New Dark Age Is Dawning. The show is also available later via podcast.

Thursday, October 29, 2015

The RNC Clutches The Reins


Remember when, months ago, Donald Trump said something about the nomination process having to be fair, or he'd give the GOP a lot of grief? The process hasn't been fair for a long time, and we're fooling ourselves if we think otherwise.

From Time (August 8, 2014):
...RNC Chairman Reince Priebus announced a 13-member committee of Republican officials who will set rules for the GOP’s debates during the 2016 cycle, including selecting venues, debate partners, and even moderators. The committee will be led by Priebus ally Steve Duprey of New Hampshire, who was close to both Mitt Romney and John McCain. The committee is dominated by Priebus loyalists.

[...]

Any candidate who participates in a debate that is unsanctioned by the RNC’s committee will be barred from appearing in any of the authorized debates, according to the party’s rules.

The RNC debate committee has yet to determine the qualification standards for candidates to earn a spot on the stage.
Shall we take bets as to whether or not Reince Priebus and Karl Rove are best buddies? See Gestapo Cartel Of Karl Rove, Reince Priebus, and Establishment Republicans (September 10, 2015):

Wednesday, October 28, 2015

Tales From The Classroom

("Tales from the Classroom" is a feature posted occasionally here at this blog.  All tales are true and present matters about which I have personal knowledge.  The following tale helps to explain why I love working with classes of homeschoolers. The parental support I typically receive is the antithesis of the reactions my public school and private school colleagues often encounter in a similar situation.

The students in my high school Advanced Composition classes write timed essays once a month.  These timed essays are completed in class within 25-30 minutes and are handwritten drafts of approximately 300 words; I mark these essays and provide "suggestions" for improvement.  Five weeks later, the students must submit revisions which require expansion (450-600 words).

On the first day of class this 2015-2016, the students received this timed-essay prompt, used by College Board on January 2015 SAT:

Tuesday, October 27, 2015

Jean Raspail's The Camp of the Saints

This blog post stuck here until further notice. Please scroll down for other material.


What Jean Raspail wrote about in 1973 is happening now as Europe is being overrun by "migrants."

Raspail out-Orwells Orwell!


One review from Amazon:

Monday, October 26, 2015

Modern Life

(For politics, please scroll down)

Biting satire

Phone Slaves by Steve Cutts

Evolution by Steve Cutts

More illustrations by Steve Cutts HERE. Yes, Cutts definitely leans Left, but some of his critiques have validity.

Saturday, October 24, 2015

Luxury Hotel Converted Into Housing For Migrants

Chancellor of Germany Angel Merkel posing for a selfie with one of the migrants

I typically do not post subtitled videos. This time, however, I am making an exception. Please make time to watch (read) the video about Maritim Hotel in Halle, Germany (hat tip to Infidel Bloggers Alliance):

Friday, October 23, 2015

The Benghazi Hearings (October 22, 2015)


According to the "journalists" at the Washington Post: GOP lands no solid punches while sparring with Clinton over Benghazi.

Today's New York Times has a similar take in the lead editorial of October 23, 2015.

Apparently, not only the Left wingers are opining as above: Even Conservatives Realize Hillary Clinton's Benghazi Committee Hearing Was Ridiculous: The 11 hours of questions were "a waste of time," one pundit wrote.

From Mediaite's Rep. Jim Jordan Goes After Hillary: ‘Where’d the False Narrative Start? It Started With You’ (emphases mine):
Republican Ohio Rep. Jim Jordan took issue with former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton‘s comment that protests had erupted in both Cairo, Egypt and Benghazi, Libya, citing evidence from the House Select Committee’s investigation stating that no protest of any kind had occurred in Benghazi. He then went on to quote from various State Department spokespersons who, in the weeks following the Sept. 11, 2012 attack, claimed that the incident in Benghazi was linked to the Cairo-based protest, which was a reaction to an offensive online video.

“Where’d the false narrative start? It started with you, Madame Secretary,” said Jordan,
adding that a statement released by Clinton the night of the attack suggests as much. “At 10:08, with no evidence. At 10:08, before the attack is over. At 10:08, when Tyrone Woods and Glen Doherty are still on the roof of the annex fighting for their lives, the official statement of the State Department blames a video. Why?”

