« October 2004 | December 2004 »

November 1, 2004

CQ Flashback: Convention Interview With Sen. Alan Simpson

Former Wyoming Senator Alan Simpson came by Bloggers Corner just a few minutes ago and spoke to the group about liberal Republicanism, the electoral college, the current campaign and its tone, and John Kerry's Senate career. As you might imagine from his press conferences during his tenure in Congress, Senator Simpson spoke directly and even bluntly in responding to our questions. My audio of the interview turned out poorly as Sean Hannity's show insists on blaring out their program over speakers pointed directly at our area, but I can rebuild the important parts. In response to questions regarding the Electoral College, Simpson strongly defended the current structure and explained that any attempt to eliminate it would never pass muster with enough states. Too many smaller states would lose their impact on presidential contests, and as Simpson said, no one would ever see a campaign outside of New York, Chicago, and...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

CQ Flasback: Convention Interview With Tommy Franks

General Tommy Franks announced today that he will support George Bush for president at our blog conference at the Republican National Convention. Q: General, do you support George Bush for President? A: Yes. Q: With regards to consistency, did George Bush hurt himself with his remarks on Matt Lauer that maybe we can't win a war on terror? A: Absolutely not. We won a Cold War, didn't we? And we didn't do that in 15 minutes. Q: Did Ronald Reagan show that kind of doubt in his effort to win the Cold War? A: I don't know that there was any doubt shown at all. I think that we're talking about consistency, and persistency, and anybody who looks at this thing over the last three and a half years is going to have a heck of a hard time trying to point out when he was not consistent or persistent....

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

CQ Flashback: Kerry Admits Attendance During Assassination Planning Meeting (3/19/04)

John Kerry's campaign has backed off their earlier denials that Kerry was not present for the VVAW meeting in Kansas City, November 1971, where the "Phoenix Project" was brought to debate and a vote: Senator Kerry of Massachusetts yesterday retreated from his earlier steadfast denials that he attended a meeting of Vietnam Veterans Against the War at which a plan to assassinate U.S. Senators was debated. The reversal came as new evidence, including reports from FBI informants, emerged that contradicted Mr. Kerrys previous statements about the gathering, which was held in Kansas City, Mo. in November 1971. John Kerry had no personal recollection of this meeting 33 years ago, a Kerry campaign spokesman, David Wade, said in a statement e-mailed last night from Idaho, where Mr. Kerry is on vacation. The historian Gerald Nicosia, who happens to be a Kerry supporter, released the minutes of the VVAW meeting, as well...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Captain's Caption Contest #33: Energizing The Base Edition

It's Friday, so it must be time for another Captain's Caption Contest! It's the final countdown, so this contest will remain open as long as the polls do -- which means 8 PM CT on Election Night! This weekend, the candidates have to get their voters to the polls -- that means they have to get them motivated, get their energy up, and inspire them to go to the polls in unprecedented numbers. Here's an example of that Kerry/Edwards magic: As always, make sure you put your entries in our comments section -- NO e-mailed entries, please! E-mailed entries will be tied to the leg of Ohio geese and flown over John Kerry's official hunter surrogates. The contest will end on Tuesday, November 2nd at 8 pm CT, when The Anchoress will select the winners. The Anchoress is an excellent writer on Catholicism and her personal spiritual journey; make sure...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Kerry Discharge "Other Than Honorable": NY Sun

Our friend Thomas Lipscomb writes today at the New York Sun that based on records produced at the John Kerry campaign website and military regulations and practice at the time of Kerry's Navy career, John Kerry received a less-than-honorable discharge for his service. Because of Kerry's refusal to make all of his records public and the Privacy Act of 1974, Lipscomb's sources would not go on the record. However, a reserve JAG and a former Navy officer from the Bureau of Personnel have helped Lipscomb build a strong circumstantial case for the negative separation: The "honorable discharge" on the Kerry Web site appears to be a Carter administration substitute for an original action expunged from Mr. Kerry's record, according to Mark Sullivan, who retired as a captain in the Navy's Judge Advocate General Corps Reserve in 2003 after 33 years of service as a judge advocate. Mr. Sullivan served in...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Mainstream Media's Love Affair With Kerry

The Center for Media and Public Affairs conducted a study confirming what everyone already knew -- the mainstream media gave John Kerry the kid-glove treatment this year, while being unusually harsh to George Bush. What most of us didn't realize is that the amount of positive press given to Kerry set a new record for media brown-nosing, the Washington Times reports: "It's not just that John Kerry has gotten better press than President Bush before this election, he's gotten better press than anyone else since 1980. That's significant," said Bob Lichter, director of the D.C.-based nonpartisan research group. "Kerry also got better press than anyone else in the days before the primaries as well," Mr. Lichter added. In October alone, Mr. Kerry had a "record-breaking 77 percent positive press evaluations," compared with 34 percent positive for Mr. Bush, the study states. The overall treatment of Kerry broke the record of...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

With 24 Hours To Go, Democrats Running Away From Kerry

The AP reports that Democrats running for state offices around the nation have one thing in common -- a desire to put as much distance between themselves and John Kerry as possible: Democrats running for the Senate in Republican-leaning states want to be more like President Bush clearing brush in Crawford, Texas, than John Kerry windsurfing off Nantucket Island, Mass. Democratic chances of regaining control of the Senate may depend on candidates who run away from their party platform and their presidential contender. "We've got eight or nine really competitive races and just about all are in strong Bush states," said Larry Sabato, director of the Center for Politics at the University of Virginia. "Democrats have some bad luck here." I'd argue that it has less to do with bad luck than it does from the obstructionist tactics of the Democratic Senate contingent the past four years. Obviously, Democrats got...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

CQ Flashback: Kerry Said Terrorist Had "Legitimate Voice"

John Kerry continues his quest towards self-destruction today in an NPR interview this morning, as he described a radical Islamist currently attacking American troops in Iraq as a "legitimate voice" who shouldn't necessarily be arrested if encountered: In an interview broadcast Wednesday morning, Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry defended terrorist Shiite imam Moqtada al-Sadr as a "legitimate voice" in Iraq, despite that fact that he's led an uprising that has killed nearly 20 American GIs in the last two days. Speaking of al-Sadr's newspaper, which was shut down by coalition forces last week after it urged violence against U.S. troops, Kerry complained to National Public Radio, "They shut a newspaper that belongs to a legitimate voice in Iraq." Never mind that this "legitimate voice" used that newspaper to call for an armed revolt against the Coalition and the Iraqi provisional government. John Kerry isn't concerned with that. John Kerry sounds...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

CQ Flashback: Kerry Would Have Waited For Saddam To Attack (1-27-04)

