By Debbie Schlussel
**** SCROLL DOWN FOR UPDATES – Retired ICE Agent is Wrong, Other Feds Confirm ****
Last week ATF agents and Michigan State Police busted 18 Arabs–about half of them Muslims and the other half mostly Chaldeans (Iraqi Christians)–for defrauding the State of Michigan of cigarette taxes, smuggling them from states with a much lower tax rate than Michigan and selling them here.
But, per usual, if you read about these arrests in any of the mainstream media sources in Michigan (including the Detroit Free Press and the Detroit Newsistan, you didn’t read any of their names and didn’t know that they were all Arabs–all of Middle Eastern heritage, as is usually the case in cigarette smuggling cases. This is significant because in most of the cases–as in this one–the criminals involved are Hezbollah supporters who are usually sending the money to finance terrorist operations against Christians, Jews, Israelis, and American soldiers (Hezbollah trains and builds IEDs for anti-U.S. terrorists in Iraq).

While the Chaldeans arrested and charged in several federal criminal complaints should face justice and were working in concert with Muslims (including a Yemeni Muslim), it is the Muslims that are noteworthy. As noted, they are mostly well-known Hezbollah supporters of South Lebanese heritage. Here is the press release, including the list from the Michigan State Police of those who were arrested and charged:

Investigators of MSP’s Tobacco Tax Unit worked alongside ATF agents in this two-year federal investigation. More than 150 law enforcement officers from ATF, MSP, and the Dearborn and Detroit Police Departments participated in the arrests and with the service of 25 federal search warrants for documents at private residences, gas stations and convenience stores throughout southeast Michigan. Items seized from various locations searched today include: documents, firearms, suspected contraband cigarettes and more than $115,000 in U.S. currency.
“At a time when Michigan’s economy is struggling, these defendants chose to break the law for their own personal gain by not paying the required State excise taxes on over 100,000 cartons of cigarettes. They sold the contraband cigarettes out of their businesses, pocketing over two million dollars in revenue that was due to the State of Michigan,” stated [ATF Special Agent in Charge Thomas E.] Brandon.
Those arrested for their role in the contraband cigarette trafficking scheme are: Abdo AL-HANUMA, 46; Jim ATTY, 56; Salim Georges ATTY, 72; Ali BAZZI, 36; Farid BAZZI, 32; Kassem Ali BAZZI, 62; Mohammed BAZZI, 33; Nasser BAZZI, 37; Sima Dehashti FALLAHI, 54; Khalil Ibrahim GARMO, 59; Abdul HEZAM, 40; Sam Gerges JINA, 47; Ali Salah KAHWAJI, 30; Khaled Abdo MOZEP, 24; Mukhlis MURAD, 50; Raghid MURAD, 36; Najib YATOOMA, 56; and Marawan EL-TOHAMY, 27. All defendants were brought before U.S. Magistrate Judge Virginia M. Morgan, Eastern District of Michigan this afternoon for initial appearances on criminal complaints.
The joint investigation reveals that these individuals conspired to defraud Michigan the proceeds of cigarette taxes. Michigan requires every pack of cigarettes to carry a stamp showing that taxes have been paid. The state’s tax on cigarettes is $2 per pack, making it one of the highest state tax rates in the country. During the two-year criminal investigation, these defendants allegedly purchased approximately 104,310 cartons of contraband cigarettes, representing a tax loss to Michigan of $2,086,200.

Several of them are from the Bazzi family, one of a few major families that make up the nucleus of Hezbollah in South Lebanon and its supporters and financiers here in Southeast Michigan. Several Bazzis have been charged and convicted with finance-related crimes involving money-laundering. And one name in ATF Special Agent George F. Linen’s Affidavit attached to USA v. Kassem Bazzi states:

A brown Jeep, MI plate BBD6931, (registered to a Reda Mohamed BERRO)was loaded with contraband.

As I’ve previously written, the Berro family is not only well known for participating in Hezbollah, but a Berro family member–Ibrahim Hussein Berro, cousin to the Detroit Berros–was the man who blew up the Jewish Community Center in Buenos Aires, Argentina, on behalf of Hezbollah and Iran in the mid-’90s, murdering almost 100 innocent people. His identity was confirmed when Detroit Berro family members were required to give DNA to match with his remains.
Don’t be surprised if the Bazzis and this particular Berro–as well as other co-conspirators in this case–were sending their profits from the cigarette smuggling to Hezbollah back in Lebanon. That’s what’s happened in most previous cigarette smuggling cases, involving Shi’ite Muslims from Lebanon, such as these defendants are.
Congratulations to ATF agents Linen, John W. Franklin, Troy A. Dannenfelser, Michigan State Police Det. Lt. Marty Bugbee (who’s overseen a lot of these cases and was censored by the Detroit Free Press after noting the scams were related to Hezbollah), and the other ATF agents and Michigan State Police detectives who diligently investigated this case.
Cases like this used to be the domain of the U.S. Customs Service Office of Investigations, which became ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement). Customs did great work catching and stopping Hezbollah cigarette smugglers.
But now that ICE has become a bloated, ineffective agency with no mission and dominated by political correctness toward extremist Muslims (especially with Special Agent in Charge Brian Moskowitz a/k/a “Abu Moskowitz” running the show in Michigan and Ohio), ATF, DEA, and local and state police pick up the slack as much as they can minus the appropriate budgets.
Florida Private Investigator, Bill Warner, who does great work on the terrorism front also wrote about this.
***
Read the interesting Affidavits in support of complaints in these separate but related cases:
* USA v. Kassem Bazzi
* USA v. Abdo Al-Hanuma
* USA v. Sima Dehashti Fallahi
**** UPDATE, 11/18/08: Yesterday, I posted herein an e-mail message from a retired ICE agent criticizing me for criticizing ICE for no longer being involved in cigarette smuggling cases and not doing the work necessary to stop it. The agent claimed ICE and Customs never had a mandate or interest in these kinds of cases. I was sure he was wrong, since U.S. Customs foiled many Hezbollah cigarette smugglers and ICE has an interest in any money laundering and smuggling that has an overseas component. Several experienced former Customs and current ICE agents confirmed what I’ve written, so I’ve removed the incorrect correction by the retired ICE agent, who was wrong.
Again, as I’ve noted, in the past U.S. Customs was involved in investigating cigarette smugglers, because they smuggled the money overseas (to Hezbollah, etc.). This case is no different.
**** UPDATE #2: Like many of the e-mails I’ve received from ICE agents, this retired high-ranking ICE and Customs agent notes I’m correct:

