Cat Saves Family From Fire

An alert tabby cat saved an Australian family of four from a house fire by clawing at its owner's face, emergency officials said on Friday. The tabby sprang into action by waking his unidentified owner when a mattress caught fire as the family slept early on Friday in Cairns in Australia's tropical north. "The cat was probably the best smoke alarm system ... it was clawing at the occupant's face and got him up and out of bed," Cairns fire service spokesman Robert White-Macfarlane told reporters. The man was then able to wake his family and call for help.

In other news, Saddam Hussein was executed at 6am Baghdad time.

Oh...the cat's name is Timmy.

Merry Christmas

We wish all a Merry Christmas & a very Happy Holiday.

Iraq, I Ran, I Stayed - What To Do

Iraq is not the Vietnam - like quagmire that's being depicted by some media & pundits. Nor is success in Iraq easily seen down the road. The American military & US policy is facing a host of problems.

The primary problem is the Iraqi religious & political divisions that are perpetuating the on-going violence. Iraqis have yet to learn peaceful solutions to on-going disputes. Shiite & Sunni religious sects are at each others throats. Thrown into this are the former Baathists of Saddam's regime who hope to topple the current government & retake the power they lost. There are the nationalists who can't stand the presence of American troops. There are the militias of Sadr & other leaders. Least we forget, there is Al Qada & the foreign volunteers & agents of Iran & Syria who are looking to destabilize the country. And let us not forget about the common thug & criminal who for his own enrichment or for a price adds to the mix of instability.

We are not just fighting one army or group. We are fighting many groups with shared or opposing views & ideas. We are fighting a culture of corruption & dealing with Iraqi army & police who have shifting loyalties or opposing loyalties.

Coupled with all this is an Iraqi government that has been less than stellar in unifying the country & imposing a central government will on areas & groups that need to be focused on. Many of those in the government have open ties with militias & corruption is ever present, even rampant in some quarters.

The US military cannot defeat this hodge podge that is Iraq. Their prime mission was to defeat the Iraqi military & remove Saddam. They did this in a quick & stunning manner, with few casualties. It is the aftermath of insurgents & terrorists & pay-back killings between Iraqis that cannot be defeated & has caused the vast amount of casualties to the US military.

The US removed a brutal dictator & gave birth to the first democracy in the Arab Middle East. We stayed in Iraq to ensure that that democracy took root & the government of Iraq was stable enough to govern Iraq. But we cannot be an extension of that government. We cannot fight the battles for their government, nor for that matter for the Iraqi population. It is up to the Iraqis themselves to do that.

It is up to the Iraqis to come to terms with each other at some point. We cannot be their police, their army or their government for the long haul. We can only do so much. We can only give them the opportunity for a democratic country. What they do with that opportunity is their responsibility. Currently, they are blowing it.

The Iraqi government has put restrictions on our attacks against militias - Shiite in particular. They've released insurgent leaders we've captured. They told us to remove barricades from cordoned-off areas. We are not in their employ.

What we need to do is tell the Iraqi government what we are going to do. We are going to increase troops levels & go after the militias that are a large part responsible for the carnage. We are going to lock down the entire country if we have to. We need to continue training & building the Iraqi military. The Iraqi army can follow or not, but we will do what we have to do to drastically reduce the craziness. We must be ruthless in achieving that goal. Then we hand the keys back to Iraq & leave. What they do after we leave is their business.

We need to put Iran & Syria on notice that they need to stop aiding & abetting foreign infiltrators, they need to lock down their borders & stop facilitating crossings into Iraq or there will be punitive measures taken against them. So far the US has done little to address this issue.

The Iraq Study Group recommendations are at best a joke. Why they think Iran & Syria should be brought into talks to help stop the violence, when they are perpetuating it, is a mystery. Why they think that settlement of the Israeli-Palestinian issue should be linked to Iraq is a mystery. If there was no Israel the radicals in Iran would still be fomenting trouble against the Great Satan.

The media & many Democrats have trashed this war from the get go. They are playing political football because they abhor the current President. They distort, lie & exaggerate in anyway they can to humiliate this President, not caring about the country or its soldiers. They are reprehensible.

We are in the War on Terror for the long haul, like it or not. It is the Islamo-fascists that have chosen this fight, not us. They will not just go away by wishful thinking. We need to crush them in Iraq, Iran or wherever else we need to go to stop them. If we as Americans lose heart to do this, if we are more concerned about the newest iPod or Gameboy then the threat before us, then we are in for some tragic times.

Sensitivity Run Amuck Again

A high school choir in Riverside, California was asked to stop singing Christmas carols during an ice skating show featuring Olympic medalist Sasha Cohen out of concern the skater would be offended because she's Jewish.

Choir director Staci Della-Rocco said she complied with the request when a city staff member approached her along with a police officer "because a policeman told me to stop. I didn't want to have a big old huge scene in front of my kids."

How dare they offend Sasha Cohen. Sasha must be deeply offended, right? Wrong. Sasha Cohen gave no complaint or indication that she was offended. In fact, her web site lists the Christmas Tree lighting ceremonies she is scheduled to be present at.

Instead, it was an idiotic staff member who on her own thinks she knows what Sasha Cohen is feeling, who thinks she knows what's best for everyone else when it comes to sensitivity. The irony is that the patronizing staff member is the insensitive one. Extrapolate this into State & Federal do-gooder legislators who think they know what's best for the rest of us & you can see where this whole "sensitivity" & multicultural awareness takes us - into a fool's paradise.

And we think the police officer should be retrained so he or she learns what is & is not within the law enforcement domain.

Taliban Tolerance

Torture So They Learn

A 46 year old school teacher in Afghanistan was killed by members of the Taliban - that peace loving Muslim radical group that ruled the country until the US invasion in 2001. Three other teachers have been killed also.

The teachers' crime? He had the audacity to teach young Afghani girls & help give them the education they were forbidden under Taliban rule.

These peace loving Muslims were not content to just kill the teacher. He was part-disembowelled and then torn apart with his arms and legs tied to motorbikes, the remains put on display as a warning to others against defying Taliban orders to stop educating girls.

This is what we are facing in the War on Terror - or rather the War on Islamo-facists. We see their sick mutilations, beheadings & killing of innocents throughout the world where ever Muslims live. They cannot be rehabilitated - only killed. The sooner they are killed & the more of them who can be killed, the better for the world.

This is a long-term commitment for Americans, if we are to overcome this scourge disguised as religion. We think Americans have a short attention span & do not seriously consider the consequences if we do not continue the fight against these pigs. We have become fat, lazy & spoiled with our iPods & SUV's.

Meanwhile, human debris like the Taliban & the Islamo-facists in Iraq, Iran & elsewhere are deadly serious. It is at our peril if we do not become deadly serious at stopping.