How offensive is it that democrats who claim (falsely) to be the champion of poor people and minorities would take away the right of poor D.C. kids to go to private school? The D.C. opportunity Scholarship Program allowed poor blacks and other minorities the chance to attend the same school as Barack Obama’s kids, but democrats refuse to allow that to happen. Starting next year, those kids will have to go back to the horrible D.C. public school system where they’re certain to not receive a decent education.

The reason democrats want to keep poor kids out of good private schools is because they don’t want them to be successful. Democrats depend on keeping black people poor and ignorant so they can win elections. There’s no advantage for democrats to actually lift anyone out of poverty. That’s why they drown the ghettos with entitlements and tell minorities that without their help they have no chance of being successful in America.

The D.C. public school system is the most expensive per student system in the country. They spend $14,000 dollars per year per student and guess what they have to show for it? Some of the lowest reading and math scores in the country.

Bush’s voucher program only cost $7,500 dollars per student per year and they receive a quality education. So why would any reasonable person deny a child the best education possible at half the price? Because, the idea is to keep these kids stupid.

When you don’t have a high school education and you can’t read good you have very few job prospects. When you have few job prospects who do you turn to? Obviously, you turn to the government for assistance, and the smiling democrats are more than happy to give you just enough to keep you alive, but not enough to improve your situation.

Since you now depend on the government (democrats) to eat, who do you think you’re going vote for when the next election comes around? I’m thinking probably democrats.

Democrats claim to want to end poverty, but an end to poverty would mean an end to the democratic party. By ending the school voucher program democrats have shown their true colors to the American people.

-Chris Jones

We are currently enjoying day number two of the Rev. Jeremiah Wright media blitz, and it gets a little worse at every stop.

I watched Rev. Wright on Bill Moyers the other night and was impressed. Keeping in mind that Bill Moyers is a dishonest hack who's just trying to get Obama elected, I still thought Rev. Wright showed an impressive intellect and made some very good points.

I was even prepared to come in this morning and write what could be perceived as an apology for some of the unfair criticisms I've made about Wright. I do think some of the YouTube clips were taken out of context and many in the media have rushed to judgment on the man.

Then Obama's "crazy uncle" gave the keynote address at yesterday's NAACP luncheon. It was slightly hysterical, but otherwise a very entertaining speech. The man is about as charismatic as anybody I've ever seen.

Then the wheels came flying off the "reconciliation train" so to speak this morning. The good pastor gave a shortened version of the previous day's speech, this time to The National Press Club and then (much to the chagrin of the Obama campaign I'm sure) he answered questions.

It turns out all those YouTube clips may not have been taken out of context after all. Rev. Wright may just be the anti-American race hustler I thought he was.

His demeanor in front of the press club was arrogant in the extreme. His attitude was dismissive, racist, and dare I say 'elitist'.

When asked about his comments just 5-days after 9/11 about America's "chickens coming home to roost" he defended the words.

...“Jesus said do unto others as you would have them do unto you. You cannot do terrorism on other people and expect it never to come back on you. Those are biblical principles, not Jeremiah Wright bombastic, divisive principles.”

When asked if he loves America, he responded:

”I served six years in the military. Does that make me patriotic?” he asked. “How many years did (Vice President Dick) Cheney serve?”

Instead of taking responsibility for his own statements, Rev. Wright accused the media and other critics of "attacking the black church".

“The most recent attack is on the black church, it is not an attack on Jeremiah Wright, it is an attack on the black church,” Wright said.

When asked about his relationship to Louis Farrakhan he was again unapologetic:

...So what I think about him, as I’ve said on Bill Moyers and it got edited out, how many other African-Americans or European-Americans do you know that can get one million people together on the mall? He is one of the most important voices in the 20th and 21st century. That’s what I think about him.

Probably the most outrageous thing Rev. Wright did was defend his belief that white people created the AIDS virus as an act of genocide against people of color.

I read different things. As I said to my members, if you haven’t read things, then you can’t — based on this Tuskegee experiment and based on what has happened to Africans in this country, I believe our government is capable of doing anything.

In fact, in fact, in fact, one of the — one of the responses to what Saddam Hussein had in terms of biological warfare was a non- question, because all we had to do was check the sales records. We sold him those biological weapons that he was using against his own people.

So any time a government can put together biological warfare to kill people, and then get angry when those people use what we sold them, yes, I believe we are capable.

He also defended his comparison of Roman soldiers who killed Jesus to the U.S. Marine Corps. if you can believe it.

The Roman oppression is the period in which Jesus is born. And comparing imperialism that was going on in Luke, imperialism was going on when Caesar Augustus sent out a decree that the whole world should be taxed. They weren’t in charge of the world. It sounds like some other governments I know.

That, yes, I can compare that. We have troops stationed all over the world, just like Rome had troops stationed all over the world, because we run the world. That notion of imperialism is not the message of the gospel of the prince of peace, nor of God, who loves the world.

