This is infuriating. HotAir, Michelle Malkin, and others have covered this and there's not much to add because I think we're all equally outraged at the "rules of engagement" that led to this Clinton style bungle. Kerry Sanders originally broke this story, and has details on the photo release.

Anyway, here's the deal. We had an undetected drone spot over 100 taliban fighters standing in formation at a funeral in Afghanistan. Excited Army officers quickly had the wind taken out of their sails when folks higher up in the chain of command said a strike was a no go because apparently our self imposed rules of engagement forbid attacking terrorists at a funeral.

To be clear, there is nothing illegal or against Geneva Conventions (not that ununiformed soldiers that don't fight for a particular country are entitled to Geneva Convention rights anyway). Judge Napolitano broke it down on Gibson today, and to sum up this was basically a stupid decision in an effort to appear civil to people that don't car about civility! There was nothing that forced us to pass on this massive target, other than our own "let's play nice" rules. This is crap. I just mentioned the other day that this mentallity is our biggest weakness and we need to cut the crap and get tough.

Remember the fiasco in Iraq when terrorists were hiding in hospitals, mosques, and schools. They fired out but we wouldn't fire back in. Actually this is still going on today. These sorts of rules are our weakness and get our military folks killed. It's the same as this funeral incident. We try to play nice with terrorists... why? I don't think anyone wants to argue that we're trying to show good will to the Taliban, in hopes that they'll "see the light" or something. The argument you'll probably hear is that we're trying to be sensitive to everyone in the region, but come on. If they're going to get made about it, you know who's side they're on anyway. There's comes a time when we need to decide if we are trying to win these wars, and stop all these politically correct tactics. How many people will now die at the hands of these 100+ Taliban fighters?

 

If you've actually been paying attention to the U.S. economy under the Bush administration, you're aware that it's been nothing short of great for most of the Bush administrations time in office, since troubles from the Clinton-Gore recession and 9/11. While all sectors of real estate were hitting record levels month after month for years under Bush, the necessary slow-down has begun and the media has been rushing to spell doom for the economy through alarmist headlines, and spun articles. They were even doing this during continual record growth over the past two and three years, insisting a "crash" was imminent, but as predicted by any realisting non-BDS suffering economist, we're experiencing a necessary and healthy slowdown, particularly as the fed raises interest rates to slow inflation.

But the housing sector doesn't even scratch the surface of the media lies that are leaving most people giving negative numbers on the economy, while giving positive numbers to their own situation. I love these numbers because they prove that people are being lied to or they wouldn't think that their own positive situation was a fluke, while knocking the economy as a whole. The major problem with all of this, is that a recent Fox News poll shows that the economy is the number 1 issue on voters' minds as the midterm elections approach. Let's take a closer look at the numbers and the lies.

The jobs numbers are out today, showing that another 128,000 jobs were created last month, which brings us to more than 5.5 million jobs created in the last 3 years! This also brought the unemployment rate back down to 4.7%, from the slight increase to 4.8% in the previous month. Even if the number had stayed at 4.8, it would have still been great and lower than the average of the 70s, 80s and 90s! Better still, wages grew faster than inflation.

I do have to say that this is probably the most fair AP story I've read on the economy in recent months, though you can still sense that they're looking for something negative to print, just not as hard as usual:

The tally of new jobs last month was slightly stronger than the 125,000 that economists were forecasting. The nation's unemployment rate dropped down a notch from a five-month high of 4.8 percent in July. Job gains for June and July also turned out to be better than previously estimated. In June, employers boosted payrolls by 134,000 positions and in July they added another 121,000.

See, what is the point of that "five-month high" line? An average reader sees "unemployment was at a high", they don't know that 4.8 is still a historically low unemployment rate and barely up from the previous months which obvioiusly were also historically low, especially in an economy after the recession, 9/11, expensive wars, the New Orleans situation (that I refuse to call "Katrina"). This leaves the impression that the drop to 4.7 was some sort of fluke, when in fact it's part of the low unemployment trend. But as I said, this AP article was much more fair than most, and this is a minor offense. I do have to give them credit for including this:

Workers' average hourly earnings edged up to $16.79 in August, a 0.1 percent increase from July. Economists were forecasting a bigger, 0.3 percent advance. While workers welcome strong wage growth, economists worry that a rapid and prolonged pickup in wages can ignite inflation fears.

Over the 12 months ending August, wages grew by a strong 3.9 percent. The last time this figure was higher was in June 2001.

Oddly "Consumer Confidence" dropped, but "Consumer Spending" rose. I'm not an economist, but those two numbers would seem to contradict eachother. More importantly, I've isolated a flat out AFP lie in the short article on consumer spending growth. The whole article follows:

WASHINGTON (AFP) - US consumer spending has rallied strongly in July but incomes fell, according to the government.

The Commerce Department reported Thursday that personal spending rose 0.8 percent last month, after going up 0.4 percent in June. It was the fastest pace of spending since January.

Personal incomes rose 0.5 percent, a slower pace than June's increase of 0.6 percent.

Both releases were in line with Wall Street forecasts.

I hope I don't need to spell that out for you, but on the assumption a liberal might be reading this... The very first sentence says that income FELL. But by the time you get to the third paragraph you learn that it simply GREW at a slightly slower rate, but didn't fall by any means. This is one of those situations where you libs can't spin this. That first line is a lie any way you slice it.

Still with me? I'm just laying the groundwork, because the poll responses are when the issue will really sink in, so hang in there. So far we know GDP and job growth continue to be strong, the unemployment rate remains historically low, wages are increasing, etc. etc. But as you're about to see, the public continues to be very down on the economy. Of course the liberal response is "the growth only helps the rich, and the economy is bad for the average person". Well, as I've done for months (see here, here, and here), I'm about to do a preemptive strike on those sort of responses, because the fact is that most people ARE happy with their own financial situation. (All numbers that follow via American Research Group, Inc.)

First I always like to start with the biggest proof that the public is being lied to about the economy: the recession question. Consistently only about half of the country knows that we are NOT in a recession, the other half either believes that we are or is undecided. For starters there shouldn't be "undecided" because recession is an absolute, either we are or we aren't, it's not an opinion.. And the fact is WE AREN'T. Here are the numbers:

How can only half of the country not know that we aren't in a recession? The only logical conclusion is that they are getting bad information, and where do they get their information? The news media! How can 28% be so stupid to think that we are in recession, and another 22% be unsure about something that isn't an opinion question!? How!?

Before I get to the public's view of their own financial situation, here's their opinion of the economy:

Ouch! 55% see the economy either bad, very bad, or terrible, while only 44% see it as good, very good, or excellent. As bad as that is, it's actually a sharp jump from July's numbers where 68% rated the economy in the negative columns, and only 31% positively, but it still doesn't jibe with the personal situation numbers:

Whoa! 68% of the public is happy with their own financial situation, while only 31% aren't!!! Again, how do you explain this discrepency, without concluding that the public has been lied to, leaving them with the impression that they are the lucky flukes in an economy in the crapper. It probably doesn't help that virtually everytime positive economic numbers are reported, it's always with words like "unexpected" or "surprising", again leaving people with the impression the growth is out of the ordinary, while the numbers show the economy has been booming, and only in recent months has it even begun the necessary slow down to maintanable levels that won't cause inflation to go out of control.

Like with all lying liberal media issues, the big problem is that their lies (obviously) affect public opinion, and public opinion dictates how the public votes. We've got an extremely important election coming up in which the public puts the economy above terror and Iraq on their "what is important to me" scale, an economy they have a negative opinion about, because they were lied to. This of course carries across all things from national security to wars to immigration, but this is the easiest example to lay out with irrefutable facts. Please, tell your liberal friends that any financial upturn they've had isn't luck and they aren't in the minority. Or you could just wait for speaker Pelosi to come in and waste our time and money with a series of pointless investigations.

Oh, and suck on this White House summary:

On August 4, 2006, The Government Released New Jobs Figures – 113,000 Jobs Created In July. The economy has created more than 1.7 million jobs over the past 12 months – and more than 5.5 million jobs since August 2003. The unemployment rate is 4.8 percent – below the average of each of the past three decades. In addition, wages grew 0.4 percent in July, the second consecutive month of strong wage growth and faster than inflation.

The Economy Remains Strong, And The Outlook Is Favorable

• Employment Increased In 47 States Over The Past 12 Months Ending In June.
• Real GDP Grew A Strong 3.5 Percent Over The Past 4 Quarters.
• Productivity Has Grown At A Strong 3.5 Percent Annual Rate Since The First Quarter Of 2001. Productivity growth during the past five years has been at the fastest rate in nearly four decades.
• Real After-Tax Income Has Risen By 13.5 Percent Since January 2001.
• Industrial Production Increased 4.5 Percent Over The Past 12 Months.
• Manufacturing Production Has Risen 5.7 Percent Over The Past 12 Months. Manufacturing productivity has grown 4 percent over the past four quarters, faster than the 3.7 percent average growth in the 1990s.
• Strong Growth Is Helping Raise More Tax Revenues For The Federal And State Governments. In 2005, Federal tax revenues grew by $274 billion, the largest increase in 24 years, and State tax revenues are up substantially in 2006.

 

*(Scroll for actually city council resolution blocking this)*

When will the elected officials of my state stop embarassing us? If it's not Howard Dean and his "Civil Unions" it's Howard Dean screaming like a mental patient after the Iowa primaries... YAAAAAARGH. If it's not having U.S. Senate candidate and current congressman from VT Bernie Sanders being the only self-proclaimed socialist in Washington, it's crazy hippy ladies coming home after visiting their online Pakistani boyfriends in their homeland, flying with banned weapons and peeing on the floor of the plane. If it's not Howard Dean saying... well, I'll stop there because that could go on forever and I really haven't kept up with updating my Dean's List anyway.