Senator John Kerry continues to make odd statements about the Iraq war, trying to reconcile his vote authorizing it with his current anti-war platform: Kerry said that the administration had promised to go through the United Nations first, and then didn't do it, but he added that at the time Saddam Hussein constituted a threat. “From 1991 to 1998, we had inspectors in Iraq blowing up weapons of mass destruction,” Kerry said. “A lot of people seem to have forgotten that. We destroyed plenty of weapons of mass destruction in those 7½ years. We found more weapons than we thought Saddam had, and evidence of a nuclear program. " Kerry is either lying or being deliberately obtuse. Bush went to the UN twice. In December, he pushed through UNSC resolution 1441, demanding immediate and full compliance from Saddam Hussein with the previous 16 UNSC resolutions. Inspectors were supposed to report...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

CQ Flashback: Give UN Command Over US Forces

John Kerry, when he first ran for elective office in 1970, told the Harvard Crimson that he was an "internationalist" who felt that the UN should retain command of the US military: "I'm an internationalist," Kerry told The Crimson in 1970. "I'd like to see our troops dispersed through the world only at the directive of the United Nations." Kerry said he wanted "to almost eliminate CIA activity. The CIA is fighting its own war in Laos and nobody seems to care." The Kerry campaign, celebrating primary victories in Virginia and Tennessee last night, declined to comment on the senator's remarks. As a candidate for president, Kerry has said he supports the autonomy of the U.S. military and has never called for a scale-back of CIA operations. When a candidate takes elective office, they swear to uphold and defend the Constitution of the United States. Nowhere in that document does...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

CQ Flashback: Kerry -- Bush/Cheney "Most Crooked ... Lying Group" (3/10/04)

Senator John Kerry revealed an ugly and poorly controlled side of himself when he thought he was off-mike this afternoon while speaking with AFL-CIO union workers in Chicago: Sen. John Kerry, all but officially the Democratic presidential nominee, called Republicans he is battling "crooked" Wednesday. ... "Keep smiling," one man said to him. Kerry responded, "Oh yeah, don't worry man. We're going to keep pounding, let me tell you -- we're just beginning to fight here. These guys are the most crooked, you know, lying group of people I've ever seen." Simply appalling. In the picture above, you can see a Kerry aide hurriedly trying to disconnect the microphone, to no avail, which leads me to wonder what else John Kerry says when he thinks the mikes are off. Does he speculate on Roswell? Discussing alien abductions? Kerry's campaign immediately retreated into damage control, saying that Kerry was referring to...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

QandO Explodes The Afganistan "Outsourcing" Myth

Jon Henke at QandO, the essential neolibertarian blog, does some research on John Kerry's oft-repeated assertion that the US "outsourced" its efforts at Tora Bora in order to do war on the cheap. Despite the vehement denials by General Tommy Franks and others within the Afghan operation and the detailed explanations as to why our strategy not only made sense but paid off, Kerry continues to use this canard as a major part of his stump speeches. It should surprise no one at this date that Kerry's position represents a complete reversal from what Kerry advocated at the time of the Afghan operation. Jon notes Kerry's appearance on the Bill O'Reilly show for December 11, 2001, where Kerry not only approved of the Afghan operation as implemented but called for moving our focus to militarily removing Saddam Hussein and leaving the liberation of Afghanistan to the Afghanis. He also made...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

CQ Flashback: Kerry -- Democracy Not Important (5/29/04)

In words that echo his 1971 Senate testimony on the Vietnam war, John Kerry told the Washington Post that establishing democracy would not be a priority of a Kerry administration, preferring to work on more pressing issues other than liberty and freedom: Sen. John F. Kerry indicated that as president he would play down the promotion of democracy as a leading goal in dealing with Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, China and Russia, instead focusing on other objectives that he said are more central to the United States' security. ... In many ways, Kerry laid out a foreign-policy agenda that appeared less idealistic about U.S. aims than President Bush or even fellow Democrat former president Bill Clinton. While Kerry said it was important to sell democracy and "market it" around the world, he demurred when questioned about a number of important countries that suppress human rights and freedoms. He said securing...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

CQ Flashback: A Moment To Acknowledge Our Humanity (5/6/04)

Hindrocket at Power Line directs our attention to a story, with accompanying photograph, from the Cincinatti Enquirer about a moment on the campaign trail where we can remember that despite all of the partisan vitriol and rhetoric, we are all Americans. George Bush, making a campaign appearance in Lebanon, OH, shook hands with the crowd who had gathered to enthusiastically greet him. As he did, the following incident briefly made everyone forget about campaigns and speeches: Lynn Faulkner, his daughter, Ashley, and their neighbor, Linda Prince, eagerly waited to shake the president's hand Tuesday at the Golden Lamb Inn. He worked the line at a steady campaign pace, smiling, nodding and signing autographs until Prince spoke: "This girl lost her mom in the World Trade Center on 9-11." Bush stopped and turned back. "He changed from being the leader of the free world to being a father, a husband and...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

OBL Transcript Posted (Updated)

Matt Drudge has posted a transcript of the new OBL tape. I'm with my partner on this: OBL has definately been watching too many Michael Moore videos in his cave. As Captain Ed also noted, the emergence of two AQ tapes signals something very, very bad. Apparently federal officials agree. On Fox News, Shepard Smith is reporting that analysts believe the first tape symbolizes brute force and AQs presence in the US while the tone of the OBL video justifies killing of innocents. While that's a plausible analysis, it is also possible (knock on wood) the videos were made because AQ no longer has the ability to attack us here and hopes to influence the election via propaganda. I think it must come down to either of those scenarios. Or maybe he's seeking a larger speaking part in the next Michael Moore mockumentary. UPDATE: Aljeezera has posted the full transcript....

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

CQ Flashback: Kerry Still Sacrificing The Freedom Of The Vietnamese (8/25/04)

John Kerry has taken to pleading for a return to debate on current issues and more relevant qualifications for the presidency in a bid to bury the debate on his Viet Nam record, which at one time was all Kerry would discuss on the stump. Speaking in New York, Kerry told a crowd that all the Bush campaign had was fear, while he wanted to talk about how he could outperform Bush in areas such as foreign policy. So let's talk foreign policy, as practiced right here at home, by Senator Kerry. Earlier this evening, I had the pleasure of speaking with Bradley Clanton of the law firm Baker, Donelson, Bearman, Caldwell & Berkowitz, PC, in Jackson, MS and Washington, DC. Brad represents several Vietnamese-Americans who came to the US as refugees of the Communists in their native land. Some of his clients have names that students of the era...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Election Eve Phone Banking

