'Perp Walk' of IMF Big Shot Outrages French Lefties

By David Paulin

Many in France are embarrassed and ashamed at the arrest of IMF big shot Dominique Strauss-Kahn, a prominent French socialist seen as the most likely candidate to defeat center-right President Nicolas Sarkozy.

But what's got some French lefties really upset is that New York's police put the accused sex offender through a traditional "perp walk” – paraded before TV cameras in handcuffs just like, well, a common criminal suspect!

Eva Joly, leader of the French Green Party, called the perp walk a "violent image." And she had some harsh words for America's justice system – complaining it “doesn't distinguish between the director of the I.M.F. and any other suspect."

In an amusing article about how the “perp walk” has shocked the French – and particularly French lefties -- the New York Times noted that Joly is "a well-known French magistrate who once brought charges against Mr. Strauss-Kahn for corruption (of which he was later acquitted)." She's expected to run in next year's presidential election.

Strauss-Kahn, 62, has been denied bail, having been deemed a flight risk. He is accused of attempted rape, a criminal sex act, and unlawful imprisonment – all for his alleged sexual assault upon a 32-year-old chamber maid in his $3,000-a-night New York City hotel suite. His alleged victim is an immigrant from Africa who lives in the Bronx.

Meanwhile, other women are coming forward about nasty encounters with Strauss-Kahn, a communist-turned socialist who's known in France as the “great seducer” because of his reputation as an out-of-control womanizer. One French journalist complained of an encounter in which Strauss-Kahn, whom she was trying to interview, pawed at her like a "chimpanzee in heat."

France's right-wing politicians, meanwhile, are calling Strauss-Kahn a name that's perhaps worse than being called a sex offender: a "champagne socialist!" Among the incriminating evidence: A photo of Strauss-Kahn and his wife getting into a Porsche costing more than $100,000. The car didn't actually belong to Strauss-Kahn but to a friend. But no matter. The photo “sparked sneers on the Internet and from the Right,” noted London's conservative newspaper, The Telegraph.

The paper added that "Brice Hortefeux, (France's) former interior minister and a close friend of President Nicolas Sarkozy, quipped that the Left had abandoned the symbols of the workers' struggle used when Socialist president, Francois Mitterrand, first took power.

"Back in 1981, it was the rose and the clenched fist. Today it's a Porsche at the wheel," Mr. Hortefeux said.

"The jibe was aimed at proving Mr. Strauss-Kahn is out of touch after four years with the IMF, and sought to stoke tensions within the French Left, where traditionalists already see Mr Strauss-Kahn, a former Socialist finance minister, as too Right-wing."

During the French Revolution, the guillotine was introduced as a form of punishment symbolizing the revolution's highest ideals: It treated rich and poor exactly alike -- giving them an equally quick and painless death. Obviously, France has come a long way since those lofty ideals. Disgust among some lefties over the "perp walk" -- and view that it should be reserved only for common criminal suspects -- is testimony to that.

Originally published in The American Thinker

Police Raid Florida Mosque in Politically Correct Fashion




By David Paulin

In an early-morning raid on Saturday, dozens of Federal agents and police surrounded a mosque in west Miami-Dade County. They were after suspected jihadists – Pakistani-born American citizens who'd allegedly been providing material support to the Pakistani Taliban and who hoped for the deaths of American soldiers in Afghanistan. They wanted to see Sharia law established in Pakistan as well.

Accordingly, police weren't taking any chances. They were heavily armed. And they showed up just after 6 a.m. to ensure they had the element of surprise.

“Open up! Police!” they shouted.

But, alas, police encountered a pesky little problem: Religious ceremonies were being conducted by their prime target – a 76-year-old iman named Hafiz Muhammed Sher Ali Khan. Accordingly, 25 to 30 law-enforcement officers respectfully waited for prayers to end – and then obligingly took off their shoes upon entering the mosque, according to an article in Sunday's South Florida Sun-Sentinel.

What evidence might have been destroyed before police finally got inside the mosque to handcuff suspects? Drug dealers, mafia dons, and KKK members are never accorded such courtesies – police quickly break down their doors and arrest them. So why are suspected Muslim terrorists given such respect? Well, there's a two-word answer for that: political correctness. But at least the respectful way Saturday's raid was carried out can help President Obama prove to Muslims that America respects Islam!

Aside from the raid's troubling example of dhimmitude, the FBI and Joint Terrorism Task Force appear to have done a splendid job; their indictment was based on a three-year investigation involving wiretaps and the analysis of suspicious wire transactions. Khan and five accomplices -- including two of his sons -- were accused of providing at least $50,000 to America's enemies -- an amount prosecutors called the "tip of the iceberg." The money was allegedly used to buy guns for the Pakistani Taliban, support terrorism, and to operate an Islamic school in Pakistan with terrorists ties.

Kahn, after hearing the mujahideen in Afghanistan had killed seven American soldiers, also was reported to have boasted that he wished that God kill 50,000 more of them.

As the Sun Sentinel also reported:

One of the imam's sons, Izhar Khan, a 24-year-old North Lauderdale resident, was arrested in the parking lot of the Masjid Jamaat Al-Mumineen mosque in Margate, where he is imam, just before the 6 a.m. prayer.

Agents also seized computers from the mosque office.

The other son, Miami resident Irfan Khan, 37, was awakened by agents at a hotel in Los Angeles at 3 a.m. Pacific time and taken into custody there.

All three men are American citizens who are originally from Pakistan, authorities said.

"Despite being an imam, or spiritual leader, Hafiz Khan was by no means a man of peace,'' said U.S. Attorney Wifredo A. Ferrer. "Instead, as today's charges show, he acted with others to support terrorists to further acts of murder, kidnapping and maiming."

Three others named in the indictment remain at large in Pakistan. They were identified as Ali Rehman, also known as Faisal Ali Rehman; Amina Khan, also known as Amina Bibi, who is the daughter of Hafiz Khan; and her son, Alam Zeb, Khan's grandson.

Fortunately, the arrests had absolutely nothing to do with Islam or the two Florida mosques that were raided. As the Sun-Sentinel reported in a separate article:

Yazid Ali, the board president of the Margate mosque, said those who know Izhar Khan were "very surprised" by news of his arrest.

"We are in full cooperation with all of the authorities involved in this case," he said. "We would like everyone to know that Margate mosque Al does not support terrorism, for this is a forbidden act in Islam."

Mosque secretary Fazal Deen said, "I never, ever heard anything that came close to militancy from him."

The indictment does not charge the mosques themselves with any wrongdoing. The U.S. Attorney's Office said they are charging the individual defendants based on their support to terrorism, not on their religious beliefs or teachings.


