A terrorist by any other name...

Branding hate sure can be hard.

Three Burleson men who belong to a "radical Christian activist group" were in the Johnson County Jail on Friday night after a church deacon caught two of them attempting to ignite an explosive device on Independence Day at a church under construction in north Burleson, authorities said Friday.

Dayton Lee Calaway, 19, and Michael Philip Plaisted Jr., 18, were arrested Wednesday night near the Victory Family Church after they got bogged down in mud as a fleet-footed deacon chased them from the church in the 400 block of Northwest John Jones Drive, police said.

Two other people drove away, the deacon told officers...

Cmdr. Chris Havens, the Police Department spokesman, said the suspects boasted about belonging to a leaderless group of 10 or 15 who share a belief that society has become too focused on self-improvement and self-gratification and has lost focus on the glorification of God.

"They did not say they had a name for their group, other than they were a radical Christian activist group. That was the way they explained their group," he said.

As someone who's worked on publicity campaigns, may I suggest "The Foundation" or "The Seekers"?

I think someone owes Paul Hackett an apology.

Update: I've been chastised through e-mail by someone I admire quite a bit that "three fuckups do not a theocracy make." True, and I was being a bit hyperbolic. However...

Sometime in 1994, as Afghanistan tumbled into disarray in the wake of the civil war that followed the 1989 Soviet withdrawal, there emerged a highly secretive and heavily armed group known as the Taliban. Its declared purposes were to restore peace, to enforce traditional law and to defend the Islamic character of Afghanistan.

And then today, here:

Today was a historic first for religion in America's civic life: For the very first time, a Hindu delivered the morning invocation in the Senate chamber — only to find the ceremony disrupted by three Christian right activists...

For their part, Operation Save America put out an interesting press release, claiming responsibility for the protests and castigating Senators for not joining in:...

Ante Pavkovic, Kathy Pavkovic, and Kristen Sugar were all arrested in the chambers of the United States Senate as that chamber was violated by a false Hindu god. The Senate was opened with a Hindu prayer placing the false god of Hinduism on a level playing field with the One True God, Jesus Christ. This would never have been allowed by our Founding Fathers.

"Not one Senator had the backbone to stand as our Founding Fathers stood. They stood on the Gospel of Jesus Christ! There were three in the audience with the courage to stand and proclaim, 'Thou shalt have no other gods before me.' They were immediately removed from the chambers, arrested, and are in jail now. God bless those who stand for Jesus as we know that He stands for them." Rev. Flip Benham, Director, Operation Save America/Operation Rescue

This is how "defending the Christian character of America" begins...

Bob Ewegen calls it Treason

Jim here:

Columnist Bob Ewegen of the Denver post, a Vietnam-era vet and reporter for 40+ years, opens with:

I am angry at ... the fact that an American patriot whose only crime was to serve her country in a dangerous and honorable profession had her mission undercut for partisan political purposes.

I am even angrier that the vicious "outing" of Valerie Plame put her sources at risk - the men and women in foreign countries who had risked their own lives to help America in our war on terror.

In the intelligence trade, such foreign sources are called "assets." I call them heroes.

Moves through:

I will never forgive anyone who willfully puts the lives of America's military or intelligence personnel or our friends abroad in danger.

And that's exactly what former Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage did when he leaked Plame's identity to Novak - and what Novak did when he published the name of a covert CIA agent.

And closes with:

The outing of Plame may have been technically legal, as the commutation of Libby's sentence undoubtedly was. But our supreme law, the U.S. Constitution, still defines treason as giving aid and comfort to our enemies in time of war.

And in this aging veteran's eyes, that's exactly what Armitage, Cheney, Libby and Novak did.

If you haven't read Ewegen's piece yet, I urge you to do so. Then email him your thanks. While you're at it, email the Post's editor, Gregory Moore and its President and CEO, Harry Whipple the same.

(My thanks to Larry Johnson at No Quarter for posting on Ewegen's column)