The New American articles from September 2007

The New American archives from September 2007

Appreciated John Wayne.(LETTERS TO THE EDITOR)(Letter to the editor)
September 3, 2007... Thank you for the tribute to John Wayne ("John Wayne: Mr. America," May 28 issue), but I have a comment about the article. In his excellent biography, John Wayne: The Man Behind The Myth, Michael Munn acknowledges that there has always been...

Open borders, not amnesty.(LETTERS TO THE EDITOR)(Letter to the editor)
September 3, 2007... The Senate is not debating the problem of illegal aliens in our country ("Will Congress Turn Its Back on You?" June 11 issue); it is deciding whether or not to promote the "open border" agenda of the internationalists. Even mentioning the...

Losing control at home, Iraqi leader visits friendly Iran.(Inside Track)(Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki)(Brief article)
September 3, 2007... The dominant Muslim sect in Iran is Shiite. Suspicions that Shiite-dominated Iran has been supplying weapons to its co-religionists in Iraq have been confirmed in recent weeks. U.S. military leaders have found sophisticated Iranian-produced...

Disney/ABC receive top rating from homosexual activists.(Inside Track)(Brief article)
September 3, 2007... For regular viewers of network television dramas, soaps, and sitcoms, it might appear that Hollywood has been on a "gay" binge in recent years. After all, the number of lesbian, homosexual, bisexual, and transgendered (LGBT) TV characters in...

Russia stakes claim on North Pole.(Inside Track)(Brief article)
September 3, 2007... On August 2, two deep-diving Russian mini-submarines descended more than 2 1/2 miles under North Pole ice to plant a Russian flag on the ocean floor. Russia portrayed the event as a technical achievement, with its goal being the peaceful...

Stealth passage of "Protect America Act".(Inside Track)(Brief article)
September 3, 2007... A newly crafted piece of legislation will expand the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). The legislation, entitled the Protect America Act of 2007 (S. 1927), was authored mostly by the White House and submitted to Congress by Mike...

Leaks lead to investigations in German rendition inquiry.(Inside Track)(Germany's Federal Intelligence service)(Brief article)
September 3, 2007... A German parliamentary panel is investigating whether and to what degree German government agencies assisted the American CIA's "extraordinary rendition" efforts to move captured illegal enemy combatants from the "War on Terror" to secret...

Iowa Straw Poll has interesting results.(Inside Track)(Brief article)
September 3, 2007... The Iowa Straw Poll was expected to attract as many as 40,000 people this year, with about 30,000 of them voting. But on the day of the event, the heat index soared to 102 degrees, discouraging a big turnout, and the final vote tally totaled...

Building the new Chinese police state.(Inside Track)
September 3, 2007... China, many might be surprised to learn, is still a communist nation. As such, it has a long and rich history of oppressing the Chinese people. Most of the techniques of oppression practiced by the regime in Beijing were learned from Soviet...

Chinese officials threaten to pull the plug on the U.S. dollar.(Inside Track)(Brief article)
September 3, 2007... China possesses as much as $900 billion worth of U.S. bonds. As pressure mounts here at home for placing tariffs on the Chinese goods continuing to flood America, officials in Beijing have threatened to sell their U.S. holdings. If they carry...

Canada reinforces its claim on the Arctic.(QuickQuotes)(Brief article)
September 3, 2007... "Canada has a choice when it comes to defending our sovereignty over the Arctic. We either use it or lose it. And make no mistake, this government intends to use it." After Russia staked a symbolic claim over the North Pole by sending...

British leave and Basra becomes a war zone.(QuickQuotes)(Brief article)
September 3, 2007... "It's hard now to paint Basra as a success story. The British have basically been defeated in the South." The British sent 40,000 troops into the war against Iraq, and they occupied the area around the southern city of Basra. As recently as...

Joint chiefs nominee not optimistic about success in Iraq.(QuickQuotes)(Michael G. Mullen)(Brief article)
September 3, 2007... "No amount of troops in no amount of time will make much of a difference." Testifying before the Senate Armed Services Committee on July 31, Admiral Michael G. Mullen gave his bleak outlook because of the poor performance of the Iraqi...

Columnist asks why Ron Paul isn't noticed by major media.(QuickQuotes)(Brief article)
September 3, 2007... "So why, I am often asked, doesn't Ron Paul get more coverage? You might think the mainstream media would pay more respect to a guy who ended up the recent fundraising quarter with more cash on hand than John McCain." Chicago Tribune...