Originally published at The American Thinker

Outraged Texas Lawmakers Seeking to Stop TSA Abuses



By David Paulin

Little girls, grandmothers, beauty queens – all are unlikely terrorists. Yet all have been victims in recent months of invasive Transportation Security Administration pat-downs at the nation's airports. The searches have sparked public outrage -- despite claims from the Obama administration that they're needed to stop would-be terrorists.

Now, Texas lawmakers are seeking to end this insanity after a former Miss USA complained last month that TSA agents "molested" her at the Dallas/Fort Worth airport. On Thursday, House members passed a bill banning pat-downs in the Lone Star State in which a TSA agent "touches the anus, sexual organ, buttocks, or breast of another person including through the clothing, or touches the other person in a manner that would be offensive to a reasonable person."

Moreover, TSA agents who conduct such pat-downs could be found guilty of sexual harassment and official oppression. They could be charged with misdemeanor crime and be subject to a $4,000 fine and one-year in jail under the measure, according to news reports.

"Indecent groping searches when innocent travelers are seeking access to airports and public buildings would be outlawed under this bill," the measure's author, Republican David Simpson, was quoted as saying.

"This has to do with dignity in travel," he said. The House must take a final vote on the bill and it must then be approved by the Senate.

Of course, there's another side to this story -- whether TSA agents ought to be able to carry out invasive pat-downs on certain travelers who fit a profile that, well, nobody in the Obama administration dares to talk about. Israeli airline El Al does do profiling that's based on a variety of criteria. It has a stellar safety record.

Speaking of profiling, here's a YouTube clip of a TSA agent groping a little girl -- apparently checking for, ah, plastic explosives or box cutters. At least it's all very politically correct; the 6-year-old, after all, is not wearing a burka or from the Middle East.

Imbed of video clip



Originally published in The American Thinker

Jay Leno Does Osama: 'The Pakistani Hillbillies'

By David Paulin

Americans have a sense of humor, even when confronting abject evil. The "Tonight Show's" Jay Leno, for instance, has been finding lots of humor this week in the death of terror master Osama bin Laden. One gem from Leno's show was a skit called "The Pakistani Hillbillies" -- starring none other than Osama bin Laden.

Americans during WW-2 loved poking fun at two larger-than-life and goose-steeping manifestations of fascist evil -- Hitler and Mussolini. So it's perhaps no surprise that Islamo-fascists should be good for plenty of laughs, too.They may be terrorists and existential enemies, but in the end they're also a bunch of squares -- or hillbillies if you well.

Enjoy the show.



Originally Published at The American Thinker.

Iraqi TV Commentators Trade Blows While Discussing Saddam Hussein



By David Paulin

In Iraq, two television commentators on a show called "The Democratic Club" recently came to blows when their discussion turned to Saddam Hussein's legacy.

"I will chop off your tongue if you talk about Saddam!" shouted one.

"Eat Shit! I will talk about Saddam!" shouted the other.

That's when the two jumped out of their chairs, exchanged blows, and began grappling. They stumbled out of camera range -- but their political discussion continued.

"Come here, you son of a bitch!" shouted one.

"You dog, you low life!" shouted the other.

"You're sister is a whore!" one said at another point.

Iraq is a much better place today than it was under Saddam Hussein, even if things there can, well, get a bit raucous. Iraq's government also is far more in line with America's interests than it had been. Even so, perhaps the Obama administration ought to reconsider plans to disengage from the country. You can see the whole segment of "The Democratic Club" here:



Hat Tip: Robert J. Avrech at Seraphic Secret.

So Long Bastard. Have A Nice Trip To HELL!



By David Paulin

It wasn't supposed to be like this. President Obama was going to make the world love us -- all while fighting the war on terror with Marquess of Queensberry rules. No more "torture" such as Bush-area waterboarding, during interrogations of 9/11 suspects. No more Guantanamo. Our foreign policy would be based on "mutual respect."

Yet there was Osama bin Laden, mastermind of 9/11, hiding in practically plain sight in Pakistan, a supposed ally. He was in a resort town just down the street from a military academy. No doubt Pakistan's intelligence service knew all about it.

Now Osama bin Laden is dead, and millions of savages in the Middle East and elsewhere are enraged – going into anti-American fits because America defended itself and sought justice for 3,000 murdered civilians on 9/11. How ironic that information used to track down bin Laden came from the Bush administration's waterboarding of some of the 9/11 conspirators.

The war on terror is far from over. This is simply a pivotal stage in a long war -- one pitting Islamic extremists and their cheerleaders in the Muslim world against American, Israel, and the West. These jihadists, of course, have their friends in the West – sympathizers and facilitators in the international Left, a fact that complicates the war on terror.

So long bastard. Have a nice trip to HELL!

Members of Society of Professional Journalists Seeking to Rehabilitate Helen Thomas




By David Paulin

You can't say journalists don't take care of their own.

Members of America's most hallowed journalism organization -- the Society of Professional Journalists -- are embroiled in a nasty food fight over disgraced journalist Helen Thomas and efforts by some SPJ members to rehabilitate her. But in this fight, it's hard to tell the good guys from the bad guys.

At issue for the SPJ is whether it did the right thing by retiring its prestigious "Helen Thomas Award for Lifetime Achievement." Some SPJ members believe the journalism organization did the wrong thing. Accordingly, they intend to put forth the case for reinstating the prestigious award at the SPJ's national meeting this September.

The battle over whether to in effect rehabilitate Helen Thomas has pitted members of the SPJ against one another, resulting in an unseemly "baseball food fight," according to an article in Wednesday's Editor & Publisher by Rutgers University journalism professor Allan Wolper.

Sadly, however, it's hard to tell who the good guys are in this fight. Leaders at the SPJ who voted to retire the Helen Thomas award apparently did so for all the wrong reasons; her anti-Semitism about Jews getting out of Israel, and Zionists controlling America, was the least of their worries, according to Wolper's eye-opening account about the controversy at embroiling the SPJ -- an organization that he points out is "the keeper of a Code of Ethics that is a template for journalism behavior."

Ethics aside, the SPJ is apparently a forgiving bunch when it comes to anti-Semitism. It gave Thomas the benefit of the doubt after her first anti-Semitic outburst outside the White House last May during which she called for the Jews to get out of Israel and go "home."

Why was the SPJ so forgiving?

As Wolper tells it, it's because "the allegedly anti-Semitic remarks attributed to" Thomas were regarded as "a one-time misstep or slip-up resulting from 'questionable interview tactics,' according to an internal report by Joe Skeel, SPJ's executive director."

Then came Thomas' remarks in December at a conference of Arab journalists. She said that "Congress, the White House, and Hollywood are owned by Zionists. No question."

"That did it," Wolper relates. "The SPJ executive committee in January voted 6 to 1 to retire the award, and the full board of directors went along, 14 to 7."

