Fantastic report here from Pajamas Media:
a great example of what the internet does so much better than the MSM.

THE FAKING IMAMS -- Pajamas Media Exclusive: Police Report,
Passenger Reveals That Flying Imams Were Up to No Good

By Richard Miniter, PJM Washington Editor

PJM in Seattle
December 1, 2006 5:58 PM

The Now Notorious Flying Imams Claim Their Only Crime Was “Flying While Muslim,” But Our Exclusive Reporting Reveals They Are Trying to Sweep Their Real Motives Under Their Prayer Rugs

[Bloggers are invited to examine these documents and provide theories for what happened. Please notify Pajamas Media. — Editors]


The case of U.S. Airways flight 300 gets stranger by the minute. When six traveling Muslim clerics were asked to deplane last week, it looked like another civil rights controversy against post-9-11 airport security.

Now new information is emerging that suggests it was all a stunt designed to weaken security….

Yesterday I spoke with a passenger on that flight, who asked that she be only identified as “Pauline.” A copy of airport police report, which I also obtained, supports Pauline’s account - and includes shocking revelations of its own. In addition, U.S. Airways spokeswoman Andrea Rader also confirmed much of what Pauline revealed…..

The passenger, who asked that she only be identified as “Pauline,” said she is afraid to give her full name or hometown. She is spending the night at “another location” because she does not feel safe at home. She credits reports that one imam is apparently linked to Hamas. “It is scary because these men could be dangerous.”

Pauline said she never wanted media attention. She wrote an email to U.S. Airways and cc:ed her daughter, who unexpectedly emailed it to her friends. As the letter took on an internet life of its own, it made its way to the inbox of a retired CNN executive producer. Then, to her dismay, the feeding frenzy began.

Pauline revealed to the Pajamas Media that the six imams were doing things far more suspicious than praying - an Arabic-speaking passenger heard them repeatedly invoke “bin Laden,” and “terrorism,” a gate attendant told the captain that she did not want to fly with them, and that bomb-sniffing dogs were brought aboard. Other Muslim passengers were left undisturbed and later joined in a round of applause for the U.S. Airways crew. “It wasn’t that they were Muslim. It was all of the suspicious things they did,” Pauline said.

Here is her story, along with corroborating quotes from the U.S. Airways spokeswoman Andrea Rader and the official report, another Pajamas Media Exclusive.

Sitting in Minneapolis-St. Paul’s Airport Gate C9, she noticed one of the imams immediately. “He was pacing nervously, talking in Arabic,” she said.

She quickly noticed the others. “They didn’t look like holy men to me. They looked like guys heading out of town for a Vikings game.”

Pauline said she did not see or hear the imams pray at the gate (she was at dinner in a nearby airport eatery), but heard about the pre-flight prayers from other passengers hours later.

As the plane boarded, she said, no one refused to fly. The public prayers and Arabic phone call did not trigger any alarms - so much for the p.c. allegations that people were disturbed by Muslim prayers.

But a note from a passenger about suspicious movements of the imams got the crew’s attention. A copy of the passenger’s note appears in the police report.

To Pauline everything seemed normal. Then the captain - in classic laconic pilot-style - announced there had been a “mix up in our paperwork” and that the flight would be delayed.

In reality, the air crew was waiting for the FBI and local police to arrive.

Ninety minutes after the flight’s scheduled 5:15 p.m. departure, the captain announced yet another delay. Still, Pauline said, there was no sense of alarm.

Still, it seemed like just another annoying development, typical when flying the friendly skies.

The situation in cockpit was far more intense, according to a U.S. Airways spokeswoman and police reports.

Contrary to press accounts that a single note from a passenger triggered the imams’ removal, Captain John Howard Wood was weighing multiple factors - factors that have largely been ignored by the press.

Another passenger, not the note writer, was an Arabic speaker sitting near two of the imams in the plane’s tail. That passenger pulled a flight attendant aside, and in a whisper, translated what the men were saying. They were invoking “bin Laden” and condemning America for “killing Saddam,” according to police reports.

Meanwhile an imam seated in first class asked for a seat-belt extension, even though according to both an on-duty flight attendant and another deadheading flight attendant, he looked too thin to need one. Hours later, when the passengers were being evacuated, the seat-belt extension was found on the floor near the imam’s seat, police reports confirm. The U.S. Airways spokeswoman Andrea Rader said she did not dispute the report, but said the airline’s internal investigation cannot yet account for the seat-belt extension request or its subsequent use.

A seat-belt extension can easily be used as a weapon, by wrapping the open-end of the belt around your fist and swinging the heavy metal buckle.

Still, it seemed like just another annoying development, typical when flying the friendly skies. Days after the incident, the imam would claim that the steward helped him attach the device. Pauline said he is lying. Hours later, when the police was being evacuated, the steward asked Pauline to hand him the seat-belt extension, which the imam did not attach, but placed on the floor. “I know he is lying,” Pauline said, “I had it [seat belt extension] in my hand.”

A passenger in the third row of first class, Pauline said, told a member of the crew: “I don’t have a good feeling about this guy,” about the imam who wanted the seat-belt extension.

A married couple one row behind first-class, tried to strike up a conversation with the imam seated near them. He refused to talk or even look at the woman in the eye, according to Pauline. Instead, he stood up and moved to join the other imams in the back of the plane. Why would he leave the luxury end of the aircraft? Pauline wondered. The account of the married couple does not appear in the police report.

Finally, a gate attendant told the captain she thought the imams were acting suspiciously, according to police reports.

So the captain apparently made his decision to delay the flight based on many complaints, not one. And he consulted a federal air marshal, a U.S. Airways ground security coordinator and the airline’s security office in Phoenix. All thought the imams were acting suspiciously, Rader told me.

Other factors were also considered: All six imams had boarded together, with the first-class passengers - even though only one of them had a first-class ticket. Three had one-way tickets. Between the six men, only one had checked a bag.

And, Pauline said, they spread out just like the 9-11 hijackers. Two sat in first, two in the middle, and two back in the economy section. Pauline’s account is confirmed by the police report. The airline spokeswoman added that some seemed to be sitting in seats not assigned to them.

One thing that no one seemed to consider at the time, perhaps due to lack of familiarity with Islamic practice, is that the men prayed both at the gate and on the plane. Observant Muslims pray only once at sundown, not twice.

“It was almost as if they were intentionally trying to get kicked off the flight,” Pauline said.

A lone plain clothes FBI agent boarded the plane and briefly spoke to the imams. Later, uniformed police escorted them off.

Some press reports said the men were led off in handcuffs, which Pauline disputes. “I saw them. They were not handcuffed.”

Later, each imam was individually brought back on the aircraft to reclaim his belongings. They were still not handcuffed. They may have been handcuffed later.

At this point, the passengers became alarmed. “How do we know they got all their stuff off?” Pauline heard one man ask.

While the imams were soon released, Pauline is fuming: “We are the victims of these people. They need to be more sensitive to us. They were totally insensitive to us and then accused us of being insensitive to them. I mean, we were a lot more inconvenienced than them.”

The plane was delayed for some three and one-half hours.

Bomb-sniffing dogs were used to sweep the plane and every passenger was re-screened, the airline spokeswoman confirmed. Another detail omitted from press reports.

The reaction of the remaining passengers has also gone unreported. “We applauded and cheered for the crew,” she said.

“I think it was either a foiled attempt to take over the plane or it was a publicity stunt to accuse us of being insensitive,” Pauline said. “It had to be to intimidate U.S. Airways to ease up on security.”

So far, U.S. Airways refuses to be intimidated, even though the feds have launched an investigation. “We are absolutely backing this crew,” Rader said.

Tucked away in the police report is this little gem: one of the imams had complained to a passenger that some nations did not follow shariah law and his job in Bakersfield, Calif. was a cover for “representing Muslims here in the U.S.”

So what are the imams really up to? Something more than praying it seems.

The War of All Against All
By Patrick Buchanan

A few days back, the "Today" show, speaking for NBC News, declared Iraq a "civil war," and said the network and CNBC and MSNBC would henceforth use that term to describe it.

President Bush and White House Press Secretary Tony Snow angrily objected. A civil war, said Snow, is when two identifiable armed forces war with each other for control of a government and nation. And Iraq is not that.

Contradicting Snow and the president are most journalists and Colin Powell. Speaking in Dubai, Powell declared, "I would call it a civil war ... because I like to face reality," a smart slap across the face of the president who made him secretary of state by a soldier who feels badly used by Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld and the neoconservatives.

Is this a matter of politics and semantics?

Yes, but it is also far more than that. Those who insist on calling Iraq a civil war are consciously undercutting Bush's case that Iraq is "the central front in the war on terror," that we fight them over there so that we will not have to fight them over here.

