I just took a quick read of this story, about the IDF making its own YouTube channel in order to fight the online battle:

In the midst of its Gaza operations, the IDF is entering yet another conflict zone: the Internet. The Israeli army announced yesterday the creation of its own YouTube channel, through which it will disseminate footage of precision bombing operations in the Gaza Strip, as well as aid distribution and other footage of interest to the international community.
A screen shot of an IDF video…

A screen shot of an IDF video showing terrorists loading rockets into a truck.
Photo: Youtube
Slideshow: Gaza op, Day IV

“The blogosphere and new media are another war zone,” said IDF Foreign Press Branch head Maj. Avital Leibovich. “We have to be relevant there.”

Her sentiment reflects a growing awareness in the Israeli government that part of the failure of the 2006 Second Lebanon War was Israel’s lack of readiness for the intense media debate surrounding its operations.

That, naturally, led to watching this video:

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is one of the best videos I have ever seen. 

Can I just make a point about Obama’s reaction to the Blagojevich scandal?  I just thought it was the greatest thing in the world that Barack Obama’s very first reaction to the scandal was ..... to lie.  I mean, is that just perfect or what?  His first reaction, first statement, the first thing he said to the American public was a lie.

Here’s the video:

And the relevant quote:

I had no contact with the governor or his office and so I was not aware of what was happening.

And of course, by now, we know that’s not true, thanks to David Axelrod’s appearance on Fox News Chicago (video is no longer available, shock):

I know [Obama] talked to the governor and there are a whole range of names many of which have surfaced, and I think he has a fondness for a lot of them.

Of course, the Obama team has since said that Axelrod ”misspoke." Yeah right.

First scandal, first response, a lie.  I love it.  Welcome to the era of Hope and Change, baby.

h/t to Hot Air and Jake Tapper

So MPACUK, The Muslim Public Affairs Committee in England, writes a post titled ”Understanding the Philosophy of Muslim Violence” on their site that starts off like this:

MPACUK, unlike the many other Muslim groups out there, have not just pioneered the best solution against any terrorist attack in mainland Britain (i.e. get the mosques and ISOCs to teach democracy) but has now embarked in cutting through the media propaganda to reach British Muslims, and hopefully non-Muslims, and informing them of the true nature of Muslim violence.

We know it will get us in trouble with the media; make us targets for the government elites who want to hide this from you. We are prepared to pay the price. Most Muslim groups in the UK are still silent, or worse apologising, so they can get the ‘moderate’ medal of dishonour from their masters. We prefer the truth - no matter what they call us.

Sounds promising, right?  Don’t get your hopes up.  They go on in this way for a little while, in which their intent is clearly to bait, finally turning to this:

That said, if you want to know why Muslims - or any human being - turns to violent ends, then watch this:

You see, according to MPACUK, if you want to understand the cause of Muslim violence, you simply need to understand that it’s your fault.  You, the oppressor, the “Executioner,” you made them do it.  It’s never, under any circumstances, the fault of fanatic Islamic terrorists, they are the “Victims,” simply reacting to your oppression, just “fighting for their liberation.”

Vomit.  Excuse me, just had to vomit for a second.

And check out the comments section on their post, it’s a fascinating display, ranging from delusion to anti-semitism to common sense to pro-terrorism and so on.

So now we get to see the Rev. Wright ad that McCain’s team put together, but he never approved:

Not that it would have made much difference, I suppose, but it’s just one more example of McCain’s inept campaign.

I had to point out this piece from yesterday by Dennis Prager:  The Rabbi and the Terrorists

An excerpt:

Why would a terrorist group of Islamists from Pakistan whose primary goal is to have Pakistan gain control of the third of Kashmir that belongs to India and therefore aimed to destabilize Indias major city devote so much of its efforts—20 percent of its force of 10 gunmen whose stated goal was to kill 5,000—to killing a rabbi and any Jews with him?

The question echoes one from World War II: Why did Hitler devote so much time, money, and manpower in order to murder every Jewish man, woman, and child in every country the Nazis occupied? Why did Hitler—as documented by the late historian Lucy Dawidowicz in her aptly named book The War against the Jews—weaken the Nazi war effort by diverting money, troops, and military vehicles from fighting the Allies to rounding up Jews and shipping them to death camps?

From the perspective of political scientists, historians, and contemporary journalists, the answer to these questions is not rational. But the non-rationality of an answer is not synonymous with its non-validity.

For the Islamists, as for the Nazis, the destruction of the Jews—and since 1948, the Jewish state—is central to their worldview.

Prager absolutley nailed it with this column.  Read the whole thing!