Incredibly, though, the SPJ leadership wasn't upset at Thomas' anti-Semitism. As Wolper explains: "The rationale was stunning: There was a fear that future recipients would have to answer questions about Helen Thomas instead of talking about their lifelong accomplishments."

Wolper also relates that the SPJ's "decision (on Thomas), and the way it was handled, infuriated Christine Tatum, a former president of SPJ, and Ray Hanania, a Chicago columnist and coordinator of the National Arab American Journalists Association. Hanania sees the decision as an example of SPJ's alleged bias against Arab journalists, a charge SPJ fiercely denies."

Incredibly, the conduct of the SPJ's Thomas apologists gets sleazier. Wolper says they're convinced the SPJ's leadership "buckled under pressure from Jewish organizations led by Abraham Foxman, national director of the Anti-Defamation League. They cite as proof a letter he wrote to SPJ castigating Thomas, which was printed online and in Quill magazine, SPJ's monthly publication."

Wolper also writes that Thomas' SPJ apologists "whisper that Hagit Limor, the Israeli born president of SPJ, is Jewish, a not-so-nice way to hint that she might not have been as fair as she could have been. I have found no evidence to support that notion. Meanwhile, Limor, an investigative reporter for WCPO-TV in Cincinnati, has been bombarded with angry telephone calls from non-journalistic Thomas supporters."

None of this should surprise anybody who's noticed an anti-Israeli bias in the mainstream media over the years -- an issue that more than a few articles at this publication have addressed.

The SPJ, incidentally, is no stranger to controversy. Less than a month after the Sept. 11 terror attacks, it passed a controversial resolution at its national convention in Seattle telling SPJ members how to cover the war on terror. Among other edicts, it advised against using the word "jihad" and said that stories should "portray Muslims, Arabs and Middle Eastern and South Asian Americans in the richness of their diverse experiences."

On the other hand, the SPJ offered no edict about portraying Jews, Israeli-Jews, or American Jews in the richness of their experience.

No surprise there.

Originally published at The American Thinker.

Second Amendment Culture Wars: Eastern Elites vs. Gun-friendly Red States


By David Paulin

America's gun-rights debate has moved into some new territory that highlights the ideological divide separating gun-hating Eastern elites from Americans in fly-over country.

Recent events in New York City, Washington D.C., and in gun-friendly fly-over states (mostly red) demonstrate how profoundly the nation's Second Amendment debate is wrapped up with its culture wars.

Consider how Americans on opposite sides of the liberal-conservative divide are viewing the gun-rights debates underway in at least nine state legislatures. According to Eastern elites, lawmakers are doing the unthinkable: They're debating whether to eliminate so-called "gun-free zones" on public college and university campuses; such zones exist in 22 states, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. Texas is considered the most likely to pass such legislation, with a vote possible this March. Only Utah allows concealed carry holders on its campuses.

Conversely, 25 other states leave it to colleges and universities to allow or ban concealed carry holders; and so a handful of schools in the Midwest and West actually do allow concealed carry holders on campus to varying degrees. They include Michigan State, Colorado State, and the University of Colorado, schools where no concealed carry holders are reported to have been involved in campus massacres or robbery sprees. Nine of those states nevertheless introduced legislation last year to ban concealed carry on campuses, a response to shootings like the Virginia Tech massacre.

Besides gun-friendly Texas, states that may do the opposite and ban gun-free zones on campuses include Arizona, Florida, Tennessee, Michigan, New Mexico, Mississippi, Oklahoma, and Nebraska. To be sure, abolishing gun-free zones wouldn't involve handing out Glocks to boozed-up college kids, as gun-haters fear. Rather, it would to varying degrees allow gun owners with concealed carry permits, including students, to bring handguns on campus.

In gun-hating New York, getting a carry permit involves a nightmare of red tape. But not so in Texas and most states, where it's relatively easy for law-abiding adults to obtain concealed carry permits after passing a course and undergoing a background check. In Texas, one part of the 10-to-15 hour course includes instruction in "non-violent conflict resolution" - to help ensure people only use their weapons for legitimate self-defense purposes.

Gun-hating liberals may be surprised to hear it, but it's virtually unheard of in Texas for people with carry permits to commit crimes or be involved in unnecessary shootings. They don't hold up convenience stores; don't get involved in shoot-outs at bars or after traffic accidents. Nor do they shoot people whom they feel have "dissed" them -- a common occurrence in gritty parts of Chicago and Detroit. It all underscores a fact that gun-hating liberals overlook: Culture plays a big role in gun violence. Switzerland, after all, is armed to the teeth, with members of its large citizen militia keeping military-issued weapons at home -- yet gun-related crimes in Switzerland are rare.

In the guns-on-campus debate, reasonable people might disagree about the wisdom of allowing undergraduates to keep handguns in dorm rooms. But what about college professors and staff members? Consider a strange inconsistency in Texas. In Austin, a short drive from the University of Texas' gun-free zone, is the state capitol. It's a part of the real-world: Concealed carry holders are allowed to bring handguns into the legislature and capitol building. Security guards wave them through after they present their carry permits. To date, no shoot-outs have occurred among gun-toting legislators, lobbyists, and visitors during heated debates.

Yet at the University of Texas, professors, staff, and students with concealed carry permits are prohibited from carrying their guns on campus when, say, they must walk to and from a night class and a dark parking garage. The absurdity of campus gun-free zones prompts the National Rifle Association to ask: "Should you have less freedom and safety than anyone else simply because you go to college?" Besides personal protection, gun-rights advocates note that a person with a carry permit could stop a Virginia Tech-style massacre in its tracks.

Recently, legislative initiatives to abolish gun-free zones were the subject of an article in the New York Times, an agenda-setting paper for liberal elites. It soft-peddled the obvious: Gun-free zones don't make anybody safer -- except for gun-toting criminals. If the Times thinks otherwise, it should disarm the security personnel who presumably guard the New York Times Building. Then it should put up a sign that sanctimoniously proclaims: "Gun-free Zone." But don't count on that happening; even Times publisher Arthur Ochs Sulzberger Jr. wouldn't be so stupid. Yet gun-hating liberals nevertheless portray gun owners in fly-over country as bubbas and hayseeds: people who cling to their guns and religion as President Obama put it.

Speaking of Obama, the Senate Judiciary Committee is now considering the President's controversial nomination to head the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms. Andrew Traver, 47, is being vigorously opposed by gun-rights advocates. The veteran ATF agent, among other things, has likened automatic black-market weapons to legal semi-automatic assault weapons and is involved with the anti-gun International Association of Chiefs of Police. "You might as well put an arsonist in charge of the fire department," said Chris Cox, an NRA spokesman.