It would seem that Vermont politicians are in a competition to prove their idiocy. Well, the mayor of Burlington (Vermont's largest city), Bernie Jr. Bob Kiss actually proposed making the city a sanctuary for illegal immigrants!!! I'm not putting on some Republican spin job, this is what he did. Luckily the city attorney and council wasn't having it, but he actually made the attorney look in to it. Locals may be familiar with the story already, but having not moved back until late June, I hadn't heard about it until my brother mentioned it to me at Al's French Fries earlier last night.

I figured he must have heard wrong, so I did a quick search and sadly I quickly discoverd via Burlington's City Council Agenda that he was all too right. What kind of fricken' twilight zone city do I live in? A mayor encouraging mass criminal activity by attempting to set up his city to host illegal immigrants. Not to mention that with the insanely high cost of living here, the last thing one should do is bring in a bunch of cheap labor.

Now for the goods... The City Council's resolution, blocking this crap after the mayor asked the city attorney to look in to implementing the "concept". Incase you don't have Acrobat to read the PDF, I've decided to reproduce the whole document below. Again, why should this even have to have been done?

CITY ATTORNEY EFFORTS ON SANCTUARY CITY CONCEPT

In the year Two Thousand Six………………………………………………………………
Resolved by the City Council of the City of Burlington, as follows:

That WHEREAS, the Mayor of Burlington, the Honorable Bob Kiss, has proposed designating the City as a sanctuary for illegal immigrants and directed the eminent City Attorney, Joseph E. McNeil, Esq., to research how such a concept could be implemented; and

WHEREAS, since the concept of a sanctuary city entails a municipality adopting a policy which would forbid its officials, including police, from inquiring into anyone's immigration status or cooperating with immigration officials, such a policy thus creates a safe haven for illegal immigrants by condoning their violation of Federal law; and

WHEREAS, while the United States is an immigrant nation and has been made great by the contributions of those who have come to our shores; and

WHEREAS, while we are all the children of immigrants and strongly support legal immigration, to become a sanctuary city would not only condone but encourage violation of Federal law on the subject and serve as an insult to the many millions of people who strove for the privilege of building their lives in this nation while adhering to the law; and

WHEREAS, in 1996, the United States Congress passed two bills enacted into law which dealt with the concept, the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act and the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act, both of which were later upheld and under which state and local governments can no longer prohibit employees from inquiring about immigration status or reporting to immigration authorities; and

WHEREAS, the Deputy Chief of the Burlington Police Department noted in response to the concept of a sanctuary city that law enforcement officers are bound to uphold federal laws on immigration and to make reports to immigration authorities; and

WHEREAS, however, it is not currently the practice of the Burlington Police Department, or any other City entity, to seek out illegal immigrants; and

WHEREAS, any influx of illegal immigrants to Burlington as a result of implementing the sanctuary city concept could place added burdens upon City social services and infrastructure at a time when both the municipal budget is overburdened with costs, to the extent that the Kiss Administration is proposing a 9% increase in property taxes that does not even include an educational tax component, and there is a serious affordable housing crisis; and

WHEREAS, the City Attorney has stated that his research indicates that while the criminal laws regarding immigration issues must be enforced, the civil laws are more complicated and has further stated that there will be "no recommendation from the City Attorney's Office that would involve anything less than full enforcement of our criminal laws. And with regard to the civil statutes there's a great deal of policy discussion that will have to take place between the research that we found and any implementation."; and

WHEREAS, the City Attorney's Office already has extensive tasks to complete on behalf of the City such as, most prominently and most importantly to the City Council, the Zoning Re-Write; and

WHEREAS, while the City Attorney's Office has always most ably and professionally served Burlington, there is a limit to how many demands can be placed upon its Staff and resources, particularly at this busy time; and

WHEREAS, since the Burlington City Council must ultimately approve any implementation of the sanctuary city concept;

NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED that the City Council does not now wish to consider the sanctuary city concept; and

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the Council therefore directs the City Attorney's Office to terminate both any of its further research efforts into and any of its further development of a proposal for implementing the sanctuary city concept.

lj/KAS/c: Resolutions/City Attorney Efforts on Sanctuary City Concept
6/8/06

 

Associated Press headline: Rockets hit Lebanon despite cease-fire

Regular readers know that a favorite pastime of mine is busting Yahoo! and the AP for their misleading or outright lying headlines. Sometimes it's the AP's own headlines, other times Yahoo! reveals their own bias by changing a perfectly good AP headline to a misleading or lying one, often only for the purpose of displaying it on their home page (to mislead headline skimmer types). (For a few examples see here, here, here, and here)

The blame for today's example rests on the AP's shoulders, because as we see here other's picking up the story are using the same headline. Worse than the fact that the AP is up to the old tricks again, is the fact that I wasn't the one who found it this time! Credit for today's find goes to 7 Deadly Sins who I was linked to by Byran at HotAir. Great find guys, as you'll see from my links above, this is definitely a type of bias I enjoy exposing. There are way to many headline readers out there, and the MSM knows it.

Here's a screen cap of Yahoo!'s home page, incase they decide to change it (which is unlikely anyway). Eventually it will be bumped off of the home page, but they never respond to emails or anything, so don't bother. (image links to story)

If you check out the story, you'll see that these are actually rockets launched by Hezbollah at Israel, but they didn't reach. So these are rockets originating in Lebanon, staying in Lebanon. How hard could it be to write a headline that accurately describes the situation?

What media bias?

*UPDATE*
At least Fox News did the right thing here and took the identical story, and applied a proper headline: Hezbollah Rockets Fall Inside Southern Lebanon As Citizens Return to Battered Region

Related:
Stout Republican, The Jawa Report

 

***UPDATE 8/19/06 9:31pm ET - EMAIL REPLY FROM THE TIMES***
FINALLY, I got an email reply from the Times about this after emailing some specific people. Looks like they passed it off to someone else, because the reply I got was from a name I didn't email. The case isn't closed by any means, but now we have a dialogue going. Here's what NY Times staffer Seth Carlson said:

(note: Seth didn't know which photo we're talking about because I didn't include the link in my emails to the Times, for fear of setting off a spam filter)

Randy,

Are you referring to this image? It's the only Hicks photo of a Tibnine hospital that I can find on the site.

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/08/01/world/middleeast/01scene.html?ex=1156132800&en=71a6dfdf1f535cbe&ei=5070

I can assure you that no photograph that appears on nytimes.com or in the printed paper is altered before publication.

If it's a different photograph that concerns you, please send me the link. Thanks.

Seth Carlson
nytimes.com

To which I replied:

Seth,

Thanks for the quick reply.

I respect that the company line is that no photos are altered before publication, and that you truly believe this, but let's be real? We've all seen the staged images, and the "body" of the man who was obviously posing who had been a rescue worker only moments before. I know you guys got out of that one with the "imprecise" caption excuse. But there is no excuse that will work for this other one:
http://www.nytimes.com/slideshow/2006/07/25/world/200607725_LEBA_SLIDESHOW_4.html

Look at the black man's head in the bottom right. Crop and zoom in if need be, but you can clearly see that his head is pasted over the head of a woman in a headscarf. You can see the headscarf all around the back and on top of where his head is pasted. The tan cloth with writing over his/her right shoulder appears that it is photoshopped in as well.

I'm not calling "bias" (in this instance) because I don't understand what the motivation would be for photoshopping this, I don't see any agenda that it helps further, but it is clearly photoshopped. If the Times would like to be a paper of record and hold any credibility, swift and decisive action must be taken against whoever is responsible, regardless of why it was done.

While I don't think there is any logical explanation for this I'll be interested to hear what you have to say about it. I would also be interested to know if you would agree that whoever is responsible for this should be fired immediately. I don't know if this was done by Tyler Hicks, or by a photo editor, but whoever is responsible should no longer be working at the Times, and a VERY public apology should be made, especially as this comes amid the Reuters/Hajj scandal (which you may or may not be aware went way deeper than what the mainstream news covered).

Thank you again for your reply, and I look forward to you next one. Please don't attempt to stealthily remove the image without any public apology or acknowledgment.

Thanks,
~Randy

So, now it's a waiting game to see what Seth has to say. My only fear is that the Times with try to quietly remove the photo from the internet. If this happens, I'm going to need your help to expose this. I have the screen captured image and we'll have to come up with a way to get this on at least Fox News.

(/end update 8/19/06 9:31pm ET.... original post below)

****SCROLL FOR UPDATES - EVERYONE WEIGHS IN****

When will the MSM hire some competent editors and honest photoshoppers photographers so us bloggers can get some sleep!?

LGF has presented us with yet another, shall we say odd, Tyler Hicks photo from the NY Times. Before I get to that though, I've got to mention that the blogosphere scored a victory forcing a halfassed correction out of the NY Times for yesterday's scandal.

You might remember from yesterday's coverage that Tyler Hicks was the fauxtographer who took the photos of of a man running all over rubble and later as a dead body amid the rubble. After seeing that NPR labeled the same photo as a man who had fallen down (rather than at body like the Times), I assumed that the people at fault were those who got production credits for the Times' slideshow, so I took back my rushed call for Hicks's head. Well, at least the Times was forced to issue a..... um... correction (?), of which Michelle Malkin has details.

A picture caption with an audio slide show on July 27 about an Israeli attack on a building in Tyre, Lebanon, imprecisely described the situation in the picture. The man pictured, who had been seen in previous images appearing to assist with the rescue effort, was injured during that rescue effort, not during the initial attack, and was not killed.

Riiiiight.