He was asked many more questions which you can both read and watch by following the link to the transcript and video.

While Rev. Wright loves to point the finger at so-called "white America" and "rich white people" who run the country, it is he who should be looking inward at the hypocrite and race hustler within himself.

At one point in today's presentation in response to a question, he said that America is the only country that has refused to "apologize" for slavery and for the injustices done to black people.

He said we can never bridge the divide or begin the healing until we as a nation (white people) apologize. The harsh reality is that most divides have already been bridged, unfortunately pastor Wright never got the memo.

What I mean is that the issues which divided the whites and blacks of Rev. Wright's generation don't divide today's young people. Socio-economic inequalities still exist in some places for sure, but that's not because of racism. Some areas may still be effected by the racist policies of the past, but white people are not preventing blacks from getting ahead.

People in my generation (18-36) don't even think about race issues. We've moved beyond racial issues of previous generations, but people like Rev. Wright want to keep pulling us backward.

Jeremiah Wright is no different than Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton, or Louis Farrakhan. All of them make a living trying to convince black folks that "white devils" are still trying to keep them down. He speaks bitterly of continued black oppression to a congregation that until recently included Oprah Winfrey and Barack Obama.

Yet the irony of that completely escapes him.

Wright is a hypocrite, because while giving speeches about "rich white people" he's building a multi-million dollar mansion in a gated community that is 97% white.

Rev. Wright is an arrogant, racist, bitter, and divisive individual who cares more about hearing himself thunder away on television than about black people.

If he really cared about black people he wouldn't be sabotaging the chance for the first black man to be elected president. He knows that his ridiculous and offensive statements are going to hang Obama out to dry, but he doesn't care.

-Chris Jones
The Hot Joints

Chris@thehotjoints.com

In what could be the first chink in the otherwise impenetrable armor of Barack Obama, a memo obtained by the Clinton campaign proves that Obama's senior economic adviser did tell Canada that Obama's rhetoric on NAFTA was only "political positioning" and shouldn't be taken seriously.

The memo is the first documentation to emerge publicly out of the meeting between the adviser, Austan Goolsbee, and officials with the Canadian consulate in Chicago, but Goolsbee said it misinterprets what he told them. The memo was written by Joseph DeMora, who works for the consulate and attended the meeting.

"Noting anxiety among many U.S. domestic audiences about the U.S. economic outlook, Goolsbee candidly acknowledged the protectionist sentiment that has emerged, particularly in the Midwest, during the primary campaign," the memo said. "He cautioned that this messaging should not be taken out of context and should be viewed as more about political positioning than a clear articulation of policy plans."

Goolsbee disputed the characterization from the conservative government official.

"This thing about 'it's more about political positioning than a clear articulation of policy plans,' that's this guy's language," Goolsbee said of DeMora. "He's not quoting me.

If used properly this could be a very powerful instrument for the Clinton campaign to bludgeon Obama with. This is the first concrete evidence she can use to show voters that Obama's rhetoric is simply that, rhetoric.

This revelation will not come as a shock to anyone except the hopelessly naive, which unfortunately this election season has produced quite a few of.

The fact remains that if Obama were really being truthful with voters in Ohio he would explain to them that NAFTA is not to blame for their lot in life. Manufacturing jobs were declining their long before NAFTA was ever signed, because of Ohio's increasing hostility towards business.

Egregiously high taxes and out-of-control unions have succeeded in chasing away all the good jobs, not NAFTA.

It's a simple formula: HIGH TAXES + STRONG UNIONS = NO JOBS

The solution is also a simple formula:

LOW TAXES + WEAK UNIONS = VIBRANT ECONOMY

-Chris Jones
The Hot Joints

From Mediabistro:

On Thursday's "Tucker" on MSNBC, David Shuster, who was serving as guest-host of the program, made a comment about Chelsea Clinton and the Clinton campaign that was irresponsible and inappropriate.

Shuster, who apologized this morning on MSNBC and will again this evening, has been suspended from appearing on all NBC News broadcasts, other than to make his apology.

He has also extended an apology to the Clinton family. NBC News takes these matters seriously, and offers our sincere regrets to the Clintons for the remarks.

In a conference call with reporters, Clinton communications director Howard Wolfson Friday excoriated MSNBC's David Shuster for suggesting the Clinton campaign had "pimped out" 27-year old Chelsea by having her place phone calls to Democratic Party superdelegates on her mother's behalf.

Wolfson called the comment "beneath contempt" and disgusting.

I guess Chelsea Clinton is American royalty at this point, and any discussion of her must be done with the utmost respect. It was understandable when there was a "hands off" policy towards Chelsea when Bill was President, because she was just a little girl and had nothing to do with politics.

Now Chelsea Clinton is a grown woman who decided to make herself apart of her mother's campaign. She travels around the country giving speeches and makes phone calls on behalf of the Clinton campaign.

