Free Republic

There is a saying in police work and in military service that certain very noxious, offensive substances always roll downhill. That is to say, foul-ups instigated by bad policy will always be blamed on the lowest possible links in the chain of command. Such is the case now in Afghanistan. Diana West writes extensively about U.S. Army General Stanley McChrystal’s (pictured above with CIC Obama) “hearts and minds” Afghanistan counter-insurgency campaign: Sacrificing American lives by denying artillery and air support to our ground troops pinned down under heavy enemy fire is acceptable, because artillery and bombs may cause collateral damage...

On Christmas Day, a gentleman from Nigeria succeeded (effortlessly) in boarding a flight to Detroit with a bomb in his underwear. Pretty funny, huh? But the Pantybomber wasn’t the big joke. The real laugh was the United States government. The global hyperpower spent the next week making itself a laughingstock to the entire planet. First, the bureaucrats at the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) swung into action with a whole new range of restrictions. Against radical Yemen-trained Muslims wearing weaponized briefs? Of course not. That would be too obvious. So instead they imposed a slew of constraints against you. At Heathrow...