Romney at the SLC Olympics

Mitt Romney, in pledging to turn around the Olympics in 2002, had promised to restore the honor and integrity of the scandal-clouded Salt Lake City. The Games captured the world’s attention and became all the more urgent after terrorists attacked us on 9-11. But while Romney invoked the wellspring of American patriotism after the attacks, he neglected their heroes, the fallen firefighters of that early September morning.

Romney’s executive assistant, Donna Tillery, twice denied requests to provide free or discounted tickets to widows and orphans of the felled firefighters but gave them for free to Utah legislators just six weeks later, according to a new book, The Real Romney (HarperCollins, 2012).

Tillery sent e-mails to A.J. Barto, a former Salt Lake City firefighter helping the 9-11 widows and orphans, citing a policy barring giveaways, but Romney gave 100 free surplus tickets ($885 each) to Utah legislators. “I was outraged at the hypocrisy,” Barto told Kranis and Helman. “In less than two months, he went from saying, ‘We’re going to run a tight ship’ to throwing out free tickets to a group of people who could help him politically.” (221)

(more…)

Van Jones (Photo East Bay Express via zTruth)

When Obama administration Green jobs czar Anthony “Van” K. Jones resigned late Saturday night, September 5, 2009 over the long Labor Day weekend, a storm of breaking news about his radical anti-American history was being reported by conservative bloggers. One such storm was about the racist, hate-America rally Van Jones held the day after the September 11, 2001 terror attacks on the United States where speakers cheered the attacks and Jones himself said America deserved it.

World Net Daily was first to report on the rally, on August 28, 2009.

However, it was Powerline’s post the evening of September 3rd (and expanded on at Free Republic), hours before Jones’ resignation was announced, that included the first mention of what Jones said at the rally. The Powerline article was based on a leftwing report made at the time of the rally.

A YouTube video of the rally reported on by BizzyBlog on September 8th captures some of Jones’ remarks at the rally. (The quote from Jones is similar in nature to that quoted in the leftwing article. However, no context is given so Jones could have said both lines, or been accurately characterized but misquoted.)

Jones is featured twice at the end of the five minute video. BizzyBlog transcribed his comments:

(4:38) “It’s the bombs that the government has been dropping around the world that are now blowing up inside the U.S. borders.”

And:

“We’ve got something stronger than bombs, we have solidarity. That dream of revolutionary change is stronger than bombs.”

One unidentified speaker on the video praised the 9-11 attackers as heroes (transcribed by Kristinn Taylor).

(more…)

“I can hear you! I can hear you! The rest of the world hears you and the people who knocked these buildings down will hear all of us soon!”

When President George W. Bush spoke through a bullhorn to emergency rescue workers at Ground Zero just two days after 9/11, he put the world on notice: We are coming to get those who did this, and we will not stop until we do.

The attacks of September 11, 2001 underscored the gravity of threats posed by international terrorist organizations. Responding to the attacks, on October 7th President Bush declared a “war on terror” and identified Osama Bin Laden’s al-Qaeda network responsible. Within weeks, as opposed to our current Commander in Chief’s dithering for months, a US-led coalition launched air-strikes against targets in Afghanistan, where Bin Laden was believed to be sheltered by the Taliban regime.

(more…)

Americans fancy the idea that while we might have been asleep prior to 9/11/2001, now our eyes are wide open and we are on alert. This is a pipe dream.

If people’s eyes were truly open, they would be closely examining the path Gitmo detainee Said Ali al-Shihri took to Yemen, where we are now learning he helped plan the Christmas Jihad.

Said reportedly left Gitmo, went through “rehabilitation” in Saudi Arabia, then moved to Iran before ending up as a leader of al-Qaeda in Yemen.

For example, Said Ali al-Shihri left Gitmo in 2007 and became a patient in Saudi Arabia’s terrorist rehabilitation program. Upon graduation, he went to Iran, and then became the deputy leader of Al-Qaeda in Yemen. Abdullah al-Qarawi following a similar path, also traveling to Iran after finishing the program, where he know oversees over 100 Saudi Al-Qaeda operatives. Mohammed al-Oufi, a former Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula commander, also was released from Gitmo. Luckily, he defected later and informed the Saudis about Iran’s secret involvement with Al-Qaeda in Yemen and a plot to bomb the Saudi oil infrastructure. [READ MORE...]

(more…)

President Bill Clinton should be cut a lot of slack when it comes to 9/11. Sure the attack was planned under his watch, and sure President Clinton cowardly avoided taking custody of Osama bin Laden when Sudan offered him on a platter.

The truth of the matter is that prior to the 9/11 Jihad attack, there was no way in the world the American people would have stood for the large scale war that was necessary in order to fight this new kind of Jihad army.

Think about it this way, even after the Jihadis have murdered thousands upon thousands of people all around the world, including here in America on 9/11, the American Left still think it’s all America’s fault and that we deserved it, and therefore we have no legitimate right to fight back. Just image how much resistance there would have been toward going into Afghanistan prior to 9/11.

Add to the whack-o Left the fact that the Right would have accused Clinton of simply trying to distract attention away from his perjury case, and it should be obvious that Clinton didn’t have much political capital in reserve to convince the country that a preemptive war was necessary to avoid a large scale attack against an American city.

(more…)

It is a Friday and President Obama is abroad.  What better time for the President and the Department of Justice to announce that 9/11 coordinator Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and some of his fellow terrorists will be tried in a civilian court in New York City?

Yesterday, I wrote about the curious connection that major Obama and ACORN supporter Bruce Ratner has to the Department of Justice – the very department that refuses to initiate a criminal trial of ACORN. It just so happens that Bruce Ratner’s brother, Michael Ratner, shares the terrorist coddling sympathies of Attorney General Eric Holder.  As Michelle Malkin documents, Holder not only pushed for the pardoning of actual terrorists in his last stint at DOJ, but he was also a senior partner at a law firm representing detainees at Guantanamo. While Michael Ratner has not represented Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, he did represent a handful of terrorists and won them the right to challenge their detention in U.S. courts under habeas corpus. This is just one of many legal “victories” that have paved the way for folks like Khalid Sheikh Mohammed to be tried in civilian court on our soil.

This particular example highlights the underlying notion that terrorists should be privy to the same rights as United States citizens. In this instance, President Obama did in fact exercise his discretion (if you can call it that) by allowing the trial to take place in civilian court.  Attorney Brian Levi serves as the Director of the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism at California State University.  As Levi noted today, “As a legal matter President Obama could very well also have tried these five detainees before military tribunals, as five others are…”

(more…)

For the Left, one of the most defining images of the previous administration can be summed up in three words “ My Pet Goat.”

If you remember, when President Bush was informed of the second plane crashing into the World Trade Center, while his photo op with school children at the Emma  E. Booker elementary school was about to start. For the next several minutes, (much maligned by Michael Moore, in “Faranheit 9/11″) we saw a man confused by the situation. It has been joked about by comedians as him wanting to see how the story ended.

Every time I watch this footage, I always saw a strong man, who knew that twenty school children had looked forward to their chance to read to the President, for weeks. He decided they would not be disappointed. And knowing that this was an attack on the United States, the President did his best to neither disappoint nor alarm the children.

I’ve always imagined his narcissistic predecessor bolting straight out of the room and into a bunker, stepping over any children in his path. In reality, what could the President do? In that moment of confusion there really was nothing that could be done, other than have him sit there uncomfortably, and pretend that everything was normal. It takes a strong man not to flinch under adversity.

(more…)