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More Dzurinda. He has assisted in the implemenation of a “flat tax” for Slovakia . . . and guess what, it’s working:

We have gained valuable experience from the tax reform. We have introduced a flat rate tax for both legal and natural persons. We harmonised VAT rates into a single rate. Without any exceptions. The result is improved tax collection and administration, higher transparency, less bureaucracy, and higher tax revenues for the state budget.
The result of this reform is also a significantly higher influx of foreign investments, which brings new jobs and a faster economic growth.

High transparency and less bureaucracy! That doesn’t sound like the IRS. The U.S. has set an example of democracy and freedom for Slovakia. Perhaps, Slovakia could teach us something about tax collection.

Slovakian Prime Minister Mikulas Dzurinda spoke the truth about the MSM’s coverage of the Iraq War during President Bush’s visit to the former Communist country. Here’s the tasty bite:

“President Bush told me in Brussels: ‘I am so unhappy that media creates the picture that Bush wants war in Iran. This is crazy,’ ” Mr. Dzurinda told a small group of reporters over lunch.
The prime minister was reminded that while the governments of Central and Eastern Europe supported Operation Iraqi Freedom, the populace was much more skeptical, according to polls.
Mr. Dzurinda responded by telling the journalists, including one from CNN, that he was “shocked” to see media outlets like CNN and the British Broadcasting Corp. (BBC) showing “only American soldiers killing people. But nobody was able to show Saddam Hussein, who killed many, many thousands of Iraqi people.”
“It was impossible to see a real picture of this regime,” he lamented. “And the result is the public is one day strongly against Bush. ‘Bush loves war,’ he’s ‘new terrorist,’ and so on and so on.”
The prime minister predicted that it is “only a question of time when people in Slovakia, in Germany, in European countries, will understand more that this activity were necessary. And the world, without Saddam Hussein, is much more democratic than before.”

This blatant honesty is refreshing from a European leader. It seems that the Eastern Europeans are more grateful to the United States for their freedom (liberating the eastern bloc countries from Soviet repression) than their Western European counterparts. For example, the Frenchy-French would be speaking German if it were not for the bravery of American troops yet they have violently opposed the U.S. in liberating Iraq. If any European deserves an invitation to Bush’s ranch (besides Tony Blair), it’s Dzurinda.

Here’s some of Dzurida’s comments prior to the U.S. invasion of Iraq:

Iraq pursued a nuclear weapons programme, and owned and produced tons of banned chemical and biological weapons. Its arsenal included thousand of litres of anthrax, warheads with mustard gas, biological bombs, and the VX nerve agent. The task of the inspectors who returned to Iraq a few weeks ago is not to prove that Hussein owns such weapons. On the contrary – Saddam Hussein has an obligation to prove that he has disarmed. Weapons inspectors report that he has not provided the requested evidence on the destruction of chemical weapons, has failed to fulfil the demands of disarmament, and is concealing documents from them. Therefore: Iraq had the weapons, and under a resolution of the UN Security Council was required to produce evidence of disarmament. It did not do so. It did not submit the evidence. It did not cooperate as required. It did not comply with the UN resolution.
Facts, experience, and common sense speak clearly: If such a regime – in the face of tremendous pressure from the international community – fails to act in an honest and sincere manner, it harbours evil intentions. When such a regime trains and supports terrorists who present a global threat, it must be brought down as a matter of self-preservation and self-defence. The longer such a regime stays in power, the greater the danger of other terrorist attacks, similar to those in New York, Washington, Bali, or Moscow. Today’s international terrorism does not take the form of isolated acts committed by individuals – it is represented by a well-trained army, which needs bases, support, and weapons. There is a direct link between regimes such as Hussein’s dictatorship in Iraq and terrorism. The idea of chemical or biological weapons in the hands of terrorists is an ominous one.
We support the peaceful resolution of conflicts. However, the historical experience of both Europe and our homeland tells us that yielding to aggression does not lead to peace. In the last century, Europe pondered whether and how it should confront a mad dictator. The decision to yield to Hitler was taken in Munich in 1938. Fifty million people paid the price of this decision with their lives.