I was listening to Hugh Hewitt’s radio program today.  He had Christopher Hitchens on and Hitchens made a great point.  Something to the effect of:

The terrorist attack in Mumbai illustrates perfectly the cynicism of the hysterical anger of the Muslim world. If a similar attack had been perpetrated by 10 Christian terrorists and had occured in a Muslim country, much of the Muslim world would have erupted in righteous, hysterical fury.  Yet, in the wake of the Mumbai atrocity, you barely hear a word of anger coming from the Muslim world.  It shows that the insta-mobs whipped into a fury over an allegation of mistreatment of the Koran are nothing but a cynical farce, used selectively for political gain.

He may have lost me on nominating Obama, but when it comes to the war, Hitchens still has his head on straight.

UPDATE:  Here’s a link to the Hewitt interview with Christopher Hitchens:  The Hugh Hewitt Show

And here’s the full quote Hitchens was referring to, from Thomas Friedman’s NYT column:

[I]f 10 young Indians from a splinter wing of the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party traveled by boat to Pakistan, shot up two hotels in Karachi and the central train station, killed at least 173 people, and then, for good measure, murdered the imam and his wife at a Saudi-financed mosque while they were cradling their 2-year-old son — purely because they were Sunni Muslims — where would we be today?

British journalist Tom Gross had a fantastic piece today in The Wall Street Journal titled If This Isn’t Terrorism, What Is?

In the piece, he rightfully asks:

So why are so many prominent Western media reluctant to call the perpetrators terrorists? Why did Jon Snow, one of Britain’s most respected TV journalists, use the word “practitioners” when referring to the Mumbai terrorists? Was he perhaps confusing them with doctors?

Why did Britain’s highly regarded Channel 4 News state that the “militants” showed a “wanton disregard for race or creed” when exactly the opposite was true: Targets and victims were very carefully selected. Why did the “experts” invited to discuss the Mumbai attacks in one show on the state-funded Radio France Internationale, the voice of France around the world, harp on about Baruch Goldstein (who carried out the Hebron shootings in 1994), virtually the sole case of a Jewish terrorist in living memory?

We’ve all grown accustomed to the media’s malfeasance in the realm of politics, but what we’re seeing here is worse than the usual bias.  In this case, the media shows they have become unwilling to name a terrorist a terrorist in even the most extreme circumstances.  I for one, am having none of it, and neither should you.

Read the whole article, it’s important.

Any chance I get to listen to or read Victor Davis Hanson, I take advantage.  The man is smart.  Real smart.

His most recent article is a fine read too:

1. Tempered not melted. The question is not whether America is in decline, but whether it is in decline at a more rapid pace than true of Europe, Russia, or Asia. And one bright spot in the otherwise dark economic news will be the resilience of the United States. Forget trillions of this, and billions of that, or our sinking GDP and GNP, or deflation and unemployment rates, or all the other data—at least for a moment. Instead consider the gargantuan mess that Europe is in with its even wilder real estate market, greater deficits, and far larger banking losses from bad loans abroad. Russia is a mess; with less than $50 a barrel oil, it will be worse than a mess. Export-driven China may have trillions of US dollars in reserves, but it has tens of trillions in infrastructure investments to make before it can match US roads, dams, and airports, much less approximate our standard of living. Americans are far more meritocratic than others, success far less predicated on birth, accent, parentage, or class. We are more optimistic, and do best when pressed (Consider a broke America in 1939, and a rich America in 1946 that defeated the Axis and sent billions to its allies in the UK and Russia.). Our demography is far more encouraging than Europe’s. We react to crises far more energetically; compare US troops in Afghanistan to their NATO counterparts; or ask who adapted more successfully in Iraq—the US Marines far from home, or Al Qaeda terrorists in their own backyard? Once the dust settles on this crisis, I wager the United States will be relatively stronger after than before the meltdown. One can do almost anything with a $13 trillion economy, a two-percent-plus growing population, and a stable political system; much harder with a shrinking work force that breaks apart along class lines and resentments. Even while pundits write weekly books about the ‘end’ of the United States, or at least ‘American decline,’ the United States will emerge relatively stronger for the ordeal.

There are 6 more where that came from. 

A thing of beauty:

Attorney General Michael Mukasey collapsed while giving a speech to the Federalist Society tonight.  It appears to have been a stroke.  Prayers.

By now, you’ve most likely read Mitt Romney’s op-ed in The New York Times titled ”Let Detroit Go Bankrupt.” The piece is interesting in that Romney’s credibility as a turn-around artist is backed up by a giant pile of money.  Simply said, he knows what he’s talking about.  If you haven’t yet, definitely read it.

Here’s Romney discussing the op-ed yesterday: