You won’t read it in the Times or the Washington Post, but Investor’s Business Daily reports that Bush may keep his promise and halve the deficit three years early

Aided by surging tax receipts, President Bush may make good on his pledge to cut the deficit in half in 2006 — three years early.

Tax revenues are running $176 billion, or 12.9%, over last year, the Treasury Department said Monday. The Congressional Budget Office said receipts have risen faster over the first eight months of fiscal ’06 than in any other such period over the past 25 years — except for last year’s 15.5% jump.

The 2006 deficit through May was $227 billion, down from $273 billion at this time last year. Spending is up $130 billion, or 7.9%.

The CBO forecast in May that the 2006 deficit could fall as low as $300 billion. Michael Englund, chief economist of Action Economics, has long expected a deficit of about $270 billion this year. Now he thinks there’s a chance the “remarkable strength in receipts” will push the deficit even lower.

With the economy topping $13 trillion this year, a $270 billion deficit would equal less than 2.1% of GDP, easily beating the president’s 2.25% goal. Bush made his vow when the White House had a dour 2004 deficit forecast of 4.5% of GDP, or $521 billion. The actual ’04 deficit came in at $412 billion, or 3.5% of GDP, before falling to $318 billion, or 2.6% of GDP, in 2005.

A CBO analysis last week noted that withheld individual income and payroll taxes are up 7.6% from a year ago, with the gains picking up in recent months.

In our Second (and continuing) Reconstruction Period, few thought crimes are more vigorously prosecuted by the radical mob of the MSM than expressions of sympathy for the Lost Cause of the Southern Confederacy, and public display of the Confederate flag is treated as a major offense.

One might have assumed leftist power was purely terrestrial, but, no! it seems that even commercially-motivated displays of Confederate flags in space by foreigners must be carefully noted and arraigned before the bar of bien pensant opinion.

Russian cosmonaut Salizhan Sharipov may possibly have, with a keen eye on the bottom line, fetched along a 4×6″ Confederate flag with the diabolical intention of selling the well-travelled emblem of Rebellion and Agrarianism on Ebay to some overly affuent and irredentist red state dweller. Thank goodness, the forces of Political Correctness were on top of things to prevent the prospering of such a nefarious scheme.

The seller, one Alex Pachenko, withdrew the controversial symbol from the Ebay auction, claiming that cosmonaut Sharipov denied having anything to do with it, though NBCs photo does suggest otherwise.

Second story.

Scott Ott delivers another gem.

As news media reports of the potential murder of Iraqi civilians by U.S. troops continue to win the hearts and minds of the American people, al Qaeda today announced that it would launch its own probe to determine if some of its jihadists and martyrs “may have committed premeditated murder and even intentionally killed civilians.”

Usama bin Laden, Ayman al-Zawahiri and Abu Musab al-Zarqawi released a joint statement condemning violence against non-combatants and calling for “the immediate detention and speedy trial of any perpetrators of such crimes against Allah.”

In an attempt to quell the growing furor in the Arab world over reports of al Qaeda beheadings, bombings and abductions of civilians, Mr. bin Laden has dispatched a team of military crime scene investigators and attorneys to conduct a full investigation of all allegations against al Qaeda members.

“The accusations shocked us,” the statement said. “We must uphold our core values and military code of conduct, and 99.9 percent of our jihadists and martyrs do just that. But if anyone is found to have intentionally harmed innocent civilians, he will face Islamic justice.”

Bill Sammon, writing in the San Francisco Examiner, notes that the president is getting considerably less than fair reporting from the MSM.

When President Bush nominated Gen. Michael Hayden to run the CIA, the press focused on disapproving Democrats and even some Republicans who were dubious about confirmation.

A month later, when the Senate confirmed Hayden by a 78-15 vote, the story was given much less emphasis in the media, which had moved on to other stories critical of the Bush administration.

Similarly, when Bush nominated one of his aides, Brett Kavanaugh, to the federal judiciary, the press was filled with reports about Democrats threatening a filibuster because Kavanaugh once worked for special prosecutor Kenneth Starr in the case against President Clinton.

Last week, there was much less media coverage of a Rose Garden ceremony in which Bush presided over the swearing-in of Kavanaugh, who had been confirmed by a 57-36 vote.

Bush has quietly been racking up small victories like these that seem at odds with the media’s conventional wisdom of a presidency on the skids.

In addition to success with his nominations, Bush also is presiding over a booming economy and is even scoring some foreign policy advances..

