But will the President do what is necessary?

As President Obama mulls the military’s request for a big troop build-up in Afghanistan, Americans have swung in favor of such a move, according to a new IBD/TIPP Poll.

The survey of 927 adults found that a plurality of 48% favors sending more troops and resources to Afghanistan. That’s a sharp reversal from September, when Americans opposed the idea, 55%-35%.

Gen. Stanley McChrystal, commander of U.S. and NATO forc es in Afghanistan, has reportedly asked for another 40,000 troops to help control rising violence.

But Obama is in no rush to make a decision, holding a series of high-level meetings with military and political advisers on his next move.

And the upsurge in overall support for more troops in the IBD/TIPP Poll may not sway Obama.

That’s because the turnaround comes from a surge in support from Republicans — up 27 points just in October to 72%. A month ago, GOP respondents had leaned against sending more troops, 47%-45%.

But, Mr. President, we’re showing that we’re behind you 100% in your role as Commander in Chief. For us GOPers, politics does end at the water’s edge.

Win the war, Mr. President – we’ll provide all the political support you need, and the troops will do all the rest.

Run a dog fighting ring: you’re ok!

Be a conservative commentator: you’re out!

Is there a point to her still calling herself a Republican? Its not like the Democrats needed her vote – so, why provide it? Either she’s contemplating a party switch, or she’s just a complete fool…

Not too well:

The US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has praised Russia for its diplomatic work with world powers over Iran’s nuclear program.

But she has failed to reach agreement with Russia on new sanctions against Iran.

A month ago in New York, Russia’s President Dmitri Medvedev appeared to suggest his country might support new sanctions against Iran.

In Moscow Ms Clinton was looking for a more solid commitment.

She did not get one.

And she won’t get one – because Russia wants a strong, nuclear-armed Iran to be a thorn in our strategic side; because Russia wants to rebuild some sort of Russian Empire; because we already gave away our best leverage – the missile defense system in Poland and the Czech Republic.

We’re being governed by arguably the most foolish Administration in world history…

She grew up on Islam and hatred of the Jews – now she’s in the West, is a Christian and has this to say:

…Islam has been moderate from time to time, I point out. Voltaire put it best in describing it as a violent sect that had become “benign and tolerant”.

“I tell you why Islam was becoming moderate, and that was because Islam was weak. Then they discovered oil and a lot of Muslims looked on Saudi’s oil as a blessing from God.”

But it is also, perhaps, because the West does not believe in itself.

“The West is no longer proud of the Judeo-Christian culture and democracy. It does not believe in its own beliefs. Tolerating intolerance is not a sign of virtue, but gross negligence. The West hates itself and it’s very sad.”

She shakes her head at the thought that elements of Sharia law are recognised in England.

“We look to the European democracies as our escape to freedom. As a former Muslim and someone who lived under Islamic law, one of the major reasons I went to America was to escape my second-class citizen status.

“There are forces of reform in the Middle East. People are sticking their heads on blacklists, whether they are journalists, intellectuals or simply people who want change. When we see the West treat groups like Hamas as a legitimate government, and allowing something like Sharia law to be practised, it really weakens their position. And the radicals see that violence works!”

That last bit is very important, because it bears strongly on our new policy of “engagement” with the Islamists. Given that they are corrupt tyrants, the only thing they are likely to take away from Obama’s glad-handing is “hey, America is weak; let’s attack some more!”. We can’t win by tolerating – we can only win by insisting upon truth and justice.

What we need to do:

Our defense is in the preservation of the spirit which prizes liberty as a heritage of all men, in all lands, everywhere. Destroy this spirit and you have planted the seeds of despotism around your own doors. – Abraham Lincoln

There is Krauthammer’s excellent essay, Decline is a Choice; there is also Pat Austin’s excellent build off the essay, Where Will We Be in a Year?. All very good stuff – but, also, all very gloom-and-doom. I went to get the antidote for such things – a bit of prayer in the chapel devoted to the adoration of the Blessed Sacrament and out it came: the answer to, what are we to do?

Be just, be merciful, keep love in our hearts as we take the measure of events and people – and have so much faith in God that we’d be willing to walk blindfold, as He has our hand in His. Everything really is under control – we’re just having to pass through our troubles, as each generation has since Man was created. This, too, shall pass and out of it will come good – there is no other way for it to come out, even if we have to deal with quite a lot of evil along the way. It would be helpful, I think, to consider the why of it all – why is Obama, why are leftists, doing what they do?

They think they are doing good – bringing freedom, justice, prosperity and equity to a word wounded in body and soul by the evil, rapacious people of the right. Why do they think this? Because they don’t know what freedom is. They also don’t know what justice is. Most emphatically, they don’t understand what wealth is. It might be rather odd to think that people can be ignorant of these things even as they use the words all the time – but, ignorant they are…and thus they are hurtling down a path of destruction and all they see at the end is the bright, sunlit uplands of a Utopia. That it is a slave pen and a grave is something they just can’t recognize.