Retired general says the core of terrorism can be found in Afghanistan, not Iraq.(QuickQuotes)(James L. Jones)(Brief article)
September 3, 2007... "Symbolically, it's more the epicenter of terrorism than Iraq. If we don't succeed in Afghanistan, you're sending a very clear message to the terrorist organizations that the U.S., the UN, and the 37 countries with troops on the ground can be...

A European sends a warning about granting amnesty to illegal immigrants.(QuickQuotes)(Paul Belien)(Brief article)
September 3, 2007... "The European experience teaches us that governments always underestimate the number of people who can apply for an amnesty, and that amnesties do not close the floodgates, they open them." Paul Belien is the editor of the outspokenly...

Sale of Wall Street Journal to Murdoch not welcomed.(QuickQuotes)(Brief article)
September 3, 2007... "It's sad. We stood around a pile of Journals and drank whiskey." A veteran reporter for the Journal spoke his mind but asked not to be named for fear of losing his job.

Muslim terror increasing in the Philippines.(QuickQuotes)(Brief article)
September 3, 2007... "They have bombed buses carrying workers, food markets where people were shopping, airports where relatives were waiting for loved ones, and ferryboats carrying families." Human Rights Watch spokesman John Sifton issued his statement about...

Behind Islamic terror: Syria and Iran are scorned in much of the Western world for supporting terrorism, but neither one is the puppeteer directing the worldwide terror network--Russia is.(TERRORISM)(Cover story)
September 3, 2007... "Al-Qaeda Stronger than Ever." "U.S. Concern at Al-Qaeda Strength." These and similar titles accompanied news stories that began breaking during the second week of July, announcing leaks of a disturbing new classified intelligence report....

The real terror paymasters: the KGB has long sponsored the Muslim fundamentalist groups that have now become a global terror network carrying out the Marxist-Leninist revolution in Muhammad's name.(TERRORISM)
September 3, 2007... In 1972, the Kremlin decided to turn the whole Islamic world against Israel and the U.S. As KGB chairman Yuri Andropov told me, a billion adversaries could inflict far greater damage on America than could a few millions. In the quote...

Blown away: wind power is floating high on the political winds as the country's answer to its power needs, but, in reality, it's an idea whose time has come ... and gone.(ENERGY)
September 3, 2007... Hardly a stump speech goes by without a political candidate calling for "more renewable sources of energy such as wind or solar" to either stop our dependence on foreign oil or to slow the C[O.sub.2] emissions that mean certain doom for our...

"For God, Spain, & El Cid": during the centuries-long struggle of the Spanish Reconquista against the Muslim occupiers of Iberia, one name stands out above all others as the exemplary Christian knight.(CULTURE WAR)(Rodrigo de Vivar)(Critical essay)
September 3, 2007... On a sandy beach on the north coast of Africa sit a dozen richly robed men, surrounded by scimitar-wielding men-at-arms, some standing, some mounted. From their opulent raiment and bejeweled fingers, the seated men are obviously individuals of...

Goodness of Minneapolis.(THE GOODNESS OF AMERICA)
September 3, 2007... The collapse of the Interstate 35W bridge in Minneapolis on August I made news headlines around the world. As we go to press, the official death toll stands at nine, with several more still missing. However, such emergency situations often...

Religion by the sword: in the century following the death of Muhammad, the religion of Islam formed the basis for the rapid conquest of the Christian lands of Europe, North Africa, and the Near East.(HISTORY--PAST AND PERSPECTIVE)
September 3, 2007... The fate of Christendom hung by a thread. It was October 732 A.D. Arrayed on a hill, partially obscured by forest, the flower of Frankish chivalry stood waiting for the bloody onset of battle. Their leader, a fearsome Germanic warrior named...

One man's trash can be a treasure worth defending.(EXERCISING THE RIGHT)(Brief article)
September 3, 2007... One might think that a poor person would not have to be too concerned about being robbed because he doesn't have much to steal. However, some thieves in Athens, Alabama, proved once again that such a belief is wrong--thieves will steal whatever...

Brutally honest.(EXERCISING THE RIGHT)(Brief article)
September 3, 2007... After Tashia Lovelace ran into her verbally and physically abusive estranged husband at a high-school graduation, he called her several times that day and told her that he was going to kill her. Apparently, he meant it. At just before 10...