While some voters get calls from an ersatz Norman Schwarzkopf or from the real Bret Favre or Curt Schilling, I've only been fortunate enough to get one call tonight from the GOP. After hearing someone grunt "Please listen," I got this recorded message with a female voice: "Democrats keep accusing Republicans of secretly planning on reinstating the draft. But Democrats are the only ones who have proposed a new military draft ..." It would have been all right if someone like the Bush twins had done the commercial. Heck, since Pete Coors is running for the Senate, maybe they could have had the Coors Twins record it. But no -- all I get is the gosh-darned generic message. I'm already supporting the GOP, of course, but I did feel a twinge of resentment that I didn't get to be phone-spammed by a really cool celebrity. I'd even have settled for...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

CQ Flashback: Kerry Flip-Flops On Education (4/5/04)

Who wrote these words about education reform? "It bothers me," the reformer wrote, "that some Democrats have resisted the idea of making educational outcomes the skills and knowledge our kids obtain from the educational system as important as educational inputs the adequate funding, the good facilities and the higher teacher pay we all want." The answer? John Kerry, in his campaign book he published just last year. However, Kerry the Candidate has reversed course and now campaigns against No Child Left Behind because of its "punitive" provisions for schools that fail to raise educational outcomes. The Los Angeles Times' Ronald Brownstein -- who usually acts as a reliable spin doctor for the Democrats -- unspins Kerry on this issue: After voting for President Bush's No Child Left Behind Act in 2001, Kerry, during his race to the nomination, joined the mob of Democrats condemning the education reform...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Mike Weighs In On Iraq, Al Qaqaa, and Osama - Part I

I had an opportunity to interview my friend "Mike", the Navy SEAL and private contractor who spent the last three years in Iraq. I wanted to get his perspective since the Al Qaqaa story broke, since part of Mike's work as a private contractor dealt with explosives demolition. Part I of the interview focuses on that issue. Q. What do you know about the ASP at Al Qaqaa and the missing 380 tons of explosives? A. Not much first-hand knowledge That was not one of the sites I was sent to blow anything up or acquire any of the explosives that were there. I had access to a lot of different site maps, and I dont remember seeing it on a site map. It may have been there, but I dont remember it. If it was the size they say it is, I cant imagine that we need to...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

CQ Flashback: John Kerry -- Not A Black Man After All (3/8/04)

A few days ago, John Kerry tried on the Bill Clinton approach to civil rights, noting that Clinton had sometimes been called the nation's "first black President" for his humble Southern beginnings as well as his affinity to African-American leadership, and said that he wouldn't mind being known as the second black President. Oddly enough, having a rich, white, power-born politician describe himself as black didn't sit to well with those who actually are black -- and they're not just giving Kerry disapproving glances: The head of a civil rights and legal services advocacy group wants Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry to apologize for saying he wouldn't be upset if he could be known as the second black president. "John Kerry is not a black man he is a privileged white man who has no idea what it is in this country to be a poor white in this...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

November 2, 2004

CQ Flashback: Senator Flip-Flop Lectures Bush On Values? (7/10/04)

I guess it didn't take me too long to find my post for the day -- in today's New York Times, Jodi Wilgoren and Richard Stevenson report on the "full-throated battle" between the major party nominees after Thursday evening's Democratic fundraiser: A day after a $7.5 million Democratic fund-raiser in New York at which an array of stars harshly ridiculed President Bush, the Bush campaign criticized Senator John Kerry for what it called a "star-studded hate fest." Mr. Bush's campaign manager, Ken Mehlman, demanded that the Kerry campaign release a videotape of the event at Radio City Music Hall, which featured performers including Chevy Chase, Whoopi Goldberg and Jessica Lange. Although Mr. Kerry had told the crowd at the New York fund-raiser that "every single performer" on the bill had "conveyed to you the heart and soul of our country," his campaign on Friday sought to distance Mr. Kerry and...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

CQ Flashback: A Distinction Without A Difference

John Kerry continued his attempt to differentiate himself from George Bush on Iraq policy yesterday in a speech at Westminster College in Fulton, Missouri, following Dick Cheney's widely-criticized political speech last week at the same venue. The Los Angeles Times reports that Kerry continues to expound on "international cooperation" without explaining how that differs from what the US is doing now: Sen. John F. Kerry challenged President Bush on Friday to engage in personal diplomacy to try to repair relationships with other influential nations and gain their support for an international mission in Iraq. During a 30-minute address at Westminster College here, the presumed Democratic presidential nominee pledged to support his rival's policy in Iraq if Bush pursued that effort. ... He urged the president to form a political coalition with the United Kingdom, France, Russia, China and other nations to endorse the effort to stabilize Iraq and back the...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

CQ Flashback: Looking Backward On Security (5/28/04)

John Kerry talks about strengthening security and fighting terrorists, saying earlier this week that those who plan to attack us should understand that he would hunt them down and kill them, if he became president. However, The New York Times reports today that the foreign policy/national security team he has assembled for his campaign represents a flashback to eight years of the so-called "law-enforcement approach" that culminated in the 9/11 attack: Seated in leather swivel chairs in the glass-walled conference room at Senator John Kerry's Washington campaign headquarters two Fridays ago was a veritable reunion of President Bill Clinton's national security team: Madeleine K. Albright, Samuel R. Berger, William J. Perry and Gen. John M. Shalikashvili. Richard C. Holbrooke joined his former colleagues via conference call from Tokyo. ... Besides the Clintonites and Mr. Biden, those in the loop or on its fringe include former Senator Gary Hart, who ran...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

CQ Flashback: For Small Businesses, Kerry's Help Has Never Been On The Way (9/8/04)

CQ reader Mike Maerten noticed this analysis from the Small Business Survival Committee over at Townhall.com regarding John Kerry's voting record on small-business issues over the past 10 years. Bear in mind my earlier analysis of National Journal's ratings of John Kerry during the Clinton Administration, where his votes skewed more conservative when Bill Clinton occupied the White House than when Republicans held executive power. Even during this more conservative period, John Kerry's voting record displays a remarkable hostility to small businesses: Of the 101 votes in the U.S. Senate that SBSC has rated since the 103rd Congress Senator Kerrys record is unsettling. He has voted on the side of small business a mere 13 times out of the 101 votes that SBSC rated during the past decade giving him a weak 13 percent rating on key small business issues. Senator Kerry voted against small business 94...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

CQ Flashback: Kerry Flip-Flops On Life (7/5/04)

Despite having a more consistent record on abortion than any other issue in his career, John Kerry yesterday tried to have it both ways again, flip-flopping on the definition of human life. Kerry tried to pander to Catholics and strict Christians but instead raised far more questions than he answered: But even as he tried to avoid making news Sunday, Kerry broke new ground in an interview that ran in the Dubuque, Iowa, Telegraph Herald. A Catholic who supports abortion rights and has taken heat from some in the church hierarchy for his stance, Kerry told the paper, "I oppose abortion, personally. I don't like abortion. I believe life does begin at conception." Spokeswoman Stephanie Cutter said that although Kerry has often said abortion should be "safe, legal and rare," and that his religion shapes that view, she could not recall him ever publicly discussing when life begins. "I can't...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Bush Wins First Scrimmage While Daschle Melts Down