Anyway, on to today's story, check out this Tyler Hicks photo via the NY Times. (click image for full size, or follow NY Times link until they inevitably take it down)

The thought is that the black guy in the bottom right corner isn't real. It appears that his face may be crudely photoshopped on to someone else's body, that may or may not be a woman (I'm begining to think more and more that it's a woman, but I'll get to that in a minute). Check out the blown up version of the head that LGF added to help us make up our own minds:

The first thought is "oh crap, busted again!" when you see the back of someone else's head emerging from the back of the black man's head. But for some reason Allah thinks there's nothing here. He even points to Daily Mail photo with an indistinguishable man in the background that he thinks is the same black man. First of all, I'm not sure how that would prove the photo real anyway, but most importantly, how can you make out anything about the man in the background. I wouldn't say anything about background man is 100% but from what you can see he appears to be a lighter skinned Arab man with a beard. Check it out folks, am I right? (*MID-POST UPDATE* - It appears Allah is less convinced it's real, but won't buy it until we get a confession.)

Still, Allah's skepticism did get to me where I forced myself to question the Times' image further. For a minute I thought maybe that weird different color head emerging out of the back of his head was a bandage or something, possibly covering an injury caused by another evil Israeli civilian massacre. But then I began to think about LGF's suggestion that the body might be that of a woman. on closer inspection it appears that it is a woman with a tight headscarf on, which explains the tight cloth all around his neck and the different color head protruding from the back of his head.

I bolster my believe that what you see coming out of the back of the mans head is really a woman's headscarf by creating the following negative image of LGF's blown up image. No smoking gun, but interesting. Notice that the cloth on the neck looks to be the same color as the back of the head?

I know everyone is afraid of taking this too far and jumping the gun, but I believe that this is undoubtedly a photoshop. Just look at it, it's almost as bad as a Hajj job! I won't again call for Hicks's firing (yet), because I don't know who shopped the fauxto yet, but heads need to roll at the Old Gray Lady this time.

****UPDATE****

Codemite breaks it down with excellent photographic analysis. Seems more and more clear, to me, that this is a photoshop.

Rusty gives his take, and mocks with his own PS.

Malkin makes mention, but doesn't go out on any limbs.

*****BONUS*****
The first photo in the NY Times slideshow containing the above photoshop, was taken by none other than our old pal Adnan Hajj. Not surprisingly the Times doesn't have the integrity to purge all of his images. I have much more about this image later as I have it in a foreign publication with much brighter colors, etc. But I dont' want to tip my hand on anything yet.

***UPDATE***
The photoshopped image is also featured in this NY Times story.

Others:
Old War Dogs, Iowa Voice, TexasXtreme, Pillage Idiot

 

This is one of the most sickening and sad stories I've heard in a while. Two border upstanding border patrol agents face 20 years in jail for shooting a Mexican drug smuggler who fled from them and while fleeing turned to one agent with what the agent thought was a gun.

The drug smuggler was shot in the buttox (too angry for a Forrest Gump joke), and didn't act as if he'd been shot at all. He quickly jumped in a van, fleeing off back in to Mexico. The border patrol aparently has a policy that agents can't pursue people (WTF?!), and that on top of the fact that at the time the agents didn't know he was a drug smuggler carrying 800 pounds of marijuana in his van, and can't be 100% sure that what he flashed was a gun, these mens' lives are essentially over. Oh by the way, the drug smuggler is suing the Border Patrol for $5 million for violating his civil rights (wait, he's not a U.S. citizen), and he'll probably see some money considering that violiting his civil rights is one thing the agents were convicted of.

I will only post a handful of excerpts as the story is rather lengthy, but read the entire thing, pray for their families, and pray that someone in government will fix the system so this sort of tragedy NEVER happens again. Get pissed, and spread the word. I don't know what we can actually do about this, but perhaps there is a way to get this overturned in time but it would definitely require massive outrage.

EL PASO, Texas - Border Patrol Agent Ignacio Ramos could hear his heart racing. He could feel the dry, hot dust burning against his skin as he chased a drug trafficker trying to flee back into Mexico.

Ramos' fellow agent, Jose Alonso Compean, was lying on the ground behind him, banged up and bloody from a scuffle with the much-bigger smuggler moments earlier.

Suddenly, the smuggler turned toward the pursuing Ramos, gun in hand. Ramos, his own weapon already drawn, shot at him, though the man was able to flee into the brush and escape the agents.

Now, nearly 18 months after that violent encounter, Ramos and Compean are facing 20 years in federal prison for their actions.

According to the U.S. attorney who successfully prosecuted the agents, the man they were chasing didn't actually have a gun, shooting him in the back violated his civil rights, the agents didn't know for a fact that he was a drug smuggler, and they broke Border Patrol rules about discharging their weapons and preserving a crime scene.

Even more broadly, Assistant U.S. Attorney Debra Kanof said, Ramos and Compean had no business chasing someone in the first place.

"It is a violation of Border Patrol regulations to go after someone who is fleeing," she said. "The Border Patrol pursuit policy prohibits the pursuit of someone."

If there is any job in the country where someone should be pursuing someone who is fleeing, it's the fricken border patrol!!!

The smuggler was given full immunity to testify against the agents and complete medical care at William Beaumont Army Medical Center in El Paso.

Read: Your tax dollars helped heal a Mexican drug smuggler, and brought him back here to testify to put good men in jail for doing their job.

"They don't throw this many charges at guys they've caught with over 2,000 pounds of marijuana," Ramos said. "There's murderers and child rapists that are looking at less time than me.

"I am not guilty. I did not do what they're accusing me of."

Ramos, 37, and Compean, 28, are set to be sentenced Aug. 22 for shooting Osbaldo Aldrete-Davila, a Mexican citizen, on Feb. 17, 2005, in the small Texas town of Fabens, about 40 miles south of El Paso.

A Texas jury convicted the pair of assault with serious bodily injury; assault with a deadly weapon; discharge of a firearm in relation to a crime of violence; and a civil-rights violation. Compean and Ramos also were convicted of four counts and two counts, respectively, of obstruction of justice for not reporting that their weapons had been fired.

Keep that date in mind as we wait to see just how big of a tragedy we're dealing with.

But the conviction for discharge of a firearm in relation to a crime of violence requires a minimum 10-year prison sentence. The sentences for the other convictions vary.

On July 25, the U.S. Probation Office in El Paso recommended to Judge Kathleen Cardone that each man get 20 years.

Ramos, an eight-year veteran of the Naval Reserve and a former nominee for Border Patrol Agent of the Year, now has but one thing on his mind: What will happen to his wife and three young sons if he spends the next two decades in prison?

"It's (with) a leap of faith and my devotion to God that me and my family will make it through this," Ramos said as he looked at his wife, Monica, during an interview last month in El Paso.

The van later was found to have about 800 pounds of marijuana inside.

Aldrete-Davila is suing the Border Patrol for $5 million for violating his civil rights.

As a Border Patrol agent, Ramos has been involved in the capture of nearly 100 drug smugglers and the seizure of untold thousands of pounds of narcotics. He also was nominated for Border Patrol Agent of the Year in March 2005, though the nomination was withdrawn after details of the Aldrete-Davila incident came out.

Ramos also had drug-interdiction training from the Drug Enforcement Agency and qualified as a task force officer with the Border Patrol. But Ramos' training in narcotics - as well as the numerous credentials he had received for taking Border Patrol field training classes - was not admissible during the trial, he said.

"My husband is a good man, a loving father, and his devotion to his country and his job is undeniable," Monica Ramos said. "Prosecutors treated the drug smuggler like an innocent victim, refusing to allow testimony that would have helped my husband. The smuggler was given immunity. My husband is facing a life in prison.

Again, you have to read the entire story to get Ramos's story vs. the prosecution story, as well as the laundry list of injustices done to these men.

 

****UPDATE***** - AFP PHOTO OF SAME BURNING DUMP SAYS: "Black smoke engulfs the sky following an Israeli air raid on Beirut's Kafarchima neighborhood." So Reuters calls it a downed Israeli Jet, AFP calls it the results of an Isreali air raid, and again we call it... a trash dump. SCROLL FOR DETAILS AND PHOTO

I can't tell you enough times DON'T TRUST ANYTHING YOU SEE IN THE MAINSTREAM MEDIA! And I can't ask the media enough times, where the hell are all the editors!? How is it all you high paid jackasses manage to let all of these just slip past your high standard scrutinizing policies. I can only pray that Fox News picks up on the story (beyond the original photoshopped images) and exposes what a widespread scandal this is to an audience beyond the blogosphere. Any Vermonters want to get together and hold a rally mocking the "bring the troops home now" crowd, with a "bring the journalists home now" rally? That's the kind of cut and run I can get on board with.

On with the show...

Big hat tip goes out to AllahPundit who is getting bombarded with tips, and while I don't have nearly as many tipsters, keeping up with everything and posting a few things in my backlog is practially impossible. But this one is a must see.

If you're a subscriber to U.S. News & World Report (*MID-POST UPDATE* Time Magazine was fooled too<), then your magazine showed up in the mail a couple weeks ago with the cover you see at right. And if you've been following the Hajj scandal, and all the subsequent disection of the Hezbollywood media, you probably also saw the following photo taken by Adnan Hajj.

Maybe you didn't catch that image, but most of us in the blogosphere did as we dug through the Hajj collection, looking for more to crow about. Dan Riehl actually posted it when trying to determine if the man in the photo was the same man seen in other photos. He recalls the photo in his two posts (here and here) on the latest development (which I promise I'm getting to).

Now thanks to Allah, Michelle Malkin, Riehl and others, we learn that this photo is yet another case of fakery.

Obviously you see the burning pile in the distance in both photos, but can you tell what's burning? All captions we've seen say that the fire is wreckage from a downed Israeli jet, do we have any reason to doubt that? Allah posts a scan of the caption from Time magazine who also featured a photo of the same scene. It reads:

The wreckage of a downed Israeli jet that was targeting Hizballah trucks billows smoke behind a Hizballah gunman in Kfar Chima, near Beirut. Jet fuel set the surrounding area ablaze.