Robbed before.(EXERCISING THE RIGHT)(Robert Cushingberry)(Brief article)
September 3, 2007... Robert Cushingberry, a 72-year-old man from North Texas, and a friend were approached by two men demanding money. Because he had been robbed before, Cushingberry kept a gun under the seat of his truck. When he reached under the seat to get it,...

Criminal arrogance.(EXERCISING THE RIGHT)
September 3, 2007... Merlony Colaco, who owns a convenience store in Greencastle, Pennsylvania, has been busy catching criminals lately. But he may not get the medal he is owed; he may get jail time instead. Several months ago after a series of break-ins at his...

Children's Health Insurance.(Correction, Please)(Correction notice)
September 3, 2007... ITEM: "The Children's Health Insurance Program has suddenly become a vehicle for an ideological struggle between President Bush and Congress over the future of the health care system," reported Robert Pear in the New York Times for August I....

Funding infrastructure.(THE LAST WORD)
September 3, 2007... In a 2006 report to Congress, Secretary of Transportation Norman Y. Mineta claimed that U.S. transportation infrastructure was improving, but it wasn't. He was cherry-picking facts. While it is apparently true that since the mid-1990s the...

Correction.(LETTERS TO THE EDITOR)(Correction notice)
September 17, 2007... In your otherwise fine article "The 'Hydrogen Economy'" (August 20 issue), it should read gaseous hydrogen will be produced at the negative pole, known as the cathode. And also read, similarly, oxygen will collect at the positive pole, or...

Faulty portrayal.(LETTERS TO THE EDITOR)(Letter to the editor)
September 17, 2007... Ed Hiserodt's article "The 'Hydrogen Economy'" plays loose with the facts. Hiserodt wrongly claims that the sun is only perpendicular to the Earth at the equator. The perpendicular rays of the sun "move" northward, reaching perpendicular...

Universal healthcare not a good idea.(LETTERS TO THE EDITOR)(Letter to the editor)
September 17, 2007... Regarding Michael Moore's advocacy for socialized medicine (Inside Track, July 9 issue), I have to recall when I was a "beneficiary" of universal healthcare in the U.S. Military. The medical treatment was "free" and, sometimes, even...

Government agents provocateurs try to incite violence.(Inside Track)
September 17, 2007... Video footage of demonstrations at the North American Leaders' Summit in Montebello, Canada, on August 21 captured an incident in which three police officers masquerading as demonstrators attempted to incite a violent confrontation with the...

Conservative leaders denounce SPP/NAU.(Inside Track)(Security and Prosperity Partnership and North American Union )
September 17, 2007... While left-wing demonstrators marched in front of Canada's Parliament building in Ottawa and outside the North American Leaders' Summit of the Security and Prosperity Partnership (SPP) at the nearby resort village of Montebello, Canadian and...

Chertoff to punish states that don't accept Real ID.(Inside Track)(Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff)(Brief article)
September 17, 2007... More than half the nation's states have passed or proposed legislation opposing the federally mandated Real ID plan in some way or another. This 2005 legislation requires the states to issue new driver's licenses based on federal standards for...

Clergymen recruited to assist in enforcing martial law.(Inside Track)(Dr. Durell Tuberville)
September 17, 2007... "Could martial law ever become a reality in America?" asks reporter Jeff Ferrell for KSLA News 12, a CBS affiliate in Shreveport, Louisiana. The concept of martial law, the policing of American citizens by the United States military, is almost...

Ghoulish gimmick offers to turn sibling embryos into body parts.(Inside Track)(StemLifeLine)(Brief article)
September 17, 2007... A California biotech company, StemLifeLine, is peddling a service that offers to transform "spare embryos" into stem-cell lines that clients "may one day use to create personalized therapies for themselves and their families." StemLifeLine...

Padilla convicted with no evidence to back up charges.(Inside Track)(Jose Padilla )(Brief article)
September 17, 2007... Jose Padilla was arrested in 2002 and accused of planning to detonate a dirty atomic bomb in a major U.S. city in order to kill thousands. He was also labeled an enemy combatant and a collaborator of Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda. Held for more...

Report highlights pre-9/11 intelligence failures.(Inside Track)(Brief article)
September 17, 2007... A report released by the CIA provides additional details as to federal intelligence failures prior to 9/11. The report was prepared by the agency's Inspector General in 2005, but was kept under wraps until August 21, when it was released at the...