Believing him, half the country is convinced we cannot retreat, cut-and-run, for that would mean the terrorists win in Iraq and bring the terror war to the United States. But if Iraq is but a "civil war," most American would say that it's not America's war -- let's go home.

This battle over definitions recalls Vietnam. Those who wanted to stay the course in Vietnam argued that it was the central front in the Cold War against communism, which threatened Southeast Asia today but America tomorrow. Those who had supported the war, but concluded it was no longer worth it, suddenly changed their story to declare it was now a civil war and none of America's business.

What is happening today is that those who once cheered Tommy Frank's march to Baghdad to liberate Iraq from Saddam are trying to rationalize their throwing Iraq to the wolves that the invasion unleashed. America's elite does not wish to admit the truth: that it has no stomach for fighting this ugly and unpopular war into which it foolishly marched the United States.

The baby boomer elite arrogantly and ignorantly led us into a quagmire, as their fathers did in Vietnam -- and now, just like their fathers, they lack the stamina, courage and perseverance to see it through. As they don't want to be held accountable for losing the war, they have seized upon the rationale that it was never our war to fight.

Calling it "a civil war" is a cover for people who wish to cut and run.

What is the truth? Is it a civil war, like the Spanish Civil War of 1936-1939, when Franco led his armies out of North Africa into Spain to overthrow a regime and end an anarchic situation where priests and nuns were being murdered and Bolsheviks seemed about to ascend to power? No, it is not.

The war in Iraq consists rather of many small wars. The Kurds in the north are seizing and ethnically cleansing Kirkut in anticipation of a day of secession that will give them a nation. Al-Qaida and the Baathists in Anbar are fighting U.S. Marines to expel them from Iraq.

Al-Qaida attacked the Golden Mosque and perpetrated atrocities against Shia civilians to incite the Shia to reprisals and ignite a Sunni-Shia sectarian war. Zarqawi, before we got him, succeeded. He set off the chain reaction that has now a momentum of its own.

The Shia initially backed the Americans and Brits against the Sunni insurgents. Having won power, however, they now are fighting each other over how orthodox the regime should be, and whether the Shia should, like the Kurds, break away and set up an independent state.

The twin pillars of Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's government are the U.S. military and Moqtada al Sadr, mortal enemies who have fought bloodily before and may well be preparing for a decisive Battle of Baghdad.

Iraq seems to this writer less a classic civil war, like the Spanish and the Russian civil war between "Reds" and "Whites" from 1919 to 1921, than a version of bellum omnium contra omnes, the war of all against all. That is the Latin phrase Thomas Hobbes gave to human existence in the state-of-nature thought experiment he conducted in "Leviathan."

Even our War Between the States was not truly a civil war. For the South did not seek to overturn Lincoln's election, capture the capital or rule the country. The South wanted only to secede from the Union of Abraham Lincoln as their fathers had seceded from the England of George III.

Yet, this argument about whether Iraq is or is not a civil war is deeply consequential for what it exposes. Our elite senses this war is lost, and they are preparing alibis for their roles in what may yet prove the greatest strategic blunder in American history.

Hard to believe anyone would get upset with representatives of this religious tradition.

COULTER GETS RESULTS!
by Ann Coulter

November 29, 2006

The six imams removed from a US Airways flight last week have apparently adopted my suggestion that if they really want to protest the airline, instead of boycotting US Airways, they should start flying it frequently.

The spokesman for the imams — or as I believe it's phrased in their culture, "designated liar" — Omar Shahin, staged a protest at Reagan Washington National Airport on Monday, after which, according to The Associated Press, "he and other religious leaders boarded a US Airways flight to demonstrate their determination to continue praying and flying."

The original six imams removed from the flight last week first attracted attention when they said prayers to Allah on traditional Muslim prayer rugs in the boarding area. After boarding, they changed seats, spreading themselves throughout the plane. They were also overheard spouting anti-American rhetoric. Witnesses said the six men appeared to be either Islamic fanatics or U.S. Army chaplains on leave from Guantanamo.

Following the lead of FEMA in keeping Americans safe, the Homeland Security Department's Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties is investigating the removal of the imams from the US Airways flight. (Talk about coincidences — I'm currently investigating the removal of the Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties from the Department of Homeland Security!)

Imam spokesman Shahin is a great example of why airport security ought to be profiling Arabs. Shahin's predecessor at the Islamic Center in Tucson was Osama bin Laden's financier and head of logistics — until he was arrested in Saudi Arabia in 2002.

Instead of aggressively distinguishing himself from his terrorist predecessor, judging by news reports, Shahin spent the five years after 9/11 denying that Muslims were behind the attacks and complaining of phony anti-Islamic "hate crimes" — as opposed to the pro-Islamic hate crimes he presumably endorses.

In 2003, for example, Shahin alleged that a woman in Arizona had thrown shoes at children at the mosque.

This is the most transparent hoax I've heard since, "If I did it, here's how I would have done it." This is like the joke about a speaker at an American communist rally opening with: "Workers and peasants of Brooklyn!" Shahin has so little insight into this country, he can't even invent a believable hate crime.

It's Arabs who have a thing about shoes being a sign of disrespect, not Americans. When Iraqis toppled the statue of Saddam Hussein, the crowd immediately pelted it with shoes. Saddam installed a mosaic of the first president Bush's face on the ground floor of his palace so that visitors would be forced to disrespect Bush by walking on his visage in their shoes.

Shahin himself couldn't get away from this pan-Arabic shoe fetish, adding: "The incidents of Muslims being attacked kind of shocked me in my shoes." Note to imams trying to fabricate hate crimes against Muslims: Americans don't share your shoe neurosis.

At Reagan National this week, Rabbis joined the Muslims at the prayer protest — though one imagines they did not share this prayer from the Hadith: "And the Jews will hide behind the rock and tree, and the rock and tree will say: 'O Muslim, O servant of Allah, there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him!'" In fairness, they usually save that one for the high holidays, like the "Festival of the Six Dead Jews" or "Honor Killing Week."

Nor this one, also from the Hadith: "The Prophet said: 'The Hour will not take place until the Muslims fight the Jews, and the Muslims kill them. The Muslims will kill the Jews. Rejoice! Rejoice in Allah's victory!'" (Is it just me, or might some fanatic twist those words into an excuse to kill Jews?)

Also strange was that the NAACP has piped in to complain about racial profiling of Muslims. The only reason Americans feel guilty about "racial profiling" against blacks is because of the history of discrimination against blacks in this country.

What did we do to the Arabs? I believe Americans are the victims in that relationship. After the attacks of 9/11, profiling Muslims is more like profiling the Klan.

From TPM Cafe: A good piece pointing out how George Will got his bowtie too tight, affecting the oxygen to his brain and thus his good judgment, resulting in maybe the most ridiculous column I've ever seen from him. It just may be possible that what Washington needs is less civility and more honesty.

George Will Distorts WaPo's Own Reporting To Smear Jim Webb
By Greg Sargent

This is one of the rankest displays of journalistic dishonesty I've seen in some time. In today's Washington Post column, George Will assails Dem Senator-elect Jim Webb over his now-well-known confrontation with President Bush at a White House reception. To do so, Will badly distorts the reporting his own paper did on the episode, and it's quite clear his distortions were entirely deliberate.

First, let's check out how Will recounts the episode in his column.

Will writes:

Wednesday's Post reported that at a White House reception for newly elected members of Congress, Webb "tried to avoid President Bush," refusing to pass through the reception line or have his picture taken with the president. When Bush asked Webb, whose son is a Marine in Iraq, "How's your boy?" Webb replied, "I'd like to get them [sic] out of Iraq." When the president again asked "How's your boy?" Webb replied, "That's between me and my boy."

Will says the episode demonstrates Webb's "calculated rudeness toward another human being" -- i.e., the President -- who "asked a civil and caring question, as one parent to another."

But do you notice something missing from Will's recounting of the episode?

Here's how the Washingon Post actually reported on the episode the day before Will's column:

At a recent White House reception for freshman members of Congress, Virginia's newest senator tried to avoid President Bush. Democrat James Webb declined to stand in a presidential receiving line or to have his picture taken with the man he had often criticized on the stump this fall. But it wasn't long before Bush found him.

"How's your boy?" Bush asked, referring to Webb's son, a Marine serving in Iraq.

"I'd like to get them out of Iraq, Mr. President," Webb responded, echoing a campaign theme.

"That's not what I asked you," Bush said. "How's your boy?"

"That's between me and my boy, Mr. President," Webb said coldly, ending the conversation on the State Floor of the East Wing of the White House.

See what happened? Will omitted the pissy retort from the President that provoked Webb. Will cut out the line from the President where he said: "That's not what I asked you." In Will's recounting, that instead became a sign of Bush's parental solicitiousness: "The president again asked `How's your boy?'"