The French press service AFP reports that George Bush has won the traditional Dixville Notch vote at midnight, while Daschle v. Thune liveblogged Senate minority leader Tom Daschle's strangulation of the remnants of his credibility and dignity. From Dixville Notch: A tiny population of 26 registered voters backed Bush by a comfortable 19-7 margin over Democratic challenger Senator John Kerry, according to a tally by the town clerk's office. ... The settlement's 26 voters trooped into the luxury Balsams hotel just after midnight local time (0500 GMT) Tuesday to cast some of the first votes in the 2004 election. Almost half were registered Republicans. The 26 voters included 11 registered Republicans, two registered Democratic voters and 13 independents, according to the town clerk's records. Bush won the key Dixville Notch vote in 2000, but Bill Clinton won it twice before that. As portents go, I'd rank it right up there...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Zogby Bounces Back To 2000

In what must be a crushing blow to those on the Left who crowed about the positive Zogby numbers from the weekend for John Kerry, Zogby revised the numbers last night -- and put the states right back to where they were in 2000: Last night, habitual poll-watchers had new numbers to digest when John Zogby released results for a four-day poll that included some voters surveyed yesterday. That poll showed Mr. Bush with a solid lead in Ohio (49 percent to 43 percent) and also ahead in Nevada (50 percent to 45 percent) and Colorado (49 percent to 47 percent), while Florida was a tie at 48 percent each. According to the final Zogby pre-election survey, Mr. Kerry was leading in Pennsylvania (50 percent to 46 percent), Wisconsin (51 percent to 45 percent), Iowa (50 percent to 45 percent), Minnesota (51 percent to 45 percent), Michigan (52 percent to...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Good News Out Of Ohio

Staff Mate Joseph tipped me off to this early and more significant election result from Ohio (also at Megapundit, if the SoS's site is down). According to the Secretary of State, George Bush has a slim lead over John Kerry in early and absentee voting: Bush: 49.87% with 800,950 votes. Kerry: 49.12% with 788,799 votes The Democrats have made a huge effort into getting their voters to go early or vote absentee, and the fact that Bush still leads after all that effort has to be encouraging. As Megapundit notes, that represents 34% of the Ohio popular vote in 2000. We're not talking Dixville Notch here, and when the rest of Ohio's voters go to the polls today, we can presumably expect a greater share of Republicans than Democrats remain....

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Kerry Apparently Wants US Election Law To Meet Global Test

Foreign election monitors complained yesterday that they had been assigned to overwhelmingly pro-Kerry events, calling their neutrality into question even as their members lobbied John Kerry to make changes in electoral law: European election monitors touring central Florida were dismayed yesterday at their local hosts' emphasis on Democratic events, saying their schedule of pro-Kerry and left-leaning themes has left little time for similar Republican visits. The day started with a small airport rally for Democratic presidential nominee Sen. John Kerry, who appeared to promise a senior member of the delegation that he would commit to reforming federal election processes. The four-member delegation of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) also listened to filmmaker Michael Moore address the League of Conservation Voters and visited a polling station in Sanford, Fla., which was the site of voting irregularities four years ago. "I would say we are dismayed," said Bart...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Live Blogging Tonight!

I will be live-blogging the presidential-election results tonight while Mitch Berg, King Banaian and I give quarter-hour updates on AM 1280 The Patriot, starting at 8 pm. I plan to start blogging at 7 pm or so as the Eastern time zone polls close up. Be sure to keep checking back here -- more details later!...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

CQ Flashback: Kerry Calls McCain A Liar, Erases History (9/7/04)

Two days ago, I wrote that John Kerry called John McCain (and just about everyone else at the Republican Convention) a liar, based on a press release at his website. A number of you wrote to tell me that the page had disappeared from Kerry's website, but it had mysteriously reappeared by the time I checked on it. Well, it has disappeared once more, as the Kerry campaign tries to keep its candidate from infuriating the one man who has tempered the criticism from the right in this electoral cycle. McCain, who constantly refers to his friendship with Kerry, might take the gloves off if Kerry impugns his character as he did with the Viet Nam veterans who have campaigned against Kerry. The campaign made a smart move taking down that list, especially since they never bothered to factually refute even one of the 143 statements they listed as lies,...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

CQ Flashback: Kerry Calls GOP Racists, Promotes Urban Legends (9/11/04)

John Kerry told the Congressional Black Caucus that the Republicans want to suppress the black vote in November, repeating the canard that a million black votes went uncounted in 2000: "We are not going to stand by and allow another million African American votes to go uncounted in this election," the Democratic presidential nominee told the Congressional Black Caucus. "We are not going to stand by and allow acts of voter suppression, and we're hearing those things again in this election." Kerry has a team of lawyers to examine possible voting problems to try to prevent a repeat of the 2000 election disputes. He also has said he has thousands of lawyers around the country prepared to monitor the polls on election day. "What they did in Florida in 2000, some say they may be planning to do this year in battleground states all across this country," Kerry said. "Well,...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

CQ Flashback: Voting In Bizarro World (1/26/04)

On the eve of the New Hampshire primary, John Kerry's inconsistencies seem to be catching up to him on the stump, if not quite yet in the polls. Facing a challenge from Howard Dean on his votes in 1991 against military action in Kuwait and in 2002 to authorize military action in Iraq, Kerry has come up with a novel explanation -- his votes meant the exact opposite of what they were: Kerry said Sunday that he supported the Iraq resolution 15 months ago because he believed President Bush would use force only as a "last resort." "The vote I cast was not a vote to go to war immediately," he said. ... Although Kerry said he "believed we ought to kick Saddam Hussein out of Kuwait," uppermost on his mind in 1991, he said, was public ambivalence about sending U.S. troops to the Persian Gulf. "I said we ought...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

CQ Flashback: Champion Against Special Interests? (2/4/04)

The AP reports an "exclusive" on an apparent conflict of interest involving Senator John Kerry from four years ago, when he blocked legislation and later received cash from a beneficiary of his action: A Senate colleague was trying to close a loophole that allowed a major insurer to divert millions of federal dollars from the nation's most expensive construction project. John Kerry stepped in and blocked the legislation. Over the next two years, the insurer, American International Group, paid Kerry's way on a trip to Vermont and donated at least $30,000 to a tax-exempt group Kerry used to set up his presidential campaign. Company executives donated $18,000 to his Senate and presidential campaigns. The colleague was John McCain and the project involved was the Big Dig, a highway project often cited as an example of cost overruns and government inefficiency. McCain wanted some government funding of the Big Dig stopped...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