Traver was based in Chicago, a city without gun shops; and yet it's got a high crime rate and well-armed gangs that Trevor, to his credit, went on the offensive against -- treating them as criminal organizations instead of neighborhood thugs.

'Outing' Gun Owners

As the gun-rights debate has heated up, the New York Times recently launched an anti-gun crusade -- running a full-page article that "outed" well-known New Yorkers who own handguns. It portrayed them as members of a strange and troubling subculture; and it was published not long after another anti-gun piece -- a female reporter's amusing account (by red-state standards) of her visits to some New York gun shops.

Not surprisingly, getting a handgun permit in New York is hard if not almost impossible, whether it's to carry a handgun in the street or keep at home. Even so, many well-heeled New Yorkers have actually managed to get such permits. So who are these crazies? To find out, The Times culled through thousands of names of gun owners that it got from the police after filing lawsuits and freedom of information requests. It was amazed to learn that some of the city's leading citizens were handgun owners and even had carry permits. According to The Times, the list included: "Men and women. Democrats and Republicans. Doctors, lawyers, merchants and moguls. A remarkable, if relatively small, cross-section of New Yorkers."

In all, more than 37,000 New Yorkers keep handguns in their homes or carry them in the street, according to the full-page article: "Armed in New York, and Carrying Well-Known Names." The article's print edition was dominated by a photo of a shooting target: a human silhouette. And around it were 15 photos of high-profile New Yorkers with handgun permits: actors, public officials, journalists, and other celebrities.

In its quest for accountability from the city's gun-toting subculture, The Times then contacted a number of gun owners. Some were apparently outraged at being outed -- and told reporter Jo Craven McGinty to go screw herself. Others, apparently embarrassed at being outed, proceeded to blurt out some incredibly dumb comments; things no gun-toting bubba or hayseed in fly-over would ever be so naive to utter.

Consider not-too-bright Alexis Stewart, 45, a radio and television talk-show host. She was among a surge of New Yorkers who bought handguns after 9/11. Obviously embarrassed at being outed, the daughter of classy Martha Stewart gushed: "I keep it in my apartment unloaded in a safe. Wait. I probably shouldn't say that. It's under my pillow and ready to go." (Readers who don't know why it's dumb to say such things are obviously not among American Thinker's conservative readers.)

Then there was gun owner William Rosado, an illustrator. He all but apologized for enjoying his regular visits to a shooting range with his 9-millimeter Smith & Wesson. "In a weird way, it's kind of a stress reliever," he confessed. "It's something completely different than what I do for a living."

Most of the gun owners told the Times they'd never pulled their guns in self-defense; no surprise there. And nor did the paper mention that any New Yorkers had abused their concealed carry privileges -- and you can be sure such anecdotes would have been mentioned if the Times had found them. One example was nevertheless provided of a New Yorker who'd actually defended himself with a handgun. You have to wonder: How many other such cases did the Times find but fail to mention?

The case of John A. Catsimatidis, 62, was nevertheless interesting. The owner of a supermarket chain, he once used his Walther PPK to stop an armed robbery. Upon entering one of his stores, three armed robbers rushed past him, one by one. Each carried a sawed-off shotgun. (Shotguns are easier than handguns to obtain in New York City and surrounding metropolitan area.)

"Be cool, man!" the first thug told Catsimatidis. Then the second one rushed past, also saying, "Be cool, man!" As the third emerged, Catsimatidis was ready. He related: "I intertwined my arm into his arm, and I put my gun to his head, and I say: 'Drop your gun or I'll blow your head off'." When the police arrived, a sergeant told Catsimatidis: "You couldn't have shot the guy anyway; your safety is still on."

It was the perfect anecdote with which to end an anti-gun story -- one making a gun owner look like a bumbler.

Interestingly, the same edition of the Times also featured a long story with a self-defense angle -- of sorts. "It Ended in a Suitcase," as it was titled, dealt with a "strung-out" 28-year-old hooker who called herself "Jackie" and the violent 55-year-old man who killed her, a drifter with a long criminal history named Hassan Malik. It was an utterly banal crime story, the stuff of New York's lowbrow tabloids; and it certainly wasn't what the Times normally gives its upscale readers. But apparently Times' editors felt more "diversity" was needed in its crime coverage -- and so they offered up "It Ended in a Suitcase" -- an in-depth story about two losers from the city's low-life culture.

The fates of Malik and "Jackie" (real name: Betty Williams) were completely predictable given the lives they had led. Yet reporter Alan Feuer was clearly intrigued, and he naively wrote: "Why had things turned violent? And, most important, how, in 21st-century New York, was it possible for a strangled woman to be stuffed inside a suitcase and summarily deposited on the street?" Of course, no gun-toting bubba or hayseed in fly-over country would have trouble answering that question.

Malik, incidentally, didn't dispatch Williams with a gun. He used a frying pan and a VCR cord - and he claimed he acted in self-defense. A likely story. One that raises a question: "When frying pans and VCR cords are outlawed, will only outlaws have them?"

Originally published at The American Thinker

'Therapy-Dog' Sessions For Yale's Liberal Law Students



By David Paulin

A "therapy dog" named "Monty" will be offered next week to students at Yale Law School, part of a pilot program to help them relieve their "stress." All of which raises a question: What kinds of horrific stress do students suffer at Yale Law School, a place noted for its touchy-feely legal education and its overwhelmingly liberal students and faculty?

Indeed, Yale Law School has for decades been an Ivy League school offering a kinder and gentler education -- a response to student unrest and demands in the 1960s. Yale Law School was definitely not the high-pressure school portrayed in the movie "The Paper Chase;" that was Harvard Law School.

Unlike other law schools, Yale does not do mean, stressful things like officially "ranking" its students. Nor does it offer traditional grades; instead, first-semester students get credit or no-credit. And during the remaining two-and-a-half years, students are graded on a system that gives them marks such as "honors," "pass," "low pass," and "fail." Students take only one semester of required courses, whereas most other law schools have a full year of required courses.

Yet Yale's privileged law students can expect to get just about any job they desire. Interestingly (though perhaps not surprisingly), a relatively large number of Yale law grads go on to teach or work for the government. Only 49 percent become honest-to-goodness lawyers who really practice law.

So perhaps it's no surprise that Yale's law students are now getting therapy-dog sessions to help them get through the day.

Curiously, news of Yale Law School's therapy-dog program has not been well publicized, according to an article in The New York Times. "I'm surprised to hear of it," law professor John Witt was quoted as saying. "I've always found library books to be therapeutic. But maybe that's just me."

Spoken like a true academic.

Originally published at The American Thinker.

Male Cartoonist Poses as Woman to Get Work


By David Paulin

It's not only in America that political correctness and affirmative action have run amok. From Europe comes a wacky story that calls up the amusing cross-dressing and role reversals in the Hollywood movie "Tootsie."