Will's change completely alters the tenor of the conversation from one in which Bush was rude first to Webb, which is what the Post's original account suggested, to one in which Webb was inexplicably rude to the President, which is how Will wanted to represent what happened.

It's virtually impossible to see how that could have been the result of mere incompetence on Will's part. Rather, it's very clear that Will cut the line because it was an inconvenient impediment to his journalistic goal, which was to portray Webb as a "boor" who was rude to the Commander in Chief, and to show that this new upstart is a threat to Washington's alleged code of "civility and clear speaking" (his words). On that score, also note that in the original version, Webb said "Mr. President" twice -- and neither appeared in Will's version.

You'd think such an obvious misrepresentation would irritate the Post's top brass. You'd think they would be annoyed with Will for sullying their pages with such journalistic misbehavior. Indeed, it's kind of amusing to imagine what went through Will's mind as he cut and pasted the Post's original reporting and then hit the delete button to get rid of the inconvenient quote. Did he think to himself, "Yeah, this is bad, but no one will notice"? Or did he think, "What the heck -- people will notice, but it won't affect my professional or social standing, so who cares"?

Paging Howard Kurtz: Do you consider your colleague's effort journalistically acceptable? I don't. This was a really bad one.

From The New York Post:
BAKER'S SELLOUT PLAN
By DICK MORRIS & EILEEN McGANN

November 29, 2006 -- CAN Iran help us bail out of Iraq? Maybe - but we'd better take a hard look at the price.

The idea has reportedly been floated via a draft report to the Iraq Study Group (headed by former Secretary of State James Baker), which calls for a "dialogue" with Iran as well as Syria. Along the same lines, British Prime Minister Tony Blair recently said Iran could be a "partner" with the West if it did not develop a bomb.

Presumably, we'd ask Iran to help stabilize the situation in Iraq, curb the Shiite militias and encourage the Iraqi government to make sufficient concessions to the Sunnis to end or at least reduce the violence.

Would it work? It could. Iran certainly has sought to arm and enflame the Shiites in Iraq. Maybe the mullahs can rein in their proxies, and let us withdraw in dignity - not holding onto the skids of the helicopter as it lifts off our embassy this time.

But why would they play ball with Washington at the same time that Bush is threatening sanctions explicitly and a military strike implicitly if Iran proceeds to develop nuclear weapons? No chance.

So this proposal amounts to the de facto abandonment of any military or economic actions that could deter Iran from going nuclear.

Of course, Baker may seek and Iran may offer public assurances that it won't develop nuclear weapons - the same worthless assurances it now passes out to the entire world. What will have changed is that America and Britain will be so engaged with Iran that they can't and won't bomb or even impose tough sanctions.

In short, we can only get Iran's help on Iraq if we let Tehran get the bomb.

Yet, with nukes, Iran gains the leverage to force Iraq, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and all the region's oil producers to move in its orbit. The Middle East will become an Iranian sphere of influence.

Such an under-the-table deal would amount to a total sellout of Israel and Saudi Arabia and America's other Arab allies.

The Jewish state would be left with no alternative but to take whatever military action it could to stop Iran from completing its nuclear program. American capitulation will have left it with no alternative.

Would Jim Baker cut such a deal? In a heartbeat. Never a friend of Israel, he wouldn't flinch at a realpolitik solution giving Iran power throughout the region.

But why would Bush go along? It would be "peace in our time" - Munich, 1938 - all over again

From TarHeelBlue.com:
Lose Yourself

Adam Lucas on the win over Ohio State.

What were you thinking? How did you do it? What was the plan?

These are the questions you ask a Carolina basketball team that exactly one week ago looked like they had just been introduced to each other and then turned into the Showtime Lakers in a 98-89 win over Ohio State.

So, what were you thinking? You had to be thinking something, right?

Nope. And that's why it worked.

"Everybody stopped thinking so much and started playing and lost themselves in the game," Danny Green said. "When you lose yourself in the game, that's when you have fun."

Come to think of it, it did look like fun out there, didn't it? For the first time all year, it looked like Carolina's 2006-07 Tar Heels enjoyed each other's company and enjoyed the game of basketball.

Leading by 8 points with just under 6 minutes to play, Wayne Ellington had a breakaway layup. No one was within a Brandan Wright wingspan of him. He had plans for something grand--"I was going to get up in the air, and whatever happened, happened," he said--but they dissolved about the time his plant foot hit a wet spot on the Smith Center floor. His legs buckled awkwardly and he was forced to drop the ball into the hoop with all the grace of a tap-dancing grizzly bear. It was perhaps the first time in his freshman season that the normally perfectly balanced Ellington has looked askew.

Steve Robinson thought it was hilarious.

As the Tar Heels got back on defense, they held a 10-point lead. The game was not over; this team has already seen similar leads dissolve this season. But as Ellington ran back on defense, he glanced over at the Carolina bench and saw Robinson with an enormous grin on his face.

"Oh man, we had a timeout right after that and my teammates got all over me," Ellington said. "You know what? It was fun, though."

Consider a play. It's later in the game and Carolina holds an 86-80 advantage. Under three minutes remain, and after a hectic possession, Marcus Ginyard gets the offensive rebound.

Of course he does. That's what he does.

So Ginyard gets the offensive rebound and gives Carolina another possession. This is a point in the game when every possession is crucial, every basket seems like a potential back-breaker.

When play restarts, the Tar Heels allow 15 seconds to melt away. They are methodical, almost casual.

And then they strike. Lawson catches a pass from Hansbrough 23 feet from the basket. Actually, he does not catch it. The ball is barely in his hands long enough to qualify as a catch. He just controls it, just for a second, and then he redirects it on a flat angle straight down the length of the court. It arches perfectly into the waiting arms of Brandan Wright, who catches it--really catches it--and then slams home a dunk to provide an 8-point margin.

It is the kind of play only teammates can make, the kind that is triggered by an imperceptible nod from one player to another.

"When we reversed the ball, I saw him push his man up the lane," Lawson said. "I knew there was nobody back and I could throw the ball over the top."

"The whole night they were fronting me really hard," Wright said. "They were trying not to give up any easy post entries. So I turned and rolled my man up the lane. I looked at Ty, put my hand up, and he made the perfect pass."

It took them longer to describe it than it did to execute it. Ohio State spent the evening writing almost every offensive play on a white dry-erase board held in the air by one of their assistants. Players checked the board and ran to their spots.

At a time when Carolina badly needed a basket, though, they didn't need a scripted play or a sideline diagram. They just needed the eye, big man to point guard.

Sure, sometimes they need a little refresher. With 32.3 seconds left, Lawson went to the free throw line. His team was lollygagging down the court in anticipation of the freshman's free throws, so Roy Williams stomped his foot. "Come here!" he said.

What he told his starters was simple: when Lawson made the second free throw, apply pressure in the backcourt.

The second free throw went in the basket, Carolina applied the defense, and Ohio State--taken aback by the sudden pressure--had to burn their last timeout of the game.

That was only one of numerous subtle contributions by Williams on a night when everyone on the roster played a significant role. Green was enormous in the first half, drawing charges and creating deflections that turned the momentum after the Buckeyes built a 10-point lead. Deon Thompson and Alex Stepheson provided 6 first-half points in relief of Wright, who had foul trouble. Ginyard was, well, he was just Ginyard. And for the second time this year, Bobby Frasor tapped the ball ahead from the seat of his pants to create a dunk.

"I just wanted to get on the floor before the Ohio State guy did," Frasor said.

No time to think. Just dive.

The logical question now is how this happened. A whole team can't simply click like that, can they? How do you go from losing in New York City to simply losing yourself?

"Defense," Ellington said. "We had to dig deep on defense. In that second half, we were selfless representing that name on the front of the jersey. We lost ourselves in the game."

Basketball is funny that way. Sometimes it takes getting lost to find what's been missing.

Remembering George Harrison

November 29, 2006

Hard to believe, but it was five years ago today (November 29th, 2001) that George Harrison lost his long battle with cancer and died at the age of 58. His legacy was secured as soon as the Beatles started making records in the early 1960s, but Harrison wasn't content to just be a sideman to John Lennon and Paul McCartney.

His contributions to the Beatles included the songs "Taxman," "Something," and "While My Guitar Gently Weeps" and his solo career kicked off with the Number One hit "My Sweet Lord" and Number One album All Things Must Pass. He was also responsible for The Concert For Bangla Desh, which was the first major rock and roll fundraiser, paving the way for countless other music-supported benefits over the years. He later went on to become a member of the Traveling Wilburys with Bob Dylan, Roy Orbison, Tom Petty, and Jeff Lynne, finally securing himself legendary status. He is sorely missed -- today, and every day.