CQ Flashback: The Man Who Can't Say No

For a man who claims not to be beholden to special interests, John Kerry certainly appears to enjoy thir fruits as often as possible. The Los Angeles Times -- not exactly big boosters of the Right -- reports today that Kerry wrote 28 letters on behalf of a defense firm that filled his coffers with illegal campaign contributions: Sen. John F. Kerry sent 28 letters in behalf of a San Diego defense contractor who pleaded guilty last week to illegally funneling campaign contributions to the Massachusetts senator and four other congressmen. ... Between 1996 and 1999, Kerry participated in a letter-writing campaign to free up federal funds for a guided missile system that defense contractor Parthasarathi "Bob" Majumder was trying to build for U.S. warplanes. ... Kerry's letters were sent to fellow members of Congress and to the Pentagon while Majumder and his employees were donating money to...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

CQ Flashback: Why I Support George Bush (3/1/04)

Mark asked me a direct question yesterday in response to my post about the laughably transparent Iranian attempt to influence the election Friday: And what do you have against Kerry? Or has Bush really fought to improve your way of life? I wrote later that his question was valid, and rather than point to a collection of earlier posts on various incidents, I think it would be more honest for me to put together a comprehensive argument for my position on this election. I will address this in two parts, just as Mark asked: why I oppose John Kerry, and why I support George Bush. Primarily, I don't trust John Kerry, and I never have. He's spent most of his Senate career carrying Ted Kennedy's water and regularly competes with Kennedy for the most liberal voting record -- a contest he won last year, according to the National Journal. He...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Sabotage In Milwaukee

Unfortunately, some people believe that they have the prerogative to determine who can and cannot vote in today's election. In Milwaukee, thirty rental vans that were intended to help GOP voters get to the polls to exercise their franchise rights had their tires slashed, presumably in an attempt to keep Wisconsin from slipping away from John Kerry: The tires of at least 30 cars and vans rented by the Republican Party to carry voters to the polls were slashed, Milwaukee police said this morning. The discovery was made at 6:30 a.m., said Sgt. Mark Wroblewski. The rental cars were parked near a GOP office in the 7100 block of W. Capitol Dr. Wroblewski said "at least" 30 cars were disabled. At least one tire was slashed and in some cases, all four tires were cut. Detectives were on the scene, the sergeant said. Police had no suspects in custody as...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Democratic Pollster Predicts Bush Victory

In one of the more unusual analyses of this presidential campaign, The Hill published a prediction of victory by George Bush in today's race. That may not sound unusual, but when the pundit making the prediction turns out to be John Kerry's chief pollster Mark Mellman, it raises a few eyebrows: First, we simply do not defeat an incumbent president in wartime. After wars surely, but never in their midst. Republicans have been spinning this fact for months, and they are correct. Democrats have spoken often and powerfully about the nations economic problems. But by historical standards, they are not that bad. The misery index is 7.8 today but was 20.5 when Jimmy Carter was defeated. Economic models of elections show Bush winning 52-58 percent of the vote. Nor does Mellman stop there. Much has been made about Bush's approval ratings and the "right direction/wrong direction" polling during this cycle,...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Election Day Observations, Midday

I went to vote first thing this morning. When we arrived at our polling place, the line snaked around the vestibule like a confused boa constrictor and went out the door, into the rain. At first I assumed we would be there for hours, but at 7 am precisely, the line began moving and kept going steadily. After 10 minutes, the First Mate and I finally made our way to the check-in station. One of the judges saw me providing sighted-guide to the FM (she's blind) and stopped us. "Are you going into the booth with her?" the poll worker asked me. "Yes," I replied, "I do this every year." "You have to have an election judge go with you," she told us. Now, I had no real objection to that -- after all, I'm not doing anything wrong and I don't have paranoia about people knowing how I voted....

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Election, 6:36 PM - Looking Good So Far

Instead of updating the same post over and over, I'll post new thoughts as we go along in sepearate entries. Checking the election ticker on Fox and the CNN election website, and the early results are fairly promising, if unsurprising. CNN called Vermont for Kerry, not exactly a shocker, and Indiana, Knetucky, West Virginia, and Georgia for Bush as expected. The overall vote tabulated shows Bush up 15 points, but it's very, very early. So far, nothing's been called for Virginia, although Bush is up strong there with 5% of the vote counted. Expect that to get called next -- and Kerry's campaign insisted this weekend that they would carry Virginia....

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Eastern Polls Close

CNN and Fox just called New Jersey for John Kerry with no precincts reporting, indicating that their exit polls must be rather strong. A good chunk of the northeastern Atlantic seaboard has been called for Kerry now, but that was expected. So far -- no surprises, although I'm surprised that so many of these have been called with no vote counts. Florida so far shows rather strongly for Bush, but Miami-Dade and Palm Beach haven't reported yet. Nor has any of the panhandle, either. At this point, with 18% of the precincts reporting, Bush has an 11-point lead, a good head start. No numbers yet on Ohio or Pennsylvania. UPDATE: South Carolina goes Bush, again no surprise. I'm not surprised by the caution being shown by Fox and CNN, but I am surprised at how quickly both have called a couple of states for Kerry without getting any vote counts...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

New Jersey Called Too Soon?

Watching Fox News, I see that they called New Jersey for Kerry very quickly, before posting any results. However, with 2% reporting now, Bush holds a 1-point lead over Kerry. Fox and CNN must have called it based on their exit polling, but it looks like it's too close to call based on the results. Keep an eye on the Garden State. It may wind up becoming the Florida of 2004 -- called too soon......

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Old Dominion Stays Red

Fox News has called Virginia for Bush with 45% precincts reporting....

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Coburn Holds The Oklahoma Senate Seat For GOP

Not all the festivities have to do with John Kerry or George Bush. In Oklahoma, the GOP candidate for Senate pulled out a tight race to hold the seat, after being accused of forced sterilizations: Conservative Tom Coburn on Tuesday defeated his Democratic opponent in one of the nation's tightest Senate races and will succeed retiring Don Nickles, also a Republican, NBC and ABC television networks projected. That's good news for the GOP, which had started to sweat this race over the past few weeks,...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Senate Update

Fox and CNN have both called the Oklahoma Senate race for Coburn. This was a hard fought, sometimes nasty race. OOPS: Ed and I did a double-post, so see below for his comments....

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Voter Fraud In Duluth?

David Strom, our friend from the Taxpayers League, lets us know that allegations have been made that a suspicious number of voters being bused into the polling stations, with "massive vouching" going on. Minnesota allows registration with a registered voter vouching for the registrant instead of insisting on more positive ID. We'll stay on top of this, as local media seems to have responded to this story....