He has it right. Only preemptively striking the terrorists can we be safe and protect ourselves against catastrophic death. If the United States or other nations “yield” to terrorists (i.e., favor diplomatic pusillanimity) and placate instead of punish, we place our future into terrorist hands. I wish there were more Dzurinkas than Chiracs in Europe.

I disagree with scientists or science-lovers (Libs or Cons) who lift science upon a secular holier-than-thou pedestal in which science explains everything or will explain everything as soon as scientific discovery catches up the unknown.

Case in point: Wacko columnist Glenn Edwards attacks intelligent design and bemoans any religious influence in our society not boxed into the separation of church and state.

Edwards is wrong on several points. Here are a few:

• Intelligent design does not automatically equal creationism. The Earth could have been created by a higher life form, not a God, and so it is incorrect to muddle their meanings by arguing they are one and the same.
• The Constitution does not have a separation of church and state. Religion and religious influence is encouraged, not discouraged, in the First Amendment. The wall of separation is liberal fiction.
• The United States was founded by Christians and remains still a Christian Nation. To unequivocally state the contrary is to defy history and read blindly such historical masterpieces as George Washington’s first Presidential Address. President Washington, said among other things that “[I]t would be peculiarly improper to omit in this first official act my fervent supplications to that Almighty Being who rules over the universe, who presides in the councils of nations, and whose providential aids can supply every human defect, that His benediction may consecrate to the liberties and happiness of the people of the United States a Government instituted by themselves for these essential purposes, and may enable every instrument employed in its administration to execute with success the functions allotted to his charge.”
• The mere discussion of intellgent design with or without Darwinism does not create an establishment of religion. Establishment is much more than discussion (e.g., citizen pays taxes to support the particular religious creed).

Ultimately, science attempts to explain what God created. Until the psuedo-religionists or athetists acknowledge this, they will never reach a complete (or more complete) understanding about the Earth, the Universe, and why we exist. For now, it seems that Thomas and other like-minded Wackos are content to remain in secular/scientific darkness.

As I was perusing the updated conservative/liberal ratings of U.S. Senators and Representatives, I stumbled across yet another journalist miffed about the bloggers success.

Williams Powers’s piece in the latest issue of National Journal at first-glance reads as if Powers approves of bloggers but actually is a stealth-attack masked as favorable parlance. Powers indeliably praises the bloggers (e.g., for the takedown of CNN executive Eason Jordan), however, he describes the result as “wicked.” Also, Powers is mistaken in claiming the MSM was centrist! before the bloggers arrival:

The current momentis troubling for a lot of people precisely because it’s so cannibalistic. In the last half of the 20th century, the media consolidated a great deal of power for themselves in a tiny tribe of supreme outlets. Since those outlets had strong tendencies toward the center (because that’s where the big audiences and the money are), it was inevitable that a lot of news consumer –those who aren’t so centrist –would be unhappy with the product.

Calling the MSM centrist is a joke. I wonder who he believes is centrist: The New York Times? The Washington Post?

Powers reasons that because only the MSM can perform “the heavy journalistic lifting” necessary to vet out the truth or produce real news, bloggers will soon fade away into obscurity.

Powers is wrong. He appears, from his clever but substance-less writing, that he is one of those snob journalists who feels that one needs a degree in journalism or a job at a MSM outlet to be taken seriously.

As the Eason Jordan scenario (among others) illustrates: Bloggers are staying and Journalists now have some competition. How sad, Mr. Powers. How sad indeed.

As usual, LGF digs up the good stuff.

Today, a young Muslim has been charged with conspiring to assassinate President Bush. Allegedly, Ahmed Omar Abu Ali wanted to kill President Bush by shooting him, or like a good Muslim terrorist, by detonating a car bomb.

