The media has been in a frenzy claiming that a few isolated hecklers at campaign events was evidence that the McCain campaign, and especially Sarah Palin, was ginning up anger by recounting Barack Obama's past alliances with former terrorists and bigoted pastors.

Especially eschewed as execrable was the Republican Vice-Presidential nominee's assertion that Obama's domestic alliances and foreign policies were "dangerous." The media went wild.

The next day, in response to a statement by an American citizen that said she was "scared" for Obama to be Commander in Chief, the ever timid of the opprobrium of the politically correct media, tone deaf John McCain defended Obama as non-scary. The media's designated most experienced foreign policy expert, the Democrat's VP nominee, begs to differ:

"Mark my words," the Democratic vice presidential nominee warned at the second of his two Seattle fundraisers Sunday. "It will not be six months before the world tests Barack Obama like they did John Kennedy.

So what else is new about a newly elected Democrat being tested? Nothing, It's the norm.

With respect to JFK, I would point out that he later admitted his mistake in meeting with Khrushchev without preconditions and that his weak performance and failure in the Bay of Pigs invited and led to the Cuban Missile Crisis. Thankfully, the anti-Communist WWII vet that vowed to bear any burden in the cause of Liberty passed his test.

Not so for his successors.

President Lyndon Johnson allowed the Russian and Chinese communist backed Vietcong safe haven in North Vietnam and let Walter Cronkite drive him from office. He failed the test.

President Jimmy "inordinate fear of communism" Carter saw the Russians invade Afghanistan and back communist insurgents around the globe, as he abandoned the Shah of Iran under pressure from a "religious man [he] could deal with", the Ayatollah Khomeini launched the radical Islamist Revolution. He failed the tests.

President Bill Clinton treated terrorist attack after terrorist attack, including the clear act of war in the 1998 African Embassy bombings, as crimes for law enforcement to handle after the fact. Osama bin Laden cited Clinton's failures as showing America was a "paper tiger" that could be defeated and began planning the 911 attacks with operatives inside the United States as early as 1998.

Biden does not say that America would be so tested under a Republican President McCain. History is on Biden's side.

President Richard Nixon went after the safe havens in Cambodia and his "Vietnamization" strategy had essentially won the war before the post-Watergate Democrat congress intentionally lost the war in 1975.

Iran released American hostages they had held for 444 days within minutes of the 1980 Inauguration of President Ronald Reagan. Russia never tested Reagan. They surrendered without a shot.

As noted above, 911 was already planned before the Inauguration of President George W. Bush with UBL's most vivid recent memory of America presidents being Clinton's inaction and one of two partial exceptions to this rule:

Reagan's abandonment of Lebanon after the Marine killing bombing in Beirut and Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait test of President George H.W. Bush.

The former was remote in time and was not the same kind of test, given that the US placed the troops in country as peacekeepers.

The latter, however, does bear examination.

Most historians say that Saddam did not think he was testing Bush 41. Most agree that Saddam thought we had winked at the idea of the invasion.

I would say that UBL cites our refusal to finish the job in Iraq in 1991 as evidence that we were a weak horse unwilling to kill the king we struck.

Back to Bush 43. Immediately upon taking office he faced a belligerent Saddam, and al Qaeda. In February 2001 he told then National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice that he was "tired of [the USA] swatting at flies [in Afghanistan]" and directed her to have the CIA to plan removal of the regime.

That plan was placed on his Oval Office desk on September 10, 2001 and was the basis for the quick victory that deposed the Taliban, thus removing the safe haven from our enemies.

Libya surrendered without a shot and after several years of emboldening of the enemy by bushlied congressional democrats Kerry, the enemy and our allies got the message after the 2006 election that Bush was different. They saw the spine, intel poured in and the surge won the war.

Bush had to do this virtually alone, except for a minority of congressional republicans led by John McCain and one democrat, Joe Lieberman.

Yet now, Biden pleads for the kind of support for a besieged America under an Obama, that he and the rest of the democrats, especially including Obama (who Biden himself once denounced for voting to cut-off funds for the troops ala Vietnam), denied America under President Bush.

You need not worry Joe, should, by some ACORN miracle this neophyte gets the nukes.

Remember Bosnia, Kosovo and the Desert Fox bombing of Iraq under President Clinton? Speaker Newt Gingrich led the overwhelming majority of Republicans in vocally supporting Clinton.

So don't question our patriotism!

I am sure you agree that it is dangerous to be tested. Thanks for affirming one of the three main rules of life:

Death Taxes Democrat party weakness invites aggression

One of the reasons I left your party in 2000 (should have been years earlier) is when I realized that there was absolutely no reason for a foreign enemy to fear a Democrat.

[Caveat: Given your recent rhetoric and votes, as well as Bill and Hillary's statements, it appears that you three might be able to avoid a test. See if you can get Obama to step down. Or do you want us to be tested?]

Mike DeVine’s Charlotte Observer columns

Race 4 2008

"One man with courage makes a majority." - Andrew Jackson

The media focuses on horse races between men while the Earth turns. Some major events have occurred on the third stone from the Sun and significant dawgs haven’t barked within the din of mostly insignificant barking by McCain, Obama and Biden.

Russian forces occupy a small portion of former USSR slave state, Georgia. For the first days and weeks after Russia’s invasion, the media was filled with voices of doom that the US was powerless to prevent Russia from taking Georgia, Ukraine and even Poland. (Reminds me of a middle school bully bragging about smacking a wheelchair bound classmate in the boy’s room.) They focused on Putin’s smile in China, flight to “the front” as Bush’s beach volleyball party continued and years’ old soul peering stories.

Weeks later, Georgia exists. American military planes occupy Tbilisi with guns and butter ala Berlin airlift, but it is the presence of their bodies and the flag on their uniforms that keeps the bear (see cub circa 2008) at bay.

Ukraine, Poland and the rest of Free World New Europe (Rummy was right) have openly defied Russia with Poland allied with America on Star Wars. Thank you Gipper.

Iran endures riots and demonstrations in the street as MembersOnlyJacket-ijad has been forced to buy Great Satan brand wheat. They still breadlessly occupy Tehran and Qum, but no part of the Free World, including its newest member: Iraq.

The Olympics have ended with the USA the medal winner leader. The Big Question: How long will it take the thousands of homeless Chinese driven from their homes for aesthetic reasons to be re-located to their ramshackle lean-tos that look so spectacular to Obamas on NBC.

Ah, the luxury of obsessing on the utterances of a one-disciple chosen at 3am Messiah in a nation devoid of terrorist attacks from a still-free UBL (is dead free?) in a dangerous world.

Thank you President George W. Bush.

A President that liberated Iraq and saved Tbilisi and New Europe without firing a shot while rubbing sun tan oil on the back of a gold medal holding beach volleyball babe.

Mike DeVine’s Charlotte Observer columns Legal Editor for The Minority and HinzSight Reports "The way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race." - The Chief Justice Race 4 2008 "One man with courage makes a majority." - Andrew Jackson