“In today’s political climate, daily headlines and fast-moving events make it easy to lose the forest for the trees,” Bush counselor Dan Bartlett wrote in a memo this week. “But there is a clear tide of positive developments that reflect the president’s ability to get things done.”

“President Bush’s leadership is achieving a steady flow of results that do not always dominate the day’s headlines on their own but that together represent real progress for the American people,” Bartlett said.

LGF finds The Guardian, always quick to condemn the US on the basis of even rumors of coercive interrogation of captured terrorists, nodding approvingly at coerced (but persuasive!) confession extracted by terrorists themselves.

Blackmailed into a web of treason woven from their own deceit and sexual transgressions, Jefal and his lover faced the justice of the street this week when the 25-year-old Palestinian father was dragged blindfolded into the heart of Balata refugee camp in the West Bank and shot as the worst kind of traitor – a collaborator with Israel. At the execution the mother of one of those he betrayed handed out sweets.

An hour or so later Jefal’s mistress, Wedad Mustafa, a 27-year-old mother of four young children, was hauled from her home by her brothers and killed before a crowd in an act designed to restore the family’s honour.

Public killings of collaborators are not uncommon in the occupied territories. But behind the deaths of Jefal and Wedad lies a tale of both Israeli blackmail, in an operation to stalk one of the most wanted men in Balata, and of two lovers seeking to get rid of an unwanted husband.

Jefal, a member of a respected family in Balata, left an account – coerced but persuasive – of turning traitor. A “confession” video was recorded following interrogation by members of al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades, the armed Palestinian group responsible for hundreds of deaths in suicide bombings and other attacks and which dominates the refugee camp next to Nablus.

Would that there were only some way to separate our entire treasonous liberal clerisy from the rest of the population of the Western democracies, step aside, and let the Islamofascists have them, to deal with as they choose.

Photo used by London Times to libel US Marines

Michelle Malkin today publicly identified a major case of fraud by one of the most prominent international members of the mainstream establishment media.

The Times (UK), on June 1st, ran a vitriolic anti-US news story, titled ‘Massacre Marines blinded by hate’, based entirely on selective quotation of an interview with Corporal James Crossan, a marine injured in the IED attack, which included a photo of supposed victims of American forces. The photo was actually taken six months earlier, and the bodies were the victims of a massacre by insurgents in a soccer stadium.

That lying bastard who wrote the smear story selectively quotes Crossan speculating, in a video interview with KING5 News in Seattle, on what might have happened after he had been evacuated by helicopter:

I think they were blinded by hate . . . and they just lost control.” Corporal Crossan, who passed out soon after being hit by the bomb in al-Haditha on November 19 last year, said that the unit had a lot of new members. “

They might have got scared or they were just p*****, really p***** off and did it.”

(Note: Crossan is only speculating on why marines might have shot civilians, if they actually had. He dd not witness any such thing personally.)

But he didn’t quote Crossan saying:

Crossan: We used to go out on patrols and have the little kids count the patrols and all that stuff and we couldn’t really do anything except grab them and throw them inside their houses…

KING 5 TV interviewer: Why would you do that? Because you were afraid that the kids were scouting for the insurgents or you thought they were in danger?

Crossan: There are little kids that scout for ‘em. ‘Cuz later that day we, along the main road there, we cut behind a few buildings and the next patrol that went out got hit. And that little kid that was just there and there was people all around. But the day that I got hit they were planning a major attack and it got spoiled, so, and there was like 20 some people, insurgents, that were gonna attack the cop that day.

Then we got hit by an IED and the cops sent out a squad of Marines, and the insurgents just started attacking then, just right off the bat and we just foiled it. We were just driving back from the cop. I remember taking a left and then a right, and then remember waking up from the ground for a split second. And then waking up in the helicopter and then finally knew what happened in the hospital.

KING 5: So after you were injured, also tell me, you lost one of your guys. What can you tell me about him?

Crossan: We lost Lance Col. Miguel Terrazas. He was a good guy. He was from El Paso, Texas. And he was my point man. He was pretty much the guy I went to if I needed anything.

Great work, Michelle Malkin.

The US Government really ought to deport leftwing London Times journalist Tim Reid for this one.

USATODAY has a story quoting marines currently serving in Iraq, warning of the harm being done to US efforts to stop the insurgency by the MSM’s haste to trumpet unproven charges damaging to the reputation of American forces.

Allegations that Marines killed civilians in the western Iraqi town of Hadithah last year could undo efforts to win the cooperation of locals in the volatile Anbar province, some Marines say.
“All it does is make our jobs harder out here,” said Capt. Andrew Del Gaudio, commander of Kilo Company, 3rd Battalion, 8th Marine Regiment. “Every Iraqi will assume Marines will act like that. It’s a perception that in this part of the world is hard to overcome.”

