Code Pink Sounds the Retreat!

Last night outside the main entrance to Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington DC, the anti-war leftists of Code Pink were forced into an ignominious retreat! They were obliged to abandon their protest corners and seek refuge a block away, where they licked their wounds. For at least one evening, the wounded troopers in the hospital, some of whom can see the entrance where all this takes place from their windows, did not have to see the Pinkos who mock them with their fake vigils.

The battle was not won with bombs or bullets, or even with force of numbers. We simply outmaneuvered them by getting a permit for "their" corner before they had a chance to file. So we had permits for all four corners and they had none. You snooze you lose.

If you are not familiar with the situation see my previous posts on the subject here, here, here, here, and here.

The short version is that a radical pro-Castro group called Code Pink Women for Peace holds an anti-war rally outside of the hospital every Friday night between 7 and 9pm. Code Pink is perhaps most notorious for having given $600,000 to the terrorists in Fallujah in December of 2004. They have been holding these protests at Walter Reed for almost 10 months now.

Word got out quickly that the Pinkos were outside the hospital, and the folks at Free Republic started holding counter-demonstrations/pro-troop rallies at opposite corners to where the Pinkos stood.

Last August the face-off made national news when CNS News reported what was going on. After hearing about it on talk radio and Fox News, I decided to go downtown and see what was happening for myself. Even since that night I have been at Walter Reed more Fridays than not.

Seizing Their Corner

As soon as I got there lat night I knew that something was different.

I arrived shortly before 7pm, and as I drove up, I saw quite a few people on the Pinko's two corners. Odd, I thought, as they usually didn't arrive in numbers until 7:30 or 8. After I parked and walked to one of our corners, I noticed to my great surprise that those were our people across the street.

This is what I saw.



Something's up, I thought. Those are mostly our prople, with one or two Pinkos mixed in. What's going on? Usually we stay on our side of the street and they on theirs.

I asked one of our members standing nearby and that's when I learned that one of our number, "Concrete Bob", had secured permits this week for the Pinkos two corners. They had been laggard in renewing their permits and Bob seized the opportunity.

Yes!

As you might imagine, as soon as the light changed I went over to our "new" corner to join my compatriots and see what was up. I knew that the Pinko leaders would arrive shortly and wanted to make sure we had adeqate numbers in place.

We were mixed in with a few Pinkos, but one of our number decided to make sure that passers by knew who was who:



The Pinkos Arrive

Somewhat perplexed, they're carrying their signs and such from their cars and putting by the fence as they normally do. Somewhat annoyed, the guy pictured here, Bruce, asked me ifr we really had to take so many photographs of them. "Yes!" I chearfully answered. Odd, but my answer didn't seem to satisfy him.



Their guitarist showed up, getting ready to play his Pete Seeger 60ish leftie songs.



At this point the Pinkos were informed that they did not have a permit for this corner and that so sorry, but they would have to leave. They got on their cell phones (whatever did we do before we had them?) and said that they were going to "straighten things out". But after a few minutes they gave up and beat a hasty retreat down the steet to lick their wounds.



The corner resume activities, this time under new, non-commie management:



And for once I remembered to have someone take my picture:



Now I know what some of you are going to say; "oh how childish all this is".
Well....on one level yes, but not so on another. Understand that the troops in the hospital know full well what is going on outside. I know this because I've spoken with enough of them, as in addition to this I pay visits to the hospital where we bring them things. And, as I've pointed out in previous posts, when the troops come back from Fran O'Briens at 9:15 or so on the bus they flip off any Pinkos who are still hanging around. Yes yes, I know there are a few troops who are anti-war and all that, so please don't post links on that subject("In any large organization..."). Everyone knows full well that most troops support the war and hate groups like Code Pink. Believe you me if you don't think that chasing off the Pinkos wasn't a morale booster for the troops inside Walter Reed you're kidding yourself.

Crossing the Line

Many Americans oppose the war in Iraq. Most of them still genuinely support the troops. But many do not, among them Code Pink. I'm not going to go into my case against them here, interested readers can check out the links posted above.

Suffice it to say that if you're hanging out with pro-Fidel Castro people like Code Pink, you're not "supporting the troops".

Congressman John Murtha has crossed the line of decency.

From the Code Pink Website, here he is, hanging out with Code Pink co-founder Gael Murphy and DC coordinator Allison Yorra.



According to the Pinkos website:

We presented him with our pink badge of courage and pink flowers sent by CODEPINK members nationwide. Rep Murtha was very appreciative of these gestures as he has been receiving many responses to his public denouncement of the war.

Either Murtha agrees with the Code Pink agenda or he's a useful idiot. Take your pick.

Update

Make sure you check out GunnNutt's excellent post on Friday night. She has excellent photos you won't want to miss.

How low can you go?

Code Pink photoshops Iranian freedom babes as Iraq antiwar activists.

UPDATE: Code Pink quietly removes photo, ... replaces with another fraud.

Being a citizen in the new "cold" war

Read this first before you continue reading.

I don't know what most scares the hell out of me: Wretchard's prospect of a new, but much "hotter" "cold" war between the "West" and the "jihadi's" or the author himself not blinking an eye while telling it.