Maybe the best way to judge Harrison's importance is for his fellow artists to talk about him:

When Harrison was inducted into the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame as a solo artist in March 2004, Tom Petty said: "George really was a man who lived every single minute of his life. He was a very upbeat person, had a very keen sense of humor, very keen sense of spirit, he led by example. Years before Live Aid, George invented the idea of rock and roll giving back to the people."

Badfinger guitarist Joey Molland worked with Harrison on All Things Must Pass, and Harrison helped the group make their Straight Up album in 1971. Molland told us what it was like taking direction from Harrison: "It was easy, very easy. You know, George was just such a nice guy, like...a regular kind of person, really. He doesn't come off, like, 'I'm a Beatle,' you know?"

Life-long friend Eric Clapton said that it might have taken Harrison's death to show people just how great he really was: "The best thing that came out of his passing was that we all got to remember exactly what he'd contributed, you know, as much as any of the other guys -- and maybe more so, because it was an individual achievement. You know, Lennon & McCartney's one thing, and Paul is one thing, and John's one, but I think George -- in my opinion, I found him, his work the most accessible, and the strongest, for me to tune in to."

Kiss singer-guitarist Paul Stanley told us that Harrison's legacy can't be underestimated: "Everybody knows that George Harrison is part of the fabric of rock 'n' roll and he's been an influence on everybody no matter what kind of music they play. Probably more so than they even know. He's been an influence on every kind of music that exists at this point because the Beatles are woven into everything that rock 'n' roll is about."

Pope Benedict in the Lion's Den
By Tony Blankley

Pope Benedict XVI's trip to Turkey was characterized by the Associated Press thusly (in one of their increasingly rare exercises in objective journalism): "Benedict's journey is extraordinarily sensitive, a closely watched pilgrimage full of symbolisms that could offer hope of religious reconciliation or deepen what many say is a growing divide between the Christian and Islamic worlds." While we must hope for the former, it is hard not to expect the latter.

Lamentably, the time is past (if it ever existed) when mere benign expressions of convivial tolerance could have any lasting, positive effect on inter-religious and inter-cultural relations. Pope Benedict well understands the current inefficacy of mere expressions of tolerance unconnected to specific, current Muslim nation practices, whatever he may or may not say on the remainder of this dangerous trip (originally intended as an outreach from the Catholic pope to the Eastern Orthodox Christian patriarch of Constantinople, before it was transformed by events into a Muslim-Christian-dominated event).

The pope believes in the need for deep, honest dialogue, premised on the need for reciprocity between Christians and Muslims. But as a man of honest faith and scholarship he refuses to go beyond where the teachings of his faith can take him.

As former foreign policy advisor to the U.S. Catholic Bishops, John F. Cullinan pointed out in National Review a few months ago, Pope Benedict recognizes "Lacking a common spiritual heritage, such as shared between Christians and Jews, purely theological dialogue [with Muslims] is counter productive and should be subordinated to an examination of how to exist peacefully in a pluralistic world." Thus Benedict sees reciprocity as applicable to attempting to reduce religious-motivated violence and to gaining religious freedom for religious minorities -- Christians, Muslims, Jews and all others.

We should not expect such reciprocity soon. Just this Monday two Turkish Christians (Hakan Tastan and Turan Topal) were defendants in a Turkish court accused of violating penal code Article 301, "insulting Turkishness" and Article 216, "inciting hatred against Islam." Their crime was peacefully missionizing on behalf of Christianity.

Similarly, the pope seeks to correct the imbalance between mosques being built throughout the cities of the West, while any non-Islamic religious expression (let alone church building) is strictly proscribed from Turkey to Saudi Arabia to Pakistan to most other Muslim countries.

There is something courageous but forlorn in Benedict's modest request for reciprocity on these matters. Such minimalist goals of the pope nonetheless earned him the following characterization by Time magazine last week: [He is] "carrying a reputation of a hard-knuckle intellect with a taste for blunt talk and inter-religious confrontation." Time went on to write: "Ratzinger [i.e. Pope Benedict XVI] has always favored bright theological lines and correspondingly high walls between creeds he regards as unequally meritorious."

It would seem that the pope is destined to be a bafflement to secularists because he remains true to his Christian faith, just as many Muslims will despise him because he remains true to his Christian faith -- even as he reaches out for at least minimal standards of reciprocal respect between the religions of the world.

Though I am not a Catholic, I rather prefer the description of Pope Benedict by the Catholic essayist Michael D. O'Brien (to the silliness of Time magazine's):

"Benedict is a man of charity and of truth, and rarer still, he is a man who has integrated both within his life and teaching. In a sense he is like St. Francis of Assisi, who in 1219, during the Crusades, walked into the midst of the Saracen camp and preached for days, and eventually spoke with the Sultan of Egypt in the hope of converting him ... He was a sign of contradiction to all parties in the wars. He was unarmed. He was a presence of Christ to the major adversary of Christian civilization in those times."

"So, too, Pope Benedict continues to be a sign of contradiction. He has crossed the lines of our normal categories regarding the world situation. He has made possible a dialogue with Islam. ... He is not naive about the nature of radical Islamics, and indeed his Regensburg speech has been a catalyst of clearer vision about the nature of militant Islamism -- its irrationality, its spirit of relentless hatred and contempt for human dignity. Yet we must remember that neither is the pope naive about the other beast -- the one that is killing us from within the parameters of our civilization, the secular humanism of Late Western Man."

Benedict will surely be condemned in both the secular and Muslim media for political sins he has not committed. But if given time, Benedict's stubborn, peaceful witness to his faith both in the Lion's den and amidst the non-believers may yet lead the world toward better days.

From TarHeelBlue.com:
Meet Butch Davis
Getting acquainted with Carolina's new head football coach.

By Adam Lucas

The Butch Davis era at Carolina officially begins with a question.

Davis was sitting in a room with several members of the Carolina athletic department in the days before his introductory press conference. Over sandwiches, the Tar Heel staffers were trying to break the ice with the new football coach. The typical subjects were covered: the weather, the schools...all the details a resident of Chapel Hill needs to know.

Davis had already familiarized himself with the layout of his new home state, which he wants to be the base of his recruiting efforts. But he was curious about the driving distance to the potential recruiting hotbeds of Washington, D.C. and Atlanta. He also had one other target area in mind.

"How close is Virginia Beach and that Tidewater area?" Davis asked.

After a discussion of the Tidewater area and its recruiting history, it seemed like a good opportunity to sell him (again) on his new home state. Sure, he had already agreed to be the coach, but you can never be too careful.

Besides, everyone else in the room heard "beach" and immediately pictured a sun-splashed afternoon, toes in the sand, and the Atlantic Ocean splashing over their legs. It was almost like a first date, so everyone quickly tried to provide their best recommendations.

"Coach, Wilmington is going to be your closest beach," he was told. "Topsail is close also. You could maybe consider..."

Davis humored the suggestions for a few seconds. Eventually, though, it became obvious they weren't answering the question he had asked. He interrupted with a laugh, and in the next few seconds he acted and sounded like Carolina's head coach for the first time.

"Guys, I'm not talking about swimming," he said. "I'm talking about recruiting."

"Beach" means one thing to some people. It means something entirely different to football coaches. That's why Davis had specifically inquired not just about any beach, but about Virginia Beach. He wanted to know about Tidewater because it's a hotbed of football talent, a place that has produced Carolina greats like Lawrence Taylor, William Fuller, and Dre' Bly.

Everyone else in the room was thinking like a representative of the Chapel Hill Chamber of Commerce...Davis was thinking like a football coach.

He spent the past two years as a television analyst. But he never really stopped being a coach. With a few minutes to kill before his meeting with the Carolina officials, he didn't put his feet up and watch some daytime television. He sat down with a thick white notebook labeled "Carolina Football" and worked on the details surrounding his transition to Chapel Hill.

Davis has a nice Arkansas twang that can pepper his speech with phrases like, "busier than a one-armed paper hanger." Don't let that fool you. The man has been to the top of the college football world at Miami and remembers exactly how he got there. He's a football coach, but he's also a CEO.

So he thinks about things like shirt logos. Handed a stack of shirts to wear for a photo opportunity, he picked out a navy one with a Carolina blue stripe.

"This is what I'd probably wear on game day," he said. But then he went on to suggest several possible alterations to the shirt, including the placement of an interlocking "NC" logo on the sleeve so it would show even if he wore a sweater vest on top of it.

"The recruits have got to see it," he said. "We don't want to cover it up."

Davis projects the type of no-nonsense authority you want in your football coach. He loves special teams. Loves aggressiveness, but tinged with a healthy dose of discipline. And he loves being a football coach.

Some coaches talk about players they've coached who have gone on to productive NFL careers. Davis talks about Pro Bowlers. All of them are talented, of course. But they also have one other common trait:

"I like players who really get after it and play with a high motor," he says.