Dave Price at Dean’s World compares the MSM’s feeding frenzy over alleged events in Haditha with the Duke lacrosse team rape case coverage.

Well, the press is in full troop-bashing mode, with 90% of Iraq coverage now focused on Haditha. And almost to a word, the articles are written with the assumption U.S. Marines have committed an atrocity; this before any serious look has been taken at the evidence.

But there are problems with the narrative. First off, the doctor who certified the civilians as having been shot is, shall we say, not exactly objective. Secondly, the area is rather pro-insurgent, and witnesses may not be credible (remember the early reports of the Jenin “massacre?”). Third, given that the insurgents commit mass murders on a daily basis and understand propaganda, it’s not unreasonable to think they might have committed the atrocity themselves, then staged the area to give the impression it was coalition troops that had been responsible.

Meanwhile, defense lawyers for the accused Marines are requesting drone footage, saying it will exonerate them. That doesn’t sound like something they would do if they thought the evidence would show them committing atrocities.

Does this remind anyone else of the Duke lacrosse team rape case? Unreliable witness, exculpatory footage, a media that has already hung them…

At the very least, our troops deserve the benefit of the doubt until tried. Hard to believe Memorial Day was only a few days ago, and already the media is spitting on our soldiers.

Tim Graham compares the MSM’s treatment of Ron Howard’s The DaVinci Code (2006) — and its treatment of the Danish cartoons– to its treatment of Mel Gibson’s The Passion of the Christ (2004).

âu2013 The DaVinci Code received more of a publicity push from the networks than The Passion of the Christ. The number of segments devoted to the movies in the year before their cinematic release was 99 for The DaVinci Code to 66 for The Passion. Most of those came on morning shows. By far, the biggest Code promoter was NBC’s Today, which more provided more stories (38) than the other two network morning shows combined (29). By contrast, NBC was in third-place in Passion segments (11).

âu2013 The Passion of the Christ was treated as a social problem — the biggest TV anti-Semitism story of that year — while The DaVinci Code was presented more often as an “intriguing” theory rather than threatening or offensive to Christians. Nearly every one of the 66 network segments on The Passion on ABC, CBS, and NBC touched on those complaints. But only 27 of the 99 Code segments focused on Christian and Catholic protests.

âu2013 While the faith of millions of Americans, Christianity, is singled out for criticism, with one “fascinating” fictional detail after another, the networks either refused to air or barely aired mild Mohammed cartoons out of great sensitivity to American Muslims. At the same time that Christianity is questioned as a false religion in The DaVinci Code, the networks demonstrated an exquisite sensitivity to American Muslims on the sensitive subject of threatened violence against mostly mild Danish cartoons mocking the prophet Muhammad. ABC aired a glance at one cartoon on two programs. CBS and NBC declared they would censor the images.

âu2013 In their push to promote The DaVinci Code, the networks routinely failed to address how the book most offended Christian sensitivities: that Christianity itself is a lie. The networks showed their lack of belief or interest in religion as they almost always failed to examine Brown’s most contentious charge: that Jesus was not the Son of God. While many noted the scandalous claim of a sexual relationship between Jesus and Mary Magdalene, only six stories explained the Code’s denial of the divinity of Jesus.

âu2013 While Mel Gibson was attacked and even psychoanalyzed for his religious beliefs, DaVinci Code author Dan Brown and filmmakers Ron Howard and Brian Grazer were never personally examined or challenged about their personal religious beliefs, their willingness to milk controversy, play fast and loose with facts, and offend Christians for personal gain. Whenever the networks decided to address fact and fiction in The DaVinci Code, they almost always found it was stuffed with falsehoods. But they never focused on the idea that Brown, Grazer, or Howard should be criticized for being too casual with the truth.

âu2013 The networks also bought into the DaVinci Code craze by picking up and publicizing other Code-related books attacking Christianity and the Catholic Church, but their standard of evidence was hardly an example of what a skeptical journalist would apply. Authors of new books like The Jesus Papers and The Jesus Dynasty were offered publicity forums, even though the network journalists pronounced the evidence behind the claims was flimsy, even non-existent. So why did the networks promote them?

Instapunk explains how the MSM did it.

while the bloggers were fighting their various and diverse battles in the name of truth, justice, and common sense, the MSM ocean was harnessing its entire immensity on just one story, told an infinite number of times, in every possible inflection, from every direction, and with the deadly persistent accuracy of a dripping tap: George W. Bush is no good.

