'The Interview' Billboards Come Down

And along with them, America's pride.

At ABC-7 Los Angeles:

Hollywood billboards for "The Interview" taken down after Sony cancels release http://t.co/klgKXYnHtK pic.twitter.com/UHBGCuQYbm

— ABC7 Eyewitness News (@ABC7) December 18, 2014

Cuban-Americans Voice Disgust Over Obama's Communist Normalization (VIDEO)

At CNN:

Obama's Cuba Normalization is a Victory for Communism!

Well, it's like I've been saying all along.

But of course it takes an unreconstructed '60s-era New Left Marxist to actually spill the beans.

From former SDS-er and pro-Hanoi stooge Tom Hayden, at the Nation, "Why the US-Cuba Deal Really Is a Victory for the Cuban Revolution":

For those actually supportive of participatory democracy in Cuba, as opposed to those who support regime change by secret programs, the way to greater openness on the island lies in a relaxation of the external threat.

Despite the US embargo and relentless US subversion, Cuba remains in the upper tier of the United Nations Human Development Index because of its educational and healthcare achievements. Cuba even leads the international community in the dispatch of medical workers to fight Ebola. Cuba is celebrated globally because of its military contribution to the defeat of colonialism and apartheid in Angola and southern Africa. Now a new generation of Cuban leaders who fought in Angola is coming to power in the Havana and its diplomatic corps. For example, Rodolfo Reyes Rodríguez, Cuba’s representative to the United Nations, today walks on an artificial limb as a result of his combat in Angola.

When few thought it possible, Cuba has achieved the return of all five prisoners held for spying on right-wing Cubans who trained at Florida bases and flew harassment missions through Cuban air space. The last three to be released served hard time in American prisons, and are being welcomed as triumphant heroes on the streets of Havana. Three of the Cuban Five served in Angola as well.

Tens of thousands of Americans, from the veterans of the cane-cutting Venceremos Brigades to the steady flow of tourists insisting on their right to travel, deserve credit for steady years of educational and solidarity work and for pushing a hardy congressional bloc towards normalization.

President Obama has kept his word, despite relentless skepticism from both the left and the mainstream media. He is confounding the mainstream assumption that the Cuban right has a permanent lock on American foreign policy, especially after the Republican sweep in the November elections.

In this case, Obama’s extreme emphasis on diplomatic secrecy worked to his advantage. For over a year, leaders in both countries have conducted regular private debates and consultations, which resulted in the detailed normalization plan released in both capitals today. No one was more important on the American congressional team than Senator Patrick Leahy. Their tight discipline held until the final moment.

It is known that the private US-Cuba conversations about Alan Gross and the Cuban Five were the most difficult. The United States has never acknowledged that Gross was a de facto spy of a certain type, having traveled five times to Havana to secretly distribute advanced communications technology to persons in Havana’s small Jewish community before he was arrested in 2009. Also problematic for American officials immersed in decades of Cold War thinking was the task of wrapping their minds around the idea that the Cuban Five were political prisoners and not terrorist threats...

Criminy!

He's a bald-faced liar! No one --- and I mean no one, not even the far-left New York Times --- has suggested that Gross was a spy. He was, in fact, a pawn in Obama's Manchurian campaign to give Cuban Communism the ultimate bailout.

And that's why Hayden's praising Obama to high heaven. Barack Hussein's striking a blow for the international Marxist proletariat!

Here's Discover the Networks on Hayden's pro-Communist agitation:

During the Vietnam War, Hayden traveled many times to North Vietnam, Czechoslovakia, and Paris to strategize with Communist North Vietnamese and Viet Cong leaders on how to defeat America's anti-Communist efforts. He came back from Hanoi proclaiming he had seen "rice roots democracy at work." According to people who were present at the time, including Sol Stern, later an aide to Manhattan Borough President Andrew Stein, Hayden offered advice on conducting psychological warfare against the U.S. He arranged trips to Hanoi for Americans perceived as friendly to the Communists and blocked entry to those seen as unfriendly, like the sociologist Christopher Jencks. He attacked as "propaganda," reports of the torture of American soldiers, and labeled American POWs returning home "liars" when they described the brutal treatment they had received in Communist prisons.