yes, you are correct: Customs always had an interest in cigarette ‘smuggling’ cases, even those that involved domestic purchases, because of terrorist financing concerns. Customs in particular looked at the terrorist financing/money laundering implications of the proceeds of illicit cigarette trafficking, being transferred out of the US to folks supporting international terrorist groups. ICE in the past was looking at trade-based money laundering related to both terrorist- and drug-related activities; it is unclear what the current status of those efforts is. This is similar to ICE/Customs’ interests in the past regarding illicit domestic trade in baby formula, often stolen from retail outlets and re-sold by the traffickers, again because of terrorist funding implications.
Again, you are right: Customs looked at such illicit trafficking problems, involving not only cigarettes and baby formula but also counterfeit intellectual property items, with a view to the terrorist funding implications, not merely the illicit trafficking per se.

By Debbie Schlussel
On Friday, I told you about ESPN’s racist, bigoted casting call for a commercial depicting various ethnicities on college campuses.
But apparently, the bigotry of his own employer was lost on ESPN prettyboy Chris Fowler. The “College Game Day” broadcaster announced to viewers that if you didn’t vote for Barack Obama, you won’t hire a Black coach. In other words, if you didn’t vote for Obama, you’re a racist.
I’ve gotten a number of letters from rightfully upset ESPN “Game Day” viewers, who want to watch football, not hear the inane Fowler’s political views and racism litmus tests. That includes reader David:
Look Who’s Calling You a Racist . . .

ESPN’s Chris Fowler Says Non-Obama Voters are Racist

Chris Fowler opened his mouth only to insert his foot.
During College Gameday this past Saturday he stated if you didn’t vote for Obama then you likely wouldn’t hire a black guy as a head coach.
So in other words… if you didn’t vote for Obama… chances are you are a racist. Ideology be damned – skin color should decide your vote/choices, right?
Almost a new low for ESPN. Right up there with sending Jeremy Schaap up to Iceland to goad [DS: the anti-Semitic, anti-Israel nutjob] Bobby Fisher into saying something crazy, and then calling it news. Fowler should be made to apologize, but he won’t be.

Commenter “scottinoc” wrote on Free Republic:

On the discussion of why there aren’t “enough” African American coaches in college football, Chris Fowler discussed the lure of big money NFL contracts for black assistant coaches, etc, then the discussion naturally gravitated to the racism angle, “behind the scenes”.
“Among those behind-the-scenes financial backers of big universities, there may not be…you know…that many people who voted for Obama…”
Sheesh, now I can’t even watch ESPN college football gameday without being told that I’m racist for not voting for Obama.

Thanks, Chris. Look in the mirror. And look at your own network and their bigoted casting call for a commercial for your own show.
Oh, and by the way, the real racists are the ones–like Jesse Jackson–who constantly complain that there aren’t enough collegiate Black coaches, but look the other way on the obvious disparity on the field, where 75%–plus of the players are Black, and 77%-plus of the players on scholarship are Black. Yes, the real racists are the ones who set quotas and affirmative action requirements for hiring and promotions in coaching.
But don’t hold your breath for Chris Fowler to give both sides and comment on that.
Complain to ESPN, and let the network know that Chris Fowler’s politics have no place in college football broadcasts.
Oh, and by the way, don’t expect a “Fairness Doctrine” to balance this kind of stuff out.
***
I looked for YouTube video of Chris Fowler to find anything of substance. While there were many videos of Fowler spewing forth hot air, the only videos of any entertainment value were those depicting Chris Fowler juggling. But it’s a different Chris Fowler. Well, at least one Chris Fowler has talent. And it’s not the one who called 55 million-plus Americans “racist”:

By Debbie Schlussel
Over recent years, I’ve written repeatedly about Congress’ and the rest of the Government’s absurd attempt to become sports czars. Whether it’s college or pro sports, these jock-sniffers in office want to run the show.
While a very few issues are legitimate–such as questioning the tax-exempt status for college sports programs, which in many cases really are the tax-funded, very profitable farm teams for billionaire pro sports team owners; and questioning why taxpayers must finance the sports palaces for gazillionaire team owners–most issues are not appropriate topics for the nannying interference of the likes of John Kerry and others. As I’ve noted Kerry and others interfered with Major League baseball cable and TV packages and NFL ones, too. The repeated Congressional hearings into steroid use in Major League Baseball were a joke and accomplished nothing.

