For those doom-and-gloom pessimists convinced of the inevitability of the Islamization of Europe, here's a wonderfully cheery news bulletin:  Moslem imams are fleeing Holland in droves. Of course, the BBC reports this as proof of Dutch Islamophobia.  The tuth is that the Dutch are finally waking up to the threat of Islamofascism in their midst.  There are over one million Moslems in Holland now, and in cities like Rotterdam, well over a third of the children are Moslem. Now, if the Dutch could just get regular Moslem immigrants to follow their imams out of the country... Yet there is far better news in France.  The fate of Europe will be decided there in the presidential election on April 22, with a runoff if necessary on May 6.  The "Sego-Sarko" race is the most important political event in the world for 2007.

Wow.  That's my and everybody else's reaction to our first To The Point Rendezvous in Las Vegas last weekend (1/26-28).  The abundantly clear lesson we learned was:  members of To The Point really get along with each other! At every get together, I was so hesitant to begin speaking as I didn't want to interrupt folks who were having such an obvious good time together.  Then again, I had such a good time. Another thing I learned is that TTPers are a curious bunch.  I can't begin to remember all the topics we discussed.  Countries all over the world.  The Washington circus.  How politicians exemplify a Hyper-Peter Principle. The Peter Principle, that people are promoted to their level of incompetence, applies to companies.  Politicians (and bureaucrats in general) shoot way beyond it, into hyper-incompetence.  The just-elected governor of Nevada, Jim Gibbons, is a perfect example.  He is an absolute fool, and is wife Dawn is an even greater ditz.  Sad to say, he's a Republican. Yet a neighbor Democrat governor, Bill Richardson, is...

On January 20, Iranian agents kidnapped five US soldiers in Karbala, Iraq.  They killed one immediately. The bodies of the four other Americans were found later. President Bush's subsequent decision to permit U.S. troops to kill Iranians who are trying to kill them came shortly after the Karbala attack, which in earlier times would have been recognized by one and all for the act of war that it was. But as evidence mounted over the weekend of Iranian involvement in the terror in Iraq, Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass, was at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, describing his country as an "international pariah" for fighting it. Sen. Kerry followed to the podium former Iranian president Mohammed Khatami, whose speech he praised.  Sen. Kerry's remarks were front page news in Iranian newspapers. In the "War Crimes" museum in Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon), there is a photo of Sen. Kerry greeting the general secretary of the Vietnamese Communist party.  Perhaps Sen. Kerry is angling for similar recognition in Tehran.

For the last two weeks the weather in Pittsburgh has been typical for January -- it's snowed almost every day.  And for the first time this winter I've heard complaints about the weather at work.  I heard none during our unseasonably warm December. I note this to put in perspective the latest scare report on global warming from the United Nations:  Hypothetical piled upon hypothetical,  based on computer models which cannot duplicate the actual climate of the present or the recent past. Alarmists attribute warming to rising levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.  But CO2 accounts for only about 0.03 percent of the earth's atmosphere, and less than 10 percent of the greenhouse effect.  Only about 14 percent of the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere comes from burning fossil fuels. That means all of Algore's hysteria, all the economy-destroying restrictions of the Kyoto Treaty, are about stopping carbon emissions responsible for 1.4% of the greenhouse effect.

It has become obvious that US action against Iran has dramatically sped up recently. The US Navy has a second carrier group now in the Persian Gulf, overwhelmingly intimidating military power on Iran's doorstep.  At last, Bush has authorized US forces to hunt down and kill or capture Iranian operatives in Iraq. The White House is targeting Iranian financial assets throughout the world. So, finally we are going faster - but towards what?  Is the US goal a democratic revolution effecting genuine regime change, with all the mullah terror masters out of power?  No - not if the State Department has its wish. Our Foggy Bottom Pinstripes are doing everything they can to prevent genuine regime change in Iran.  What they want instead is a palace coup, the seizure of the government by different forces within the government, not outside it. Here's how it's going to come down.

The fun of watching The Obamarama being dismantled by the Clintonista attack machine continues. It may, or may not, surprise you to learn that certain members of the PIAPS's "Oppo" team (opposition research) read To The Point.  When they saw The Audacity of Apostasy earlier this month, they promptly zeroed in on the meanest and stupidest way to attack Obama's Moslem upbringing. How his campaign is about to respond will totally blow you away.  You better be sitting down. But rather than let her campaign be blown away by him, she has already come out with an even more vicious assault.  Here are the entertaining details....

The conservative "activist" community here in Washington got itself into a foaming lather last week over the attempt by Senate Democrats to subject their activities to criminal penalties. Section 220 of the S.1 "lobbying reform" bill required all activists - even bloggers on the internet - who communicate in any way with 500 or more members of "the public" to register and file reports with the government as lobbyists, and face criminal penalties including heavy fines and one year in jail if they fail to do so. It was a straightforward and outrageous assault on the First Amendment, true blue fascism embedded right in the very first Senate bill in our new Democrat-controlled Congress.  The New York Times had nary a word of complaint, nor did the rest of the major media. Yet it was simply the latest example of the assault Democrats are making on our 1st Amendment free speech rights across the board.  For their "lobbying reform" is part of a growing comprehensive effort to silence and criminalize speech liberals don't like.