Nevertheless she's still allowed to live outside the media bubble. After one of her speeches a couple of weeks ago a reporter asked her a question and she said, "I don't talk to the media."

I guess that also means the media can't talk about her. Obviously, what David Schuster said was out of line, but that's typical of MSNBC. That's the kind of crap they routinely traffic in on that so-called "news" channel.

It's absolutely stunning that MSNBC can have Keith Olbermann on calling President Bush a liar, a war criminal, and an idiot at 7:00, then at 9:00 they have him on again to give "fair" coverage of a Presidential debate.

Their news coverage is so damn dishonest that I literally laugh out loud sometimes.

MSNBC is basically an extension of the left-wing blogosphere. Spouting outright falsehoods and leveling personal attacks is business as usual on that network.

The only reason you never hear any outcry is because the outrageous comments are directed at Republicans 99% of the time.

If Shuster had called one of the Bush twins a sl*t, you wouldn't have heard a peep about it. But when something is said about a Clinton, people get fired.

The Democrats are beginning to run out of networks to appear on at this point. They've boycotted Fox News and now MSNBC is out, which makes CNN (Clinton News Network) the sole mouthpiece for liberals.

-Chris Jones
The Hot Joints

With the surge strategy in Iraq showing progress, the number of horror stories for the NY Times to put on the front page has been severely reduced. However, the liberal media struck gold this week with another rehashing and repackaging of the "Bush lied about Iraq" story.

It's been common practice in recent years during unfortunate periods of reduced violence in Iraq, for the media to find a fresh way to rekindle the "Bush lied, People died" argument.

That argument is continuously repackaged and trotted out to an eager left-wing press like it's a brand new story, and the AP appears to be the first news organization in 2008 to tell that story again.

The latest reincarnation of the story comes to us in the form of a "study" conducted by two "non-partisan journalism organizations."

The Center For Public Integrity and the Fund for Independence in Journalism found (to their shock and horror) that President Bush and top administration officials issued hundreds of false statements about the national security threat from Iraq in the two years following the 2001 terrorist attacks.

The study concluded that the statements "were part of an orchestrated campaign that effectively galvanized public opinion and, in the process, led the nation to war under decidedly false pretenses."

They even give the exact number of "false statements" allegedly made by the administration.

The study counted 935 false statements in the two-year period. It found that in speeches, briefings, interviews and other venues, Bush and administration officials stated unequivocally on at least 532 occasions that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction or was trying to produce or obtain them or had links to al-Qaida or both.

Which inevitably led to the "Fund for Independence liberals in Journalism" to conclude:

"It is now beyond dispute that Iraq did not possess any weapons of mass destruction or have meaningful ties to al-Qaida," according to Charles Lewis and Mark Reading-Smith of the Fund for Independence in Journalism staff members, writing an overview of the study. "In short, the Bush administration led the nation to war on the basis of erroneous information that it methodically propagated and that culminated in military action against Iraq on March 19, 2003."

The part of this story you aren't supposed to know is the one Texas Rainmaker is already out in front of. The two so-called "non-partisan" groups responsible for this story are both funded by anti-American as*hole George Soros.

Which makes those groups many things, but "non-partisan" damn sure isn't one of them.

The Center for Public Integrity is funded by The Open Society Institute… yes, the same Open Society Institute founded by George Soros.

And the Fund for Independence in Journalism’s self-described primary purpose is “providing legal defense and endowment support for the largest nonprofit, investigative reporting institution in the world, the Center for Public Integrity, and possibly other, similar groups.”

The last Soros funded piece of propaganda was the now debunked study that claimed 650,000 civilians had been killed in Iraq since the invasion.

Just exposing the fact that George Soros funded this latest study automatically gives it zero credibility, but putting that aside for a moment let's instead focus on the substance of the piece.

The mantra radiating from the left has always been that Bush knew Iraq had no WMD, so the administration manipulated the intelligence to fool the public into supporting a war.

There's no question that we did get it wrong on Iraq. We always assumed that Saddam never really destroyed his stockpiles after the 1991 Gulf war like he was supposed to, but we were wrong.

We know now from debriefing Saddam after his capture that he was bluffing Bush into believing he had WMD, to avoid looking weak to his old nemesis Iran.

Saddam had been lobbying the U.N. privately for more than a year to lift the decade old sanctions against Iraq, and was within months of achieving that goal.

He wrongly calculated that if he could stall and bluff Bush long enough, the sanctions would be lifted and he would once again be on easy street.

He was so confident that Bush wouldn't really invade that only a few weeks before "shock and awe" began, Saddam hadn't even started on a war plan.

You can read all about what Saddam's life was like after his capture all the way up to his execution in Ronald Kessler's book "The Terrorist Watch." Kessler talks with the FBI agent who spent nearly a year talking with Saddam for 8 hours a day 7-days a week.