#1 College Football Nanny:
Doing the “Work” Some Americans (From the BCS) Won’t Do
And now there is Barack Obama. If you saw his interview with Steve Kroft, last night on “Sixty Minutes”, you saw him call for something he and other self-appointed Congressional sports nannies have been calling for for years: a play-off system for college football’s Bowl Championship Series (BCS).
A definitive BCS championship is something that many sports fans want, since it’s never really been settled which college football team is number one. That’s because the arcane BCS system doesn’t always play the top two teams against each other. In fact, rarely do they face each other. And, in the end, while sometimes the best college football team is obvious, at other times it is not–and murky AP and coaches polls decide the season champions. Collegiate sports authorities have repeatedly admitted the reason they don’t have a definitive championship is that if they did, a lot of bowl games would immediately lose interest, viewership, and sponsor dollars. That’s not a good reason not to pick a winner.
Still, why is this the business of the next President . . . or anyone in government? Is our economy in such great shape that they have nothing better to do than stick our noses in something that, frankly, isn’t their business. Who cares about a possible auto industry bailout, when we have a BCS championship to worry about?
Now, to be fair, Kroft asked Obama about this. But he only did so because this is one of the “important” things Obama has pushed in the past. And it’s not like Obama said, “Steve, America has so many pressing issues. I’m not going get involved in that.”
Nope. Instead, Obama was already deciding the new future of college football and pledged to throw his “weight around” on this very important issue that will rescue families from losing their homes and their sudden inability to put food on the table.

Eight teams. That would be three rounds to determine a national champion. It would add three extra weeks to the season. You could trim back on the regular season. I don’t know any serious fan of college football who has disagreed with me on this. So, I’m going to throw my weight around a little bit. I think it’s the right thing to do.”

No, the right thing to do is stay out of sports and other similarly trivial things that really aren’t major problems facing America.
Echoes of Jimmy Carter overseeing the White House tennis court schedule.

By Debbie Schlussel
Very funny, well done, and echoes what I said is missing from the latest James Bond movie, “Quantum of Solace” (read my review)–ie., fun.

**** UPDATE, 11/14/08: Here’s a great rendition of the classic version. Pour yourself a martini, shaken, not stirred.

By Debbie Schlussel
**** SCROLL DOWN FOR UPDATE on Ray Kelly ****
Today, a myriad of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents contacted me from all over to let me know that their unqualified, incompetent Bush crony-ette boss, Julie L. Myers a/k/a “The ICE Princess”, stopped by ICE headquarters to say good-bye to the little people.
After months away from the office–an unearned paid vacation courtesy of your tax dollars–she decided to make an official stop in. And, surprise, it wasn’t to judge a costume contest and give out awards for “originality” to employees dressed in blackface . . . or to illegally destroy evidence when she got caught.
Also, today, while she was saying good-bye, I was observing one of the many sad legacies she’s left in her destructive path of incompetence, ineptitude, and selfishness.

Laverne & Julie:
From the Beginning, ICE Agents Compared Julie Myers to a Bad Sitcom
(Artwork by a Concerned Federal Agent)
Here are some of the many fun and appropriate ICE images I’ve asked David Lunde to make over the last three years . . .
Julie Myers Was Unqualified, Clueless, and an Embarrassment to ICE Agents . . .




Prima Donna Julie Myers Liked to Be Chauffeured Around by ICE Agents, Who Were Forced to Buy Her Diet Coke (Out of Their Money) . . .


And She Liked to Give Awards to Her Employees Dressed in Blackface . . .

As I walked down the aisles of a Detroit-area kosher supermarket and saw signs all over saying there is no pastrami or buffalo meat, I thought: this is really the main legacy of “The ICE Princess”–the head of our nation’s immigration enforcement for the last three years, and the woman who exacerbated the problem.
The reason there is a shortage in kosher beef across the country is that instead of tracking down illegal alien visa violators–which include many Muslim “tourists” and “students” who came here for neither purpose and are still here–Myers wasted over $10,000,000 and thousands of ICE agent man-hours to round up just 300 mostly Guatemalan illegal aliens at the nation’s primary kosher meat processing plant in Postville, Iowa.
I’m all for arresting illegal alien workers, but we must set priorities. And the priorities she set dictated that several hundred Somalian Muslim extremist workers with work visas got the illegal alien Guatemalans’ jobs. Don’t you feel so much safer now that “Black Hawk Down” was imported to Iowa? Wow, that was really worth the $10,000,000 national photo op Julie Myers bought with your taxes.
Also, the plant and its parent company just filed for bankruptcy. It is taking the whole Postville town out of commission economically–in a time we can least afford it. The whole town will collapse.
But, hey, the hundreds of thousands of Muslim tourist and student visa violators continue to roam free. I guess they are “less dangerous” than Guatemalan Catholic meat packers.
And, of course, as I noted right after the raid, I asked an ICE agent who conducted the raid whether they’d ever raid Muslim halal meat-processing plants (many of which have been linked to terrorist money laundering), and he say, “F-ck no! The White House has to sign off on this.”
Instead, Julie Myers spent her days feting “former” Islamic terrorists who commit marriage and immigration fraud and work to impede her agents from enforcing the law–an amazingly obtuse move about which I wrote in the New York Post. Yes, American has its priorities.
And the priorities under Julie L. Myers, Michael Chertoff, and George W. Bush were not immigration enforcement. Estimates say that under Myers and her two top protectors–Bush and Chertoff–hundreds of thousands to a million new illegal aliens either entered the country illegally or stayed here past the time they were legally allowed to be here.
That’s the rest of her Politically Correct and incredible bankrupt legacy. Under Myers, ICE became LICE–Latino Immigration and Customs Enforcement, because that’s the only ethnicity that seems to be the target of immigration enforcement in these post-9/11 years.
Finally, there’s her hand-picked temporary successor, whom she promoted to Deputy Assistant Secretary of ICE, even though she knew he was and remains under investigation for promoting unqualified women to important ICE positions because they slept with him.
My sources say that John P. Torres, the proud high school graduate running ICE now that Myers is gone, is under serious investigation for that misconduct and for misusing and misspending ICE money on flights to fly his extramarital girlfriend around. Because of him, she is now Assistant Special Agent in Charge in Baltimore. And don’t forget the hundreds of thousands of dollars he wasted on a weeklong ICE confab promoting . . . himself and paying $30,000-$50,000 to Tommy Lasorda to speak to ICE agents.
Nice work if you can get it.
And, apparently, at ICE, you can only get the plum jobs and get promoted if you are dishonest and incompetent.
Meanwhile, illegal aliens laugh at us, just as they laughed at Myers’ brilliant plan to ask illegal aliens to self-deport. Only 9 out of hundreds of thousands took a bite.
Buh-bye, ICE Princess. And good riddance. So glad you are no longer on ICE and that your federal career is on ice.