On the domestic front, Hayden advocated urban rebellions and called for the creation of "guerrilla focos" to resist police and other law-enforcement agencies. For awhile he led a Berkeley commune called the "Red Family," whose "Minister of Defense" trained commune members at firing ranges and instructed high-school students in the use of explosives. Hayden was also an outspoken supporter of the Black Panther Party, calling that organization "our Vietcong." In 1968 Hayden was arrested as a member of the "Chicago Seven" for inciting a riot at the Democratic National Convention.

You know, it's not clandestine any longer. Obama and the Obama Democrats are finally --- literally --- out in the open with their hardline support for Communism.

It's just out there for everyone to see:

Obama's Cuba move is all about fulfilling long-time far-left, Marxist, progressive dreams while slamming America in the process.

— Katie Pavlich (@KatiePavlich) December 18, 2014

Sony Pictures Has No Further Plans to Release 'The Interview'

This is no temporary cancellation. Sounds like Sony's going to deep six the film.

At LAT, "Sony Pictures has 'no further release plans' for 'The Interview,' studio says"

Sony Pictures Entertainment has canceled the Christmas Day release of "The Interview" after the nation's major theater chains said they would not screen the film.

The action came as U.S. intelligence officials confirmed widespread speculation that the North Korean government was behind the devastating cyber attack, which has hobbled Sony Pictures and spread fear throughout the entertainment industry. "The Interview" depicts the fictional assassination of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.

Federal investigators began briefing some legislators that the rogue state gave the order to pilfer Sony's computer system, leading to a massive leak of sensitive data, including emails, financial documents and even the salaries of Sony's top stars.

The studio said it has no plans to release the controversial movie in the future, either in theaters or via home video on-demand. "Sony Pictures has no further release plans for the film," a studio spokesman said on Wednesday...

More.

VIDEO: Montage of Barack Obama Apologizing for America

I caught this segment last night on Hannity's:

Marquette Suspends Professor John McAdams for Exposing Leftist Totalitarian Faculty

This is just wow.

Professor McAdams is a political scientist and the publisher of the Marquette Warrior blog.

At Truth Revolt, "Marquette Suspends Conservative Professor for Exposing Totalitarian Leftist Faculty."

This part's the killer:

Once McAdam's blog post went viral, [Teaching Assistant Cheryl] Abbate and several professors signed a petition to have McAdams disciplined for his public dissent. Shortly thereafter, McAdams received the following letter of suspension from Marquette Dean Richard Holz...

Here's the offending blog post: "Marquette Philosophy Instructor: 'Gay Rights' Can't Be Discussed in Class Since Any Disagreement Would Offend Gay Students." And see, "Reprisal: Marquette Warrior Under 'Investigation' by University."

More: From Inside Higher Ed, "Ethics Lesson."

Added: At Instapundit, "HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE UPDATE: Professor Suspended for Blogging."

Transgender Movement Upends Feminism at America's Women's Colleges

Well, women's colleges were established as bastions of women's empowerment in a sea of patriarchal oppression. But with "gender fluidity" all the rage, some feminists on women's campuses are getting brushed aside as the newest social victims --- the "transgendered" --- gain credibility and power across the country.

What a trip.

At the Los Angeles Times, "Women's colleges lead push to redefine gender rules":

At a women's college, gender should be the easiest qualification for entry.

That's no longer the case. Women's colleges across the country are reconsidering their admission policies to adapt to a changing world in which gender norms are being challenged and more transgender students are seeking to enroll. It's a complicated calculus for many colleges, prompting concerns that these new considerations could affect the nature of single-gender schools.

Pressured by proactive student groups, some of the nation's 40-plus women's colleges are debating enrollment changes but also how to accommodate students who identify as men, such linguistics questions as the use of feminine pronouns, and whether school mission statements should be rewritten.

Mills College in Oakland last summer became the first in the nation to adopt a written policy on admitting transgender students, setting off a wave of self-examinations at many colleges. The latest to deal with the issue was Scripps College in Claremont.