Saddam literally told the agent he was bluffing Bush about the weapons. So this nonsense about the Administration fabricating things is total bullsh*t.

Saddam convinced intelligence agencies from around the world including China, Russia, Britain, Israel, Australia, Egypt, Jordan, Italy, France, and Germany, that Iraq still possessed stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons. There was also anecdotal evidence to suggest that Saddam was at least interested in reconstituting his nuclear program again.

So Bush had the premier intelligence agencies of the world telling him that Saddam had weapons, and U.S. intelligence agreed with that assessment. Was he supposed to do nothing? He should have just ignored all that intelligence warning of a potential danger after the horrors of 9/11?

Let's also take a look at what leading opponents of the war were saying about Iraq all through the 1990's right up to the 2003 invasion of Iraq. This fantastic compilation comes from lawhawk at A Blog For All.

-Chris Jones
The Hot Joints

Attorney General Michael Mukasey appointed an outside prosecutor Wednesday to lead a criminal investigation into the destruction of CIA interrogation videotapes.

"The Department's National Security Division has recommended, and I have concluded, that there is a basis for initiating a criminal investigation of this matter, and I have taken steps to begin that investigation," Mukasey said in a statement released Wednesday.

Mukasey named John Durham, a federal prosecutor in Connecticut, to oversee the case. Durham has a reputation as one of the nation's most relentless prosecutors. He served as an outside prosecutor overseeing an investigation into the FBI's use of mob informants in Boston and helped send several Connecticut public officials to prison.

What this entire episode represents is yet another example of the CIA's inability to keep a secret. The concept of "State Secrets" obviously died along with the cold war.

The decision to tape any interrogation of Al-Qaeda suspects especially any enhanced interrogations was probably the most horrible idea ever conceived. A tape like that is the equivalent of a loose nuke in political terms and should never have been made.

Now of course this whole thing is going to play out like a textbook, and someone is gonna have to be thrown under the bus. I suspect the sacrificial lamb at the CIA already knows who he or she is and is just waiting for the other shoe to drop.

Mukasey has to prove to Congress that he's running a different kind of Justice Department than Gonzalez, so he's obligated to hang someone out to dry.

The larger and more troubling question than anything goes back to the intelligence community's inability to keep a secret. Leaking State Secrets has become business as usual and the leaker or leakers are never caught and never prosecuted.

I don't care if the CIA destroyed one tape or a thousand tapes, or if they torture terrorists, or if they send terrorists to be tortured by someone else. What I do care about is why I know about any of it?

Contrary to what the NY Times thinks, I don't need to know about NSA wiretapping, tape destruction, waterboarding, secret prisons, extraordinary rendition, torture, or any of the rest of it.

I want the CIA to do whatever they deem necessary to prevent any future attacks. I don't care how they do it, or where they do it as long as it gets done.

We should not know as much as we do, because everything we now know our enemies now know. If leakers were sentenced to 20 years in federal prison, I'm betting the vast majority of leaks would dry up overnight.

Who in the hell is ever gonna want to join the CIA or NSA, DIA, if they run the risk of being prosecuted for doing their job if a political scapegoat is needed?

Americans need to decide if gathering intelligence and conducting clandestine operations is something that's important to our National Security. If we don't believe intelligence is important then let's just close down the CIA and other agencies.

If we do think that gathering intelligence is indeed vital to our national security, then we should just shut-up and let the CIA do their job. That means not asking how information was obtained, where it was obtained, or under what conditions.

Playing "gotcha" with America's most important intelligence agency during a time of war is despicable, disgraceful, and outrageous.

-Chris Jones
The Hot Joints

The NY Times lead editorial today is left wing lunacy at its very finest. Every despicable word of it paints a perfect picture of far-left hysteria, and reveals the author to be suffering from late stage "Bush Derangement Syndrome."

The whole "America is the real terrorist" routine is a constant theme that surfaces time and time again especially among those suffering from BDS.

It is these very sick "Americans" that are left sitting up nights fretting over the possible mistreatment of terror suspects in far away lands.

As they sip their winter coco, they imagine how frightened Al-Qaeda terrorist Abu Zubaydah must have been as he was being waterboarded by those damned CIA thugs. If they actually believed in god, they would pray that one day Mr. Zubaydah sees justice for the horrible crimes committed against him.

Those inflicted with this terrible illness often times just sit and weep uncontrollably thinking of the many "victims" locked away in secret CIA prisons.

Hundreds of men, swept up on the battlefields of Afghanistan and Iraq, were thrown into a prison in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, so that the White House could claim they were beyond the reach of American laws. Prisoners are held there with no hope of real justice, only the chance to face a kangaroo court where evidence and the names of their accusers are kept secret, and where they are not permitted to talk about the abuse they have suffered at the hands of American jailers.

In other foreign lands, the C.I.A. set up secret jails where “high-value detainees” were subjected to ever more barbaric acts, including simulated drowning. These crimes were videotaped, so that “experts” could watch them, and then the videotapes were destroyed, after consultation with the White House, in the hope that Americans would never know.