Really? Let's take a closer look:

Closer still:

Wait, that appears to be just a trash dump, full of burning tires. I'd like to know what Mr. Hezbo is aiming his gun at, but I'm certain he couldn't just be posing for this captivating photo, right? I mean, if there's one thing we've learned this week... it's to believe every photo and piece of news you see coming out of Lebanon. Well, that's the gist of what we've learned.. only the exact opposite. (Okay, not that funny of a joke unless you're hearing Norm MacDonald saying it in your head, like he did in Dirty Work after describing the bar fight).

AllahPundit has some questions about some other photos as well. And more here and here.

Rusty uses some one of these images, and another taken moments later as part of his making the case that Adnana Hajj may have multiple identities, one of which may or may not still also be employed by Reuters.

Zombie has a great round-up of all the types of deceit Reuters has been found to traffic in, this week in Lebanon.

*****UPDATE****
I thought I'd breeze through some AFP photos to see if they had anything interesting related to all the "Fautography" we've been exposing this week, and what did I find? Another photo of the burning trash dump, with yet another description. The photo is actually on the Yahoo/AFP wires in two locations (here and here) with two slightly different captions (though their description of the cause of the fire is the same, which is the important part anyway).

Black smoke engulfs the sky following an Israeli air raid on Beirut's Kafarchima neighborhood. Britain is preparing for the biggest evacuation carried out by its military since World War II, as Israel continued to pound Lebanon in deadly air raids.(AFP/Oussama Ayoub)

Black smoke engulfs the sky following an Israeli air raid on Beirut's Kafarchima neighborhood. The first of six Royal Navy ships is positioned off Lebanon to begin a potential mass evacuation of Britons from the "appalling" situation there, Tony Blair has said.(AFP/Oussama Ayoub)

I'm going to ignore the different posting times of the images, because I think one could easily argue any number of reasons that this occurred innocently, but for the record they are stamped Tue Jul 18, 5:09 AM ET and Tue Jul 18, 6:38 PM ET respectively. 13 hours is a big difference, but again, I'm not sweating that.

What I'm concerned about is the fact that AFP calls the fire a result of an Israeli airstrike. We just established that Reuters (Hajj in tow) called the fire a result of a downed Israeli jet, while they had a Hezbollah fighter posing with his gun aimed at the fire. Despite both of these descriptions, we can easily see that it's a trash dump on fire, particularly rubber tires, which accounts for the dark black smoke (Rumor has it Adnan Hajj was relieved it wasn't gray smoke, or he'd have had to photoshop the black smoke in).

So it would appear that both AFP and Reuters are lying about the fire, sense we see it's just a trash dump. Is it possible that a jet went down there? Yes. Is it possible Israel struck the location? Yes. While I personally don't think either of these is likely, if one were proven true, it still means that the other description is a lie and someone needs to publicly own up to it.

More:
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***SCROLL FOR UPDATES***

Reader Michelle has tipped me off to a very disturbing photo slideshow at the website of As-Safire Newspaper. Yeah, the As-Safir that we recently learned employs Adnan Hajj as an economic editor.

I don't want to show a lot of the images here because they are extremely graphic and disgusting, but if you have the stomach for it, it's important to see how these "Lebanese civilians" treat their dead - By dangling mangled and charred corpses, one after another for cameras of local newspapers..

*BONUS* Some mild (comparitively) photo fakery included. Again, I don't want to show these extremely graphic images, but I need to show two to expose the photo fakery. Read the captions closely (photos are linked to their location on As-Safir's site):

A United Nations medic holds a body that was badly charred and destroyed after an Israeli missile hit a van carrying passengers on a road in southern Lebanon, July 15

Lebanese civil defence member carries the corpse of a young girl from the southern village of Marwahin

There is no question that this is the same man... The question is why he's identified as a "Lebanese civil defence member" when is shirt patch is visible (and the UN flag isn't), and why when there is a hand in front of his badge and a UN flag visible he is called a "United Nations medic"? WTF?! Sadly, as this is a Lebanese paper, we can't hold their feet to the fire the same way we can over here, however one of those photos is credited to Reuters, and I suspect all in the album are, but they aren't labeled clearly.

If you have the stomach for it, and want to see this dual-careered hero disgustingly posing and dangling corpses for cameras, check out the rest of the short slide show.

By the way, like Allah who can't keep up with the tips, I have a backlog of things that need posting but I simply don't have the time. Stay tuned to see them trickle out.

*UPDATE*
Trouble isn't over for Reuters either (I'm talking to you Alan Colmes). Earlier they LIED, reporting that Israel bombed a funeral procession. Later they took it back in a very low key manner (h/t Allah).

***UPDATE***
TownHall has more on the parading of dead children for the cameras.

 

Like I told Dan Riehl in my email reply to him, I don't want to go too far and call this a "smoking gun" yet, but it's about as close as you can get. Before you watch the video, you absolutely must read Riehl's break down. Too important to pick and choose what to quote, you've got to read the entire thing.

Riehl catches the "rescue workers" directing the scene to set up for photographers. He notes that they're bringing people from around the block and pausing to put down the body while the media gets in position. One HUGE giveaway that Riehl repeatedly hammers home though, is that every "rescue worker" appears spotless. Their clothes look brand new, no wrinkles, no nothing. How would people who've been digging dozens of children out of rubble (and we've seen the photos, the kids are clearly covered in dust, etc.) look like they're ready to go on a date? When you get done reading Riehl's analysis, watch his slow-mo video. Then watch the normal speed version at Little Green Footballs, or right here:

Previous:
EXCLUSIVE: Another BIG Reuters / Adnan Hajj Scandal Busted
Lebanese Website Blames Hizbollah For Qana Incident, Says Set Up
PHOTOS: "Green Helmet's" Friend "White T-Shirt" A Hizbollah Fighter?
Reuters Rocked: More Adnan Hajj Photoshopping & The Reuters Lebanese Mystery Woman Who's Always Ready For Her Close-Up
Photoshopping The News - Reuters Blows Smoke Up Our...

 

*****UPDATE***** Reuters pulls all Hajj photos. Congratulations conservative blogosphere, especially Jawa, you've done it again. SCROLL to the bottom of this post for full details and more updates...

****SCROLL FOR UPDATES**** AFP labels one photo with two opposing captions

Bear with me through the longwinded opening, it gets good

It appears things are only getting worse for Reuters. First, a little background...

After being thoroughly busted by the conservative side of the blogosphere, Reuters thought their "photo kill" and decision not to use photographer photoshop artist Adnan Hajj's "photos" anymore would get them out of hot water. Not so fast Reuters. First of all, you still haven't held any editors responsible. Hajj is clearly a guilty party, but this should have never made it to the internet supported by your logo if you followed your own policy. (Note: Reuters has played around with their links in the past day, and you have to click another link on that page to find the policy I'm quoting)

Our policy is to send news to our customers only after scrutiny by a group of production editors who ensure quality standards are maintained across all our news services. When we get something wrong, our policy is to be honest about errors and to correct them promptly and clearly.

1. How did this group of production editors miss the crappiest photoshop the world has ever seen?
2. A follow up to #1 - How does the obvious fact that you didn't scrutinize the image (images as you'll see), fit with you policy to be "honest" about errors? Either you have children running your organization, who couldn't spot the photoshop, or you're lying.
3. I don't believe you'd corrected promptly and clearly. I'll leave promptly alone, because at least you took some action, AFTER the blogosphere took you to the cleaners. But "clearly"? It seems more like your corrections and apologies have been low key in an effort to put this behind you.

Ready to laugh? Listen to Hajj's excuse for his photoshop job:

"The photographer has denied deliberately attempting to manipulate the image, saying that he was trying to remove dust marks and that he made mistakes due to the bad lighting conditions he was working under," said Moira Whittle, the head of public relations for Reuters.

Bee Ess! You've all seen the images, so you don't need me to tell you, but check out this animation from Wuzzadem (probably the best I've seen), that shows the vast differences in the images. Beyond the cloned smoke, look at the sky color, building color, etc.

Reader Jim Flynt emailed the following explanation:

1 - The entire picture was darkened quite a bit to give a gloomy effect 2 - The entire pitcure was then sharpened several times 3 - The smoke in the sky created a cloud over the top 80 per cent of the picture not allowing sun to shine on the front of the buildings 4 - next the photo doctoring was done adding black smoke and cloning buildings 5 - Finally a tool called the magic wand was used to highlight the sunlit fronts of all the buildings in the lower 20 per cent of the picture and they were brightened to help highlight the gloomy background

Dorkafork at INDC Journal has a couple animations for anyone who still might not get it, and Tim Blair busts ABC News still using the photoshopped image WAY after even Reuters pulled it. Where are all the fricken editors in the MSM!? Anyway, another lie totally busted, moving along... (stick with me, this only gets better)

Before I get to the good stuff, let's look at a couple smaller, but equally important Reuters photos that leave many scratching their heads. Remember the guy strolling away (looting?) from a burning building, in what appear to be brand new clothes? (another Hajj photo) Flopping Aces wondered if it was also a photoshop job, due to some odd pixelation from the shoulders up. I don't believe we've determined anything for sure on that, but Beth at My VRWC busts a lie in the caption. Does the man appear to be "running" to you? 1. Why is he so clean and 2. Why is it clearly daytime when he flees, when the building was supposedly struck in the middle of the night?