In this case, it's not a down-on-his-luck male actor (Dustin Hoffman) pretending to be a woman to jump-start his career. It's a down-on-his-luck political cartoonist in Austria named Markus Szyszkowitz. Deciding he could turn his country's political correctness to his advantage, Szyszkowitz reinvented himself as a political cartoonist named "Rachel Gold" -- a young and attractive Jewish immigrant from Israel.

And incredibly, he became much more successful as Rachel Gold than as himself.

Posing as Gold, Szyszkowitz produced cartoons with a different style. They also had a hard-hitting liberal viewpoint, one that Szyszkowitz believes neither editors nor readers would have as readily accepted had he done them himself. He thinks this was due more to the fact that Rachel Gold was Jewish than female, owning to Austria's terrible history regarding its Jewish citizens.

Among other benefits of being Rachel Gold, Szyszkowitz became one of Austria's top cartoonist. "Rachel Gold" even took over the old job he'd lost for having offended a politician who later became Austria's chancellor.

The story of this hilarious farce is the subject of an article, "Secrets of a Woman," by American cartoonist Daryl Cagle at his website "The Cagle Post." Interestingly, it's a story that Cagle said he can relate to as an American cartoonist.

As he explains:

There are very few women editorial cartoonists, and I'm not sure why. At this time, there is only one woman who has a full time job drawing editorial cartoons for a print newspaper, out of about 75 newspaper cartooning positions in America. The disparity extends to the unsolicited submissions I get from aspiring cartoonists, who are 99.9 percent male; the same is true among the almost-all-male cartoonists around the world. Naturally, a rare woman editorial cartoonist gets special attention, just because she is a woman.

When discouraged political cartoonists sit behind a beer and complain, sometimes the talk turns to the idea of pretending to draw as a woman, to take advantage of affirmative action minded editors who might prefer cartoons by a woman, and affirmative action minded award juries who might be more inclined to give awards to a female cartoonist - but I had never heard of a cartoonist actually going through with the scheme.

Until, of course, Rachel Gold.

As Cagle notes, editors eventually caught onto Szyszkowitz's subterfuge and fired him. But he landed on his feet and today continues to do political cartoons under his own name and as Rachel Gold. Most readers in Austria remain clueless as to what's going on.

Alas, Cagle doesn't say if Szyszkowitz has became a better man for having successfully pretended to be a pretty Jewish woman in the way Dustin Hoffman's character in "Tootsie" supposedly became a better man for pretending to be a woman.

One thing that's certain: Szyszkowitz has become more successful after reinventing himself as Rachel Gold.

Hat Tip: Editor & Publisher

Originally published at The American Thinker.

Alaska Lawmaker Victim of Latest TSA Outrage

David Paulin

An Alaska lawmaker is the latest victim of an absurd TSA outrage. State Rep. Sharon Cissna, a 68-year-old Democrat, refused at Seattle's airport on Sunday to submit to the TSA's full-treatment - a hard-core pat down. She refused, she later explained, to be humiliated by the "invasive, probing hands of a stranger."

So she skipped her flight.

Now she's heading to Alaska via ferry, car, and light plane. She's expected to arrive Thursday, according to an article about her ordeal in the Anchorage Daily News. Cissna had been in Seattle for medical treatment and has been excused from Alaska's legislature through Wednesday.

Cissna looks like an all-American grandma. So how come vigilient TSA personnel singled her out for extra screening beyond a full body scan and metal detector? It's because she'd had a mastectomy, explained her chief of staff Michelle Scannell. Apparently, a body scan turned up scars or a prosthetic device.

Three months earlier, Cissna had run into similar problems with the TSA and suffered the indignity of a full pat down. On Sunday, she decided she'd had enough -- even though it meant missing her flight.

As she was surrounded by police, TSA agents, and airline personal, Cissna said she repeatedly told TSA agents she would "not allow the feeling-up and I would not use the transportation mode that required it."

"Facing the agent I began to remember what my husband and I'd decided after the previous intensive physical search. That I never had to submit to that horror again!" she said. "It would be difficult, we agreed, but I had the choice to say no, this twisted policy did not have to be the price of flying to Juneau!"

It's doubtful, of course, that Rep. Cissna's fellow passengers felt safer from would-be terrorists because the lawmaker wouldn't be travelling with them. But at least they got to watch yet another absurd example of what TSA's critics refer to as the agency's "security theater."

Don't expect politically correct liberals to rush to the lawmaker's defense. For that, she would have had to be wearing a burka.

Originally published at The American Thinker.

Crazy in 'socialist' Seattle: Bending the Law for 'Social Justice'

David Paulin

Forget about equal protection under the law in hip Seattle. One of America's most liberal cities is turning a blind eye to some crimes committed by minorities. In addition, legal and illegal immigrants are getting off for offenses for which American citizens would be prosecuted.

How can Seattle overlook one of the cornerstone's of the U.S. Constitution? It's because of its “race and social justice initiative,” reports Fox News.

Outraged, Seattle police officer Steve Pomper has started an uproar by writing a column in his union newsletter titled: "Shut Up and Be a Good Little Socialist." Officer Pomper explains: “When somebody comes in with a policy like that, it doesn't allow us to treat people with equal justice. It’s socialism."

Clearly, political correctness and leftist ideology have clearly run amuck in Seattle's Alice-in-Wonderland world. Now, African-Americans can expect to get off for traffic offenses for which whites would be prosecuted.

That's considered "social justice."

The reason is because African-Americans in the past were "disproportionately" charged with some traffic offenses -- and those higher arrest rates are blamed on the law's inherent social injustice! That's what Seattle's "race and social justice initiative" aims to combat.

For example, when a motorist is charged with driving on a suspended license for failing to pay a fine, the law calls for the person to be charged with driving on a suspended license in the "third degree." But therein lies a problem in the minds of Seattle's city leaders, for as FoxNews.com reports:

"City Attorney Pete Holmes says 44 percent of the people prosecuted were African American. Holmes believes that’s because blacks and other racial minorities are more likely to be poor than whites and unable to pay their fines. He also says it’s a waste of city resources to prosecute those cases, so his goal is to reduce prosecutions by 90 percent.

“If we start to learn and understand that one of those institutional causes of racism is actually in the criminal justice system, it’s our obligation as prosecutors to address it,” Holmes told Fox News' Megyn Kelly in an on-air report.

Immigrants -- legal and illegal -- also have become a privileged class in Seattle that's above the law. They're getting lighter sentences for crimes than American citizens due to concerns they might be deported, according to Kelly's report. This includes things like "alcohol-related" offenses.