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Florida Creeps In, Ohio Starts Rolling

With slightly under half of all precincts reporting in Florida, Bush is still up, but the lead has settled down to seven points as Broward County started reporting. We still haven't heard from Miami-Dade or West Palm Beach, so keep checking back. Quite a bit of the Panhandle has yet to be heard from, too. Ohio, on the other hand, looks stronger. Cuyahoga has pretty much reported, and Bush has pulled ahead with 5% of the precincts reporting now. This looks better than it did earlier....

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Minnesota Results Start Coming In

We're looking at the results from Minnesota as they begin reporting. Right now with 1.5% of the precincts in, Kerry leads Bush 52-47. However, almost all of the precincts reporting are from Hennepin County, with Minneapolis driving the liberal vote here. Hardly any outstate results have come in. It seems to me that Kerry should be up by considerably more that five points from these precincts -- possibly pointing to a Bush conversion. We'll know more when Ramsey County (Saint Paul) comes in....

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Big Trunk Joins Us

Scott "Big Trunk" Johnson just joined us, and tells us that Bush/Cheney HQ was inundated with complaints about polling irregularities -- he promises us an update at the top of the hour. With a number of states reporting, the news starts looking pretty good. Wisconsin has 4% of their precincts reporting and Bush is up by 15. Bush also leads -- surprisingly -- in Michigan by seven points, even with Macomb County reporting in. Iowa hasn't begun reporting vote results yet, but if Bush hangs onto Wisconsin and Michigan, it's over. Ohio: Bush 52-47, 15% reporting. Hmmmm. UPDATE: AP shows Wisconsin a Bush "leaner" - with 8% reporting, Bush has a thirteen-point lead. This would be a tremendous capture from the Democrats......

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

AP Announces Significant Bush Leaners

The AP has updated its election map, and has put the following states in the Bush-leaning column: Wisconsin - Bush 56-43 (9% reporting) Michigan - Bush 55-43 (5%) Ohio - Bush 52-47 (24%) Colorado - Bush 56-43 (5%) Washington - No data reporting? Presumably, the AP has some exit polling for Washington that supports that decision, but that would be an unexpected and stunning result......

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Florida Coming Into Focus

None of the networks will dare call this race anytime soon, but with 84% of its precincts reporting, Bush is maintaining his five-point lead. The key counties of Broward, Miami-Dade, and Palm Beach all have results coming in now, and the gap still appears significant. If Bush can hold onto Florida and Ohio and pick up Wisconsin, this race is over -- and if he takes Michigan too, it may be significant enough to force a concession from Kerry. PLEASE NOTE!!! -- We can be heard on our Internet stream now at this link, doing the breaks on the Hugh Hewitt show. Check us (and Hugh) out!...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

More Leaners Towards Bush

Taking a look at the AP map, here are a few additions leaners toward Bush: Arizona, Colorado, and New Mexico. NM went to Gore last time out by a whisker, but with 27% reporting, Bush leads by 5. He's up by 10 in AZ with 47% reporting and 7 points in CO with 13% reporting. Expect to see Arizona get called for Bush in the next few minutes, affirming the GOP grip on John McCain's state. Keep watching Wisconsin and Michigan -- Bush continues his lead there, as well as in Ohio and Florida. In fact, he added a point to his leads in both states in the past few minutes. Momentum is starting to build, I think, for a significant win....

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Minnesota Tightening Up, Michigan Bouncing

Taking a look around the Upper Midwest, we're seeing the presidential race tighten up in Minnesota. The suburbs and exurbs have finally started to report, and John Kerry's lead has dropped to 7.5%. We think that Kerry may have hit his high-water mark for Minnesota, although we're not sure how much of the Iron Range has reported, and he may have built up enough of a lead to withstand the more conservative suburban vote. Michigan shifted back to a Kerry leaner, but that's because the urban precincts of Wayne County have reported in. A flood of Kerry votes came in all at once from Detroit, so Kerry got a double-digit swing. Looking at the county map for Michigan, though, that's the only strong point for Kerry so far this election. Bush could reclaim that lead as more suburbs and exurbs come back to the table....

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Michigan And Wisconsin Both Lean Kerry

The vagaries of the random precinct reporting have moved the states of Wisconsin and Michigan to the Kerry leaners, according to the AP. With the urban precincts starting to report heavily, the votes originally swung significantly towards Kerry, but have gradually moved back towards the center. That puts all of the Upper Midwest as Kerry-leaners, at this point, which is where they went in 2000. Flash: ABC just called Florida for Bush. That puts us up to 235 or so electoral votes ... UPDATE: Wisconsin continues to push back towards Bush. Kerry now only has a 1% edge over Bush with 47% of precincts reporting. If Milwaukee and Madison have reported in, the state may go back to leaning Bush in the next hour......

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

If Bush Gets Ohio, New Mexico, And Colorado ...

... he's been re-elected with 271 electoral votes. Even if Bush loses Nevada and Alaska, he wins the election. And in my mind, we still look pretty good to win by a small margin in Wisconsin. The major urban areas have already reported most of their results (Milwaukee over 80% and Dane County -- Madison -- two-thirds complete). The suburban and rural vote still has yet to roll in, and that's where Bush's strength lies. Not only that, but Bush is making a bit of a comeback in Minnesota as our own suburb/exurb vote starts coming in. In the past hour, he's made up about 25,000 of his gap and now trails by a shade under six points. The race here in the North Star state looks like it will go on for a while....

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

OHIO!

Fox News just called Ohio for Bush!...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Fox Calls Ohio For Bush

Fox News has called Ohio for George Bush, putting the president within four electoral votes of winning his re-election. According to Fox, the precincts left in Cuyahoga County won't have enough impact to change the direction of the vote in the Buckeye State. That puts George Bush at 266 electoral votes, meaning that New Mexico will put him over the top -- and Bush leads in NM by 4 points with 74% of their precincts reporting. So much for Ohio being a swing state! Hugh Hewitt, as you might imagine, is delighted......

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Upper Midwest Tightens Up (Except For Us)

The three big Upper Midwest states that the GOP thought might be pickups in 2004 have improved still further for George Bush. Despite having a hard time with the urban centers in each of these states, Bush trails by only one point in Wisconsin and Iowa and just two in Michigan. In each of these states, Bush trailed by double digits after the urban precincts filed their votes. The president has the momentum and hopefull will ride it to a victory in at least one of these states, and preferably all three....