New Temp Atop ICE, John Torres
***
Here are a couple representative examples of the many e-mails I’ve received from ICE agents, very glad to see Myers go, but very much captive of low morale amidst the “leadership” of John P. Torres, ICE’s own unique version of a power-mad George Costanza:

Subject: JULIE MEYERS is saying GOOD-BYE Today!
Dear Debbie,
Julie Meyers will be dropping by the new ICE HQ on 500 12th Street SW, Washington, DC to say Good-Bye today!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The exclamation marks are the message–excitement that Ms. Thang is finally gone.

Subject: Meyers finally Gone!!
Debbie,
Tomorrow (read today) is Julie Meyers last day……. Now we have the wonderful (sic) Torres running ICE………. Jeez, all we need to complete this bad nightmare is for Ray Kelly to come back to be DHS……… We are in serious kak kak………..

Note that both of these ICE agents spelled The ICE Princess’ surname wrong, because they simply don’t care about or respect her in the least to get it right. In fact, many ICE agents referred to her as The ICE Princess, after she was so dubbed by this site.
Yes, Ray Kelly, who heads the NYPD and was once head of U.S. Customs, is pushing to become Obama’s new chief of Homeland Security. I’ve written about him before. ICE agents who worked for the former U.S. Customs noted his priority as head of Customs was not law enforcement, but affirmative action for minorities in hiring and promotions. He is a close friend of Hillary Clinton, so that may put him out of the running. He’s not a good guy, but he’s far better than Michael Chertoff, in that he at least was a cop and a high-level federal cop.
Sadly, as I’ve noted in the past, Kelly was tight with his former protege, Islamo-panderer Brian Moskowitz a/k/a “Abu Moskowitz”, the sleazy, swinging ICE Special Agent in Charge for Michigan and Ohio, who was seeking extramarital relationships with employees of organizations engaged in immigration fraud, organizations that were under investigation by his agent, and suddenly aren’t now.
And that’s the latest in the ongoing comedy that is not a sitcom, but, sadly, real life for America: ICEfeld.

**** 11/15/08, UPDATE on Ray Kelly, possible new Homeland Security Chief:
One commenter, who claims his name is Tony Attansio and who says he worked in the NYPD and as a federal agent for Ray Kelly, is upset by my comments on Kelly. I have had mixed reactions about Kelly among ICE agents when I wrote about him when Hillary Clinton was the front-runner in the Presidential race.
Certainly, he’d be a vast improvement over Michael Chertoff, but why should Chertoff be the bar? If that’s the case, the bar is set very low. Here’s what I wrote about Ray Kelly, then. I think it’s a pretty even-handed assessment, since Kelly has, indeed, done a decent job of infiltrating and stopping Muslim terrorists, to the great jealousy and disdain of the FBI, which has been incompetent in the same area. At the same time, this began under Bernard Kerik, and Kelly has been very much into “outreach” to Islamic extremists:

Then, there is Hillary Cankles Clinton–for whom I would NEVER EVER vote. She is very good friends with New York Police Commissioner Ray Kelly, who would likely be among Hillary’s top choices to head up DHS. Legacy-Customs agents in Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) have mixed reviews of Kelly’s performance when he ran the then-U.S. Customs Service, a job he got because of his tight friendship with Hillary Clinton.
One former Special Agent in Charge, whom I trust a great deal, told me Kelly’s chief priority was not law enforcement and stopping money laundering and smuggling of goods into America. He said Kelly’s chief priority and objective in Customs was the affirmative action hiring and promotion of minorities, many of whom were not competent because they were not hired or promoted based on qualifications and experience. The former Customs Agent tells me that Kelly was terrible and helped destroy Customs.
And Kelly is friends with dangerous Islamo-pandering ICE officials like Brian Moskowitz a/k/a “Abu Moskowitz,” the ICE Special Agent in Charge over Michigan and Ohio. Abu Moskowitz, a former New York City cop, brown-nosed Kelly. And Kelly, in turn, repeatedly promoted and groomed Abu M (selecting him for the prestigious Customs Leadership Institute), getting him to the position where he is today. Under a Kelly DHS, Moskowitz–who panders to known Islamic terrorists and agents of the Government of Iran and refuses to investigate their illicit activity–might be as protected and unduly promoted as Julie L. Myers a/k/a “The ICE Princess” was and is. NOT a good thing.
On the other hand, as head of New York’s police, Kelly has been doing a great job getting and stopping Islamic terrorists. The NYPD has done such a great job stopping Islamic terrorists in New York, the FBI is angry and jealous. (That includes NYPD counter-terrorism personnel embedded in Israel, to which the FBI strenuously objects.) Most big terrorism suspects thwarted in New York recently have been stopped by NYPD undercover operatives and informants, not those from the FBI. While Kelly has achieved a lot in the fight against terrorism in NYC, he’s hugged and kissed a lot of extremist Muslims in photo ops, in the process. Not a good thing.

Ray Kelly: New DHS Leader?
I asked at that time for agents to respond and comment on Kelly:

I’d love to hear more from ICE agents who’ve worked for Kelly. Please post your comments in this entry and/or e-mail me, and let me know what you think of him.

Read the responses. And please comment now on your reaction to Ray Kelly atop DHS.