Tough Immigration law prompts mass exodus from Oklahoma.(Inside Track)(Brief article)
September 17, 2007... Although no one knows for sure how many immigrants in our midst are illegal, a tough anti-illegal-immigrant law recently passed in Oklahoma has prompted some illegal aliens to "self-deport" themselves from the state. According to a recent...

Filmmaker Aaron Russo dies.(Inside Track)(Obituary)(Brief article)
September 17, 2007... On August 24, cancer claimed the life of noted filmmaker Aaron Russo at age 64. Born in Brooklyn, Russo became a force in the rock and roll music industry as a young man. He eventually formed a partnership with Bette Midler and their production...

U.S. intelligence report offers dim view of Iraqi leadership.(Inside Track)(Prospects for Iraq's Stability: Some Security Progress but Political Reconciliation Elusive)(Brief article)
September 17, 2007... The August 23 release of the National Intelligence Assessment about the Iraq War could hardly have been viewed with joy by the Bush administration. Representing the consensus view of our nation's 16 intelligence agencies, the report described...

Hottest year on record in America now 1934 instead of 1998.(Inside Track)(Brief article)
September 17, 2007... Do you remember being told that 1998 was the warmest year on record in the United States? Well, we shouldn't hear that particular claim in connection with the global-warming debate any longer. As reported by ala August 15 Los Angeles Times...

Dangerous toys can be found everywhere.(Quick Quotes)(Brief article)
September 17, 2007... "If I went down the shelves of Wal-Mart and tested everything, I'm going to find serious problems. If we don't see an increase in recalls in this industry, then it's a case of denial." Toy analyst Sean McGowan at Wedbush Morgan Securities...

China's crimes against Western consumers continue to mount.(Quick Quotes)(Brief article)
September 17, 2007... "Having exported pet food and toothpaste laced with antifreeze earlier this year, the world's emerging economic powerhouse has diversified into other, equally dubious product lines: scallops coated with putrefying bacteria, counterfeit diabetes...

State department worries about Muslim youths worldwide.(Quick Quotes)(Brief article)
September 17, 2007... "There is a generation, in the Middle East in particular, of 15- to 22-year-olds, that during the most formative years of their lives has only seen the U.S. as an imperialist nation." Hoping to counter negative views of the United States,...

U.S. ambassador to Canada denies obvious NAU goals.(Quick Quotes)(Ambassador David H. Wilkins on North American Union)(Brief article)
September 17, 2007... "While conspiracy theories abound, you can take it to the bank that no one involved in these [SPP] discussions is interested in, or has ever proposed, a North American Union, a North American super highway, or a North American currency." ...

U.S. Army suicide rate soaring.(Quick Quotes)(Brief article)
September 17, 2007... "There was a significant relationship between suicide attempts and the number of days deployed." According to a report issued by the military, Army soldiers--most of whom had served in Iraq and Afghanistan--committed suicide last year at...

A record year for Afghan opium production.(Quick Quotes)(Afghanistan)(Brief article)
September 17, 2007... "I think it's sale to say that we should be looking for a new strategy." The failure of our nation's $600 million counternarcotics program designed to eradicate Afghanistan ' s opium production prompted U.S. Ambassador to Afghanistan...

Army gains recruits with a $20,000 signing bonus.(Quick Quotes)(Brief article)
September 17, 2007... "To me it signals something that we've been seeing already from the Army, a trade-off in terms of quality and quantity. My sense is that right now, they're willing to take anybody who is willing to walk in the door and ship by September 30."...

Behavior worth medicating? Government and psychiatry join forces to make children take powerful drugs, even against their parents' wishes.(CHILDREN)(Cover story)
September 17, 2007... When you are there, standing before an actual judge, real courtroom drama feels much less exciting than what you see on TV. There is no swelling music soundtrack, no scripted performances, and no overblown oratory. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]...

Solar power: not the brightest idea: while it is true that the sun sends more energy to Earth than humans could ever need, the problems associated with harnessing this energy make solar power very impractical.(ENERGY)
September 17, 2007... With "free energy" shining down, it should be expected people would want to harness solar energy to replace polluting sources of electricity. Is this possible? Yes, but the question is not whether some source of energy could provide the amount...

Torturing the English language: numerous forces in society currently promote incoherence in the use of language. This is an anti-human trend that undermines the very foundation of civilization.(CULTURE WAR)
September 17, 2007... In Japan in 1615, the forces of the Tokugawa Shogunate confronted the forces of the ruling Toyotomi clan at Osaka Castle. The Tokugawa forces outnumbered the Toyotomi and time was on their side. The Toyotomi, realizing their strategic...