It doesn't stop there. Seattle also has tweaked its hiring practices to promote "social justice": Jobs requiring college degrees are considered "racist" because more whites have college degrees than minorities.

To ensure Seattle's police enforce the law with "social justice" in mind, officers are getting hours of "sensitivity" and "racial profiling" training -- and many are not happy about that.

“Shut and be a good little Socialist”: It's an apt description of what's happening in Seattle. In his anti-communist classic "Animal Farm," George Orwell put it another way: "All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others."

Only in Stalinist Russia -- and in hip and liberal Seattle.

Originally published at The American Thinker.

Gun-hating NYT Writer Visits City's Gun Stores

By David Paulin

New York City may be a hotbed of liberals and gun haters, but a few gun stores actually do exist there. However, buying a handgun can be a frustrating experience -- thanks to burdensome regulations and lousy customer service, according an amusing article by Ariel Kaminer in the New York Times: “No Permit? No Touching the Pistols.”

“To run a gun shop in this of all cities is to weather a great deal of regulatory — even hostile — scrutiny,” writes Kaminer, a New Yorker who (surprise, surprise) all but admits she hates guns and wouldn't shoot an intruder or even a bird: She's a “pacifist or a coward,” she proudly states.

New York City is “one of the hardest places in the world to buy a gun,” Kaminer reports. What's more, Michael R. Bloomberg is proud of having tightened up gun laws and would like to export those laws to the rest of America, she says.

Visiting two dreary gun shops, Kaminer observes that unless you're a cop, they're not very interested in selling handguns to law-abiding people like her: Sales people are gruff or apathetic.

The most hilarious moments of Kaminer's gun-store visits occur when she enters a third store -- an elegant up-market place on Madison Avenue specializing in what Kaminer calls “hunting rifles.” (Hey, Ms. Kaminer, what about shotguns? Well, maybe she doesn't know the difference between a rifle and shotgun.) At Beretta Gallery, she is mesmerized by hundreds of weapons on display and costing between $1,000 and $170,000 each. Besides the firearms, other oddities at the shop captivate her -- such as “large-game trophies that peer down superciliously from their mountings.” Yikes! Kaminer also notes that Beretta has the “look of a private club and the feel of another century.”

Then for the first time in her life, she holds a gun: “a 20-gauge semiautomatic (at the lower end of the price range).” Putting it to her shoulder, she takes aim. She writes:

Holding a top-of-the-line gun is supposed to make a person feel powerful, confident, in control. Instead, I felt ridiculous. My stance was all wrong, and in any case I would never pull the trigger — not to kill an intruder, not to kill a bird. That moment of truth reaffirmed what was already beyond doubt: I am a pacifist, or a coward, depending on your perspective. But just as important, I am a New Yorker. In a city where we all live right on top of one another, playing with guns feels as out of place as wearing prairie dresses and engaging in plural marriage.

Let's hope that Kaminer's piece wasn't read by any of New York City's sexual predators, burglars, or homicidal maniacs. They might have gotten the strange idea she would be an easy target and want to look her up. Something tells me that any criminal who takes a fancy to her wouldn't be deterred by her moral superiority or her fellow sophisticates at the New York Times.

--Originally published at The American Thinker.

Tibet's 'Charms' in a Westerner's Eyes

By David Paulin

Liberals hold out Tibet and the Dalai Lama as paragons of virtue and spirituality. But how accurate are those characterizations? They're obviously accurate when Tibet and the Dalai Lama are compared to China and Mao, whose horrific human rights abuses rival those of the world's most brutal regimes. But when Tibet is compared to Western nations, it's charms leave much to be desired, according to accounts provided by noted anthropologist Frank Bessac, whose obituary ran in Sunday's New York Times.

Recounting Bessac's adventure-packed life, the Times notes that as a 28-year-old Fulbright scholar in anthropology, Bessac fled China's communist revolution in 1949 and made "a perilous year-long trek south through Tibet to India."

Bessack, according to The Times, "shared the trip’s most perilous segment...with a small party that included Douglas S. MacKiernan, an American diplomat" and CIA spy who'd been stationed in Tihwa. Some White Russians also travelled with the group.

In April 1950, tragedy struck. As The Times explains:

(A)s the party was setting up camp, a Tibetan military patrol approached and, mistaking the travelers for bandits or Communists, opened fire. Mr. MacKiernan was killed along with two other men, becoming the first C.I.A. officer to die in the line of duty. Mr. Bessac, at the time a couple of hundred yards away, heard the shots, raced toward the gunmen and confronted them waving a white flag.

The killings, which the Tibetans recognized almost immediately as tragic errors, were not reported in the West until months later.

So what happened to the Tibetans who did the shooting? Leftists who despise Western culture – and hold out Tibet as a shining example of spiritual enlightenment -- might be surprised. Bessac later published accounts of his sojourn in Life magazine and a book, and as The Times explains:

When Mr. Bessac and the other surviving member of the party, Vasili Zvansov, a Russian who had been shot in the leg, arrived in Lhasa a few weeks later, Tibetan officials suggested to them a range of appropriate punishments for the patrolmen. These included gouging out their eyes and having their ears, noses or limbs cut off. Mr. Bessac wrote that he assented to the lighter penalty of flogging.

“I watched and enjoyed the whole proceeding,” he wrote in the Life article, though in his book his reaction was somewhat revised.

“It was deeply terrifying and degrading, also for me,” he wrote. “When the flogging of the four horsemen was over, to my surprise the men came over to me and thanked me for saving their lives.”

The young Bessac, incidentally, met with then 15-year-old Dalai Lama who honored him as a dignitary. They remained on friendly terms until Bessac's death at 88 earlier this month.

--Originally published at The American Thinker.

Jimmy Carter not concerned about Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood

By David Paulin

Former President Jimmy Carter, whose foreign policy naivety and weakness facilitated the rise of Islamofacism in Iran, is confident Egypt has a promising future: The Muslim Brotherhood will be overwhelmed by Jeffersonian Democrats -- and the formerly pro-Mubarak military will bow to the will of the people and welcome free elections, he says.

Carter, during his first public comments about Egypt's so-called "revolution," told an audience at the University of Texas on Tuesday that he's not concerned by the Muslim Brotherhood – Egypt's most well-organized and virulently anti-Western political group.

"I think the Muslim Brotherhood is not anything to be afraid of in the upcoming (Egyptian) political situation and the evolution I see as most likely. They will be subsumed in the overwhelming demonstration of desire for freedom and true democracy,” Carter told 1,000 people packed into the LBJ Library in Austin.

Carter's audience was reportedly receptive and friendly. Nobody apparently asked a simple question: Do most Egyptians define "freedom" and "true democracy" as most Americans and Westerners do?