Clinton proceeded to emphasize her official statement’s use of the phrase “some have sought,” which described the efforts of a small group to use the video as a means of inciting anti-American sentiments in Egypt, Libya and elsewhere in the region. “I used those words deliberately. Not to ascribe a motive to every attacker, but as a warning to those across the region that there was no justification for further attacks.”

However, Jordan just couldn’t let the discrepancy go, citing additional emails and calls made to the Libyan president, the Egyptian prime minister and her own family. In all three messages, Clinton said that the State Department knew that “the attack in Libya had nothing to do with the film. It was a planned attack — not a protest.”

When Clinton again reference her statement’s language, Jordan erupted.

“Calling it an attack is like saying the sky is blue. Of course it was an attack! We want to know the truth. The statement you sent out was a statement on Benghazi, and you say ‘vicious behavior as a response to inflammatory material on the Internet.’ If that’s not pointing at its motive being the video, I don’t know what is. And that’s certainly how the American people saw it.”

“There was a lot of conflicting information that we were trying to make sense of,” said Clinton. “The situation was fluid. It was fast-moving.”

Jordan pressed on, repeating his previous comments and criticizing Clinton’s attempted answers to them. Two bantered back and forth for a few minutes, but when the congressman had to wrap up, he reiterated his main line of argument — that Clinton was able to “tell the truth” to her own family and foreign diplomats, but not the American people. When chairman Trey Gowdy asked Clinton whether or not she wanted to respond, she plugged her book.

“I wrote a whole chapter about this in my book, Hard Choices. I’d be glad to send it to you, congressman.”
More HERE, including video clips.

Yes, yes, there was a lot of speechifying yesterday, just as there was during the Watergate Hearings. And, yes, there is partisanship in play now, just as there was during the Watergate Hearings.


Was or was not the exchange between Rep. Jordan and Hillary Clinton a gotcha moment?

Tuesday, October 20, 2015

A History Lesson

Is America a nation with a heritage of racist imperialism?

Please watch the following video even though doing so requires about thirty minutes:


Your thoughts?

Monday, October 19, 2015

Clock Boy's Award

CAIR's Muslim of the Year Award (2015) for Clock Boy Ahmed Mohamed. The award includes a gold clock on the right panel:


Clock Boy will be participating in Astronomy Night at the White House tonight by special invitation from Barack Hussein Obama. Astronomy Night honors top scientists.

Clock Boy's "invention" ("cool clock," according to Obama):

Saturday, October 17, 2015

Open Thread


So, what's on your mind?

Here's a link to get this thread started and a story illustrating that all cultures are not equal: Albino teen attacked for her limbs.

Enough from me for now. Please opine on the topic of your choice according to the parameters below:

Friday, October 16, 2015

The Truth About Common Core


by Sam Huntington

Common Core is a global (voluntary) initiative designed to standardize educational standards in mathematics and the English Language Arts.  It sounds tame enough, so why then are (some) parents alarmed about a Common Core-Islam connection?  It is because school districts have incorporated school-sponsored programs of Islamic indoctrination, which include but are not limited to:

  • Visits to mosques at taxpayer expense
  • Requiring girls to wear head scarfs in the Islamic tradition
  • Diminishing the Holocaust as a political scheme
  • Offering allegiance to the United States in Arabic
  • Adopting observances of Islamic holy days
  • Introducing Islamic vocabulary to students who are barely able to speak proper English, introducing Islamic cultural studies
  • Proselytizing Islam by creating pamphlets about Islam
  • Reciting the Shahada, which proclaims Allah as the one true god and renounces the God of Abraham

Wednesday, October 14, 2015

Tuesday, October 13, 2015

ObamaCare Comes Up Short


Get ready for major hikes in health-insurance premiums — despite all the promises from "The One."

From Obamacare shorts health insurers $2.5 billion:
Insurers will get far less money than promised from the federal government this year — and a few billion dollars less than they requested — to help pay for their sickest customers.

Insurers learned late Thursday [October 1, 2015] that they'll receive just $362 million out of the $2.9 billion in requested for 2014 for the program, according to an announcement by the Department of Health and Human Services.