You may not see much evidence publicly of that intensity from him in the coming weeks. There will be a big splash this afternoon when he's announced as the head coach, but then a quiet may envelop Carolina football. It's possible that the full coaching staff may not be assembled until the 2007 calendar year. Don't mistake that lull for a lack of activity. Davis has an astounding list of contacts throughout the coaching fraternity; his reputation combined with Carolina's football potential will generate a staff of like-minded football wizards.

There will be no learning curve. Starting this afternoon at 3 p.m., Carolina football is in the hands of one of the best coaches in the country. He'll pass his NCAA rules test (he's already been studying) and begin recruiting immediately.

Carolina football has long been distinguished by the beauty of Kenan Stadium, by Charlie Justice, and by periodic trips to bowl games. The new head coach has his own idea about the defining characteristic of Carolina football in the Butch Davis era.

"Winning," he said. "Winning will distinguish coming to a game in Chapel Hill. That's the ultimate compliment. If you come to Chapel Hill and come to Kenan Stadium, you're going to see a win."

Short, simple, effective. Ready to start working; ready to start winning.

From The Manchester Union-Leader:
John Edwards' folly: A book signing gone wrong

Former Sen. John Edwards is to spend an hour at the Manchester Barnes & Noble tonight promoting his new book. We find his choice of venue very interesting.

In Manchester, the local Wal-Mart store sits right behind the Barnes & Noble. It has more floor space, a parking lot several times the size of Barnes & Noble's, and is easier to access by car or public transportation.

But Edwards would not be caught dead inside a Wal-Mart. Saying that the company pays its employees too little, Edwards has embarked on an anti-Wal-Mart crusade. He instructs his staff members and all Americans not to shop at Wal-Mart.

"Wal-Mart makes plenty of money. They need to pay their people well," Edwards said at a Pittsburgh anti-Wal-Mart rally in August.

So naturally Edwards is holding his book signing at Barnes & Noble instead of Wal-Mart. Which is too bad for his anti-low-wages campaign, because in Manchester Wal-Mart pays hourly employees more than Barnes & Noble does.

The Barnes & Noble where Edwards will hawk his book pays $7 an hour to start. The Wal-Mart that sits just yards away pays $7.50 an hour.

Oh, the humanity!

From 7 to 8 p.m., Edwards will bring business to a retailer that pays wages he thinks are so immorally low that they should be illegal. Meanwhile, right behind him, thousands of Granite Staters will be supporting a business that pays an Edwards-approved starting wage, but which Edwards wants everyone to boycott.

Asked back in January what he thought would be an appropriate minimum wage, Edwards told The New York Times, "My view is it should be $7.50 an hour, and I can make a great argument for it being a lot higher than that."

Seven-fifty an hour? Why, that's what Wal-Mart pays! And without a federal mandate, too.

Unfortunately, people who want to support a company that pays at least $7.50 an hour cannot go to Wal-Mart to buy Edwards' book and then take it over to Barnes & Noble for him to sign it. Wal-Mart doesn't carry it. Wonder why.

Of course, Barnes & Noble is no less virtuous than Wal-Mart because it pays 50 cents an hour less. And Wal-Mart is no less virtuous than other companies that pay more. Both businesses provide useful, productive employment at competitive market rates. That in itself is virtuous.

John Edwards should take the virtuous path and stop his anti-Wal-Mart demagoguery. Anyone can see that it is nothing more than a populist ploy to make him look like a champion of low-income people. But those very people he is trying to help end up saving hundreds of dollars a year by shopping at Wal-Mart. Its efficiencies provide them with low-cost items they might not be able to afford otherwise.

We'd bet that if America's poor could choose between Wal-Mart and John Edwards, they would choose Wal-Mart. They understand that Wal-Mart has done more to improve their lives than John Edwards ever will. Which is why, as Edwards signs copies of his coffee table book inside Barnes & Noble tonight, hundreds of people will continue to shop at the Wal-Mart just a stone's throw away, never knowing that a millionaire former senator is sitting nearby secretly disapproving of their behavior.

From The American Thinker:
Holding Islam to Account
By Amil Imani

Islam has spawned many sects that are master practitioners of the art of double standards. As far as Muslims are concerned what is good for Muslims is not good for the non-Muslims; and, what is bad for Muslims is good for non-Muslims.

What complicates matters is that there is no way of knowing which of the dozens of at-each-other’s-throat sects is the legitimate Islam. As sooner as Muhammad died his religion of peace became a house of internal war: jockeying for power and leadership started, sects formed and splintered into sub-sects, and bloodletting began in earnest.

The internal infighting in Islam is presently playing in full color—in red—most dramatically, in the Iraqi theater. Shiite raid Sunni civilians, slaughter them like sheep, and toss their bodies like trash in the streets or the rivers. The Sunnis return the favor with just as much viciousness and savagery.

Question: if this is the way these Muslims treat each other, how would they deal with the infidels, when they have the chance?

Answer: these devoted followers of Muhammad would deal with the infidels exactly the way Muhammad did: behead the non-believers, take them as slave to hold or sell, or make them pay back-breaking jazyyeh—poll taxes.

Some may objects that writings like this are little more than hatemongering and fanning the fire that rages between Islam and the non-Islamic world. They may further flash the Islamic apologists’ few well-worn-out propaganda cards as evidence for their contention that Islam is not what its detractors claim.

Here are the few favorite cards:

* There is no compulsion in religion says the Quran—the full context is never shown.

* “Islam,” means “Peace,” so Islam is religion of peace.

* “For you, your religion, and for me, my religion,” Muhammad reportedly has said.

The Muslims and their apologists quickly run out of their few cards and the rest of the Islamic deck is all about intolerance, hatred, and violence toward the infidels and all others who are not true Muslims, even toward those who consider themselves as Muslims. Shiites, for instance, judge the Sunnis as traitors to Islam and Sunnis condemn the Shiites as heretics. Each side deems the other worthy of death and hellfire.

This internecine Islamic war of the religion of peace is not confined to the Shiite-Sunni divide. There are so many internal divisions within each side that listing and describing them comprehensively would be encyclopedic.

So, who is right? What are the facts about Islam and how does Islam impact the ever-shrinking village earth and its inhabitants? Admittedly, this is a huge question and cannot be answered satisfactorily in one article. However, some facts can be presented to help the reader decide.

There is no need to belabor the point that Islam is not and has never been a religion of peace. The word “Islam,” is derived from “taslim,” which means “submission,” while the term for “peace,” is “Solh.” Another derivation of the word “taslim,” is “salamat” which means “good health,” and so on.

Irrespective of what the term “Islam” may mean, the facts on the ground conclusively demonstrate Islam’s violent nature from its very inception. No need to go back to the time of Muhammad and examine the historical records. Just a few from contemporary events should make the point.

Here is a partial list: the savage Shiites-Sunnis bloodletting in Iraq; the barbarism of the resurging Taliban in Afghanistan; the genocide in Sudan’s Darfur; the Somalis killings; the Iranian mullahs murder of their own people and support of mischief abroad; the cross-border attack on Israel by Lebanese Hizbollah; the incessant terrorist acts of Hamas, Islamic Jihad, and Fatwa of the Palestinians against Israel; the bombing of Shiites mosques in Pakistan and the Shiites retaliation against easy innocent civilian targets.

Clearly, there is no place on the planet where Muslims reside that is in peace from the religion of peace. Spain, France, Holland, England Thailand, and Indonesia, have already been attacked while others such as Belgium have been threatened and sanctioned.

Stretching the benefit of the doubt beyond limits, one may believe that all these acts of horrors are committed by a small minority of thugs and radicals who happened to be Muslims.

Fine, let us ignore all those “fringes” for now: those who are giving Islam a bad reputation. And never mind Saudi Arabia, the cradle of barbarism fixed in formaldehyde since Islam’s inception. Also, let us overlook the dastardly Shiite fanatics presently ruling (ruining) a great nation of Iran. Iran Shiite Hitlerists are hell-bent on wiping Israel off the face of the planet while viciously devastating Iran’s own largest minority—the Baha’is; the people universally-recognized as law-abiding and peaceful.

Would someone account for what is happening in the “civilized” Islamic country of Egypt? The world owes Egypt a debt of gratitude for giving it the Muslims Brotherhood—the lead promoter of Sunni hatred toward the infidels with chapters and front organizations in much of the world. With typical Islamic hypocrisy, the Egyptian government claims that the Muslims Brotherhood is outlawed, when in actuality the Brotherhood holds twenty-five percent of the seats in the Egyptian parliament. The same country that gave the world vicious American killers like Al Zawahiri is the recipient of huge largess from the American taxpayer.