For those with Bush Derangement, life in America can be a pretty scary place. These individuals often see sinister intentions behind each and every anti-terror measure the Bush Administration uses.

The White House used the fear of terrorism and the sense of national unity to ram laws through Congress that gave law-enforcement agencies far more power than they truly needed to respond to the threat — and at the same time fulfilled the imperial fantasies of Vice President Dick Cheney and others determined to use the tragedy of 9/11 to arrogate as much power as they could.

Even something as innocent as making a phone call can be a terrifying task indeed, as they imagine an NSA operative listening in, recording, and placing their conversation into a secret file that was opened on them the morning of Sept. 12, 2001.

The infected imagine conspiracies both big and small involving every level of government. Hallucinations are also common and can include seeing Blackwater contractors peeking in the window.

These thoughts of conspiracy often lead to more uncontrollable weeping as they think about how other countries must think of us. They imagine all the beautiful international treaties that President Bush stomped all over, and then Dick Cheney using the tattered pieces to light his cigars.

It is the very late stages of the illness that are often the most disturbing. Patients can sometimes sit for hours banging their head against the will mumbling something about "impeachment."

These "impeachment episodes" as they've become known usually happen just before the patient begins to vomit out the kind of editorial prominently featured in today's NY Times.

Fortunately, there are ways to protect yourself from becoming infected with Bush Derangement Syndrome:

1. Avoid far-left websites and other far-left propaganda
2. Avoid anti-war rallies, strikes, or protests of any kind
3. Avoid watching CNN or MSNBC Avoid all news channels except Fox News
4. Avoid Global Warming events and Al Gore
5. Avoid Rosie O'Donnell at all cost
6. Avoid the NY Times
7. Vote for Republicans or Joe Lieberman
8. Occasionally watch footage of the Twin Towers falling
9. Avoid hippies or any hippie-related bullsh*t
10. Avoid "progressive" causes or self-described "progressives"

-Chris Jones
The Hot Joints

Naomi Klein uses every opportunity to try and prove her ridiculous book, The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism is true. Her far-left conspiracy book sounds more like the ramblings of a paranoid schizophrenic than anything else.

Her latest attempt to prove her theories is the current protests going on in New Orleans over the city council's decision to bulldoze the housing projects. Naomi Klein claims that this is one part of the captitalist conspiracy she's been warning about.

Readers of The Shock Doctrine know that one of the most shameless examples of disaster capitalism has been the attempt to exploit the disastrous flooding of New Orleans to close down that city's public housing projects, some of the only affordable units in the city. Most of the buildings sustained minimal flood damage, but they happen to occupy valuable land that make for perfect condo developments and hotels.

The final showdown over New Orleans public housing is playing out in dramatic fashion right now. The conflict is a classic example of the "triple shock" formula at the core of the doctrine.

- First came the shock of the original disaster: the flood and the traumatic evacuation.

- Next came the "economic shock therapy": using the window of opportunity opened up by the first shock to push through a rapid-fire attack on the city's public services and spaces, most notably it's homes, schools and hospitals.

-Now we see that as residents of New Orleans try to resist these attacks, they are being met with a third shock: the shock of the police baton and the Taser gun, used on the bodies of protestors outside New Orleans City Hall yesterday.

What I find amusing is how seriously the left takes this woman and her delusions. Her claim that the city is going to bulldoze the housing projects on the so called "valuable land" in order to make room for condos is complete fiction.

The majority of the housing projects are vacant and were in fact damaged in Hurricane Katrina. What wasn't damaged in Katrina was a wreck to begin with. Those housing projects were a drug-filled cesspool of crime and misery and it's much cheaper for the city to start over then try and repair them.

In Naomi Klein's fantasy world the public housing is being bulldozed to make room for ritzy condos, but in the real world where the rest of us live, the city is in fact rebuilding better public housing right on the same spot. The city council voted unanimously in favor of tearing down the projects and rebuilding.

Arnie Fielkow, a council member at large, said the city is seizing the opportunity to remake itself as a place of prosperity, instead of violent crime, fractured schools and social inequities.

"The truth is, much of our beloved city was broken before Katrina," Fielkow said. "Quite simply, our residents deserve better."

I guess Naomi Klein thinks the poor people in New Orleans were living "ghetto fabulous," but pretty much everyone else knows better. New Orleans has the opportunity to start over and rebuild into a great city with good housing, good schools, and low crime. What a shame.

-Chris Jones
The Hot Joints

It took a while, but I think Nancy Pelosi is finally starting to understand the Iraq war debate.

"They like this war. They want this war to continue," Pelosi, D- Calif., told reporters. She expressed frustration over Republicans' ability to force majority Democrats to yield ground on taxes, spending, energy, war spending and other matters.