Still hangin' in there? Good, because now we're getting down to the nitty gritty. First, ANOTHER DEFINITE PHOTOSHOP by Adnan Hajj. The Jawa Report deserves all the credit on this one, and I'll refrain from stealing all of his supporting images, but here's the original, Reuters still has online (as I type this):

An Israeli F-16 warplane fires missiles during an air strike on Nabatiyeh in southern Lebanon, August 2, 2006. (LEBANON)

Now let Jawa show you what's what. A MUST READ, AS THIS IS A DEFINITE HAJJ PHOTOSHOP. No missiles fired, just ONE flare. SPOILER:

So, the original photo of the Israeli F-16 was probably of a single anti-SAM chaffe flare being dropped. In other words, the F-16 which Reuters proports to show firing missiles at Lebanon, was taking defensive measures.

Funny side note: As I type this, Fox News Watch's late rerun is playing in the background. The following is a word for word transcription of what far left nut Neil Gabler just said (thank you DVR):

I was interested in how skeptical people are about what they consume in the media, which I think is a product of the right-wing attack on the media, over the last 10 years.

No, it's a product of us continiually busting them lying and photoshopping you ass! I'll accept your apology on next week's show.

Back to it.... Hajj isn't just a master of photoshopping (chuckle), he's also a master of taking photos of a building twice, almost two weeks apart, and identifying it as one that had just been destroyed on both occasions. Thank the eagle eyes of Scott at Powerline Blog for this one. Check it out (captions follow each image):

Journalists are shown by a Hizbollah guerrilla group the damage caused by Israeli attacks on a Hizbollah stronghold in southern Beirut, July 24 2006. (Adnan Hajj/Reuters)

A Lebanese woman looks at the sky as she walks past a building flattened during an overnight Israeli air raid on Beirut's suburbs August 5, 2006. (Adnan Hajj/Reuters)

BUSTED... AGAIN! You're on a roll Mr. Hajj. Allah will bless you with even hotter virgins for your excellent work, battling the infidels of truth. What else ya got for us? A mystery woman? Whatever do you mean?

Drinking From Home ripped this one wide open, but I've taken it a bit further, as you'll see. Drinking From Home found a couple STAGED photos by other Reuters photographers, Issam Kobeisi and Hussein Malla. Seems Hajj has some competition (don't worry, he joins in this fun as well). Here are the two photos that Drinking from Home found (with captions):

A Lebanese woman wails after looking at the wreckage of her apartment, in a building, that was demolished by the Israeli attacks in southern Beirut July 22, 2006. REUTERS/Issam Kobeisi

A Lebanese woman reacts at the destruction after she came to inspect her house in the suburbs of Beirut, Lebanon, Saturday, Aug. 5, 2006, after Israeli warplanes repeatedly bombed the area overnight. Israeli commandos attacked near the southern city of Tyre early Saturday but were repelled by Hezbollah guerrillas who killed an Israeli member of the force and wounded others, the group said in a statement. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)

If you don't believe that's the same woman, Drinking from Home has zoomed images of both faces and you can clearly identify a scar, face marking, and headscarf in both. It's her, no doubt. But how could this woman be reacting to her "house" being bombed overnight on August 5, when she clearly already reacted to her "apartment" being bombed on July 22 (two weeks earlier)? I guess the BBC is too busy to figure this out, as they're using the second image twice on one page, as I type this.

You thought it ended there? Nope! Look what an anonymous commenter at Drinking From Home found, by yet another photographer, Issam Kobeisy:

A woman reacts as she surveys the damage to the southern suburbs of Beirut, site of intense Israeli air raids, August 1, 2006. REUTERS/Issam Kobeisy

Obviously not as good of a shot, but I think it's very likely that this is the same woman. Let me know what you think. These 3 dates weren't the only time the mystery woman seems to have shown up. Admittedly, some of this is speculation on my part, and there is no way to prove this beyond a shadow of a doubt, but don't the women in these 5 photos from our old buddy Adnan Hajj bear a striking resemblence to the woman in posing in the staged photos just mentioned? If this is the same woman, it would seem that she travels with the Reuters photographers, to pose wherever and whenever they need (see dates). Please let me know if you think all, none, or any of these women are the same as the one above:

Lebanese women walk past a damaged building in southern Beirut July 15, 2006, the Hizbollah stronghold that was targeted Friday by Israeli warplanes. Israeli aircraft pounded areas in south, east and northern Lebanon on Saturday, a day after Hizbollah's chief declared an open war against the Jewish state following the bombardment of his stronghold in Beirut. REUTERS/Adnan Hajj.(LEBANON)

Lebanese women pass under a bridge in southern Beirut July 15, 2006, the Hizbollah stronghold that was targeted on Friday by Israeli warplanes. Israeli aircraft pounded areas in south, east and northern Lebanon on Saturday, a day after Hizbollah's chief declared an open war against the Jewish state following the bombardment of his stronghold in Beirut. REUTERS/Adnan Hajj.(LEBANON)

A Lebanese woman cries as she carries belongings from her home in south Beirut, July 23, 2006. REUTERS/Adnan Hajj

A Lebanese woman after seeing her destroyed apartment in a building that was targeted by Israeli air strikes in southern Beirut, July 24, 2006. (Adnan Hajj/Reuters)

A Lebanese woman carries her belongings while fleeing Israeli air strikes in southern Beirut July 24,2006. REUTERS/Adnan Hajj (LEBANON)

Again, all input is welcome. I think the woman in the third photo looks very much like the woman in the photos that Drinking at Home caught. The fourth photo is difficult to tell because the lighting is different and she's wearing a totally different outfit, but use your imagination. Wouldn't he want to try to make her look a little different? The others are a bit too distant to be sure, but looks a lot like her to me. What say you? Perhaps I'm reaching a bit, but given what we've seen, can you blame me? And would you be surprised if I was right?

A couple other quick points worth mentioning before I finish this post up. I found this photo of a burning Koran this afternoon, but put off posting and have now been scooped by Ace of Spades who notes how lucky Adnan Hajj must have been to find a terrorist inciting burning Koran hours after an Israeli strike. I mean, clearly this little book just defied logic and stayed burning for hours. It obviously wasn't lit by Hajj or one of his pals just for this photo, right?

A copy of the Koran burns in southern Beirut after the Hizbollah stronghold was targeted by Israeli air strikes July 16,2006. Israeli air raids shook Beirut on Sunday, the fifth day of a devastating assault on Hizbollah and Lebanon that has prompted no U.N. Security Council action and only a mild plea for restraint from Israel's U.S. ally. REUTER/Adnan Hajj.(LEBANON)

I'm left wondering if this photo isn't photoshopped too. I'm no fire or photo expert, but don't those flames look weird? Why are they so translucent, and not fitting with the image? More importantly, why are they coming out of a part of the book that appears to be nothing but ash? If it was clearly paper burning, okay.. .but the flames are shooting out of a bunch of charred black ash. Am I right?

Beyond just looking weird and ash burning, look at the weird black dot in one of the flames, wtf? I've never seen fire that had solid black dots in it. And is that a stick going through the whole picture? If this isn't a photoshop (which again seems possible), was that stick used to start the fire? Also, if this is a real photo, it appears more that the Koran was dropped on top of a fire that was already there, doesn't it? Check out this zoomed image where I point a couple of these things out:

One way or another, as Ace pointed out, it makes no sense that the book would still be burning hours after an attack. And again, this is Hajj, not one deserving of the benefit of the doubt.

Another image I got scooped on by waiting to post was Cox & Forkum's latest toon. Michelle Malkin beat me to the punch and added it to her extensive and great round-up of all these new finds by the time I finally got around to posting. Oh well, it's a definite must see anyway. As always C & F nail it:

Dan Riehl is out of the gates with 3 other posts cracking down on more obvious photo fakery and other questionable photos (see here, here, and here). As I check back to see if he's updated, I see he's got more for us. It appears that Adnan Hajj is an economic editor for a Lebanese daily newspaper.

Thomas Lifson at The American Thinker thinks we need an outside investigation of Reuters, which should include Charles Johnson of LGF who got this whole ball rolling.

Counterterrorism blog catches Reuters reporting that Lebanon "rejected" the UN draft resolution, but basing it on the words of a pro-Syrian ally of Hezbollah.

What is going on at Reuters? Too bad the left side of the blogosphere isn't angry with the lying MSM (why woul they be?), or we'd have enough power to force some real change. I'm not hearing anything out of the Kos Kids or the Huffington Post folks. Do you guys care at all about this? And don't give me the isolated incident crap, you say that everytime. Eventually these "isolated incidents" need to be called a pattern. Shouldn't you lefties demand honesty in the media? I mean, you have whole sites devoted to going after Fox News... but you don't care about Reuters who feeds news to all the major outlets?

****UPDATE - ANOTHER BIG BUST*****
Bravo to Dog of Flanders (who until now I hadn't heard of), for catching AFP not knowing where missiles were coming from so they just wrote two captions to cover all bases! Okay, it's not Reuters, but you've got to see this:

Tyre, LEBANON: Rockets fired from Israel are seen falling in the outskirts of the southern Lebanese port city of Tyre, 06 August 2006. Israel's army will carry on fighting Hezbollah in southern Lebanon until two soldiers, whose capture sparked the conflict last month, are returned, its ambassador to Washington said today. AFP PHOTO/SAMUEL ARANDA (Photo credit should read SAMUEL ARANDA/AFP/Getty Images)

Tyre, LEBANON: Katyusha rockets are fired from the outskirts of the southern Lebanese port city of Tyre into Israel, 06 August 2006. Israel's army will carry on fighting Hezbollah in southern Lebanon until two soldiers, whose capture sparked the conflict last month, are returned, its ambassador to Washington said today. EDS NOTE: CORRECTING DIRECTION OF SHELLING. AFP PHOTO/SAMUEL ARANDA (Photo credit should read SAMUEL ARANDA/AFP/Getty Images)

Uh, those two captions on the same exact photo say completely opposite things. Which is it guys? Are they coming or going, and where are they coming from and going to? Please explain why it's appropriate to just say "screw it, we weren't sure so we figured with two opposite guesses, at least one would be right". Or if that's not what you attempted to do, please explain just what you did mean to do. I see on the second caption where you said, "EDS NOTE: CORRECTING DIRECTION OF SHELLING.", but what does that mean?