By Debbie Schlussel
Although it will be dwarfed at the box office by the new James Bond “Quantum of Solace” flick (read my review here), this weekend’s best new release is “The Boy in the Striped Pajamas” (also called, “The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas”).
It’s also the best movie of the year, and I can’t say enough good things about it. This poignant film should be must viewing for everyone interested in preserving our freedoms and civilization as we know it.
If you can only see one movie this year, this is it. It’s touching, moving, and a great discussion starter to teach your kids.
Based on a best-selling fiction novel for kids of the same name, “Striped PJs” is about Bruno, the eight-year-old son of a rising Nazi officer. His father gets promoted to the position of Commandant of a concentration camp, and the young boy must leave his friends for a large, cold, dark house a mile from the camp.

Without any young children his age and sheltered, naive, and unaware of the true horrors afflicted on Jews interned very near the home, Bruno soon finds himself in contact with “the strange people from the farm”–the cover story he’s told about the camp by his parents to protect his innocence. Pavel, a Jewish doctor, is now the gaunt servant in striped pajamas who must serve this Nazi family. And soon, wandering the woods, Bruno arrives at the edge of the camp, where he meets Shmuel, an eight-year-old Jewish concentration camp prisoner.
Some might wonder about the accuracy and credibility of some of the movie–since the Nazis exterminated most children immediately upon arrival at the death camps, and since it seems a guard tower in the distance is not too watchful over Shmuel at the fence of the camp, though he is somewhat hidden. However, the book on which the movie is based apparently takes place at Auschwitz–where some young kids were allowed to live so that the evil Dr. Mengele could experiment on and torture them. In the movie the name of the camp is not revealed.
At first, I thought this movie did not show enough of the brutality of the Nazis perpetrated on six million Jewish victims (and millions of others). But, in fact, you do see the brutality–how Jewish servants are treated and the demise they meet. The end of the movie is the ultimate in showing what happens. And the movie–while very much appreciated by this adult and suited for all audiences above the age of ten–is, again, based on a book for teens and young adults, so it is not as graphic as say “The Pianist.”
Some of my friends–children of Holocaust survivors–worried that the movie would show this Nazi family as too civilized. Don’t worry about that. We see Bruno’s 12-year-old sister modeling herself as a junior Eva Braun, and their home-schooling German teacher instructing them on the evils of the Jews. “They’re not people”, and “they’re not human”, are pronouncements Bruno is constantly taught by his teacher, sister, and father, but can’t quite understand, given his naivete, innocence, and secret friendship with Shmuel and the liking he’s taken to Pavel. And we see the violence and brutality against Jews within Bruno’s earshot.
The movie presents the irony of the Nazis–Germans who thought they were so refined, wore the finest clothes, and listened to the most culturally-uplifting classical music. Yet, they were the ultimate barbarians and uncivilized animals and savages. Bruno’s mother is disgusted by the stench and what is going on in the camps, but she knows full well why these people in striped pajamas are peeling her potatoes, are scarred from beatings, and gaunt from starvation and lack of sleep. She pretends to be disturbed, but is mostly just bothered by the smell of the ashes from the ovens, circulating in her air and how it will affect her children. She is selfish, not morally upright.
If they were all really so bothered about what was happening, they would have prevented the Holocaust. But they did not. Like the Commandant’s wife, they just held their noses and continued to let their kids learn that Jews are “subhuman.” They had all the luxuries and accoutrements of high culture and civilization. But they were not civilized at all.
A warning: This movie is very sad. The ending is disturbingly so, but then so are so many parts of it, in a subtle way. I cried at the treatment of the Jews working in the Nazi home. It reminded me of the many stories my late grandfather told me of how, as a young adult, he managed to survive the brutality of camps like Dora and his constant cheating of the certain jaws of death, and how he overheard neighbors who hid him for a day, brag to their friends that they were about to turn him over to the Nazis for a bottle of whisky.
The movie is only an hour and twenty minutes–always a plus in my book. It’s a tight, well-written script, well-shot movie, with beautiful and effective cinematography and excellent acting. As a member of the Detroit Film Critics Society, I plan to vote for the precocious, magnificent young Asa Butterfield, who plays Bruno, for “Best Newcomer”. And–unless I see anything better this year, which I doubt I will–I will vote for this movie as “Best Picture.”
Rush to the movies and see this. And take your whole family. You don’t want to miss this excellent, important, and moving film, best viewed on a giant screen in a dark theater. (It is shown mostly at arthouse theaters.)
FOUR REAGANS PLUS

**** Watch the Trailer:

By Debbie Schlussel
Remember when ESPN threw Rush Limbaugh under the bus after he made reasonable comments about how the media was excessively gushing over Donovan McNabb because they wanted a Black quarterback to succeed (kinda like the gushed over the current Black Quarterback-in-Chief-Elect Obama)?
Well, it looks like the liberals who run ESPN owe Rush an apology. Because we now see who the real racists and bigots are: them. Rush’s comments were tame and benign. ESPN’s casting call for a commercial, not so much.
ESPN–in a memo–set forth bigoted stereotypes against Jews, Blacks, Asians, Middle America, Southerners, you name it:

Literally & Figuratively, The Real Bigot is On The Left

ESPN canceled plans Thursday for a TV ad campaign touting its college basketball coverage after learning that the actors were to depict sometimes crude stereotypes of students at specific colleges.
A leaked memo from Anomaly, a New York agency that has produced past ESPN ads, described a casting call for actors in which it sought someone to portray a Tennessee student as “a slutty girl who would hang out at the cowgirl hall of fame” and a Notre Dame student who is “an Asian kid … who’s always fighting.”
The concept of the ad was to have students working at an ESPN call center, representing their schools as they phoned people to try to get them to watch ESPN college basketball coverage.
The campaign was killed as soon as the memo leaked. . . .
In the memo, which first appeared on awfulannouncing.com, the “defining characteristic” of the Marquette student is that “you don’t really remember her.” The Kansas student “takes great pains to point out that Kansas is very cosmopolitan.” Syracuse would need a “Jewish kid” who loves college – “all you can eat buffets in the cafeteria, who knew?“

