Making friends and influencing people

Gratuitous cute kitty pic of the Babe yesterday applying the think system to the hand that feeds. More cute animal pics at Modulator's 101st Friday Ark.

Crackpot theory update. In our previous post, our conspiratorial mind posited the brutal kidnapping two weeks ago and carefully orchestrated release this morning of Fox News correspondent Steve Centani and his photographer as a master plan designed by Hamas elements of the Palestinian Government to draw attention to their cause:

Is it too much of a crackpot theory to suggest the government was behind the whole thing, using the episode and its joyous denouement as a super-sophisticated, media-magnet photo op calling favorable attention to their cause? As Steve Centanni had reasoned to himself during the terrible days of captivity, "I'm worth more to them alive than dead."

As the photo ops unfold -- raw footage of the released captives hugging their colleagues, formal footage of the captives posing, all smiles, with the Palestinian Prime Minister, a news conference full of praise for the legendary Palestinian hospitality -- we sense the hand of media genius Roger Ailes, CEO of Fox News, guiding back-channel negotiations to an apparent win-win-win situation:

Win #1. The hostages are free.

Win #2. The Palestinian Government is presented in a most flattering light, with Prime Minister Ismail Haniya, a senior political leader of Hamas, taking the high ground.

Win #3. Fox News, fair and balanced, is covering the waterfront.

And not a single word about throwing Israel into the sea.

Update: On the other hand, notes a DEBKAfile analysis [via Michelle Malkin, who has the usual comprehensive roundup], "For Israel, the fate of Gilead Shalit, whom Hamas kidnapped from sovereign Israel in a cross-border assault, is left up in the air."

Comments

[goomp]

Instant coverage of events makes it hard to know fact from propaganda but we have our blogs to discuss the many possiblities

[Gayle Miller]

Clearly the estimable Babe is well aware of that oft-repeated, but no less true, saying: Dogs have masters, cats have "staff"!

Is Baby's staff performing up to expectations?

I slept in Sunday morning and my two boys thought that was an excellent way to start the day - particularly when I fed THEM before putting on my coffee!

Cats have their priorities in order - ALWAYS!