******UPDATE - REUTERS PULLS ALL HAJJ PHOTOS******
Pat yourselves on the back, the blogosphere does it again. Well, the conservative blogosphere (Jawa in particular), the left side didn't seem to care about this at all. Why would they, it's an honesty in media issue. First, what you've all been waiting for... the picture kill (h/t on the image - Drinking From Home):

Ynet and E&P both have details on Reuters's decision to pull all Haqq photos after Jawa busted open the "missile/flares" photo(shop). Via E&P:

Reuters also said today it had put in place a tighter editing procedure for images of the Middle East conflict to ensure that no photograph from the region would be transmitted to subscribers without review by the most senior editor on the Reuters Global Pictures Desk, according to a Reuters spokeswoman.

Why should you need tighter editing procedures? We already reviewed your policy. This is like the government not enforcing immigration laws, you just need to enforce your current policy and there wouldn't have been a problem. Or could it be that the images suited your agenda so much, that you let slip some obvious photoshops and staged images?

“There is no graver breach of Reuters standards for our photographers than the deliberate manipulation of an image," said Tom Szlukovenyi, Reuters Global Picture Editor, in a statement. "Reuters has zero tolerance for any doctoring of pictures and constantly reminds its photographers, both staff and freelance, of this strict and unalterable policy."

What kind of employees do you have the need constant reminding not to doctor photos. I don't think it's that difficult of a policy to remember. Why don't you just mention upon hiring a person "Hey, you know we don't doctor photos around here, right?", to which the new employee should say "Of course, that's common sense." Should they really need constant reminding?

Its Monday statement, after describing the flap over the first image, reads: "An immediate enquiry began into Hajj’s other work. It found on Monday that a second photograph, of an Israeli F-16 fighter over Nabatiyeh, southern Lebanon and dated Aug 2, had been doctored to increase the number of flares dropped by the plane from one to three."

Uh, actually Jawa was the one who caught that, not your "enquiry". And it wasn't just doctored to increas the number of flares, but the flares were being called missiles. A huge dfference considering missiles are imply and offensive, while flares are defensive.

Michelle Malkin is an update machine today, and links us to a great video by The Dissident Frogman, of how to tak a photograph photoshop like Hajj. Malkin updates further here.

Michelle's HotAir partners in crime AllahPundit and Ian, have some great multimedia to share as well. First, Ian posts audio of Rush Limbaugh's comments on all of this, then Allah posts video of LGF's Charles Johnson discussing all of this on CNN. The post is updated by Ian with audio of Johnson on Drudge Radio last night. In a lengthy link heavy update, Allah also posted on Reuters's decision to pull all Hajj photos, but notes that you can still find them on the wires.

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Partially cross-posted at Expose the Left

*****UPDATE***** Reuters has put out a "corrected" version of the image, but still crediting Hajj. SCROLL to the bottom of this post for the image and the caption, on how Reuters issued a "kill" on the "previous version" (read: fake one).

****UPDATE**** SCROLL for more on the "correction" from YNetNews.com. What a pile of crap Reuters.

***UPDATE*** Photography experts, please analyze the negative I created, and email me at randy at rightwinged dot com. Scroll for more updates.

Once again we have Reuters proving why you CAN'T TRUST ANYTHING you see in the mainstream media. I'm not saying that nothing is true, but the percentage that is seems to shrink by the day.

I'll never be able to totally catch up because much of the right side of the blogosphere has been all over this for a few hours (don't expect the same from the left, because this is the sort of reporting they traffic in anyway). Michelle Malkin has a great round-up, as do others I'll mention throughout this post.

Let me open the post by simply tossing up this Reuters photo for you:

I don't think we need to even debate this. That is clearly a photoshopped image, agreed? I mean, you don't have to know anything about photoshopping or have a keen eye. All you have to do is.... be conscious, and you can see what a photoshop job this is. What the photographer artist did is called "cloning". What he didn't do was make it realistic. What Reuters didn't do is give a sh**, because they like to see images of things being destroyed in Lebanon because it suits the "Israel is the problem" agenda in the media. If that's not the reason, I'm all ears. The big question is why, Reuters? We have a big enough problem with Pallywood, I don't think it needs to be supported with a Reuters paycheck.

Now, the obvious first giveaway is the "billowing" smoke, right? But many other bloggers have noticed it's more than that, check out this image from Jawa that showing some building clone action:

Jawa takes a look at some other questionable images taken by Adnan Hajj. I'm on overload as it is, so I'll just stick with this one for the time being.

Allah at HotAir has been all over this from the get go as well. Being a bigger boy on the block he's had folks emailing him tips to other photos of the same town that leaves one more curious than before. It almost looks like the "window" where the smoke is "billowing" from, isn't even part of that building in other, earlier photos.

After checking out some of the posts on other blogs, I'm beginning to believe that virtually everything the photo is photoshopped. Obviously most of the building are real buildings, but I think that the reality of this photo doesn't go a lot further than that. Check out this slightly larger version of the image hosted by Reuters. Below I've pointed out a dark puff of smoke, and smaller puffs off of it that were clearly cloned.

Check out right in between those cloned sections too. See that little section of roof? What are we supposed to assume that is? The ghost of the building that was hit, floating off to meet it's Allah and it's 72 virgin real estate properties in the sky?

Now for something really odd. I'm not a photography expert, and I don't have any good photoshopping software, just some lame version of Microsoft Picture It that came on my computer, but I used the "negative" feature with one click created this:

I don't know what, if anything, this shows.. but it strikes me as odd. Why are all the buildings in the foreground such a completely different color? I'm getting dizzy looking at all of this, but doesn't something seem a little off about that? Please, photography experts, give me your best analysis on this.

Another quick question for Reuters on all of this. I could provide a long linklist exposing your other lies and extreme liberal bias (like calling Islamofacist terror supporters in NYC, "Supporters of Lebanon"), but I just want to know why you would need to use such an obviously photoshopped image, when there are plenty of real ones that put out your intended message?

Also, why does Mr. Hajj seem to always be at the right place at the right time? Dig through some of the links to other blogs I'll provide and you'll see mention of his works in a number of places. Most notably he was in Qana to take a photo of one of the dead children that was photoed more than once, in different ways, to up the death count (which if you've been paying attention, has come down and there is a lot more to the story than the MSM would have you believe). The Shape of Days has details on this Hajj adventure.

I'll be contacting Reuters shortly, you should do the same. Malkin reminds us of their policy:

"Our policy is to send news to our customers only after scrutiny by a group of production editors who ensure quality standards are maintained across all our news services. When we get something wrong, our policy is to be honest about errors and to correct them promptly and clearly."

What kind of "scrutiny" went in to letting this crap hit the web? By the way, don't expect a "prompt and clear" correction. Expect a low key removal of the photo, which may or may not include a small note somewhere that you won't ever hear of except maybe from a couple of blogs.

Dan Riehl has posted an equally reall photograph, showing that apparently the Reuters headquarters has been struck. Someone get the loose-change guys on the phone incase it collapses. They'll be able to explain how Bush did it.

IMAO proves that even Magic Kingdom isn't safe from the Zionists in this war.

Flopping Aces has questions about other possible smoke screens being put on by Hajj. I find the man walkin on rubble away from a smoking building particularly interesting.

Others who were WAY out in front of this, and I wouldn't even attempt to catch up to: LGF, Left & Right, Ace, My Vast Right Wing Conspiracy, and of course (again) AllahPundit and Michelle Malkin.

More links to others blogging this to come... I've got to eat my Hoagie Hut (Colchester, VT) leftovers first.

Others:
Small Dean Animals, Gateway Pundit, Blue Crab Boulevard, The New American Citizen, Ed Driscoll, Old War Dogs, A Blog For All, Wizbang, Sanctuary, The Broken Chair, Say Anything, Right & Wrong, Blogofascists, Daniel360, Mark Nicodemo, Lightshiner, Willisms, In the Bullpen, Captain's Quarters

***UPDATE***
Dan Riehl has dug back in and done some serious analysis as a preemptive strike on anyone trying to defend the "photo".

***UPDATE***
My own retouch, you think anyone will notice?

***UPDATE***
Originally I didn't mention one other section of smoke that is clearly cloned as well, because I thought it was something everyone would assume. But I don't see anyone else mentioning it specifically, so I thought I'd point it out just so we're all clear. Also, you remember the one duplicated section of dark smoke on the left? I almost think I can make out another place it was copied just above and to the right of it:

Of course I should mention again that I think virtually the entire photograph may have been faked, but these are just a couple more specifics that seem odd.

*****UPDATE*****
Reuters, as predicted has tried to just sneak in a corrected version of the image. I haven't had a chance to fully analyze the photo, but it at quick glance appears to be at least more real than the obvious photoshop we've been talking about. If this new one is infact all real, I have to really wonder what the point of the photoshop was. The photoshopped one, even if someone was stupid enough to believe it was real, adds no value to the image. (h/t Bile, Snark, and Sneer)

ATTENTION EDITORS: THIS IS A CORRECTED FILE OF LBN20. REUTERS HAS ISSUED A KILL OF THE PREVIOUS VERSION. Smoke billows from burning buildings destroyed during an overnight Israeli air raid on Beirut's suburbs August 5, 2006. Picture taken August 5, 2006. REUTERS/Adnan Hajj (LEBANON)

I guess in Reuters land, "CORRECTED" means "REAL" and "PREVIOUS VERSION" means "YOU KNOW, THE ONE WE FAKED".