And the latest shameful action of the Egyptian government is the issuance of identity cards that requires listing of one’s religion. In order to be issued an ID card which is essential for just about any and all exercises of the rights of citizenship, the individual must list his religion as one of the three sanctioned faith: Islam, Christianity, or Judaism. No one is allowed to leave the religious affiliation blank or list any other religion. Buddhists, Hindus, Baha’is or agnostics and atheists have to either lie and fake a religious affiliation or run the serious risk of having to survive as non-entities in the “crown jewel” of modern and moderate Islamic society.

These are the conditions on the ground wherever Islam rules. Violence of all forms is endemic to Islam and is not confined to any fringes. Islam itself is the fringe. A fringe that is oppressive, hateful of others and violent to the core.

The world must confront Islam and demand that it mends its ways in conformity with the Bill of Rights, where every man, woman, and child is fully entitled to equal treatment under the law, irrespective of any and all considerations.

Amil Imani is an Iranian-born American citizen and pro-democracy activist residing in the United States of America. He maintains a website.

From the blog Whst Does The Prayer Really Say?
Vatican premiere of “The Nativity Story” movie
My View — Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

I attended tonight the world premiere of the new film “The Nativity Story”. It was shown to a full house in the Paul VI audience hall in the Vatican. Having the premiere of a film like this was a first for the Vatican. The woman Catherine Hardwicke (Tombstone, Three Kings, Vanilla Sky) who directed it was in attendance, as well as Secretary of State Tarcisio Card. Bertone (Archbp. Vercelli, Secretary CDF, Archbp. Genoa) was there, though not the Holy Father (Archbp. Munich, Prefect CDF). Also we saw in the hall the writer Mike Rich (Finding Forrester, The Rookie), the actor who played Joseph, Oscar Isaac, and the woman who played Elizabeth, Shohreh Aghdashloo.

If you are expecting stark realism in the film, you will not be disappointed. If you are expecting classic images of mangers and Wise Men with camels, …you will not be disappointed.

The film juxtaposed very realistic, even naturalistic scenes with scenes overlaid with classic images of the Nativity narrative, which snobs and scholars might turn their lifted noses at, but which I think should please most viewers, as they did me.

The makers of the movie did not shy from using images one nearly automatically associates with the Christmas narrative. There are Wise Men, right out of your Nativity scene and named Gaspar, Melchior and Balthasar, with camels and garish boxes. They follow the star, “moving” in the sense that planets are converging,. and the star obligingly shoots a comforting ray of light down into the animal stall while Mary is in labor. The Holy Family has a faithful little donkey and the Blessed Virgin a blue mantle, though of a very light shade. Herod is really a bad guy who will remind you of a Semitic version of Braveheart’s Edward Longshanks. The music incorporated snatches of well-known melodies such as Veni veni Emanuel and The Coventry Carol. The angel of the Annunciation was suitably luminous and the shepherds sufficiently humble.

The text of the Magnificat worked as bookends in the film and, while our version of the movie was dubbed in Italian with English subtitles, I expect the final scene, interlacing the Magnificat with strains of Stille Nacht, may move many to tears.

In fact, the audience tonight was very responsive. They burst into applause when the baby Jesus was born, as one might expect, and laughed at the appropriate moments of comic relief, provided not terribly subtly by the three Wise Guys, er um, Men. In fact their humorous repartee is sets up their glorious expressions of faith at the moment of truth. I was up in the press area and there were some studio nazis from New Line present to make sure no one was recording anything or taking images from the showing. They freaked out when people in the audience began shooting flash pictures of the screen at predictable moments, and began making hurried cell phone calls.

The film did not lack suggestions of the difficulty women faced in the ancient world. The political dimension of the expected Messiah was mentioned several times. A serious thread found its way into the Nativity narrative with the occasional glimpse of men crucified along the side of the road.

I do not want to speak too much of the actual details of dialogue or portrayal of the biblical figures. Make up your own minds. Suffice to say that in the brief time of the film the script allows for some very strong character development, making them more than simple two dimensional figures. I particularly liked their Joseph, who was young, strong, and normal man striving to be virtuous and… well… normal.

I do not think you will be disappointed by the movie. I give it a biretta tip … o{]:¬)

Before the showing, there was a little speech in Italian by Archbishop John Foley, President of the Pontifical Council for Social Communication followed by a longish reading in Italian from the Gospel of Luke from the Nativity narrative by Gigi Proietti. Archbp. Foley, for his part after his Italian text, spoke more extemporaneously for a moment in English. He said, “At a time when in so many places people are hesitant to say ‘Merry Christmas’, they are hesitant to say the name of Jesus Christ, we are happy to celebrate here this evening a film in which we commemorate the birth of Jesus Christ, the God Man, the Savior of the world, born of the Virgin Mary. … We can say, even a month before hand, may all of you have a Merry Christmas. Buon Natale a tutti.”

From SportsMediaGuide.com:

Bob Ryan on Football

Bob Ryan excerpted from the Boston Globe, September 13, 2006:

Pro sports are all grown-up enterprises, but there's none tougher or more hard-hearted than football. It brings to mind the Sausage Factory Syndrome.
You know what I'm talking about. They say that if you enjoy eating sausages, don't bother inquiring about how they make them. It will make you into an instant vegan.
I say that if you're a big fan of pro football, just plop yourself into your seat at the stadium or in front of your set when the game starts and don't think about what it took for those players to get on the field. This is the worst combination in sport: a brutal body-sacrifice game run by people who have become desensitized to the weekly carnage.

Q. How did you come up with the sausage analogy for football?

A. Because it was perfectly logical to me. There are untold millions of my fellow Americans who sit down on Sunday or Monday night and enjoy what I call a thinly-disguised barbaric exercise – who don't care to think about what it takes to get these people on the field – players sacrificing their bodies and routinely doing things other athletes would question and the judgments coaches make. Many times I've met football coaches I like at the high school or college level and I ask them "Why do you choose to do this for a living – this game is so demeaning and you have to suspend so much humanity to do this – there are better games than this – why would a person of intellect and humanity choose to make a life in football?" Most people don't think about this. So when I call pro football a sausage factory I'm calling attention to a truly barbaric exercise.

Q. How do you personally justify covering football?

A. I've said many times that for me baseball and basketball are fun and I love them - and football is a business. Even though I grew up with it and can enjoy a good game based on my accumulated knowledge of history and as a lover of sports drama, which it has to some degree though not to the degree of other sports, and it produces a wonderful atmosphere with large numbers of people in these stadiums and I can enjoy that and I am looking forward to the Ohio State-Michigan game which I can't deny – but if football were declared illegal in the next five minutes it wouldn't bother me.

I can be a hypocrite in that regard. Invariably we have to be hypocrites in this business. Look at big-time college sports – you know what a farce it is but we still embrace the pageantry and competition – but if you look at it closely it has nothing to do with higher education.

Q. Can you reconcile this?

A. You have to – if you're too troubled by it you can't work. I can deal with it. I go through this exercise at the Final Four – and I've written this – the time to complain about the folly and illogical nature of college sports is over – once you get to the Final Four. I love it – I love the competition – college basketball and baseball are in my DNA. We're covering sports – no sense getting high and mighty about it – how self-righteous should we get? We're just talking about sports.

If I were drawing a line I would rather draw it at the barbaric nature of football – that would be my choice. We're forced to compromise in sports. Now if you can find a sport relatively untainted – great – but in my world I deal with sports that have these complications.

On His Own

Adam Lucas on the win over Duke.

Nov. 25, 2006

By Adam Lucas

DURHAM--There are so many images from the John Bunting era at Carolina.

There is Sam Aiken somersaulting into the end zone against Florida State, and there is Ronald Curry dashing into the Georgia Dome end zone against Auburn. There is Dan Orner diving into the inflatable Duke helmet. There is Bunting standing, hat over heart, listening to the alma mater after his team had been flattened by Louisville.

There is Khalif Mitchell stuffing T.A. McLendon and Connor Barth beating Miami. There is the last drive against Virginia Tech in 2004, just inches away from a legitimate chance at an ACC title. There is Maryland's Sam Hollenbach firing two long touchdown passes in the fourth quarter in 2005. There is the Carolina sideline, a battered bunch, in the waning minutes of the 23-0 loss at Virginia this year

Which one you remember might depend on your general outlook on life. All of them are fitting in one way or another.

Remember this one, though.

Carolina has just beaten Duke 45-44 in one of the most improbable games in the history of the rivalry. Bunting walks to midfield to shake hands with Ted Roof, then makes a left turn and starts to walk off the field for the long walk to the makeshift visitor's dressing room at Wallace Wade Stadium.