That's because a program created under the 2010 Affordable Care Act hasn't brought in nearly as much money as it needs to pay out. As insurers enrolled more older, sicker Americans under the new healthcare law, they were promised some federal money to help cover their new costs, through a program known as risk corridors.
This shortage in funding ObamaCare was totally predictable, of course.

 People with chronic health conditions typically cost more in healthcare dollars.

The cycle of life.

All the utopianism in the world can't change the natural order of the universe.

Sunday, October 11, 2015

Quiz Time

A little something different for Columbus Day 2015:

Question 1

CLICK HERE to take the quiz Can You Guess the Invention Based on These Patent Illustrations? Hint: They are all part of the National Museum of American History’s collection.

My quiz results below the fold.

Saturday, October 10, 2015

Open Thread

Note: If you're inclined to weigh in on the previous post, FEATURED QUESTION: 2016 Election, please do so.


So, what's on your mind?

Here's a link to get this thread started: Ivy League prof. calls Ben Carson a 'coon'.

BTW, on Sunday, October 11, Steve Kroft will "grill" Obama on 60 Minutes. Here's a preview of that episode of 60 Minutes:


Enough from me for now. Please opine on the topic of your choice according to the parameters below:

Thursday, October 8, 2015

FEATURED QUESTION: 2016 Election


If you could have your druthers, whom would you choose as the GOP candidate for President of the United States? Explain the reason for your choice(s).

Tuesday, October 6, 2015

Hitler And Islam

Hitler believed that Islam was a religion perfectly suited to the German temperament: "It's been our misfortune to have the wrong religion."

Hitler and the Mufti al-Husseini

From page 96 of Inside the Third Reich (Click directly on the image below to enlarge it):


(hat tip to Infidel Bloggers Alliance)

Monday, October 5, 2015

Recommended Reading

Once in a while, along comes a moment of jaw-dropping clarity, albeit during an episode of a popular cable-television series. See It's all in the book by my good friend Jason Pappas, who tells us what Homeland's CIA Agent Peter Quinn had to say about ISIS and Islam after the agent's two-year stint Syria.

Money quote below the fold.

Sunday, October 4, 2015

Musical Interlude

(For politics, please scroll down)

Arvo Pärt's Spiegel im Spiegel (translation = "mirror in the mirror"), herewith dedicated to the victims of the October 1, 2015 massacre at Umpqua Community College:


About Spiegel im Spiegel (essential material for an understanding of the piece and why it is a fitting tribute for what happened on October 1, 2015):

Friday, October 2, 2015

Open Thread

(I've made a significant dent in grading a huge stack of essays and now offer an open thread. I'll peek in from time to time)


So, what's on your mind?


A video to get this thread started:



Please opine on the topic of your choice according to the parameters below:

We welcome civil dialogue at Always on Watch. Comments that include any of the following are subject to deletion:
1. Any use of profanity or abusive language
2. Off topic comments and spam
3. Use of personal invective

Note: comments consisting of blog gossip will be deleted as soon as an administrator of this blog becomes aware of such comments.

Wednesday, September 30, 2015

Buried!

There will be a pause from publishing new blog posts until I finish frenetically marking the mound of essays on my desk.  My classes are on a deadline because students are entering Voice of Democracy and Patriot's Pen, writing contests sponsored by the Veterans of Foreign Wars.  Meanwhile, please scroll down to the blog posts below. I shall peek in here from time to time.

Monday, September 28, 2015

Why The Trump Phenomenon

Click directly on the images to enlarge them:


AND


These principles also apply to Ben Carson's and Carly Fiorina's rise in the polls. Many in the electorate are fed up with electing representatives who don't even try to keep their campaign promises. Those who are guilty of political malpractice are a plague upon the land and stink up the whole place.

Related and a must-read: Cold Anger at Conservative Treehouse.


2014 electorate map

Sunday, September 27, 2015

The Internet And Happiness

(For politics, please scroll down)


In my own experience, interacting on the web can be discouraging and enervating — especially when engaging in political discussions during the almost election cycles. Furthermore, some studies have indicated that so much involvement in the Digital Age has negative repercussions, including computer vision syndrome, depression, and Internet addiction disorder — to name only a few of a myriad of negative consequences.

According to this recent article in the Washington Post, however:
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