Trustees there approved a new policy this month to admit applicants identified as female on their birth certificates. The school also will admit those who self-identify as women, which could include those born male who identify as female. The policy is effective for students applying for fall 2016.

College officials said the changes mostly reflect current practice and that the campus has graduated transgender students in the past, including some who transitioned while in school. Scripps, they insist, still will be a women's college.

"Colleges and universities have always led the way in policy discussions about social justice and expanding access," said Scripps President Lori Bettison-Varga. "It's not a surprise that students who we charge with thinking critically about institutions in general would be having these conversations at women's colleges right now. We're laying the foundation for a broader discussion about what it means to be a women's college in the 21st century."

Many alumnae agree but are troubled by the implications.

In a letter to the trustees, more than 100 alumnae raised several concerns, chiefly that these changes are part of a "systematic erasure of the female identity from women's colleges."

"Trans students argue that gender neutral language should be used to encompass their presence," the letter said. "But are we not, by erasing feminized language from our documents and rhetoric, erasing the female identities from a women's college? What could be more ironic?"

Yes, what could be? Indeed, the student body president at Mills is a transgendered male, Skylar Crownover, who transitioned after taking a course in "introduction to queer studies."

As the Times' piece point out:

Women's colleges began as a counter to a patriarchal social structure that excluded women from higher education. In the 1960s, these campuses became symbols of women's empowerment, graduating future judges, senators, business tycoons and astronauts.

The threat, argue some critics, is that the presence of trans men — and their potential to adopt the trappings of male privilege — may once again relegate the voices of women to the back of the classroom. Trans men have taken leadership roles at women's colleges, including the current student body president at Mills.

The alumnae coalition at Scripps unsuccessfully asked trustees to allow more time for those opposed to make their case. The group had advocated a more restrictive policy to admit only students who identify as female at the time of application.

"For many alumnae, the approval of the new admissions policy at Scripps is not just disappointing. It is heartbreaking," said Kelsey Phipps, a Washington, D.C. attorney and advocate in the LGBTQ community who graduated from Scripps in 2001. "With its decision to admit male-identified students, many alumnae who believe deeply in women's education feel abandoned by the college.... In the end, no argument, logic or passion could derail that hurtling train. We were steamrolled."

"Heartbreaking."

Well, I'm just all shaken up over here.

Who's Behind the Sony Hack Attack?

Here's a great piece from Wired, "The Evidence That North Korea Hacked Sony Is Flimsy":

Nation-state attacks aren’t generally as noisy, or announce themselves with an image of a blazing skeleton posted to infected computers, as occurred in the Sony hack. Nor do they use a catchy nom-de-hack like Guardians of Peace to identify themselves. Nation-state attackers also generally don’t chastise their victims for having poor security, as purported members of GOP have done in media interviews. Nor do such attacks involve posts of stolen data to Pastebin—the unofficial cloud repository of hackers—where sensitive company files belonging to Sony have been leaked. These are all hallmarks of hacktivists—groups like Anonymous and LulzSec, who thrive on targeting large corporations for ideological reasons or just the lulz, or by hackers sympathetic to a political cause.

More.

Also, at Twitchy, "MSM reporting that North Korea is behind the Sony hack. But where’s the evidence?":

Good post skeptical about alleged North Korea hack of Sony (TLDR: likely revenge/lulz motivation): http://t.co/PPQobRgnff
— mcantelon (@mcantelon) December 18, 2014

Obama's Cuba Deal: A Victory for Tyranny and Oppression

From Senator Marco Rubio, at the Wall Street Journal, "A Victory for Oppression: President Obama’s policy is bad news for the Cuban people living under a dictatorship, and it sends a dangerous message to the world":

The announcement by President Obama on Wednesday giving the Castro regime diplomatic legitimacy and access to American dollars isn’t just bad for the oppressed Cuban people, or for the millions who live in exile and lost everything at the hands of the dictatorship. Mr. Obama’s new Cuba policy is a victory for oppressive governments the world over and will have real, negative consequences for the American people.