"We thought that they shared the view of so many people in our country that we needed a new direction in Iraq," Pelosi said at her weekly news conference in the Capitol. "But the Republicans have made it very clear that this is not just George Bush's war. This is the war of the Republicans in Congress."

Yes, Nancy that's what we've been trying to tell you all this time! Republican's DO NOT share your view that we need a new direction in Iraq, because we already have one.

-Chris Jones
The Hot Joints

You can add USA Today to the list of main stream media that has begrudgingly acknowledged that President Bush's surge strategy in Iraq is working. Not only is it working, but it's continuing to work.

USA Today further acknowledges what most rational Americans have known for some time. That Congressional Democrats are living in perpetual denial about the war in Iraq. Harry Reid is like a parrot that just keeps squawking, "The Surge isn't working!," even in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary.

Congressional Democrats, meanwhile, seem lost in a time warp. They could try to impose new benchmarks that acknowledge the military progress. Instead, too many seem unable or unwilling to admit that President Bush's surge of 30,000 more troops has succeeded beyond their initial predictions. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., who in the spring declared the war lost, said last week that "the surge hasn't accomplished its goals." Anti-war Democrats remain fixated on tying war funding to a rapid troop withdrawal. Yet pulling the troops out precipitously threatens to squander the progress of recent months toward salvaging a decent outcome to the Iraq debacle.

Even John Murtha one of the most despicable members of Congress finally acknowledged that the surge is working. Much to Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi's chagrin, the war is in fact not lost and we're finally making progress.

Yet "dumb and dumber" still keep trying to undermine the war effort by dragging their feet on funding, or putting time tables for withdrawal. Democrats for years complained that President Bush was being stubborn and needed to "change course" in Iraq.

They were right about that initially, and all the criticism was justified. So finally, the President fired Rummy and brought in Bob Gates. After that he brought in General Petraeus to implement his counter-insurgency strategy along with an infusion of 30,000 troops to Baghdad.

So while a little late to the game, President Bush did "change course" in Iraq and we're finally getting a handle on things. It's time now for Democrats to do a little self-reflection and take their own advice about not being stubborn and refusing to change course.

Democrats should realize that acknowledging progress in Iraq, doesn't mean they can't still hate the President with every fiber of their being as they so clearly do.

There is no doubt that Iraq remains a deadly place, and the Iraqi government is not acting like much of a government. To be fair, it was almost impossible for the government to really function with violence of almost biblical proportions taking place in the capital.

With violence finally subsiding to a large extent, we're gonna have to give the Iraqi government more time to get on it's feet. I don't know how much time, but I suspect as long as it takes.

-Chris Jones
The Hot Joints

A Houston, Texas woman says she was gang-raped by Halliburton/KBR coworkers in Baghdad, and the company and the U.S. government are covering up the incident.

Jamie Leigh Jones, now 22, says that after she was raped by multiple men at a KBR camp in the Green Zone, the company put her under guard in a shipping container with a bed and warned her that if she left Iraq for medical treatment, she'd be out of a job.

In a lawsuit filed in federal court against Halliburton and its then-subsidiary KBR, Jones says she was held in the shipping container for at least 24 hours without food or water by KBR, which posted armed security guards outside her door, who would not let her leave.

Now this lawsuit actually sounds like it has some legs, because the State Department actually intervened and rescued her from the shipping container!

"It felt like prison," says Jones, who told her story to ABC News as part of an upcoming "20/20" investigation. "I was upset; I was curled up in a ball on the bed; I just could not believe what had happened."

Finally, Jones says, she convinced a sympathetic guard to loan her a cell phone so she could call her father in Texas.

"I said, 'Dad, I've been raped. I don't know what to do. I'm in this container, and I'm not able to leave,'" she said. Her father called their congressman, Rep. Ted Poe, R-Texas.

"We contacted the State Department first," Poe told ABCNews.com, "and told them of the urgency of rescuing an American citizen" -- from her American employer.

Poe says his office contacted the State Department, which quickly dispatched agents from the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad to Jones' camp, where they rescued her from the container.

According to her lawsuit, Jones was raped by "several attackers who first drugged her, then repeatedly raped and injured her, both physically and emotionally."

Army doctors performed a rape kit on Ms. Jones which clearly showed that she had been raped both vaginally and anally. However, the rape kit mysteriously disappeared after it was handed over to KBR security officers.

Over two years later, the Justice Department has brought no criminal charges in the matter. Legal experts say Jones' alleged assailants will likely never face a judge and jury, due to an enormous loophole that has effectively left contractors in Iraq beyond the reach of United States law.

I have been a strident defender of allowing contractors to be immune from prosecution in Iraq. I don't really lose any sleep over Blackwater having to shoot one or more people for whatever reason.

Immunity for "contractor on Iraqi" crime is one thing, but I never considered that immunity would extend to "contractor on contractor" crimes. Or more specifically "American on American" crimes. Shooting an Iraqi in a war zone is one thing, but American contractors gang-raping a 20-year old American woman is f*cking outrageous.