Refusing Jamestown revisionism: four hundred years after the founding of Jamestown, revisionists are accusing those first English settlers of genocidal racism, but a look at the facts tells a different story.(CULTURE WAR)
September 17, 2007... This year is the 400th anniversary of Jamestown, the first English settlement to survive in what is now the United States. But what has previously been celebrated as a triumph of Western law and culture is remembered with increasingly negative,...

Unveiling Vietnam War secrets: An Enormous Crime, by William Hendon and Elizabeth Stewart, exposes secrets of the Vietnam War and provides ample documentation that American POWs were left behind.(Book review)
September 17, 2007... An Enormous Crime: The Definitive Account of American POWs Abandoned in Southeast Asia, by William Hendon and Elizabeth A. Stewart, New York: Thomas Dunne Books (a division of St. Martin's Press), 2007, 608 pages, hardcover, $29.95. ...

Tough choice.(THE GOODNESS OF AMERICA)
September 17, 2007... Joseph Anderson, a 10-year-old boy from Elmwood, Nebraska, was born with spina bifida, a birth defect allowing the spinal cord to protrude through an opening in the bones. Three years ago, Joseph and his parents, Vince and Julie Anderson, were...

Red Cross honors.(THE GOODNESS OF AMERICA)(Brief article)
September 17, 2007... Officials of the American Red Cross Bay Area Chapter and the group's leaders from throughout San Mateo County, California, gathered at a Heroes Breakfast on June 14 to recognize area residents for heroism. Among those honored were: * Mike...

Fightin' hunger, y'all!(THE GOODNESS OF AMERICA)
September 17, 2007... Terri S. Henry of Talahi Island, Georgia, recently watched a program on the Food Network during which Rachael Ray, who hosts a popular cooking show, spoke about childhood hunger. (See "Food-show Host Helps" in The Goodness of America for July...

Artist of the revolution: Diego Rivera's artwork reflected his ardent belief in communism and his rejection of God, tradition, and capitalism. Yet his American admirers included the Rockefellers.(HISTORY--PAST AND PERSPECTIVE)(Biography)
September 17, 2007... Diego Rivera produced some of Mexico's most beautiful and competent art during the 20th century. A student of both classical and modern forms, Rivera's artwork ranged from portraiture to propaganda. But he is perhaps best known for the latter....

Daft driver.(EXERCISING THE RIGHT)(Ravi Batuk Vora)(Brief article)
September 17, 2007... A man, reported to be one David Robinson, repeatedly told a confrontational person who kept banging on his front door that the man's wife was not taking refuge in his house. The enraged and insistent husband, Ravi Batuk Vora, didn't believe...

Truckjacking.(EXERCISING THE RIGHT)(Bruce Williams )(Brief article)
September 17, 2007... Fifty-seven-year-old Bruce Williams made an early morning stop on August 2 to get money from an ATM in Miramar, Florida. Nearby, waiting for an appropriate victim, were three robbers in a brown car. One of the three predators remains...

Death grip.(EXERCISING THE RIGHT)(Santos Arriola-Rochez and Rinthya Brooks)(Brief article)
September 17, 2007... About 1 a.m. on August 5, Santos Arriola-Rochez unobtrusively entered a VFW hall in Seattle where a group of Honduran immigrants were holding a cultural event, and he rushed up to his "ex-wife, wrapped himself around her in a tight grip, and...

Got him.(EXERCISING THE RIGHT)( Alton Tillman )(Brief article)
September 17, 2007... After his Clovis, New Mexico, home was burglarized three times within a week, 85-year-old Alton Tillman put an end to it. On August 7, he left home, acting as if he was leaving as usual, but he came right back. Inside the house, he found...

Sea treaty resurfaces.(Correction, Please!)(Law of the Sea Treaty)(Correction notice)
September 17, 2007... ITEM: "Earlier this month," commented USA Today on August 14, "Russia audaciously planted its national flag, encased in titanium, on the seabed below the North Pole.... Russia is laying claim to the area under the Arctic.... The 'new world'...

Jellybeans, tear gas, & transparency.(THE LAST WORD)(North American Leaders' Summit and Security and Prosperity Partnership )
September 17, 2007... If you missed the news coverage of the August 20-21 North American Leaders' Summit in Montebello, Canada, there's a fairly simple reason: there wasn't any coverage. Certainly nothing of any length or substance. While President Bush, Mexican...