Then he receives an enormous hug from his wife, Dawn. And then he stops, maybe because he hears something. At moments like this on field level, the roar of the crowd is usually just that--a roar. It's often hard to make out exactly what the masses are saying. For once, though, thousands of voices are crystal clear. No one in the five packed Carolina sections has left. And they are all shouting the same thing in unison, repeating it in a rhythmic cadence:

"Thank you John!"

Bunting turns again and walks across the 5-yard line, from the far hash mark almost to the Carolina sideline. According to the official boxscore, there are 24,478 fans in attendance. But as he walks across the field for the last time as the Tar Heel head coach, all he sees in front of him are stands filled with fans wearing Carolina blue. There are arms raised in the air, voices cheering, the band playing.

And there are chills.

Think about it for just a minute. He is a fired coach getting a boisterous ovation from his school's fans. When is the last time you saw a fired coach go out that way? What does that say about the way he endeared himself as a person to the Carolina nation?

One more time, he returns to the locker room with his team. Usually, it is a raucous scene after a Tar Heel victory. This time it is, as Hilee Taylor puts it, "bittersweet."

Before the ritual singing of the fight song, before the cheers, before the roll call, Bunting has one more act to perform as Carolina's head coach. He alters the usual postgame routine because he has one more very important thing to do:

He hugs every single player in the locker room, one by one.

"It was...I can't even describe that feeling," Larry Edwards said.

"He told me any time I need him he'll be there for me, no matter where he is," Jesse Holley said. "Coming from that guy, you know it is extremely sincere and from the heart."

A crowd had gathered outside the Carolina locker room, a collection of families and friends and fans and wives. The locker room is approximately 100 yards from the stadium, so it made for a handy gathering place. Danny Pearman walked out in a black jacket and shirt with brown pants--and a Carolina hat perched atop his head. Pearman is a man who has been in Chapel Hill less than a year. After the announcement that Bunting would not be retained, he made a tour of the athletic department, stopping at almost every office to introduce himself.

"I wanted to do this when I was hired, but I didn't have time," he told everyone he met. "So I'm doing it now."

The crowd lingered after almost every player was out of the locker room. It was evident that they were waiting for Bunting, waiting to give him one last sendoff. One equipment truck and the three team buses were backed up to the door of the locker room, nose to trunk. They made a handy tunnel.

And that is how Bunting made his exit. No fanfare, no cheers from the fans, not even the slightest bit of recognition. He slipped out of the locker room undetected, edged through a one person-wide space between the locker room and the equipment truck, walked behind the buses, and into a parking lot with just four cars--one of them his. For the first time in six years, he didn't really have anywhere to go. His office wasn't even his office anymore--the Kenan Stadium space he had occupied was empty, ready for its next occupant.

"I guess he doesn't want the escort," said one of the highway patrolmen who were providing the team's police escort.

"No, I think he's on his own," said another.

Over the past five weeks everyone waited for the public breakdown, for the teary interview. It never came. Bunting walked into the parking lot with a handful of close friends, his wife, and his brother, Jim.

And then he was gone.

From The San Francisco Chronicle:
The Dagger at Their Throats
By Debra Saunders

The day after the 9/11 attacks, MIT professor Noam Chomsky wrote of the need "to understand what may have led to the crimes, which means making an effort to enter the minds of the likely perpetrators." What struck Daveed Gartenstein-Ross about Chomsky's response was that "Chomsky made no real effort to enter the minds of the perpetrators. Instead he simply projected his own grievances against the United States onto them."

Gartenstein-Ross had a much stronger idea as to what motivated the 9/11 attackers. After converting to Islam in college, he held a job at the Ashland, Ore., office of Al Haramain, a Saudi-funded charity that sent money to al Qaeda.

In a fascinating memoir due in stores in February, "My Year Inside Radical Islam," Gartenstein-Ross describes how he was drawn to Islam because he saw it as a religion of peace.

Over time, however, he watched himself and those around him seduced into a fanaticism that required them to loathe not only non-Muslims, but also Muslims who belonged to the wrong sect, listened to music or shaved. He had expected an open, accepting religion, only to hear sheikhs arguing that Muslims who leave the religion should be killed, that it is acceptable to kill civilians for jihad and that good Muslims should work to replace democratic governments with Shariah law.

The hate chased Gartenstein-Ross from Islam, but only after it sucked him into believing that unacceptable actions were holy.

The book's message is not that Americans should distrust all Muslims. "The message is the exact opposite of that," he told me over the phone. Gartenstein-Ross understands that America needs to enlist moderate Muslims to fight the extremists. More important, in the course of his journey he saw the many benign stripes of Islam as he befriended good people whose faith made them stronger, better human beings.

He believes Americans need a more fact-based understanding of Islam, which requires the media to do a better job of reporting what Muslims think and say -- instead of papering over radical rhetoric. Once when a local reporter visited Al Haramain to write a piece on Ramadan, a co-worker refused to shake her hand, launched a defense of sorts of Algerian terrorists and lambasted a French policy that prohibited schoolgirls from wearing the hijab in class. The comments never made the story. Gartenstein-Ross writes, "And so, as I often did, the reporter chose not to acknowledge that a real clash of values existed here."

Islam's approach to homosexuality is another area that the left ignores in deference to multiculturalism. (Think of Bay Area liberals who voice outrage at the military's "don't ask, don't tell" policy, but are silent about the Shariah policy on homosexuals -- 100 lashes or death.) Ditto the status of women.

Gartenstein-Ross also takes issue with those rose-colored-glass wearers who deny that there is any theological basis for Islamic extremism. "It's important to note that they do have an argument," he told me, if only to be able to engage them in argument and understand where they get their ideas.

Gartenstein-Ross is a strong storyteller, who enables the reader to feel the ineluctable draw to fanaticism, as well as the anguish and disillusionment that led him to support violent jihad, but ultimately reject it. He has no use for those who, a la Chomsky, pat themselves on the back for having the intellectual fortitude "to enter the minds of the likely perpetrators."

There are forces in this world that would kill these elites for the apostasy, but elites are so blinded with their sense of superiority over their political enemies -- like President Bush -- that they can't even see the dagger pointed at their throats.

Another brilliant Chicago Sun-Times column by Mark Steyn. This is followed by a PowerLine blog post referencing today's Ralph Peters column in the New York Post with an appended Steyn evisceration of Peters' argument.

Quartet of ladies shows where we're headed
BY MARK STEYN

Have you seen a movie called ''Four Jills In A Jeep''? Don't worry, it's not at the multiplex. It came out in 1944. A wartime movie, about the contribution of the gals to the big existential struggle. Great title, and downhill after that. This column is, metaphorically speaking, four Jills in a jeep: It's about a quartet of ladies who provide useful glimpses of where we're heading.

The first is Fatma An-Najar, a 64-year-old grandmother who had a livelier Thanksgiving than most grandmas. She marked the occasion by self-detonating in the town of Jebaliya, and, although all she had to show for splattering body parts over the neighborhood were three "lightly wounded" Israeli soldiers, she will have an honored place in the pantheon of Palestinian heroes. She was, according to the official statistician from the Hamas Book Of Records, the oldest Palestinian suicide bomber ever. And, naturally, her family's pleased as punch.

"We are really happy," her son Zuheir told Agence France-Presse. "She told us last night that she would do a suicide operation. She prepared her clothes for that operation, and we are proud. 'I don't want anything, only to die a martyr.' That's what she said."

Awww, bless the sweet l'il ol' biddy. She wouldn't have wanted to die a long lingering death in some old folks' home. This is the way she wanted to go: quick and painless, except for any Zionists in the immediate vicinity.

An-Najar gave birth to her first child at the age of 12. She had eight others. She had 41 grandchildren. Keep that family tree in mind. By contrast, in Spain, a 64-year old woman will have maybe one grandchild. That's four grandparents, one grandchild: a family tree with no branches.

Which brings me to our second Jill: the new Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church, Katharine Jefferts Schori, the first woman to run a national division of the Anglican Communion. Bishop Kate gave an interview to the New York Times revealing what passes for orthodoxy in this most flexible of faiths. She was asked a simple enough question: "How many members of the Episcopal Church are there?"

"About 2.2 million," replied the presiding bishop. "It used to be larger percentage-wise, but Episcopalians tend to be better educated and tend to reproduce at lower rates than other denominations."

This was a bit of a jaw-dropper even for a New York Times hackette, so, with vague memories of God saying something about going forth and multiplying floating around the back of her head, a bewildered Deborah Solomon said: "Episcopalians aren't interested in replenishing their ranks by having children?"

"No," agreed Bishop Kate. "It's probably the opposite. We encourage people to pay attention to the stewardship of the earth and not use more than their portion."