Jones went on to say that KBR and Halliburton created a "boys will be boys" atmosphere in the barracks, which created an unsafe environment for females. The fact that KBR/Halliburton would even consider making the women share the same barracks with a bunch of "alpha male" contractors is almost too much to believe. If they chose to bunk with the guys so be it, but their should have been separate quarters available.

The honest to god truth is that regardless of sleeping quarters, American contractors should act like professionals rather than a bunch of rabid animals. It's this kind of crap that brings dishonor and shame to everyone who's over there trying to do good work.

There is absolutely no legitimate reason for extending immunity for crimes against co-workers. I guess that means that a contractor could shoot a U.S. Soldier and be immune, or kill a Congressman and be immune. This is getting to be a sick situation and if a little bit of immunity is gonna become this kind of immunity, then clearly there should be NO immunity.

This entire story will be featured on an upcoming episode of "20/20."

-Chris Jones
The Hot Joints

It was a foregone conclusion that Democrats would call for dog and pony shows hearings and investigations after the CIA admitted to destroying interrogation tapes. So right on cue that's exactly what they did, complete with "faux" outrage and references to Richard Nixon.

From The Huffington Post:

Congressional Democrats Friday demanded a full Justice Department investigation into whether the CIA obstructed justice by destroying videotapes that documented the harsh 2002 interrogations of two alleged terrorists.

A day after CIA Director Gen. Michael Hayden told agency employees the tapes were destroyed in 2005, members of Congress, human rights groups and lawyers for accused terrorists said the tapes may have been key evidence that the U.S. government had illegally authorized torture...

In a letter to Attorney General Michael Mukasey, the Senate's No. 2 Democrat, Senate Democratic Whip Dick Durbin of Illinois, asked for a probe of "whether CIA officials who destroyed these videotapes and withheld information about their existence from official proceedings violated the law."

In a Senate floor speech Durbin dismissed the CIA's explanation that it was trying to protect the identities of the interrogators. "We know that it is possible and in fact easy to cover the faces" of those who appear on camera, Durbin said. "This is not an issue that can be ignored."

Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., accused the CIA of a coverup. "The agency was desperate to cover up damning evidence of their practices," he said in floor remarks. "We haven't seen anything like this since the eighteen-and-a-half-minute gap in the tapes of President Richard Nixon."

-Chris Jones
The Hot Joints

Vice President Cheney warned in an interview with The Politico that a premature withdrawal from Iraq would invite “further attacks” against the United States and said he has been surprised by the weakness of the Democratic Congress.

The funny part of the interview is when he taunts the Democratic leadership. He talked about Democratic Reps. John Dingell and John Murtha, scoffing at the idea of two men who spent years accruing so much power showing so much deference to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi in the big debates of the year.

Murtha “and the other senior leaders … march to the tune of Nancy Pelosi to an extent I had not seen, frankly, with any previous speaker,” Cheney said. “I’m trying to think how to say all of this in a gentlemanly fashion, but [in] the Congress I served in, that wouldn’t have happened.”

“They are not carrying the big sticks I would have expected.”

Rep. Rahm Emanuel got wind of the Vice President's talk of sticks and fired back,

“Some of us were surprised that the president didn’t have a bigger stick when he could have stood up to Dick Cheney.”

Cheney also left no doubt that he takes pride in the most-criticized policies of the Bush administration, including the wiretapping of suspected terrorists, and the long-term imprisonment and aggressive interrogation of suspected terrorists at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

“We’ve been very successful,” he said. “It’s not an accident; it’s because those programs have been there.”

The Vice President also made the prediction that Iraq will be a self-sustaining Democracy by 2009.

...By the middle of January 2009, it will be clear that “we have in fact achieved our objective in terms of having a self-governing Iraq that’s capable for the most part of defending themselves, a democracy in the heart of the Middle East, a nation that will be a positive force in influencing the world around it in the future.”

One thing you have to admire about Dick Cheney and President Bush is their willingness to do what they think is right, even in the face of withering criticism. Say what you want about the Bush Administration, but the fact remains that we haven't been attacked again.

I'm also glad that Cheney brought up the one fact everyone is aware of, but refuses to acknowledge. Republicans really do have "bigger sticks" than Democrats.

-Chris Jones
The Hot Joints

Houston, Texas will once again host The Texas Terrorist Dawah Convention. The event is known as "the largest Islamic convention in the southwest." The theme this year deals with "focusing on the family", but as usual the speakers include known associates of convicted terrorists, terror supporters, and 9/11 skeptics.

In addition to the various seminars, some of them given by supporters of the most conservative brand of Sunni Islam, the event will also have a variety of carnival rides, including a petting zoo!