This is expected, but not good enough. I'm still waiting for your very public apology, correction, and prompt firing of Hajj or whoever was responsible for this Reuters. Your move. At least have the cherries to respond to me, or one of the many of us who has emailed you!

And just incase there is future funny business, here are the two photos hosted by Yahoo as they appear at the moment:

Again, the right thing to do here is immediately fire the person responsible. Then the right thing for that person to do is wonder why the hell they photoshopped something that didn't need photoshopping. What purpose did photoshopping the smoke to the top of the screen serve? Does anyone else smell Karl Rove's fingerprints on this?

****UPDATE****
YNetNews has more on the Reuters "correction" (h/t Drudge):

A Reuters photograph of smoke rising from buildings in Beirut has been withdrawn after coming under attack by American web logs. The blogs accused Reuters of distorting the photograph to include more smoke and damage.

In the message, Reuters said that "photo editing software was improperly used on this image. A corrected version will immediately follow this advisory. We are sorry for any inconvience."

"Improperly used"?! You've got to be kidding me. As for the fake causing an "inconvenience"? I didn't realize that "truth" was a "convenience", especially after reading your policy (quoted earlier). Again, please contact Reuters and demand immedaite firings and public apologies. They won't do it, but at least they'll be more careful next time. Be sure to mention Flopping Ace's questions about other Hajj photos.

***UPDATE***
The picture kill order from Reuters (h/t My Vast Right Wing Conspiracy):

UPDATE
Alright kids, I've got to get some sleep. Check in with all the other bloggers I've linked to. I'm certain they'll have some animation to connect the real and fake images. All I have to add at this point is that the "real" image isn't exactly the original of the fake image. Notice it's slightly offset, etc. Not to mention the colors of even the buildings in the foreground are totally different. Maybe both the fake and real are cropped sections from one larger real photo. But I tend not to give the benefit of the doubt to proven liars.

Before I go, a few more blogging:
Stop the ACLU, Outside the Beltway, Strangely Silent, Wizbang, HiWired Blog, Amateur Megalomania

***UPDATE***
Michelle Malkin has posted on the "correction" now as well. She correctly wonders about Hajj's other photos.

 

By now you're certainly familiar with the race friendly liberals using "blackface" imagery to attack their opponents. Most noteably it's the Dems eatting their own, Joe Lieberman, simply because he has the conviction to not go with the polls on the Iraq war, even though he's a liberal all the way around. From time to time I don't even cover these type of stories, partly because the racism coming out of the left is such a regular occurance that it would be full time job, and partly because it would be overkill sense the everyone else blogs about it. The only thing unique in this case is that Lieberman is a Democrat.

If you have been following the story, you know that nutroot and Huffington Poster Jane Hamsher who originally used the Lieberman "blackface" in a piece she wrote, took it down and tried to distance herself from who she supports, Lieberman's primary opponent Ned Lamont. And if you've managed to stay out of the lefty Kool Aid zones you'd realize that despite Hamsher's claims that she's not affiliate with the Lamont campaign, and his distancing himself from blogs, she is VERY tight with the campaign. In fact, she seems like she's practically an unpaid campaign manager! Michelle Malkin has the details here, here, and especially here.

Well now some liberal blogger I've never heard of is crying selective conservative outrage because he didn't hear anyone throw a fit about my Hillary / Roots photoshop. I created the photoshop following Hillary's comments to a black Harlem audience on Martin Luther King Jr. Day, comparing what slaves endured to what Democrats in Congress endure:

The House "has been run like a plantation, and you know what I'm talking about," said Clinton, D-N.Y. "It has been run in a way so that nobody with a contrary view has had a chance to present legislation, to make an argument, to be heard."

I'm not ashamed to show the image again because it's totally different than the "blackface" images that everyone is upset about.

First of all, the "blackface" that the liberals have been using to attack opponents is deeply rooted in the racist history of America (see here). The liberals are using no context just drudging up painful memories of the racism of this country's past while taking cheapshots at political opponents. My image is clearly photoshopping Hillary in to a position that she claims to be in.

Look, I DIDN'T paint Hillary as some black slave, SHE DID. She had the nerve to devalue what the slaves went through by comparing it with whiny Democrats in Washington not getting their way! SHE DID THAT! I mocked her by putting her on the cover of roots, sarcastically saying essentially "really, is it this bad Hill?" Please explain to me how you can interpret that any other way. What else could I possibly have been saying?

Well, leave it to the libs. They are claiming that his is a "blackface" like any other. First of all, it's not the "blackface" that we've seen, referencing the "blackface" of our history. It's a Hillary face on the cover of roots, where I simply painted over her face with some semi-transparent brown to make it blend with the hands and body from the original image. With her normal pale white skin color, the image just didn't "fit". Admittedly even with my coloring job, it's not the greatest, but I don't have any real photoshopping software.

Somehow liberals see me using color to blend the skin on Hillary's face to the body I put it on, the same as they see people using the ages old "blackface" that is used to mock black people. My image has nothing to do with "black people". It has to do with Hillary playing slave!

A blogger Steve M. at RogerAiles.blogspot.com took it upon himself to expose what his misguided childish mind thinks is a double standard. He opens with these three paragraphs, with my Hillary photoshop after the first:

I didn't like Jane Hamsher's blackface Lieberman, but does anyone recall a similar reaction when RightWinged.com, a favorite of the conservative blogosphere, ran this?

(my photoshop)

*crickets*, as I recall.

(That was in reaction to Hillary's comment that the GOP-controlled House of Representatives "has been run like a plantation.")

First let me mention that Steve M. cross-posted the entire entry over at some place called "No More Mister Nice Blog". And in both locations he hotlinked my image, instead of doing the normal internet courtesy move of saving it and hosting it on your own. Steve M. wasn't amused when I replace the image file that he was hotlinking, with a giant George Bush photo, throwing his page all out of whack. He adds this update to his post:

UPDATE: Randy, you tried to pull the picture so I couldn't link it, but it's back in a non-hotlinked version. You created this. You should be proud of it. Grow up.

Where did I pull a picture? As annoying as your spinjob is, I didn't pull anything, I tought you a lesson in internet etiquet and hopefully lyou won't be hotlinking anyone else. You must be new to this. You're just lucky I didn't decide to be a real ass and replace that image file with pornography. I saved the original Hillary image under a new name, and made the changes to the post so that it was still there just as before, so nothing was pulled bud. All that happened was anywhere that you hotlinked under the original filename, you had a giant Dubya photo. Again, you must be new to how this works.

Anyway, this clown has take other comments I've said out of context to use in his updates, and he and his trolls have been arguing with me in the comments. Perhaps you'd like to join the party at Roger Ailes or No More Mister Nice Blog.

One last point to keep in mind... Steve calls me "a favorite of the conservative blogosphere". As much as I wish that were true (if I had time to blog regularly anyway), this is ridiculous. Just look at my site meter. I'm averaging like 200-something hits right now, and I barely blog. How can he say that there were crickets chirping (vs. outrage at my photoshop), when the crickets were actually my traffic. How do you compare little me with Jane Hamsher. Hamsher, who used the Lieberman image, writes at the Huff post and her own blog Firedog Lake averages over 62,000 hits per day!!!

Liberal honesty at it's best, eh? Where was the outrage at my image? Well, I don't think it would be justified, but even if it were, the outrage is lacking because the readership is. Eh, I'm bored with this for now. I feel like I'm explaining it to death, because that's what I feel I have to do after dealing with the 5-year-old like minds of the libs commenting at these blogs.

 

***SCROLL FOR UPDATES***

This is disgusting (via Local 6):

BUFFALO, N.Y. -- An Iraq war veteran who lost an arm and leg in a roadside bombing was mugged during a night out from the Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, according to an Associated Press report.

Lance Cpl. Mark Beyers, 27, and his wife were attacked and robbed as they left a restaurant in Bethesda, Md. on July 22.

The Marine from western New York was dining out while finishing up rehabilitation at the Walter Reed Army Medical Center.

As they left the restaurant, five men approached them and asked for a cigarette.

Denise Beyers told The Buffalo News they gave the men a cigarette -- but then the men grabbed her purse, kicked her and knocked the couple to the ground.

The thieves made off with $500 just wired to them by a relative.

Mark Beyers expects to be back home in the Buffalo area this weekend.

His family is planning a fundraiser for him on Aug. 12.

Watch Local 6 News for more on this story.

I felt including the entire text of the story was necessary, as it was such a short story anyway. So here's an extra link to Local 6, thanks.

Message to the muggers: First of all, you're douches for robbing anyone in the first place. Second, you're (insert something worse than douches) for robbing a handicapped person. Now you may not have known he was a Marine who was severely injured defending our country while you were back here robbing people, but I hope you all feel like sh** for what you've done if you ever find out who you robbed. It's just a matter of time before you're gunned down by someone worse than you or caught doing something, and I hope your rot the rest of your life in jail you POSs.

***UPDATE***
Michelle Malkin is now on this story, and directs our attention to this Stars and Stripes piece that provides information for those who would like to donate to Lance Cpl. Beyers:

She said the Veterans of Foreign Wars post in Akron, N.Y., is planning to hold a fundraiser for the couple.

Donations can be made by calling the Alden State Bank at 716-937-3381.

 

For months and years we've heard the media, the left, and our European "allies" crowing about the outrageous abuses taking place at the enemy combatant detention center, Guantanamo Bay Prison (GITMO) in Cuba. These claims of abuses have almost always turned out to be completely false or totally blown out of proportion. We all remember when Newsweek ran the false story about a Gitmo guard flushing one of the detainee's Korans down the toilet. Newsweek was eventually forced to make a retraction, but not before over a dozen were killed and many more injured in riots in Afghanistan in reaction to the story.