Now, that may or may not be a great idea, but it's nothing to do with Christianity, only for eco-cultists like Al Gore. If Bishop Kate were an Episcogorian, a member of the Alglican Communion, an elder of the Church of Latter-Day Chads, this would be an unremarkable statement. But, even in their vigorous embrace of gay bishoprics and all the rest, I don't recall the Episcopalians formally embracing the strategy that worked out so swell for the Shakers and enshrining a disapproval of reproduction at the heart of their doctrine.

Which brings me to our third Jill in the jeep: Scarlett Johansson. Like every other sad middle-aged loser guy, I fell in love with Scarlett's fetchingly pert bottom in the opening of ''Lost In Translation,'' and it pains me to discover she's no different from Bishop Kate's generation when it comes to being in thrall to the cobwebbed pieties of the 1960s. In a bit of light Bush-bashing the other day, she attacked the president for his opposition to "sex education." If he had his way, she said, "every woman would have six children and we wouldn't be able to have abortions." Whereas Scarlett is so "socially aware" (as she puts it) she gets tested for HIV twice a year.

Well, yes. If "sex education" is about knowing which concrete condom is less likely to disintegrate during the livelier forms of penetrative intercourse, then getting an AIDS test every few months may well be a sign that you're a Ph.D. (Doctor of Phenomenal horniness). But, if "sex education" means an understanding of sexuality as anything other than an act of transient self-expression, then Scarlett is talking through that famously cute butt.

Here's the question for Bishop Kate: If Fatma An-Najar has 41 grandchildren and a responsible "better educated" Episcopalian has one or two, into whose hands are we delivering "the stewardship of the earth"? If your crowd isn't around in any numbers, how much influence can they have in shaping the future?

Well, the Episcopal head honcho and even Scarlett Johansson are not the most powerful figures in the world, so let's usher on our fourth Jill: Condoleezza Rice.

"The great majority of Palestinian people," said the secretary of state to Cal Thomas the other day, "they just want a better life. This is an educated population. I mean, they have a kind of culture of education and a culture of civil society. I just don't believe mothers want their children to grow up to be suicide bombers. I think the mothers want their children to grow up to go to university. And if you can create the right conditions, that's what people are going to do."

Cal Thomas asked a sharp follow-up: "Do you think this or do you know this?"

"Well, I think I know it," said Dr. Rice.

"You think you know it?"

"I think I know it."

So many of our present woes are due to thinking we know things. To our four Jills in the jeep, let's add one Jim, apparently back at the steering wheel in the current war: James Baker, renowned foreign policy "realist" and the man Beltway wags are currently referring to as "the acting secretary of state." The "realists" think that "containment" and "stability" are wise strategies. In fact, they're the absence of strategy. The fertility rate in the Gaza Strip is one of the highest on earth. If you measure the births of the Muslim world against the dearth of Bishop Kate's Episcopalians, you have the perfect snapshot of why there is no "stability": With every passing month, there are more Muslims and fewer Episcopalians, and the Muslims export their manpower to Europe and other depopulating outposts of the West. It's the intersection of demography and Islamism that makes time a luxury we can't afford.

We can argue about exactly what this trend means, but not that it means nothing. At the very minimum, I'd suggest, it means the Episcopal Church is irrelevant to "the stewardship of the earth" and that Scarlett Johansson will end her days on an earth whose stewards regard being tested for HIV twice as a sign of many things, but not, on the whole, "social awareness."

©Mark Steyn 2006

From PowerLine:

They Report, You Decide (with update from Mark Steyn)

Most of our readers are aware of Mark Steyn's "Demography is Destiny" theme, which he has elaborated in much of his recent writing. Steyn thinks that low birth rates among Europeans, in particular, will inevitably lead to their replacement on the European continent by Muslims who are reproducing at a far faster rate. Steyn pursues the theme in today's article in the Chicago Sun-Times, Quartet of Ladies Shows Where We're Headed. He contrasts Fatma An-Najar, the 64-year-old Palestinian grandmother who became a suicide bomber, with Katharine Jefferts Schori, the new Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church:

An-Najar gave birth to her first child at the age of 12. She had eight others. She had 41 grandchildren. Keep that family tree in mind. By contrast, in Spain, a 64-year old woman will have maybe one grandchild. That's four grandparents, one grandchild: a family tree with no branches.

Meanwhile, what of the Episcopalians?

Bishop Kate gave an interview to the New York Times revealing what passes for orthodoxy in this most flexible of faiths. She was asked a simple enough question: "How many members of the Episcopal Church are there?"

"About 2.2 million," replied the presiding bishop. "It used to be larger percentage-wise, but Episcopalians tend to be better educated and tend to reproduce at lower rates than other denominations."

This was a bit of a jaw-dropper even for a New York Times hackette, so, with vague memories of God saying something about going forth and multiplying floating around the back of her head, a bewildered Deborah Solomon said: "Episcopalians aren't interested in replenishing their ranks by having children?"

"No," agreed Bishop Kate. "It's probably the opposite. We encourage people to pay attention to the stewardship of the earth and not use more than their portion."

Is that a death wish, or what? As Steyn points out, "Here's the question for Bishop Kate: If Fatma An-Najar has 41 grandchildren and a responsible 'better educated' Episcopalian has one or two, into whose hands are we delivering 'the stewardship of the earth'? If your crowd isn't around in any numbers, how much influence can they have in shaping the future?"

Steyn's logic is persuasive to me, but Ralph Peters isn't buying it. He thinks that, far from taking over Europe, that continent's Muslims "will be lucky just to be deported:"

Have the Europeans become too soft for that sort of thing? Has narcotic socialism destroyed their ability to hate? Is their atheism a prelude to total surrender to faith-intoxicated Muslim jihadis?

The answer to all of the above questions is a booming "No!" The Europeans have enjoyed a comfy ride for the last 60 years - but the very fact that they don't want it to stop increases their rage and sense of being besieged by Muslim minorities they've long refused to assimilate (and which no longer want to assimilate).

Far from enjoying the prospect of taking over Europe by having babies, Europe's Muslims are living on borrowed time. When a third of French voters have demonstrated their willingness to vote for Jean-Marie Le Pen's National Front - a party that makes the Ku Klux Klan seem like Human Rights Watch - all predictions of Europe going gently into that good night are surreal.

I have no difficulty imagining a scenario in which U.S. Navy ships are at anchor and U.S. Marines have gone ashore at Brest, Bremerhaven or Bari to guarantee the safe evacuation of Europe's Muslims. After all, we were the only ones to do anything about the slaughter of Muslims in the Balkans.

It's true that the Europeans have historically been willing to act much more harshly that Americans when they have felt threatened. But I wouldn't start sending the Marines to Brest just yet.

UPDATE: Mark Steyn comments:

I don’t know whether Mr Peters is referring to my book, because, as usual when this particular columnist comes out swinging, he prefers to confront unnamed generalized opponents: thus, he refers to “a rash of pop pundits” predicting Europe will become Eurabia. Dismissing with airy condescension “a rash” of anonymities means you avoid having to deal with specific arguments.

Had he read America Alone, for example, he would know that I do, indeed, foresee a revival of Fascism in Europe. He concludes: “All predictions of Europe going gently into that good night are surreal.” Which of us predicted anything about “going gently”? As I write on page 105 of my book: “It’s true that there are many European populations reluctant to go happily into the long Eurabian night.” What I point out, though, is that, even if you’re hot for a new Holocaust, demography tells. There are no Hitlers to hand. When Mr Peters cites the success of Jean Marie Le Pen’s National Front, he overlooks not only Le Pen’s recent overtures to Muslims but also the fact that M Le Pen is pushing 80. As a general rule, when 600 octogenarians are up against 200 teenagers, bet on the teens. In five or ten years’ time, who precisely is going to organize mass deportations from French cities in which the native/Muslim youth-population ratio is already – right now - 55/45?

As I’ve said innumerable times, the native European population is split three ways: some will leave, as the Dutch (and certain French) are already doing; some will shrug and go along with the Islamization of the continent, as the ever-accelerating number of conversions suggests; and so the ones left to embrace Fascism will be a minority of an aging population. It will be bloody and messy, as I write in America Alone, but it will not alter the final outcome. If you don’t breed, you can’t influence the future. And furthermore a disinclination to breed is a good sign you don’t care much about the future. That’s why the Spaniards, who fought a brutal bloody civil war for their country in the 1930s, folded instantly after those Madrid bombings. When you’ve demographically checked out of the future, why fight for it?

Ralph Peters is late to this debate. If he’s going to join the discussion, he might do better to tackle the facts. But that would require him to acknowledge real specifics rather than “a rash of pop pundits”. You’ll notice that his column and mine differ not just in their approach to worldviews but in their approach to argument: mine cites four specific persons, their actions and assertions; his boldly batters anonymous generalizations. I know which I regard as more effective.

Thanks to Mark Steyn for this addition to the discussion.