Since the U.S. severed diplomatic relations in 1961, the Castro family has controlled the country and the economy with an iron fist that punishes Cubans who speak out in opposition and demand a better future. Under the Castros, Cuba has also been a central figure in terrorism, narco-trafficking and all manner of misery and mayhem in our hemisphere.

As a result, it has been the policy and law of the U.S. to make clear that re-establishing diplomatic and economic relations with Cuba is possible—but only once the Cuban government stops jailing political opponents, protects free speech, and allows independent political parties to be formed and to participate in free and fair elections.

The opportunity for Cuba to normalize relations with the U.S. has always been there, but the Castro regime has never been interested in changing its ways. Now, thanks to President Obama’s concessions, the regime in Cuba won’t have to change...

A victory for tyranny. That's the Obama way.

But keep reading.

Charles Krauthammer: 'Is There No Tyrant In the World Obama Will Not Appease...?'

For nothing.

Obama got nothing from Cuba. No concessions. Not on rights. Not on speech. Not on economic liberalization. Nothing.

Here's the inimitable Dr. K:

The Sony Hack Attack is Cyberwarfare

From Abe Greenwald, at Commentary, "This Is Cyberwar, Not Tabloid Fodder":

The Sony hacking story has largely been treated as a juicy showbiz gossip scandal. We’re probably going to regret that.

If North Korea is behind the computer hacks and threats to terrorize theaters showing The Interview, it confirms a new era of rogue-state terrorism, one for which there’s no counterterrorism blueprint. According to the New York Times, Landmark’s Sunshine Cinema has killed its scheduled New York premier of the anti-Kim Jong-un comedy. The Hollywood Reporter says that the country’s top five theater chains have pulled out of showing the film. Time says the movie’s stars, James Franco and Seth Rogen, have called off their publicity tour. A spate of film executives are backpedaling for their lives as their emails are picked through and published to viral derision. The Times’s Michael Cieply and Brooks Barnes write that the theater threat “opens a new range of worry for Hollywood.”

But the danger is larger and graver than that.

In February, hackers laid digital waste to Sheldon Adelson’s Sands casino, forcing the Sands to temporarily disconnect from the Internet. It was a massive undertaking that wiped out or compromised millions of files. Bloomberg reports that “recovering data and building new systems could cost the company $40 million or more” (a figure coincidently close to the $44 million Sony sunk into The Interview). Why did hackers target Adelson? The cyberterrorists who hit him call themselves the “Anti-WMD Team.” They are based in Iran, and claim retaliation for Adelson’s hawkish remarks about the Islamic Republic. Here’s the rub, via Bloomberg:

The security team couldn’t determine if Iran’s government played a role, but it’s unlikely that any hackers inside the country could pull off an attack of that scope without its knowledge, given the close scrutiny of Internet use within its borders. “This isn’t the kind of business you can get into in Iran without the government knowing,” says James Lewis, a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.

So, if the evidence is pointing in the right direction, dictatorships are tanking our enterprise, holding us hostage, and essentially turning us into their offshore subjects.

This isn’t a gossip story or an industry problem. It’s war. Moreover, it’s a war we don’t know how to fight...

More.

Christmas Countdown

Hey, Amazon's got "12 Days of Deals" --- so if you're doing any Christmas shopping, it's much appreciated when you click through at AmPow's Amazon links!

Kim Jong-un Assassination Scene from 'The Interview'

At iOTW REPORT, "Kim Jong Un Assassination Scene."

And a full video clip, at the Verge, "Watch the Kim Jong-un assassination that was too gory for Sony to approve."

PREVIOUSLY: "Theater Chains Pull 'The Interview', Press Appearances Canceled Amid Threats (VIDEO)."

Val Prieto on Obama's Cuba Normalization Debacle

At Babalú:

This is a major setback for the opposition and dissident movements in Cuba. The Obama administration, by making this "deal", has confirmed that they are OK with the repression, brutality, incarceration, and murder the Castro regime foists upon the opposition. And I will once again say what I have been saying since day one of this farce of a presidential administration, for the record: faced with the fact that he is, by far, the worst President this nation has ever seen, and with no true positive legacy, Obama is relying on the low hanging fruit of the Cuban embargo to placate the left. Look for President Executive Action to undermine codified US Cuba policy.