Carter's optimism aside, things in Egypt may not be quite as simple as he suggests -- at least not if a survey in Egypt by the Pew Research Center is anything to go by. It indicates that concepts like “freedom” and “democracy” may not be quite the same to most Egyptians as to Americans and Westerners. Among other things: 85 percent of Egyptians consider Islamic influence over political life to be a positive thing for their country. And 20 percent have a positive view of al Qaeda. The Pew survey on what Egyptians really think underscores why Israel has been so concerned about what the mainstream media has portrayed as Egypt's “democratic revolution.”

Carter also was upbeat, if not somewhat ambiguous, about the role Egypt's military would play in an election expected this September. "My guess is the military leaders don't want to give up their political influence or power,” he said. “But the military has seen what the demonstrators have done and will most likely submit to their demands."

What might those demands be? Carter apparently didn't provide any answers, according to the Austin American-Statesman's account of his lecture. But pehaps the Pew survey can provide some hints along these lines.

To ensure a free-and-fair election, Carter said he and members of the Carter Center will be as "involved as possible" in voting. "The demonstrators will not accept anything less than honest, fair and open elections."

Let's hope Carter and his team does a better job of certifying the winner in Egypt's presidential election (if one takes place) than he did during a Venezuela election in 2004. There, Carter turned a blind eye to voting irregularities, belittled anti-Chavez Venezuelans, and gave his blessing to strongman Chavez's election victory. "Carter has a long history of coddling dictators and blessing their elections, and among his complex motivations is his determination to override American foreign policy when it suits him," writes Steven F. Hayward, a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute.

All of which underscores that Carter has invariably been on the wrong side of history. Given his optimism on Egypt, people who care about Egypt's future may have much to worry about.
--Originally published at The American Thinker.

WikiLeaks: U.S. Officials Praise Cuba but fault Jamaica in Anti-Drug Operations

By David Paulin

Cuba may be a tropical gulag and troublemaker in the hemisphere. But when it comes to the war on drug, the communist island is a reliable U.S. alley – with Cuban authorities even complaining to U.S. officials that neighboring Jamaica is failing to cooperate in drug-interdiction efforts.

That's according to a secret cable from the U.S. Special Interest Section in Havana dated August 11, 2009, and just released by WikiLeaks.

Cuba's state-controlled media follows a consistent narrative on the drug war: It's all America's fault because of its drug-hungry consumers. But in private conversations with U.S. officials, Cuban authorities are more likely to bad-mouth Jamaica -- not America. They express “significant frustration” over Jamaica's alleged failure to cooperate and share information to interdict drug-smuggling "go-fast" boats and aircraft originating from Jamaica and operating in or near Cuba, according to the diplomatic cable from Jonathan Farrar, Chief of Mission of the U.S. Interests Section in Havana.

Citing private conversations with at least 15 members of Cuba's interior ministry, the cable stated: “Cuban (Ministry of Interior officials) contend that narcotics smugglers from Jamaica are utilizing both Cuban airspace and waters to transport narcotics ultimately destined for the United States, but their repeated attempts to engage Jamaica on the issue have been ignored.”

Jamaica is a major transshipment point for Colombian cocaine and major producer of marijuana. Earlier this year, a State Department report on international drug trafficking said Jamaica's drug trade has compromised elected officials, the police, and legitimate businesses.

Jamaica, ironically, sees itself as a loyal ally of Cuba. Indeed, many Jamaican officials with an anti-American streak express admiration for Cuba's David-and-Goliath struggle against America. Yet the outwardly friendly relations between Cuba and Jamaica don't apply to the drug war – at least not according to top Cuban officials who privately deride Jamaica to their U.S. counterparts.

"Collectively and continually, (Cuban officials) express frustration over the (Jamaican government's) consistent ignoring of Cuban attempts to increase the flow of drug-related information between the two island nations to increase interdictions and avoid 'being surprised by drugs,'" the cable stated.

Cuba's failure to elicit more cooperation from Jamaica in the drug war isn't for lack of trying. In October, 2008, for instance, the U.K.'s Defense attache arranged an unusual meeting aboard a British Navy ship in the Port of Havana, bringing together Cuban and Jamaicans officials “to encourage greater dialogue, and to quash growing frustration between the two,” related the cable. Also attending was a U.S. Coast Guard specialist in anti-narcotics operations.

The meeting went badly. Cuban officials later complained to the U.S. Coast Guard specialist "that the two Jamaican officers 'just sat there and didn’t say anything,'" according to the cable. Cuba's interior ministry officials said “that Jamaican officials commonly agree to greater information sharing in person; however, that is the extent of their efforts.”

At one point, frustrated Cuban officials started translating communications being sent to Jamaica authorities into English “because in the past (Jamaican) officials stated to (Cuba officials) they did not understand Spanish. (Interior Ministry) officers report that despite their efforts, (Jamaican) officials still do not respond.”

The cable describes two cases of Cubans capturing drug smugglers from Jamaica.

On May 27, 2009, Cuban authorities interdicted a Jamaican go-fast boat carrying 700 kilograms of Jamaican marijuana -- an operation made possible by “real-time” information provided by the U.S. Coast Guard.

And on July 5, 2009, an aircraft from Jamaica dropped 13 bales of marijuana over a barren field in Cuba. Cuban officials determined the aircraft had been heading to a drop point in The Bahamas, but dropped its cargo prematurely in Cuba due to engine problems. The three crew members made an emergency landing in Cuba and were apprehended.

According to the cable, the U.S. Coast Guard's drug-interdiction specialist “gauges that (Cuba's government) genuinely desires greater information sharing on (anti-drug) issues with Jamaican authorities to serve the (Cuban government's) strategic interests.”

“Currently, Cuban officials appear resigned to the idea that they will not see greater (Government of Jamaica) cooperation in the near future.”

Earlier this year, Kingston, Jamaica, was plunged into violence when Jamaican authorities, after months of delays, moved to capture and extradite an alleged drug lord to the U.S. The efforts to capture Christopher “Dudus” Coke raised questions about the extent to which the alleged drug lord might be protected by government officials benefiting from Jamaica's drug trade.

Britain’s Guardian newspaper reported on the WikiLeaks cables on Tuesday, reviving claims in Jamaica that the ruling Jamaica Labor Party has been complacent with drug trafficking or is ignoring it.

The Obama administration's efforts to extradite Coke were the subject of two American Thinker articles, “Obama's Lesson in Realpolitik” and “Obama's Fruitless Quest to Extradite A Drug Thug.” (Originally published at The American Thinker blog)

The Hypocrisy of Anti-Israel 'Feminists'

By David Paulin

An ugly anti-Israel spectacle has been taking place in Philadelphia. A group of feminist women called the “Philly BDS Coalition” has been staging “flash dances” at grocery stores to force them to stop carrying Sabra and Tribe hummus; both brands are manufactured in the U.S. but are owned by Israeli parent companies. Philly BDS charges that both companies are guilty of “Israeli war crimes.” The group is the local branch of the anti-Israel group "Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions for Palestine."