Here’s the memo. Note the Duke casting–gee, the guys at ESPN aren’t trying to imply something about the guys who were just cleared for being framed for rape of a lying stripper, are they?:

ESPN
Promo
SAG
PAY RATE: SAG PROMO RATE
Director: Matt Aselton
Casting Director: ERICA PALGON
Interview: Thurs 11/13 and Fri 11/14, Mon 11/17
Fitting: 11/21
Shoot: 11/24, 25
Location: New York
SUBMIT ELECTRONICALLY LIZ LEWIS CASTING PARTNERS
EVERYONE MUST BE STRONG WITH COMEDY/IMPROV. PLEASE WRITE ANY ADDITIONAL NOTES, IN THE NOTES PAGE, ABOUT ACTOR’S COMEDIC/IMPROV EXPERIENCE/TRAINING, THAT WOULD BE HELPFUL IN LOOKING THROUGH SUBMISSIONS
All roles are ages 18-22 yrs old. WITH THE EXCEPTION of PERDUE.
The concept: The spots take place in the ESPN College Basketball Call Center (CBBCC). All of these guys are there representing their schools, calling people on the phone to get them to watch more College Basketball. Basically they are selling college basketball.
SEEKING:
[ DUKE UNIVERSITY ]
MALE. Our guy for Duke UNIVERSITY is a smart, with it, young WHITE male. He’s handsome. He’s from money. He is, in short, the kind of guy, everyone can’t stand. He is the kind of guy everyone wants to be.
[ NORTH CAROLINA ]
FEMALE. She’s a Southern bell. She is the counterpoint to Duke. Being young and pretty everyone wants to be around her. She’s charming. Not a dingbat, she’s sharp.
[ TEXAS ]
MALE. Straight out of an Abercrombie & Fitch catalog, Texas is a young man’s man. He is the kind of guy that could field dress a deer and then take you to the debutante ball in 20. Polite, farm boy. He’s good at everything. Except call centering.
[ KANSAS ]
MALE. Kansas is straight off the farm. However, he takes great pains to point out that Kansas is very cosmopolitan, as witnessed by their record, their burgeoning tech industry, and their hybrid corns (bonus: modified by fish genes!)
[ CONNECTICUT ]
MALE. Connecticut is all things Connecticut. He’s a little bit older. He’s a little bit thicker around the waist. He’s WHITE. He’s also competitive. Very. Waspy, blue blood.
[ OKLAHOMA ]
MALE. Oklahoma is awesome and he thinks everything is awesome. He’s very enthusiastic about all things call center and all things life and he wants to share this contagious enthusiasm with everyone he meets. Wide-eyed, as naive as they come.
[ LOUISVILLE ]
MALE. Louisville is very true to place. He’s short. He’s HISPANIC. And one day he hopes to carry on in proud Louisville tradition and race thoroughbreds.
[ TENNESSEE ]
FEMALE. Tennessee is orange crazy. The ice tray in her orange fridge, that freezes the water she dyes orange, is that orange. The party girl cowboy hat she wears is a white and orange zebra print. The tattoo on her lower back is Pantone 3 for that Tennessee orange. The only thing that’s not orange is her dog, which is the mascot Smokey. Did we mention she’s crazy? A slutty girl who would hang out at the cowgirl hall of fame.
[ PURDUE ]
MALE. Child prodigy. 14-year-old. Or open to an 18-year-old who looks 14. Aeronautical engineering. Wiz kid. Think McLovin from Superbad.
[ VILLANOVA ]
MALE. Villanova is the poor man’s Duke – he’s not quite as handsome, he’s not quite as rich, he’s not quite as dapper. After 2 or 3 beers though, who cares? As he’s friendly enough.
[ NOTRE DAME ]
MALE He’s an ASIAN kid who is in to all things Notre Dame, ridiculously so. Oh, and he’s always fighting. Every time we encounter him he always has some words or another, be it the faint traces of a black eye, or a scab or whatever. He epitomizes the fightin’ Irish.
[ PITTSBURGH ]
FEMALE. Pittsburgh is a tomboy. She obviously grew up in the neighborhood and isn’t going to take any guff from anyone and she’ll wallop you in the eye with a crowbar if you suggest different. So don’t. Think Tina Fey type.
[ SYRACUSE ]
MALE. Jewish kid from Long Island that is loving the college experience. It has opened up a world he never knew existed. All you can eat buffets in the cafeteria – who knew? To Syracuse, everything is a party.
[ GEORGETOWN ]
FEMALE. Georgetown, a 4.36 GPA who’s lived in 9 world-class cities, but all the time in her sister’s shadow (her GPA is 4.37). She’s sort of the female Duke, except most people like her. Think Reese Witherspoon.
[ GONZAGA ]
MALE. No one knows what Gonzaga looks like because no one knows where to find him. He is still stuck in the grunge look, reckless, in from the wild. Flannel look. Chews tobacco. Guy that would go to school in the Pacific Northwest.
[ MARQUETTE ]
FEMALE. Marquette, on a scale of 1-10, she’s a six. A B-, C in every category you can define a person by. Her defining characteristic is you don’t really remember her. You’re not breaking your arm to get to her, but you’re not chewing it off to get away. She does have a winning personality though. Midwest, sweet girl.
[ MICHIGAN STATE ]
MALE. Blue collar to the core. Michigan State is one tough kid that grew up by putting a few down. That’s just Michigan State’s way. Big beefy kid.
[ MEMPHIS ]
MALE. What can we say about Memphis? He’s a southern BLACK kid, really culinary and polite. He’s artistic, and draws comic books really well.
[ MARYLAND ]
MALE. He plays lacrosse. A dude. Low key. Mid Atlantic, wears baseball hats and chinos.
[ OHIO STATE ]
MALE. He looks like Jim Tressle (head coach of Ohio State football) in the dress code. Red sweater vest. Always. Doesn’t care for swearing either – of course we never really test this out as they are commercial advertisements and no one swears in them, but it’s true nevertheless. A Republican.
[ ILLINOIS ]
MALE. African-American. Young Obama. Think Toofer-the straight-laced, Harvard grad writer from 30 Rock (Keith Powell)
[ OKLAHOMA STATE ]
FEMALE. She’s a fun loving girl, Oklahoma born and bred. Decided not to travel out of State so she should be closer to home. She’s a flirt. She’s a hot chick.
[ TEXAS A&M ]
MALE. True to the region, Texas A&M is one tough dude. He’s not big physically, but he is imposing. He’s an ROTC kid and his 100-yard stare lets you know it.
[ BAYLOR ]
MALE & FEMALE. Baylor is not one people but two. It’s a couple. In fact, we’re not even sure which one goes to Baylor. We only know they are madly in love. Their world is each other, which is really sweet or really sickening, depending. Think Sheri Oteri and Will Farrell as the cheerleaders.