Continue.

PREVIOUSLY: "Communist Obama Normalizes Relations with Communist Cuba."

Communist Obama Normalizes Relations with Communist Cuba

He's such an asshole.

At the Wall Street Journal, "U.S. Moves to Normalize Cuba Relations as American Is Released: Alan Gross, Held in Cuba for 5 Years, Headed to U.S. on Government Plane."

It's a bad deal that rewards tyranny and terror. And of course it's our terror-enabling president who clinched this disastrous double-dealing debacle.

More at Memeorandum.

Terror in Sydney: ISIS Has Called for 'Lone-Wolf' Islamist Attacks Around the World

At WSJ:

The long reach of Islamist terror hit another Western city on Monday with a siege in downtown Sydney, and we should expect more like it as Islamic State (ISIS) tries to mobilize adherents across the world.

Iranian-born Man Haron Monis, a self-styled sheikh with a long criminal history, held dozens of hostages in a cafe while claiming to have bombs on the premises. Police stormed the restaurant and killed Monis after negotiations failed; two hostages died and four were injured.

News reports say Monis targeted the Lindt Chocolate Cafe days after he lost the appeal of his conviction for harassing families of Australian soldiers killed in Afghanistan. He also had more than 40 charges pending for sexually assaulting women while posing as a “spiritual healer,” and as an accessory to the murder last year of his ex-wife, who was stabbed and burned.

The cafe Monis attacked is part of Martin Place, a pedestrian mall near local government offices, the U.S. Consulate and major commercial towers. In September police arrested ISIS sympathizers said to be planning a public beheading there as a “demonstration killing.” Monis initially forced hostages to hold an Islamist black flag in the cafe window, then demanded that police provide him with a flag of ISIS, according to Australian media reports.

Monis’s apparent affection for ISIS is shared by a disturbing number of other Australians. Some 70 have had their passports confiscated recently for fear they may travel overseas to fight for ISIS. One such sympathizer stabbed two Melbourne police officers in September and was shot dead. Days before, an ISIS spokesman had called for “lone-wolf” attacks world-wide, including in Australia, and authorities in Canberra raised the country’s threat level to high from medium. This summer an estimated 150 Australians joined ISIS in the Middle East, including a former Sydney resident who posted photographs of his 7-year-old son holding a severed head.

Jihadists haven’t mounted a catastrophic attack in Australia, though not for lack of trying. In the past decade authorities Down Under have uncovered plots against military facilities, a sports arena and the electric grid. Terrorists have had more success targeting Aussies overseas, killing nearly 100 in attacks on the Indonesian resort island of Bali and Jakarta’s Marriott and Ritz-Carlton hotels. Eleven Indonesians died in a 2009 car bombing at the Australian Embassy in Jakarta.

Australia has been America’s staunchest ally in fighting terrorism, deploying troops to Afghanistan, Iraq and now Iraq again. As a liberal democracy with large immigrant communities and Indonesia’s population of 250 million on its doorstep, Australia understands the stakes of the West’s long war against Islamist extremism.

The threat from ISIS in particular needs to be understood as extending far beyond the territory it controls, because ISIS successes in the Middle East could motivate radicals everywhere...

More.

PREVIOUSLY: "Sydney Hostage Siege."

Islamophobia!

Via iOTW REPORT:

Theater Chains Pull 'The Interview', Press Appearances Canceled Amid Threats (VIDEO)

At BuzzFeed.

More at Mediagazer.

Britney's Back!

She's so sweet.

At Women's Health, "Britney Spears' SICK Abs Cover The Latest Issue of Women's Health: See Pics!":

She's workin' our first issue of the new year like only the Queen of Pop can.

Also at

TMZ, "Britney Spears -- My Women's Health Cover is the Real Deal ... Here's Proof - VIDEO!"

Fear of a Bourbon Shortage Puts Enthusiasts Over a Barrel

I think the fears are overblown.

Interesting piece, in any case.

At WSJ, "Whiskey Lovers Stock Basement Bunkers; Searching for Elmer T. Lee."