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

November 3, 2004

NBC Calls The Election For Bush

NBC just gave Ohio and Alaska to George Bush, putting the President at 269 electoral votes, guaranteeing at least a tie, and the GOP-controlled House of Representatives would certainly put Bush back in the White House. If New Mexico goes Bush, which it looks like it will, that gives him 274 and a clear victory. UPDATE: Bush just edged ahead in Iowa with 87% reporting -- by a few hundred votes. I told you the momentum was with Bush! Let's hope he holds it....

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Daschle May Have Pulled It Out

Tom Daschle, who looked as though he was heading to defeat as soon as an hour ago, now has pulled ahead in his bid for re-election to his South Dakota Senate seat. CNN shows Daschle up by about three thousand. UPDATE: No -- I think they had miscalculated. Now it shows Thune up by 2% and 6,000 votes....

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Whither Ohio?

Fox and NBC have called Ohio for George Bush, and with 92% of the precincts reporting, Bush has a two-point lead. The other major networks have yet to call Ohio, but the reluctance has more to do with Florida 2000 than Ohio 2004. Kerry's bastion of support, Cuyahoga County, has reported 99% of its precincts now, and Bush is still up by 102,000 votes. Athens, where they've reported 2/3rds of their votes, split 2-1 for Kerry -- but if you work the math, there's only 6,000 possible upside there. There may be another 6,000 in Lucas, but after that it gets mighty thin. Kerry has run out of votes. Ohio should be in everyone's red column by this point....

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Iowa Goes Bush

I'm going to beat the major news outlets on this one -- as I predicted, Iowa has swung back solidly towards Bush, who now has a 12,000-vote lead with 94% of the precincts counted in our neighbor to the south. I think that we can safely say that Iowa is now in the Bush column, and adding in New Mexico, that gives Bush 281 electoral votes....

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Nevada Starts To Swing Towards Bush

One of the wildcard states in this election was Nevada, and it appears that Nevadans relished that status. The gap right now is about 10,000 towards Bush with 65% of precincts reporting, and it looks likely that Bush can add Nevada to his column....

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

No Concession

John Edwards just told Kerry supporters that the campaign would not issue any statements on the race until at least tomorrow night, and plan on vigorously pursuing the provisional ballots cast in Ohio. Right now the estimates on the number of such ballots range from 170,000 to 250,000. Even on the outside edge, that would require Kerry to win 187,501 ballots, opposed to 62,499 for Bush, to edge Bush by one. It's unlikely in the extreme that he will beat Bush 3-1 in the provos. It's just another way for the Kerry/Edwards campaign to demonstrate their classlessness. UPDATE: BamaBear makes a great point in the comments on an earlier point. The media won't call Ohio when Bush has a 125,000-vote lead with 97% of the precincts reporting -- but they just gave Michigan to Kerry, when he has an 89,000-vote lead with 78% of the precincts reporting? Can someone explain...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Ohio Provisional Ballots: The New Democratic Mythology

CQ reader and fellow insomniac Byron Matthews found this tally of provisional ballots for Ohio, showing that the total number of provos -- 76,027 -- comes up to just over half of Bush's lead in the state. This race is over. Even Democrats can do math. UPDATE: Maybe I can't -- Cuyahoga has nothing listed, meaning that they haven't counted there. I believe that the Democrats estimated 25,000 provos there. If that isn't the final tally, the Ohio Secretary of State will probably have the updated totals tomorrow. Mea culpa... UPDATE II: 3:28 AM CT -- Bush now leads by 171,000 votes in Ohio. My math is at least good enough to realize that 125,000 provos cannot outweigh that margin. Ohioans have spoken. Let's demand that John Kerry do the right thing and concede so that we can present a confident and united front, at home and especially abroad....

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Final Thoughts On The Election

I have just a few more thoughts to share with everyone on this election. I started this blog about a year ago, and although I didn't conceive of it as an election project, it certainly became that. It has been my privilege and pleasure to share my thoughts and opinions with you, and my honor that so many of you have become regular readers. One aspect of this election that may have been lost in all this analysis is that we successfully held a national election in the middle of the war on terror -- and while we had a highly negative and immature discourse, no one shied away from speaking out, and we turned out in record numbers (at least it looks that way now), rather than cower under our beds. Democrat or Republican, Libertarian or Green, pat yourselves on the back. You just won a major battle against...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Provisional Ballots And The Election

After a couple of hours, the new count of provisional ballots in Ohio appears that it will barely outstrip the margin of victory by George Bush over John Kerry. With 10 smaller counties left to report their provos, Ohio has 135,149, including 24,788 from Cuyahoga County. At the moment, the Ohio Secretary of State's website shows that Bush has a lead of 133,164 votes, with 99.9% of all precincts reporting. The gap between the two numbers is significant legally, if not for the overall result. Races in Ohio get automatically reviewed under two scenarios. First, by statute, if the margin of victory does not exceed 0.25% of the overall votes cast for that race, a recount is automatically undertaken. The gap for President is much broader than that -- 2.44%, making a recount unnecessary. The second regulatory threshold is if the margin fails to exceed the number of provisional ballots...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

The Guardian Strikes Out

So much for the Guardian's Operation Clark County: Bush -- 34,444 (50.96%) Kerry -- 32,824 (48.56%) As the Professor would say ... Heh....

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Kerry concedes!

Both Fox and AP are reporting that Kerry called President Bush to concede. President Bush to make public announcement within the next couple of hours. UPDATE: Kerry will make public concession at 1:00 pm Eastern time. UPDATE: Kerry concession speech seems to be delayed by logistics. Stand by....

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

For your victory celebration

Here's a little treat for your victory party. (I saw this on The Corner yesterday but not able to post at the time.)...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Our Very Short National Nightmare Is Over

I just woke up from my post-election exhaustive collapse to Fox News on the TV and CNN on my laptop announcing that John Kerry has decided to concede Ohio and the election to George Bush: Democratic Sen. John Kerry phoned President Bush on Wednesday to concede the presidential election, aides in both camps said. President Bush was to deliver a victory statement at 3 p.m. ET, Bush aides said. Sen. Kerry's aides said he was expected to make a concession speech at 1 p.m. ET at Faneuil Hall in Boston, Massachusetts. A Kerry adviser said the campaign had concluded that the too-close-to-call battleground state of Ohio was not going to come through for the Democrats. The adviser said there was no way to gain votes on Bush without an "exhaustive fight," something that would have "further divided this country." I am delighted that John Kerry finally came to this conclusion,...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Kerry's Concession

I'm watching John Kerry prepare to make his concession speech on Fox News, and I'll live-blog it. I probably won't get the chance to do that with the President's speech because of some appointments... 12:55 CT: Teresa Heinz Kerry and her family have entered the Boston hall where Kerry will make his concession speech. She looks exhausted. I wonder if she might be relieved it's over... 12:56 - Kerry has just been announced and is taking the stage, broadly smiling ... 12:57 - Edwards will speak first, interestingly enough. He promises to continue to "fight for every vote", even though they're conceding. That seems to me to be a very ungracious thing to say -- as if the administration is suppressing the vote. Edwards just can't escape the urban-legend pimping ... 1:00 - Edwards gets more to the point, showering Kerry with praise and exhorting their supporters to stay involved....

