About
Captain Ed is a father and grandfather living in the Twin Cities area of Minnesota, a native Californian who moved to the North Star State because of the weather. He lives with his wife Marcia, also known as the First Mate, their two dogs, and frequently watch their granddaughter Kayla, whom Captain Ed calls The Little Admiral.
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The Crows Nest
Rule 1: Drag The Corpse On Over First
If I've learned anything in four years of blogging, don't try to be out in front of the death rumors, especially with the villains of the world. Saddam died a hundred deaths before we caught him alive in his spider hole, and Abu Musab al-Zarqawi almost as many before his demise last year. Osama may or may not be alive, but everyone's avoided speculating on his fate for a while now. Maybe Val at Babalu Blog will get luckier with his "Castro Is Dead" story. We all hope so. I'll wait for the announcement ....
Hobbs Choice
Volunteer Voters is holding its annual "Best of Nashville" on-line polls, and one of the categories is for the best political writer. Our friend Bill Hobbs, now posting at Newsbusters, and he'd like his on-line fans to cast their votes. Drop by and put one in for Bill if you get a chance!
Murtha Getting Backlogged On Apologies
Gary Gross of Let Freedom Ring sees another case collapsing on the Haditha charges. He's called for Murtha to apologize earlier, and adds another reason to the tally.
No Such Thing As 'Moderate' Islam?
Turkish PM Tayyip Erdogan told a television interviewer that he finds the label "moderate Islam" offensive. Shrink Wrapped has a lot more on this, but at least in the same interview Erdogan acknowledged that "radical Islam" exists, and that it's been a catastrophe. Be sure to read the whole post.
MS-NBC Gets Punk'd
Power Line has a great post on a lack of journalistic effort on the part of MS-NBC. In covering the Michael Vick story, they reported on what they thought was Al Sharpton's website proclaiming Vick's innocence. I guess Alex Johnson and two other MS-NBC reporters couldn't bother to read the title bar of the site, which proudly proclaims it as a "parody site".
New Instapundit Podcast On Pharmaceuticals
I just caught this e-mail from Glenn Reynolds about his new podcast with Richard Epstein, the author of Overdose: How Excessive Government Regulation Stifles Pharmaceutical Innovation. Haven't had a chance to listen to it yet, but the topic is important enough to make sure I carve out time for it tomorrow. Get their first and tell me what I'm missing ....
Fed Trying A 'Stealth Easing'?
The Federal Reserve seems to have conducted a quiet campaign to steady markets that started spinning out of control, according to King Banaian at SCSU Scholars. He thinks that the Fed has conducted a "stealth easing". Be sure to read his explanation and follow his lnks.
A Shameless Bit Of Sel-Promotion
Gateway Pundit and Val at Babalu Blog note a crass PR move by Hugo Chavez. Venezuela has responded to Peru's eathquake disaster with food shipments -- and with Hugo's smiling picture on the cans. He also uses the tuna-can label to undermine President Garcia of Peru, who narrowly defeated Chavez' pal Ollanto Humalla, whom the labels extol for his "solidarity" with Chavez.
Tacky beyond belief.
Bush Going After Palestinian Terror Financing?
George Bush's new orders to USAID forces them to review the executive management of all NGOs to ensure that they have no terrorist connections. Carl in Jerusalem says at Israel Matzav that the order specifically intends to target Palestinian front groups for terrorists. Let's hope he's right.
Slow Start!
Yes, I'm off to a slow start today, thanks to some scripting issues, a bad back, and an alarm clock that needs replacing. Bear with me -- I'm ramping up, I promise...
And Now, In Little League Action Last Night ...
I once played in a Little League game where we lost, 30-1, obviously before mercy rules came into being. The only comfort during that shellacking was that 13-year-olds don't have to justify their salaries for being on the field. You have to wonder what the Baltimore Orioles have to feel without that caveat today, after losing 30-3 to the Texas Rangers. Sixteen of the runs came in the last two innings .... (via TMV)
Bush Speech On Iraq
I got a couple of e-mails wondering why I haven't linked to George Bush's speech today. I liked it; I just didn't have much to add. Rush Limbaugh covered it well on his site, and Power Line also links approvingly but has nothing much more to say. Michael Goldfarb notes that the Weekly Standard had made a similar argument regarding Vietnam a year ago.
Rove Fears Me -- No, Really!
Hot Air notes the latest fundraising letter from John Edwards. No longer content to indulge his paranoia when Ann Coulter mentions him, now he wants to indulge it when Karl Rove doesn't. Has any candidate seemed this desperate before now?
Racism Or Hard Truth?
Angela Winters looks at an editorial cartoon and the controvery it has caused in Jacksonville, Florida, especially in the black community. Truth or racism? When rap artists tell young listeners not to cooperate with the police, how much responsibility do they have for the victimization that follows? Read all of the essay at The Moderate Voice.