It is easy to say: "You are out of your mind", "you are fit for a mental hospital", upon which that person would almost certainly respond: "I am not the one living in a fantasy world, you are!" And, although it is hard, even for me to accept, because denial is so much more comfortable, I think he is right (and for our own sake more people should be convinced of that). It would be understandable to feel a bit ridiculous for thinking so, but just maybe, that reluctance proves one's seriousness.

But the consequences of accepting are enormous: for the coming time (and who knows how long that will be), nothing will be more important than this and everything else will seem petty. Not only for politicians, but for every citizen, because it could affect every aspect of one's life: the relations with our Arab neighbours in the street, our friendships, the way we participate in our societies, how we value family, our professional choices, for who we vote. It has the potential to pervade, subconsciously or deliberately, your entire being.

But that is not necessarily bad: there is a choice between madness and awareness.

At the one hand, it could consume you, eventually turning you into exactly that what you are fighting. Or, at the other hand, you could fight being aware of and in accordance with our core value of freedom, from which all others spring. The difference between both is whether we disconnect from ourselves or not, whether we will still truly remember what we are fighting for or not. It is a very difficult exercise, but if we pull it off, we will come stronger out of it, making it worthwhile. The line between both is probably blurred: sometimes we will be forced to choose the lesser of two gruesome evils, but, if you accept reality as it is, we cannot avoid making hard choices, even if they imply great suffering.

I expect very testing times.

The ACLU Scares Me

The ACLU along with some like-thinking groups/people are suing the National Security Agency. They claim that they are a subject of wiretapping because of the people that they represent. Well, if they are defending terrorists, they probably should be afraid of wiretapping. They are a hazard to our safety if they are defending known terrorists. Here is the list of plaintiffs along with the ACLU:

Authors and journalists: James Bamford, Christopher Hitchens and Tara McKelvey

Afghanistan scholar: Barnett Rubin of New York University’s Center on International Cooperation and democracy scholar Larry Diamond, a fellow at the Hoover Institution

Nonprofit advocacy groups: NACDL, Greenpeace, and Council on American Islamic Relations, who joined the lawsuit on behalf of their staff and membership

Greenpeace is a terrorist organization as far as I'm concerned. They may have started out wanting to help protect the environment, but they have gone off the deep end by destroying property as well as harrassment of companies who, in their opinion, are "bad for the environment."

Greenpeace's tactics aside, these people want to take our national security and open it up to those the government is trying to protect us from. The NSA does not want to have to prove that what they did or are still doing is not illegal because the only way to prove it is to show what is being done. But, it is a secret for a reason...it's call national security. If the NSA is forced to prove it, it will let the terrorists know exactly how we are getting the information. The information that stopped a man in Ohio from blowing up the Brooklyn bridge.

They are suing over more than just supposed spying on US citizens. They are also claiming that Bush and the NSA overstepped his bounds. Their claim states:

In the legal complaint filed, the ACLU said the spying program violates Americans’ rights to free speech and privacy under the First and Fourth Amendments of the Constitution.

The ACLU also charged that the program violates the Constitution because President Bush exceeded his authority under separation of powers principles. Congress has enacted two statutes, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act and Title III of the federal criminal code, which are “the exclusive means by which electronic surveillance. . . and the interception of domestic wire, oral, and electronic communications may be conducted.”

The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in the Eastern District of Michigan, seeks a court order declaring that the NSA spying is illegal and ordering its immediate and permanent halt. Attorneys in the case are Beeson, Jameel Jaffer, and Melissa Goodman of the national ACLU Foundation, and Michael Steinberg of the ACLU of Michigan.The lawsuit names as defendants the NSA and Lieutenant General Keith B. Alexander, the current the Director of the NSA.

The White House and NSA has stated that if you are not talking to or aiding terrorists or known terrorist groups then you have nothing to worry about.

These calls are being monitored outside of the US and they are continuing the monitoring even if the call goes to a US phone number. Has there been anyone to come forward stating that they have been targeted or harrassed by the NSA? I would imagine that if someone in the US is being harrassed they are people who do not fall into these catagories:

Federal law and executive order define a U.S. Person as:

* a citizen of the United States
* an alien lawfully admitted for permanent residence
* an unincorporated association with a substantial number of members who are citizens of the U.S. or are aliens lawfully admitted for permanent residence
* a corporation that is incorporated in the U.S. (*)

If they do not fall into one of these catagories, they are an illegal alien and are not covered by the Constitution. And chances are, that if they are an illegal alien and are contacting known terrorists or terrorist groups, they are a terrorist.

It is as if the ACLU and the others involved in this suit would like to have our country attacked again. That is the only conclusion I can come to because they are trying to stop any way that the government is using to protect us from another attack. I don't have a problem with them listening in on phone calls between known terrorists and phone numbers in the US and I am not the only one to feel this way either:

Should the National Security Agency be allowed to intercept telephone conversations between terrorism suspects in other countries and people living in the United States?
Yes 64%
No 23%
Rasmussen Reports

For further posts regarding this lawsuit see Stop the ACLU and their accompanying trackbacks.

Cross-posted at A Rose By Any Other Name