It doesn’t have to be true, it doesn’t have to be fair, it doesn’t have to be consistent in its terms. All that matters is that it is repeated with uniform constancy: drip, drip, drip. George W. Bush is no good. George W. Bush is no good. George W. Bush is no good. Change the headlines, seem to change the subject. Abu Ghraib. European disdain. Tom Delay. Katrina. Deficits. Valerie Plame. Gas prices. Karl Rove. Death in Iraq. Angry mothers. NSA wiretaps. Drip, drip, drip, drip, drip, the lede is always the same. George W. Bush is no good. George W. Bush is no good. George W. Bush is no good. George W. Bush is no good. George W. Bush is no good. George W. Bush is no good. Forget the good news, bury the accomplishments or ignore them altogether. Drip, drip, George W. Bush is no good, George W. Bush is no good, George W. Bush is no good.

It took the MSM three years to bring George W. Bush’s approval ratings down from their post 9/11 high to 52 percent on election day 2004. It’s taken them just 18 months [corr. per Tim] to bring him down another 20 to 25 points.

He’s perfectly right. Bush survived well enough until the Hurricane Katrina gave the MSM what it needed, a spectacular disaster story, in which exaggerations and distortions could be disseminated day after day after day with no possibility of factual correction. Bush might have prevented their success with a better public relations campaign, but he doesn’t do very much of that sort of thing or do it all that well.

The Anti-Bush Intel Community captured today’s news lead with its latest leak in USA Today. Despite all the traction the story is getting in the Blogosphere, we are clearly really just dealing with a repackaging and reissue (“old wine in new bottes”) of the same old NSA communications data-mining story originally leaked to Eric Lichtblau and James Risen in the New York Times last December.

Today’s leak goes:

The National Security Agency has been secretly collecting the phone call records of tens of millions of Americans, using data provided by AT&T, Verizon and BellSouth, people with direct knowledge of the arrangement told USA TODAY.

The NSA program reaches into homes and businesses across the nation by amassing information about the calls of ordinary Americans — most of whom aren’t suspected of any crime. This program does not involve the NSA listening to or recording conversations. But the spy agency is using the data to analyze calling patterns in an effort to detect terrorist activity, sources said in separate interviews…

“It’s the largest database ever assembled in the world,” said one person, who, like the others who agreed to talk about the NSA’s activities, declined to be identified by name or affiliation. The agency’s goal is “to create a database of every call ever made” within the nation’s borders, this person added.

Leslie Cauley, author of the USA Today article, adds (curiously overlooking the fact that she and her employers are also breaking the law, and her name is right there at the top of the article):

The sources would talk only under a guarantee of anonymity because the NSA program is secret.

———————————————-
So, as you may well imagine, the left is, this morning, again indulging in another of its little psychodramas involving George W. Bush poring over each leftist blogger’s phone bill to see how any times he/she spoke to Aunt Tillie last month.

The Mahablog, which styles itself (tin trumpet call) as “Home blog of the American Resistance,” grabs today’s headlined leak, and runs with it, demanding indignantly:Let’s See the “Libertarian” Righties Defend This One.

Why, sure, always glad to oblige a moonbat.

The United States is at war. Foreign enemies are actively engaged in efforts to carry out attacks on civilian population centers in the United States. Enemy agents are undoubtedly resident in the United States and operating off US soil. Can the president of the United States, in such circumstances, authorize the intelligence services of the United States to intercept and open mail addressed to, or sent by, US residents, including citizens? Of course, he can. As Justice Robert Jackson remarked, “The US Constitution is not a suicide pact.”

The caterwauling of the left over the NSA’s communications data-mining activity is nothing more than narcissistic fantasy. Are there any adults on the left? You people all read like adolescent teenagers. The world revolves around little you.

In reality, no one is actually listening to your phone calls, or reading your phone bills. Some very very large computers are crunching through databases which include your phone records, my phone records, and another few hundred million phone records mechanically and indifferently, searching for various kinds of incriminating clues. If you haven’t been placing a lot of calls to suspicious numbers in Waziristan, if your favorite phone buddy is not on a list of terrorists, there is absolutely nothing to be concerned about.

Speaking frankly, guys, if they haven’t arrested Dana Priest, Lichtblau and Risen, Leslie Cauley, and most of their informants yet, there isn’t a lot of chance that anybody is coming looking for you.

The New York Times reports one of the more dubious psychological studies I’ve heard about to date, purportedly demonstrating that merely handling a gun increased aggressiveness. It seems actually to show that people who handle guns wind up preferring spicy foods.