As the YouTube video here shows, Philly BDS is an odd group of women. But not merely because of their masculine appearances, tasteless performances, and odd garb they wear. The women are odd because like other lefty feminists in America and the West, they vilify Israel -- yet remain utterly silent about the barbaric treatment of women in the Muslim word. None acknowledges that Israel is the only country in the Middle East were women are treated as equals to men.

What motivates these lefty feminists? At bottom their “feminism" reflects their anti-Western hated and leftist political agenda -- an agenda that's dressed up in feminist language. So says Carolyn B. Glick in a wonderful column in the Jerusalem Post, titled “The Feminist Deception.”

While skewering the hypocrisy of left-leaning feminists, Glick also derides Hillary Clinton and the Obama administration for in effect being ideological soul mates with Israel-hating feminists. She writes:

As secretary of state, Hillary Clinton – like her fellow self-described feminists – has chosen to single Israel out for opprobrium while keeping nearly mum on the institutionalized, structural oppression of women and girls throughout the Muslim world. In so acting, Clinton is of course, loyally representing the views of the Obama administration she serves. She is also representing the views of the ideological Left in which Clinton, US President Barack Obama, the human rights and feminist movements are all deeply rooted.”

Read Glick's entire essay for a blow-by-blow analysis of the corruption and hypocrisy animating feminists on the ideological Left. --(Originally published at The American Thinker blog.)

Tom DeLay and moral equivalence in Travis County, Texas

By David Paulin

Many Republicans regarded the prosecution of former U.S. House Majority Leader Tom DeLay as a politically motivated witch hunt. After all, the prosecution took place in Austin, Texas, located in the heart of Travis County: It's a liberal bastion in an otherwise "red" state. DeLay is hated there.

Interestingly, most people in Travis County probably would be hard-pressed to explain exactly what DeLay did to deserve to be convicted of "money laundering" -- a crime one associates with drug dealers and thugs. He's set to be sentenced later this month, and faces decades in prison.

Countering charges of a politically motivated witch hunt, DeLay's prosecutors pointed out that they also had gone after Democrats for ethics violations.

One example: State Rep. Kino Flores, a veteran South Texas politician who was convicted last October of four felony charges for failing to fully disclose assets on ethics forms.

What exactly did Flores do? Nobody would have trouble understanding that. Among other things, he ran a shake-down business. He was known as "Mr. Ten Percent" for helping people get state contracts -- and then demanding 10-percent of their profits. His victims faced him during his trial.

As the Austin American-Statesman reported:

Jesus Sifuentes, a Palmview truck driver, testified that Flores demanded — and he paid — Flores 10 percent of the money he made on a trucking contract with Transit Mix concrete company. He said Flores got him the job. He listed Flores on checks he wrote as a “consultant.”

Over three years, those payments to Flores amounted to about $20,000, the witness said. When he objected to those payments, Flores demanded $60,000 — and he refused. He then lost the Transit Mix contract, his truck, his house and eventually his marriage, Sifuentes said.

That's just one of many sleazy dealings that were described at Flores' trial. Yesterday, Flores was sentenced for his crimes: five years of probation on four felony charges; and two years of probation on five misdemeanor charges. He'd faced a $10,000 fine -- but was ordered to pay only $1,000. He also was ordered to do 400 hours of community service.

Tom DeLay faces sentencing later this month. It will be interesting to see if he also gets probation in Travis County. (Originally published at The American Thinker.)

WikiLeaks: Insult to Thin-Skinned Hugo Chávez Lands American Airlines Crew in Hot Water

By David Paulin

Two years ago in Caracas, the U.S. Embassy got an urgent call one evening. Venezuela's manager for American Airlines was on the phone, and he had a serious problem: The crew of Flight 903 was being detained at the airport.

A crew member had allegedly insulted President Hugo Chávez, explained Omar Nottaro.

A confidential U.S. Embassy cable about the Sept. 30, 2008, incident -- just released by WikiLeaks -- reveals how tough it can be to do business in socialist and authoritarian Venezuela. Among other problems there, it's a crime to insult the president -- an offense that went into the penal code in March, 2006.

The alleged “insult” happened just after the American jet landed. When announcing the local time, a crew member allegedly referred to it as "local Chavez time." There was a legitimate reason to say this -- for as the cable pointed out: "In December 2007 Venezuela created its own time zone, moving the clock back half an hour on a permanent basis. The crew member was likely trying to remind passengers of this and to suggest they turn their watches back 30 minutes.”

Unfortunately for the crew, one of the passengers aboard the jet was a friend of pro-Chavez national assemblyman Carlos Echezuria Rodriguez. Meeting Rodriguez in the airport lobby, Nestor Maldonado Lanza said the crew member had said "loco Chavez time.”

Outraged, the assemblyman demanded to listen to the on-board recordings of in-flight announcements, and he wanted statements from each crew member. Then he started making phone calls -- the first being to Venezuelan Vice President Carrizales. As the Embassy cable explains:

"The Vice President called civil aviation authority (INAC) President Martinez who went to the airport. The Directorate for Venezuelan Domestic Intelligence and Prevention, DISIP, opened an investigation. However, because ONIDEX (immigration) had not allowed the crew to go through customs, DISIP backed out of investigation and turned it over to ONIDEX which had jurisdiction as the crew had not officially entered Venezuela. The crew then waited inside the airport for the results of a meeting between airport, customs, INAC and American Airlines staff.”

Ultimately, American's quick-thinking country manager came to the rescue. As the cable explains: "Nottaro was able to diffuse the situation by promising to put the crew back on the empty airplane as soon as it was refueled and get the captain and crew out of the country immediately.

“Nottaro also apologized in person to INAC President Martinez and committed to writing several letters of apology on October 1. Venezuelan authorities accepted Nottaro's offer and the crew left Venezuela at 11:30 pm. American made the decision to turn the plane around even though it meant canceling AA flight 902 out of Caracas the morning of October 1, at considerable cost to the airline.”

Earlier that month, a Delta crew also was involved in an "incident" at the Caracas airport, the cable noted. It didn't elaborate except to say the American incident was "yet another example of how heightened sensitivities are in the bilateral relationship when a chance remark escalates within minutes to the level of the Venezuelan Vice Presidency.”

The cable, incidentally, never nailed down exactly what the flight crew member said. However, according to a report from Venezuelan immigration -- obtained by an Embassy officer from an Interpol contact -- the crew member said "the hour of the crazy Chavez and his women."

(Originally published at The American Thinker)