Don’t hold your breath for the ESPN apology to Limbaugh.

By Debbie Schlussel
Hoopsters LeBron James and Carmelo Anthony–NBA stars with, respectively, the Cleveland Cavaliers and Denver Nuggets–both admit to having “Brian Manilow” songs on their IPods. The two pro basketball colleagues (I chuckle at using the word “colleague” with regard to NBA players) are apparently a little light in the Chuck Taylors:

Nuggets star Carmelo Anthony, his longtime friend and U.S. Olympic teammate, admitted last year that he had Barry Manilow’s music on his iPod.
“I probably got a little of that,” James said. “I bet you I can find it on my iPod.”

Fruity Pebbles?: LeBron James, Carmelo Anthony & “Brian” Manilow Music

“I bet you couldn’t,” a reporter said, challenging James, who then reached into a bag holding his personal player.
“Let’s see,” James said, scrolling through the menu. “Go ahead, ask a question. I’m going to look for it.”
A few moments later, no luck.
“Nope,” James said. “No Brian Manilow.”
As the room broke up in laughter, James corrected his error.
“Oh, Barry Manilow,” he said, smiling. “I was talking about his cousin.”
James then continued his search, and sure enough, he came up with some Barry Manilow tunes, showing “Copacabana,” “Mandy” and “I Am Your Child” on his varied playlist.

“Copacabana” is fine (the version below is part of my workout music), but “Mandy”? This would make these men more womanly than the men who comprise the WNBA. Hey, someone’s gotta play with the pink basketball.
Well, I guess Barry-M is better than Jay-Z and the other vile, violent, misogynist rappers that James and many other hoops stars listen to. Compared to them, “Copacabana” is opera, and “Mandy” is high-styled symphony.
No word on whether LeBron or Carmelo have purchased from the Barry Manilow jewelry line. A pinky ring might be appropriate. Incidentally, Manilow was a major Ron Paul contributor.
What songs put a guy under gay suspicion? For me, if a guy likes this song or anything by Stephen Georgiou a/k/a Cat Stevens a/k/a Yusuf Islam (especially the insufferable “Peace Train”), it’s a deal breaker. Not kidding.

By Debbie Schlussel
The best thing about “Quantum of Solace“–the latest James Bond flick–is that the aptly-named villain-in-chief, Dominic Greene, is an environmentalist wacko, a “green” fanatic.
And, like most of them, he’s a Gulfstream eco-hypocrite, who actually rapes the land and victimizes indigenous peoples, while raising money in the name of helping them. The movie debuts today, and I was shocked that Hollywood dared go there, especially since the script is co-written by uber-leftist Paul “Crash” Harris.
Still, the villain was boring. He doesn’t compare to Blofeld (full name: Ernst Stavro Blofeld)–my favorite repeat Bond villain (best played by the late Telly Savalas)–or even Jaws. Not even close.

And aside from portraying the green movement as utter hypocrisy, the movie was dull, only so-so. Note to the Broccoli family (which owns the rights to Ian Fleming’s James Bond movie franchise): Stick to more glamorous locales than Bolivia (the setting for a significant chunk of this movie), which was very Bolivi-oring.
As was the case with “Casino Royale” (read my review), I continue to struggle to like Daniel Craig as the new James Bond (sadly, the first James Bond actor to have posed nude–not classy, just gross; Sean Connery came very close to doing the same) . I want to like him as Bond. He is masculine, hot, charismatic, and sexy . . . in a haggard, Vladimir-Putin-lookalike kinda way (I also try to forget his horrid role in the equally horrid pan-terrorist “Munich“). And they love to show this well-toned Bond with his shirt off, great for red-blooded women like me.
But the humorless script didn’t help him much. James Bond is supposed to be fun and casual–a hail fellow well met who is a good sport and doesn’t take himself too seriously, even when he’s getting the bad guys. But this movie was the exact opposite. It was smothered under the weight of seriousness, revenge themes, and bitterness. Don’t get me wrong–I love revenge, a motive and response which is under-rated and over-panned. But I just didn’t feel it here. It was empty and stupid.
One turn-on: Fortunately, Craig’s Bond wasn’t girlie-manish and metrosexual in “Quantum,” my chief objection to him in “Casino Royale.”
I wasn’t overly thrilled with Craig’s debut in “Casino Royale”, but I liked this one far less. I now have a better appreciation for “Royale”, which really was far more Bondian in tradition, tempo, and demeanor. “Royale” had a discernible, plausible plot and heart-pounding action. This one had lots more action, but it was mostly dull and unexciting action, which left me cold. That’s unless you count the scene of Bond repeatedly walking through massive flames of fire, unhurt. That’s a “Come on?!” moment that’s hard to believe. And while, yes, most Bond movies have stunts that are just not believable, the flamewalker stuff was just blatant in-your-face BS.
There was some great shooting and cool gun scenes. Love those guns–suave men with guns are hottt. But other than that, yaaawn.