I think a "Focus on the Terror" theme would be far more appropriate given the current state of things around the world. What's interesting about this year's meeting of Islamic radicals in the U.S. is that an FBI agent will be a featured speaker. Special Agent Randall Clark who is a member of the "Cyber Crimes Task Force" will be at the convention to speak about child pornography. Notchild pornography. terrorism, but in fact

Given that the Internet is a favorite recruiting tool for terrorists, lets just say it's "odd" that child pornography is what the FBI chooses to discuss. I guess the Feds just wants everyone to be on the lookout for child porn when posting jihad videos and plotting terror attacks on message boards.

The Jawa Report has an ongoing list of expected speakers at the convention and who exactly they are:

Musa Maguire- The name may not sound familiar, but maybe you know his cousin "Sulayman". Doesn't ring a bell? Well maybe you'll recognize his given name John Walker Lindh. Musa Abdun Nur Maguire is best known for his defense of his cousin's treason fighting for the Taliban. He calls Lindh a "authentic American hero".

To show you how screwed up our Federal government is, your tax money is subsidizing Musa: In 2004 he was the recipient of a Fulbright grant to take K-12 teachers to the Middle East. Read the post, in it Musa describes how Salafis (who are the Sunni Islamists with the same political goals as al Qaeda) cured him of his extremism and how convicted jihadist Ismail Royer should get a Fulbright and not jail time.

Imam Johari Abdul-Malik- Abdul-Malik is the number one fund raiser for the Ali Asad support committee which is trying to free convicted terrorist Ali Asad Chandia. Chandia, a Maryland school teacher, was convicted of providing material support to the Lashkar-e-Taiba terror organization and assisted Ali al-Tamimi, the spiritual leader of the Virginia Jihad Network.

He is the imam of the Dar Al-Hijrah mosque in Falls Church, Va, where convicted terrorist Ahmed Omar Abu AliRosa Parks of the Muslim community". worshiped. Abu Ali has admitted to meeting with Zubayr Al-Rimi, al Qaeda's #2 man in Saudi Arabia while studying in Mecca. Malik was outraged at Omar Abu Ali's prosecution for plotting to kill the President of the United States and once called him the "

Abdul Malik is most famous for his support of Hamas.

Dr. Salah As-Sawi- Vice President of the Sharia Academy, the mission of which is "to disseminate proper and authentic Islamic knowledge based on the principles of Ahlus-Sunnah Wal-Jama’ah". Longtime readers know that Ahlus-Sunnah Wal-Jama’ah is what Salafists call their version of conservative Islamic law.

What they mean by it is that they are followers of "authentic" Islam, as understood by the first generation of followers of Mohammed. In other words, they want to return to a 7th century version of Islamic law. Generally you and I would call them "Wahabbis", although they hate this term.

He is perhaps most notorious as a 9/11 skeptic and as the man who penned a counter-fatwa forbidding Muslims to join the U.S. military in any actions against the Taliban in Afghanistan. He claimed "the Jewish media" had rushed to blame Osama bin Laden for 9/11.

Siraj Wahhaj- Formerly on CAIR's advisory board and an possibly unindicted co-conspirator in the 1993 World Trade Bombings. He denies he was ever on any list of unindicted co-conspirators, but bombing mastermind Sheikh Omar Abdel Rahman (the "Blind Sheikh) was a regular speaker at Wahhaj's At-Taqwa Mosque in Brooklyn. In addition, Wahhaj was a character witness in Rahman's behalf at his terrorism trial.

Rodney Clement Hampton-El, aka "Dr. Rashid"- an Afghan veteran (fought with the mujahideen) and the group's "explosive expert", was also a worshiper at Wahhaj's mosque.

The event will be held Dec. 21-24 and The Hot Joints may live blog the event. We will post further details after a decision has been reached.

-Chris Jones
The Hot Joints

I honesty didn't think a single one of the "defeatocrats" had the "stones" to admit that the troop surge in Iraq is working. Apparently, hell has in fact frozen over or I'm experiencing the initial signs of schizophrenia, because it appears that John Murtha has finally admitted what most people already know. That the troop surge he promised would not work is working!!

"I think the 'surge' is working," the Democrat said in a videoconference from his Johnstown office, describing the president's decision to commit more than 20,000 additional combat troops this year. But the Iraqis "have got to take care of themselves."

Violence has dropped significantly in recent months, but Mr. Murtha said he was most encouraged by changes in the once-volatile Anbar province, where locals have started working closely with U.S. forces to isolate insurgents linked to Al Qaeda.

Democrats in recent weeks have used every excuse conceivable for why things are improving in Iraq, steadfastly maintaining that even if things are getting better it's not because of the troop surge.

They could chalk it up to a an act of god (or Allah as the case may be), but as we all know Democrats are a secular "peoples" so that's also out.

Provided Mr. Murtha doesn't suddenly hold another press conference and accuse our troops of "murdering civilians in cold blood" we might just be on the right track.

-Chris Jones
The Hot Joints