The majority of other cases of "abuse" turned out to be not much more than humiliation, despite attempts by the media and "human rights" insistence that they are tantamount to torture. Things like making a detainee wear a bra, dance with a man, or act like a dog. How could we treat people with such unspeakable cruelty!? (sarcasm)

Of course there were the 5 famous substantiated cases of "mishandling" of the Koran or the time urine came in contact with the Koran. Of course the media ran wild with these stories and other unsubstantiated allegations, while virtually ignoring all the cases of detainees destroying their own Korans and throwing them in the toilets.

All of these horrific abuses, according to top Senate Democrat Dick Durbin, rose the level of what some of the most evil men the planet has ever see did to their victims. Durbin famously said:

"If I read this to you and did not tell you that it was an FBI agent describing what Americans had done to prisoners in their control, you would most certainly believe this must have been done by Nazis, Soviets in their gulags or some mad regime — Pol Pot or others — that had no concern for human beings,"

You can't repeat that quote enough, because it shows exactly what the modern Democratic Party is all about. What's sad is that his Dem pals in the House even had to admit that after personally visiting Gitmo, they saw nothing to support the abuse allegations. Of course they treated is as progress, rather than a continuance of how it always was. Other reports have come back showing the same thing - that Gitmo is nothing like it's portrayed in the media.

I suppose Durbin was on solid ground when comparing our military men and women to Nazis though. He must have just gotten the advanced report that the detainees are tortured daily by being fed gourmet Islam compliant meals, cooled with air conditioning, having their own personal bathrooms, and enduring the pain of tasty treats like ice cream and cookies! Man we Americans are evil!

Screw all this reality though, we should probably take the word of human rights activists who put on a play in the UK's House of Commons to show us all what Gitmo is really like. I guess I must have missed their other performances reliving the abuses of Saddam Hussein.

Now after months of bogus liberal media reports, lies of "human rights" groups about abuse/torture that came only from the mouths of detainees, and a court ruling that forced Bush to cave in and give Geneva Convention rights to these people, which is essentially the treatment they got anyway, we learn that the abuse seems to be coming more from the detainees and not directed at them.

It seems that beyond destroying their own Korans, the detainees have violently and/or disgustingly attacked the guards on hundreds of occassions just between Dec. 2002 and July 2005. And of course we all remember the attempted (and thankfully failed) ambush attempt by detainees when one faked a suicide attempt in May of this year. Just what have the detainees been up to you ask? Well...

WASHINGTON - The prisoners held at Guantanamo Bay during the war on terror have attacked their military guards hundreds of times, turning broken toilet parts, utensils, radios and even a bloody lizard tail into makeshift weapons.

Pentagon incident reports reviewed by The Associated Press show Military Police guards are routinely head-butted, spat upon and doused by "cocktails" of feces, urine, vomit and sperm collected in meal cups by the prisoners.

If the rest of this wasn't so disgusting, the attack with a lizard tail is actually pretty funny. All I can think of is the asian guy in Austin Powers who's weapon of choice is to throw is shoe, and when Austin encounters him and says, "Honestly man, who throws a shoe?". "Honestly Jihadi, who stabs with a lizard tail?"

The detainee "reached under the face mask of an IRF (Initial Reaction Force) team member's helmet and scratched his face, attempting to gouge his eyes," states a May 27, 2005, report on an effort to remove a recalcitrant prisoner from his cell.

"The IRF team member received scratches to his face and eye socket area," the report said.

Of course the AP (always fair and balanced, right?) decided to get the other side of the story, and ask a detainee (you know, because we should trust anything they say).

Moazamm Begg, 38, a prisoner for more than two years at Guantanamo before being released to Great Britain, said he was suspicious of the Pentagon's description of incidents, especially allegations that Muslim men tore their Qurans or used sperm in attacks. The Pentagon continues to publicly question Begg's claim of innocence.

"This just doesn't make sense — especially since for Muslims this would be something that was disgusting, something that just wouldn't be done," he said. He added that some detainees told him they had mixed toothpaste and spit in the cocktails to make it look like semen.

Hold on, hold on... I'm trying to take notes on this, because I'm studying for my Islam admissions test... So that I'm clear - Muslims wouldn't throw man juice at prison guards... But they're not averse to flying planes in to buildings to kill thousands of innocent people, straping bombs on themselves and getting on buses to kill women and children, or hiding in civilian populations, mosques and schools? Allah-hu-Akbar!

The reports detail more than 440 incidents between guards and prisoners from December 2002 through summer 2005 that resulted in recommendations of discipline, an average of about three per week. The names of guards and prisoners as well as the final discipline were blacked out by the Pentagon.

Not enough for ya?

"Detainee stabbed the MP guard ... in the hand with his spork from chow meal," the report said, adding the prisoner later "made a slicing motion across his neck" and vowed to kill the guard.

"They'll take the smallest things, be it a piece of rust," he said. "They told us they are going to take that piece of rust and they are going for the jugular, they are going for the eye. They know what our vulnerabilities are, anatomically speaking."

Meal plates, shower flip-flops, cleaning brushes and other items deemed harmless in civilian life also are commonly turned into weapons, the reports said. For instance:

_"Detainee in cell (redacted) grabbed the radio from an MP and then threw the radio at the MP. The detainee then threw rocks at the MP," a Dec. 23, 2003, incident report stated.

_A detainee "reached out of his bean hole and attacked MP (name redacted) with a piece of metal foot pad from toilet striking him on the left hip area," a July 15, 2005, report said.

_"Detainee broke off the top of his sink, subsequently broke out the window then began throwing the sink and pieces of pipes at the Block Guard," a March 25, 2005, report said.

One of the most unusual incidents detailed in the four-inch stack of incident reports occurred when a detainee in the prison recreation yard assaulted a guard with a bloody tail torn from a lizard.

The detainee "caught the iguana by the tail at which time the tail detached," the May 2005 report described. When the guard turned to talk to a commanding officer, "he felt something strike him in the lower right back" and then "saw the tail on the ground at his feet and blood was in the same area of his uniform." The detainee said he was "just playing."

Nicolucci said one of the most serious incidents occurred this May, too recent to be recorded in the Pentagon's released reports. A prisoner staged an apparent suicide attempt while his inmates slicked the floors with human waste, seeking to overpower guards when they slipped, he said.

Nothing to see here mainstream media!!! Ignore these 440 documented incidents, and just keep reporting the handful of "abuses" based on nothing more than detainee testimony. I mean, reporting on what sick bastards these detainees are doesn't make the United States military look bad, and it doesn't stand to hurt the President politcally, so there's really no need to report the REAL story here.

Michelle Malkin, as digusted as I, adds more to the story with a personal letter from a father of one of the female troops serving at Gitmo. Here's just a paragraph (read on an empty stomach):

I just watched you on FOX. My daughter was in Gitmo for a year as a Master-at- Arms, E4. (10/04-10/05) She was injured several times by the inmates assaulting her physically. In addition, she knew that when she was doing her job by enforcing the rules, she was threatened by the prisoners if she had to touch them. They would get her. They mixed a cocktail of urine, feces, and semen, and let it fester for days until the right moment. They warned her that she was a target and then they got her, she was assaulted several times by loads of crap thrown at her.

BUT BUT... BUT the Americans made a detainee bark like a dog! That's the real crime, cant you see!?

How do we fight a war when we have to worry about so much little BS from the left, the media, and our "allies", essentially fighting against us every chance they get? Malkin sums it up:

Do you find yourself muttering "we're screwed" under your breath 10 times a day, too?

Sadly, yes. Can you guys even imagine what would happen to a prisoner in a civilian prison in the United States if they behaved like this?

More:
Stop the ACLU, Old War Dogs, Blogofascists, Dave Lucas, Kevin Aylward, Wizbang, Webloggin, ThoughtsOnline, Expose the Left, The Uncooperative Blogger, PoliPundit

 

(h/t Agape Press)

If you're a "transgender" individual who has been putting off applying for and enrolling in the MBA program at Harvard Business School, because you didn't like having to either choose "male" or "female" when creating your personal profile on HBS's web site, wait no longer!

A person looking in to enrolling in Harvard Business School's MBA program would probably begin their research by heading to HBS's home page. Upon arriving at the home page they'd quickly see a large link on the left side of the page that says "MBA Program", which takes you to this page, which has many links and information regarding HBS's MBA program.

Upon arriving at the MBA Program page, the most prominent links/buttons a user sees are two large ones on the left hand side. The first button is labeled "Create My Profile", and the second is labeled "Apply Now". A prospective student who chooses to create a profile at that point would obviously click the "Create My Profile" button, and which pops open a window to this page.

At first the profile creator looks like any other profile creator we've all filled out online dozens of times, until you get to the field where you're asked to select your gender. Now correct me if I'm wrong, but last time I checked there were only two genders - male and female. Apparently Harvad Business School believes there is now a third - "Transgender"

Come on! This isn't some sicko weird online dating/sex site. This is supposed to be a friggin' prestigious business school! Who, at this school, thought that this was a necessary addition to their profile creator? I mean, we know political correctness runs amuck at colleges all over the country, but I think this goes a bit far. "Transgender" isn't a real or legitimate thing! Some idiot who goes against God or nature (take your pick) and decides to change their sex, doesn't deserve a separate classification. It's bad enough that they expect us to accept their "new" gender, but do they really need to have their own little name for themselves, and does Harvard really need to legitimize them, as if they are some sort of third gender?

Beyond that gender option, a person creating their profile is also asked to check boxes next to the names of HBS "communities" they'd be interested in learning more about, one of which is the "Lesbian/Gay/Bisexual/Transgender (LGBT)" community. While I personally find this outrageous as well, it's not to be unexpected and certainly doesn't rise to the insane level of allowing a person to identify themself as belonging to a third gender.

I'm done ranting on this, I don't think you need me to explain how ridiculous this is. If you don't get it, then you're lying. Even a liberal is smart enough to see how disgusting this is.