Support Citizen Journalism
Bill Ardolino at INDC Journal reminds us that there is a reporter shortage on the front lines. The best way to solve that problem? Donate to Public Multimedia, the citizen-journalist organization that supports Bill Roggio, Bill Ardolino, and others. (And a direct donation to Michael Yon would be much appreciated as well.)
Comments (12)
Posted by NRA Life Member | June 11, 2007 4:07 PM
If the membership drop and current total can be verified, I would like to think that this would be the end of Ibrahim Hooper getting a free pass to spread his brand of disinformation on the various talking head shows. I've seen this clown quite regularly compared to the number of times someone like Wayne Lapierre of the NRA (I know, totally different focus) gets on the interview shows, but at some point the number of people an individual represents should count for something.
Posted by Lightwave | June 11, 2007 4:23 PM
More proof that CAIR is nothing more than a US front for terror lobbying, and Congressman Elison is their pointman.
If CAIR was legitimately representing and advocating the views of the majority of Muslims in the US, membership would have drastically increased, not dropped by almost 95%. The fact of the matter is CAIR is radioactive to all but a few Muslims in the US. By this account, CAIR is a failure in this regard, yet it goes on as the most visible US Muslim organization in politics today.
Why is that? And again, who are these large donors? Shouldn't the US government be doing this investigation rather than the Washington Times? Is not the relationship between America's only Muslim Congressman and CAIR a national security issue of the highest priority?
Finally, if CAIR is this toxic, why is Keith Ellison accepting any sort of endorsement from them?
Posted by Fight4TheRight | June 11, 2007 6:32 PM
" Tomorrow, the Washington Times will have more detail from the records released under the FOIA demand. "
Hmmm...me thinks that somewhere across this country there are 25 VERY nervous people tonight!
Cap'n Ed - can you please put an update on this tomorrow once the additional info is released?
As for Ellison, he will sink his own ship. As time goes by his mouth will get more and more loose and anyone that knows Keith Ellison....knows that he can't stop shooting his mouth off and sooner or later, the Minnesotans from his District will find out what they put into the House. The best thing that could happen for the voters is for Ellison to keep getting the press....a cocky Ellison is an Ellison on his way out of Congress and back to only cheating local governments.
Posted by NahnCee | June 11, 2007 6:32 PM
So if CAIR gots no members, who's been reporting all those increases in hate crimes against Muslims they regularly report, and the media regularly prints all over the place, to make the rest of us feel guilty?
Posted by chsw | June 11, 2007 6:43 PM
If those 25 are all emirs, prices and kings, then CAIR may have to register as a lobbyist for foreign governments and organizations and give up its nonprofit, tax-exempt status. Moreover, CAIR's leadership may face tax fraud charges.
chsw
Posted by RKV | June 11, 2007 6:45 PM
We need the names of those who left as much as those who stayed. Counterintelligence would do well to investigate each and every member. If you where a jihadi, you'd run from scrutiny if you became aware that a front organization you belonged to had come under suspicion. It won't be pretty, but with an actual attack on American soil, this shouldn't get played up like the red scare trials of the 50s did.
Posted by richard mcenroe | June 11, 2007 7:16 PM
CAIR lost 90% of its membership? Dayyyam! How crowded is Gitmo, anyway?
Posted by docjim505 | June 11, 2007 7:47 PM
CAIR is a typical liberal front group: bankrolled by a few anti-American billionaires and given credibility by a fawning liberal media that agrees with their hatred of the United States and (in this case) Israel.
Posted by McGehee | June 11, 2007 8:56 PM
I would like to think that this would be the end of Ibrahim Hooper getting a free pass to spread his brand of disinformation on the various talking head shows.
So would I. Sadly, I've seen too much from the Establishment Media to actually expect it.
Posted by jpe | June 12, 2007 2:39 AM
I would think the names will be redacted. And, if CAIR really were guilty of a crime, why haven't they been indicted? We know the AUSA in Texas is out for them, since s/he sidestepped regular procedure and named them as unindicted coconspirator.
Posted by Eg | June 12, 2007 6:47 AM
Cair, along with this ‘M. Zuhdi Jasser, director of the American-Islamic Forum for Democracy,‘ certainly appear to have problems with numbers as IBD noted in their editiorial, CAIR's Fuzzy Math.
The sooner Western political leaders and representatives get over being intimidated by numbers, the more lives will be spared - the better.
Expect Cair to begin a campaign of howling, shrieking and whining about being the victims of Islamophobia by the Zionist-VRWC imperialist's of the Washington Times.
Posted by always right | June 12, 2007 2:35 PM
This number only tells you that 90% of their members did not want to have their name associated with Cair.
Other numbers showing "mooslems as the fastest growing religion - in US and around the world", and "numbers of mosques or mooslem cultural centers being built in your neck of the woods" tell you that imams and other equivalents getting more sophicated, they want to go underground, grass-root movement so nobody can track them.