Liberals like Obama think that freedom is the freedom to be weird – to be tattoo’d; to be dressed freakishly; to have sex without consequences; to be free from any moral scruples and have, instead, “values”. They think that Justice is punishment – if there is injustice, the only way to set it right is to pay out the identified unjust in their own coin; its not enough that, say, a discriminatory law be repealed…those who allegedly benefited from the law must be made to pay. The think that wealth is money, and thus their whole concept is to divvy up piles of paper dollars and call that “wealth redistribution” or “spreading the wealth around”.

That freedom is the ability to freely choose to do the right thing is beyond their comprehension. They don’t understand that justice is the absence of injustice – you either have justice, or you don’t; you can’t force justice, you can only force injustice. They don’t realize that wealth is land, materials, labor and the ability of people to freely use their own to the best of their ability. Not knowing what is what, it is not surprise that they get everything wrong – and that they keep right at it no matter how many times we demonstrate their ideas to be idiocy. Unless we can impart to them understanding of true freedom, true justice and true wealth, we’ll never get anywhere with them.

Where does this leave us? To go back to square one – to be kind in our views. Forgive them, as they know not what they do…they are deceived. In an age of lies, they have swallowed them; hook, line and sinker.

Obama is not the doom of the United States; Pelosi and Reid only think they are epoch-making political leaders. They are the result of historical accidents, and these accidents will soon be set right – by an aroused electorate which does know what freedom is, what justice is, and what wealth is. An aroused electorate which has merely been awakened to its peril by the rise of Obama and his ignorant, foolish, pathetic fellow leftists.

So, sorry about that, Italian-Americans. Just for the record:

Christopher Columbus was a heroic, Christian gentleman who showed great enterprise and determination in bringing to general knowledge the New World. A whole string of good things for humanity issued from Columbus’ great voyage – not least of which was Cortez’ later destruction of the inhuman Aztec Empire.

We can use more of Columbus’ courage in this sad, weak modern age.

O’Reilly calls her one of the most compelling women in American politics – he’s right. I think she’s also a lot more savvy than anyone suspects:

For two years as a candidate, Senator Obama called for more resources for the war in Afghanistan and warned about the consequences of failure. As President, he announced a comprehensive new counterinsurgency strategy and handpicked the right general to execute it. Now General McChrystal is asking for additional troops to implement the strategy announced by President Obama in March. Hundreds of thousands of Americans have sons, daughters, fathers, mothers, sisters and brothers in harm’s way in Afghanistan right now. We owe it to all those brave Americans serving in uniform to give them the tools they need to complete their mission.

We can win in Afghanistan by helping the Afghans build a stable representative state able to defend itself. And we must do what it takes to prevail. The stakes are very high. The 9/11 attacks were planned in Afghanistan, and if we are not successful there, al Qaeda will once again find a safe haven, the Taliban will impose its cruelty on the Afghan people, and Pakistan will be less stable.

Our allies and our adversaries are watching to see if we have the staying power to protect our interests in Afghanistan. I recently joined a group of Americans in urging President Obama to devote the resources necessary in Afghanistan and pledged to support him if he made the right decision. Now is not the time for cold feet, second thoughts, or indecision — it is the time to act as commander-in-chief and approve the troops so clearly needed in Afghanistan.

Its unanswerable: As far as it concerns Obama, Palin is only calling on him to honor his pledged word. In the military sphere, she’s only asserting the Bush-era liberal position – listen to the generals. And she’s reminding all of us of the sons and daughters of America who are in harm’s way and deserve our unstinting support.

We clearly made a couple wrong choices last year – nominating McCain, and electing Obama. We could have done a lot better.

And the death of civilization continues:

Transsexual in court appeal for breast enlargement

A transsexual refused breast enlargement surgery on the NHS is to take her case to the High Court, at a cost of tens of thousands of pounds to the hospital’s budget.

The legally aided gender dysphoria sufferer, who has been living as a woman for over 10 years, says breast augmentation is essential to her female identity and emotional well-being and the refusal to give her the op amounts to sex discrimination.

Her unique test case against the West Berkire Primary Care Trust (PCT), in which the the Equality and Human Rights Commission will also be playing a part, is now set for hearing at the High Court on October 20.

This is what we get by developing an absurd idea of what a “right” is. If health care is a right and if a person has a right to alter their gender, then it naturally follows that you have a right to big old honkin’ tits. Where did we go wrong? When we said that health care is a right – its not; its a privilege. A right is something we can, at least in theory, exercise in our capacity as our selves. I can speak, so I have a right to speak; I can fight, so I have a right to self defense; I can work, so I have a right to the fruits of my labor. I can’t do breast augmentation on myself, and thus I have no right to same. Our liberties erode as our rights increase – we’re busy fighting for sex change surgery so we don’t have time to notice that our right to speak and to assemble is being progressively restricted.

And the worst thing about it: all these screwball liberals who fight out these insane issues would be the first to kneel before an Islamist master, come to conquer. They’d accept slavery so fast it’d make your head spin…given the large of amount of secret homosexuality in the upper classes of the Moslem world, someone like the plaintiff in this case might fetch a high price at auction; and we’d get not a peep out of them…except, perhaps, a demand that Christians and Jews shed their blood to liberate the twits.

And we would – and we will defend them…but a time of reckoning is coming; we can’t forever allow asinine things like this to interfere with a rational society.