Abu Ali is presumed innocent until guility because he actually is an American citizen and will be afforded a trial in U.S. District Court (unlike the Gitmo detainees who should not have any rights guaranteed in our Constutition because they are not citizens). As for the guilt or innocence of the Gitmo detainees, well, I think being captured fighting for the now-defunct Taliban in Afghanistan speaks for itself–guilty.

Getting back to Abu Ali, friends of his have started an internet petition with the aim to solict the government for Abu Ali’s release. Here’s some of the comments posted by various signatories (before Lizardoids began commenting):

• I saw this testimony on CSPAN in the middle of the night, 10/16/04. I was horrified and enraged. Bring this young man home now! Then, I hope to see a full investigative report by a major media outlet during prime time. #514
• THEY SAY THAT AMERICA IS A FREE COUNRTY ??? WERES THE FREEDOM ? I HOPE THEY FREE MY BROTHER INSHALLAH ! #588 (needs to learn how to use spell-check).

All 9/11 terrorists were Muslim. Abu Ali alleged terrorist is Muslim. It’s time to start racial profiling of all Muslims who enter the United States. I know that unfairly burdens American Muslims and non-American Muslims who live and visit America with good intentions and see our free land as “Home of the Brave.” But, we need to protect our Nation. The time is now. Seal the border, throughly screen on a pre-entry, entry, and post-entry basis of persons entering our country, and deport criminal violators (e.g., illegal aliens).

If Abu Ali is guilty, I hope he rots for life.

I’m an avid reader and subscriber of National Review. Simply, it is the best magazine on the planet, the conversative pantheon of Willam F. Buckley.

Here’s the bi-weekly snipet from “The Week”:

“A New York state judge ordered New York City to accord legal standing to same-sex ‘”marriages.’” Mayor Michael Bloomberg greeted the decision by saying that while he supports the concept of same-sex marriage, he thought that the judge had misread state law. He will appeal the decision while asking the legislature to change the law. Law-abiding is more like it. Whatever our views on same-sex marriage, we should not be twisting the law to pretend that the public has already ratified it.”

Amen. Exactly. Bloomberg is such a Lib. At least Bloomberg was gracious enough (unlike the Wacko Mayor of San Fransisco) to sustain and uphold the law as it now stands–no same-sex marriage–instead of opening the city courts for gays to “wed.”

Google (unfortunately) is full of libs.

It has always bothered me how liberal Yahoo! News is as well. Every time I look at Yahoo! News, I feel like I’m reading an anthology that is pro-gay, anti-Bush, pro-Environmental Wacko, and anti-capitalist. Thank goodness there are alternatives to their maddening biases.

Today, Senator Hillary Rodham Rodham (as Rush calls her) introduced the Count Every Vote Act of 2005 (”CEVA”). CEVA, if passed, would create a national holiday on Election Day and permit ex-felons to vote.

My beef with CEVA is the political raison d’etre for its introduction–empowering 4.6 million ex- felons to vote for the Dems without any consideration as to the why our nation removes the privilege of suffrage from those who malign society with their criminal actions. Voting is a privilege not a right. The Founders believed that only persons of good moral character should be permitted to participate in our representative government. A felony is not throwing spitwads, but in many cases brutally assaulting another human being. Although a complete ban on ex-felons might unfairly punish a few, it would be more unjust to allow murderers and rapists to be permitted to vote and select those persons of good moral character to represent my interests in Washington D.C.

One other interesting tidbit: Senator Hillary Clinton’s press release names Senator Barbara Boxer (D-CA) and Representative Tubbs Jones (D-OH) as participating in the CEVA unveilment. However, guess who was also there but not included in the title of Sen. Clinton’s press release–Senator John F. Kerry. How was he described? As an “other.” Hilliary is already bashing Senator Waffles . . . what a shame.

If you have a gazillion dollars, then why not support a terrorist? That’s what George Soros must have been thinking when his Open Society Institute donated $20,000 to the defense team of Lynn Stewart, the terrorist lawyer who was convicted of helping her terrorist client transmit messages to his terrorist thug network (see post “Another Terrorist Bites the Dust“).

Another defeat for terror = another defeat for Soros.