[guest post by Dana]

Now:

The U.S. and partner nations began launching airstrikes against Islamic State group targets in Syria for the first time Monday night, expanding a military campaign against the militants with a mix of fighter jets, bombers and Tomahawk cruise missiles fired from ships in the region.

…

Because the military operation was ongoing, no details could be provided yet, said Rear Adm. John Kirby, the Pentagon’s press secretary. He said the decision to strike was made earlier Monday by the military. He did not name the partner nations participating in the operation; however U.S. officials have said the U.S. would not launch this mission alone and some Arab nations had been expected to participate.

Some of the airstrikes of airstrikes were against Islamic State group targets in Raqqa. Military officials have said the U.S. would target militants’ command and control centers, re-supply facilities, training camps and other key logistical sites.

–Dana

[guest post by Dana]

This weekend in Manhattan, climate change supporters marched en masse in the People’s Climate March. Clearly, they love the earth more than us:

Tens of thousands of people marched through Manhattan sounding an urgent call for action to reverse global climate change Sunday.

One marcher’s sign read “cut your emissions or you’ll sleep with the fishes.”

The “People’s Climate March” in New York was billed as the largest of several protests held around the world two days before the start of the United Nations’ Climate Summit.

U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon walked with former U.S. Vice President Al Gore along the two-and-a-half mile route. Celebrity protesters included comedian Chris Rock and actors Leonard DiCaprio and Mark Ruffalo, who said he was marching for his children’s future.

And in a royal bit of hypocrisy, those earth lovers who shed tears over the terrible treatment of our planet by climate change naysayers, fossil fuel producers, and all-around enemies of the earth seemed to have forgotten what they were marching about:

Not to worry though because God is getting dragged into the climate change crusade by The Most Rev. Katharine Jefferts Schori Presiding Bishop and Primate The Episcopal Church:

We are united as Christian leaders in our concern for the well-being of our neighbors and of God’s good creation that provides life and livelihood for all God’s creatures. Daily we see and hear the evidence of a rapidly changing climate. Glaciers are disappearing, the polar ice cap is melting, and sea levels are rising. Incidents of pollution created dead zones in seas and the ocean and toxic algae growth in water supplies are occurring with greater frequency. Most disturbingly, the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is rising at an unprecedented rate. At the same time we also witness in too many instances how the earth’s natural beauty, a sign of God’s wonderful creativity, has been defiled by pollutants and waste.

Many have reacted to these changes with grief and anger. In their outrage some have understandably focused on the neglect and carelessness, both in private industry and in government regulation, that have contributed to these changes. However, an honest accounting requires a recognition that we all participate both as consumers and investors in economies that make intensive and insistent demands for energy. In addition, as citizens we have chosen to support or acquiesce in policies that shift the burdens of climate change to communities that are most vulnerable to its effects. People who are already challenged by poverty and by dislocation resulting from civil war or famine have limited resources for adapting to climate change’s effects.

God, who made the creation and made it good, has not abandoned it. Daily the Spirit continues to renew the face of the earth. All who care for the earth and work for the restoration of its vitality can be confident that they are not pursuing a lost cause. We serve in concert with God’s own creative and renewing power.

Moreover, we need not surrender to political ideologies and other modern mythologies that would divide us into partisan factions — deserving and undeserving, powerless victims and godless oppressors. In Christ we have the promise of a life where God has reconciled the human community.

Maybe The Most Rev. can ask Jesus to remind people that when they claim to live by certain standards and beliefs, that they might want to really actually do so.

Amen.

–Dana

Politico has an interview with Lois Lerner (cached version here; no links for thugs). It’s the type of soft-soap puff piece you would expect from Politico, complete with any truly tough questions being off-limits (i.e. don’t ask her about her political opinions!). This bit of rank dishonesty jumped out at me:

Lerner scoffed at the notion that she would crash her own computer to hide emails: “How would I know two years ahead of time that it would be important for me to destroy emails, and if I did know that, why wouldn’t I have destroyed the other ones they keep releasing?”

Oooh! Oooh! Call on me! I can answer that!

I think it’s time to remind you of something I quoted for you in June, from the Daily Caller, explicating the timing of all this:

Lois Lerner’s computer allegedly crashed in June 2011, just ten days after House Ways and Means Committee chairman Rep. Dave Camp first wrote a letter asking if the IRS was engaging in targeting of nonprofit groups. Two months later, Sonasoft’s contract ended and the IRS gave its email-archiving contractor the boot.

So it wasn’t “two years ahead of time” that your emails were destroyed, Ms. Lerner. It was ten days after you were told Congress was sniffing around. Then your hard drive crashed and your Blackberry was wiped. And the IRS archiver’s multi-year contract suddenly ended.

These facts are not noted, of course, in the Politico piece. You have to come here, to Patterico.com, for that particular bit of analysis.

Carl Hulse at the New York Times:

Let’s start by solving a Washington mystery.

Senator Kirsten Gillibrand of New York caused a commotion this month when she revealed in a memoir how her male colleagues felt free to comment rather vividly on her weight. The senator came under pressure to reveal the names of the perpetrators, but declined, setting off a guessing game in Washington.

Probably the most egregious incident was when a senior senator squeezed her waist and told her: “Don’t lose too much weight now. I like my girls chubby!”

It turns out the senator was the late Daniel K. Inouye of Hawaii, the decorated veteran and civil rights hero, according to people with knowledge of the incident.

Hmmm. I’ll note that in criminal cases, when the perp takes the stand, it’s far from rare for him to blame the crime on one of his dearly departed homies. This strategem alleviates the need to blame someone who, being still alive, might get upset by the accusation. Better to choose a party unlikely to contradict you.

That said, there is some reason to believe Inouye capable of such behavior:

With his deep baritone and courtly manner, Mr. Inouye was revered by his colleagues and was a powerhouse in both Hawaii and the Senate, where he was a reliable supporter of women’s rights.

But in an all but forgotten chapter of his career, the senator had been accused of sexual misconduct: In 1992, his hairdresser said that Mr. Inouye had forced her to have sex with him.

Her accusations exploded into a campaign issue that year, and one Hawaii state senator announced that she had heard from nine other women who said they had been sexually harassed by Mr. Inouye. But the women did not want to go forward with their claims.

It’s amazing how often these little piccadilloes by Democrat Senators — minor episodes like allegedly forcing women to have sex, or killing a woman in a drunken accident and failing to inform authorities for hours — end up being “all but forgotten.”

I wonder if Grinnin’ Joe Biden misses Sen. Inouye the way he misses Bob Packwood.