Daniel Craig: Bond . . . James Bond, or Putin . . . Vlad Putin
And this one was missing even more of what Bond is all about and what makes male moviegoers want to be him and female movie fans want to “date” (euphemism) him: “shaken/not stirred” drinks, sexy women, and cool gadgets. Does our depressed economy translate into a shortage of all of those? Apparently so. While Ian Fleming’s written-page Bond was actually not a womanizer, that’s not the bachelor (except in “On Her Majesty’s Secret Service”) Bond we’ve come to know on-screen. But in “Quantum”, Bond has only two women (who are strikingly flatter than General Motors’ profits and the main course at IHOP). The cool gadgets? Well, there aren’t any. Didn’t you hear? Sharper Image went out of bid’ness. And the drinks? Well, “shaken, not stirred” is gone from the Bondian dialogue. I don’t remember even hearing the “Bond, James Bond” line.
Especially in this sad economic state of affairs, we more than ever need more of this stuff in our escape at the movies. And they gave us less. It’s like we flew coach on Northwest to Greater Bondia, and they not only took away the peanuts because of someone’s allergies and the snacks to cut costs, but they ripped the cushions out of the seats, too. Plus, they lost our bags (but not the bags underneath Craig’s eyes).
Oh, and remember “M,” the elder Bond boss? It was bad enough when un-Bond-like women’s lib transformed Bond’s boss from male to female (Judi Dench). Now, it’s worse. The senior citizen was supposed to be a cameo, but now she’s a co-star. Too much of her, far too less of Bond women, gadgets, cars, and drinks. What is this–“AARP Magazine” on film? Apparently, Helen Thomas is doing the casting for Bond girls now and the guys writing Dench’s growing share of dialogue think she’s one.
Then, there’s the murky, absurd “plot”. It’s a mess and hard to discern. The movie takes place immediately after “Casino Royale”, but you needn’t have seen that to understand this. Bond and M discover moles in the British Secret Service that work for this unnamed criminal organization. Apparently this same organization is responsible for killing Bond’s true love (agent Vesper Lynd who is killed at the end of “Casino Royale”), and he wants revenge. Meanwhile, he meets a Bolivian woman who has her own similar motivations in trying to stop the eco-villain and his criminal organization from installing their own dictator in Bolivia, a corrupt general. Asleep yet?
And the plot isn’t just weak. As with all weak plots these days, it’s anti-American, the fail-safe Hollywood plot device. Two geeky, evil CIA agents are working with the eco-terrorist villain to help the corrupt general take over Bolivia, and only Bond–of course!–can stop them. Not that I love the pan-Arabist Valerie Plamesque CIA, but hey, the MI-5 and -6 guys ain’t no saintly champions of Western values either. Kim Philby, anyone?
The one cool thing in the movie was ripped off from “Goldfinger”. A Bond girl is found dead in Bond’s hotel room covered in black oil. Remember the Bond girl found in a hotel room covered in gold paint? Been there, seen that.
Yes, there are some funny lines in the movie, but very few and far in between, unlike most Bond films. And, frankly, the best line in the movie was a serious and true-to-life one uttered by the eco-terrorist:

While America is tied up in the Middle East, Latin America is falling like dominoes to the Communists.

So true, and it’s something I’ve been shouting from the rooftop of this site for a number of years, as President Bush did nothing to stop Daniel Ortega and other Communists from retaking power in our Southern Hemisphere neighbors.
Exit question: Will Hollywood ever have the guts to make James Bond fight Muslim terrorists the way he fought Cold War Communists? James Bond bedding scantily-clad Muslim women under the noses of Bin Laden acolytes, then rubbing their faces in it and his bullets, is exactly the excitement we need. And so does he.
Bottom line: The movie was entertaining and not objectionable. But it just wasn’t what we expect from James Bond. Not only wasn’t it a great Bond movie. It wasn’t even an average one. It was just okay, and–as much as I hate to say it–in terms of a Bond movie, it was sort of mediocre. I love James Bond and James Bond movies. But I don’t love “Quantum of Solace.” It was just “eh”. That’s why I can only give it . . .
ONE-AND-A-HALF REAGANS

***
Read more about how this movie clashes with Ian Fleming’s consistent vision of James Bond, in Allen Barra’s interesting, “Will the Real James Bond Please Stand Up?“–entertaining must reading for Bond fans.
***
From a past entry on “Casino Royale” and Daniel Craig as the new fair-haired Bond, here are some of my Bond favorites:

Fave DebbieSchlussel.com James Bond flick: “On Her Majesty’s Secret Service,” starring George Lazenby, the one and only time he played Bond. Also liked, “From Russia With Love,” “Goldfinger,” and “Dr. No.”
Fave DebbieSchlussel.com James Bond: George Lazenby and Sean Connery.
Fave DebbieSchlussel.com James Bond villain: Blofeld (full name: Ernst Stavro Blofeld), as played by Telly Savalas (Blofeld was also played by Donald Pleasence and Max Von Sydow).

Sean Connery, George Lazenby as James Bond & Telly Savalas as Blofeld

By Debbie Schlussel
I don’t get the people of New Zealand. They did the work some American won’t do–electing conservative, common sense leadership, while we elected a Selective Service Registration dodger.
But, then, they also have this bull testicle eating contest. Blechhhh! I’m not posting the picture, so gawk at your own risk. One word: Eeeeeuuuuuwwww.