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Bush's Victory Lap

I had to take the First Mate to the doctor's office for a flu shot (immune-depressed transplant patients are always at the top of the priority list), and I TiVo'd the President's victory speech. I caught part of it on the radio but wanted to watch the entire speech on its own before commenting. I noticed an odd reaction on my part when I saw Dick Cheney and George Bush on stage at the same time; three years of war have made me worry about an attack every time they make a joint appearance. At some point those worries will be behind us, but not yet. Cheney introduced Bush as Edwards did Kerry, but focused on the election and Bush rather than Edwards' approach, which seemed more aimed at keeping a spot warm in the 2008 primaries. The VP's speech also seemed shorter than that of his election counterpart, for...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Dayton Slouches Back To DC

Minnesota Senator Mark Dayton, who did his best Brave Sir Robin* impersonation last month when he "bravely ran away, away" from DC after a security briefing that caused no one else to leave town, has decided to make his triumphal re-entry now that George Bush won the election: Sen. Mark Dayton said Wednesday he is reopening his Senate office after closing it last month, citing terrorist threats. Dayton, D-Minn., said that the threats outlined in classified intelligence reports that prompted the closure covered activity only through Election Day. "The timeline for the heightened threat has passed in those reports," Dayton said in a conference call with reporters. "I will be opening the office effective next Monday." Dayton announced that he would release the declassified report next week so people can make up their own minds about his decision to run screeching for the hills. However, the report will not outweigh...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Caption Contest Winners!

The votes are in ... the pundits have spoken ... the AARP has filed lawsuits in every state of the nation ... it all only means one thing -- the guest judge has picked the winners of the latest Captain's Caption Contest! The Anchoress would just like to thank everyone for their patience while waiting for the results: Try to keep the excitement under control, people! Here are the winners! Captain's Award (Dan Rather Field Reporting Award) - Famous Mort: (AP) "Kerry Energizes Crowd to 'Dangerous Levels'" by Nedra Pickler (MIAMI) Soon-to-be-President Kerry energized a standing-room-only crowd of rabid supporters that left his GOP competition feeling, well, flaccid, as polls show that Kerry leads lame duck Bushitler by a whopping 120% among likely voters and an astounding 200% among dead, incarcerated, or incarcerated and dead voters. Paramedics were called to the speech dozens of times to provide aid for Democratic...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

And I Thought American TV Was Bad

The Guardian reports that British television broadcaster Channel 4 has become so desperate for material that they have created a new "reality" TV show -- watching a human body decompose (via Drudge): Channel 4, no stranger to challenging broadcasting taboos, is about to cross another televisual rubicon by filming the decomposition of a human body. The broadcaster, which billed the show as a "unique scientific experiment", has in the past featured controversial documentaries showing the first images of aborted foetuses seen on British TV and, two years ago, Britain's first public autopsy for 170 years. ... The plan is to film the body decomposing, which could take several months, in London's Science Museum, though not in an area open to the public. So they plan to keep the decomposition outside of public view, but then broadcast the film of it across the British Isles? Laughably, the broadcaster defended the programming...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Pelosi Skips Calls For Unity, Melts Down

In the aftermath of the 2004 election debacle that saw the Democrats lose even more ground in Congress than two years ago, Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi might have heeded John Kerry's call for unity and bipartisanship, putting aside the campaign rhetoric and divisiveness in order to find middle ground. After her reaction to the losses, it's clear that she didn't listen to Kerry's concession speech: A day after strengthening the Republican Party's majority in the House, Speaker Dennis Hastert called on Democrats to assist GOP efforts to fight the war on terror, create jobs and expand health insurance to more Americans. "I pledge to work with those Democrats who want to work with me to get good things done for the American people," Hastert said Wednesday. But House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi of California, stung by her party's losses on Election Day, seemed unlikely to accept the offer. "The Republicans...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

UK Guardian All Bummed Out, Dude

Pity the poor UK Guardian, which tried valiantly to stick its nose into our election but wound up only irritating the very people it hoped to influence into voting for John Kerry. Now that George Bush has been re-elected for a second term, these die-hard leftists have reacted true to form -- they are immersing themselves in their own victimization: When, some time after midnight, news came through that the exit-polls for Virginia were too close to call - a sure sign, we'd been warned, that Bush was in trouble - there was exhilaration of an intensity not felt since Stephen Twigg unseated Portillo. We were going to win! The first email I received the following morning read: "F****d off, dejected, our hopes have been blown to shit." The next one read: "As REM once sang: 'It's the end of the world as we know it.' Only unlike REM, I...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

November 4, 2004

CNN Also Missed Kerry's Unity Call

In a sign that the mainstream media will not go gently into that good night, CNN's Netscape Network Election 2004 page included a picture of George and Laura Bush, smiling and waving for the camera, catching Bush mid-sentence. If you take a look at the properties of this picture (shown below), you'll find out what CNN thinks of President Bush. As of 12:41 am CT, the filename is asshole.jpg -- another example of the objectivity and fairness so evidenced by CNN. (Hat tip: CQ reader Jinx McHue)...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Exit Polls Misused, Not Inaccurate, Pollsters Say

After twenty-four hours of solidly negative coverage of the exit polls that led many to believe that John Kerry would cruise to an easy victory, the pollsters themselves spoke out in their own defense. Today's Washington Post reports that the data fed to the networks -- and released without authorization to Internet sources such as Drudge -- carried a specific warning of its incomplete status: Results based on the first few rounds of interviewing are usually only approximations of the final vote. Printouts warn that estimates of each candidate's support are unreliable and not for on-air use. Those estimates are untrustworthy because people who vote earlier in the day tend to be different from those who vote in the middle of the day or the evening. For instance, the early national sample Tuesday that was 59 percent female probably reflected that more women vote in the day than the evening....

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Look Who Wants To Chat Now

The re-election of George Bush has resonated around the globe as a message of American determination in our current foreign policy. That message has apparently been heard quite clearly in Pyongyang and may push North Korea back to the multilateral negotiations it disdained during the campaign: North Korea is likely to return to six-party talks on its nuclear programs now that the U.S. presidential election is over, Yonhap news agency quoted South Korean Foreign Minister Ban Ki-moon as saying on Thursday. ... "With the U.S. election over, if the United States pursues an early resumption of the six-party talks, there is a chance that North Korea will respond to a resumption, considering it now has to continue dealing with the Bush administration," Ban reportedly told a closed-door meeting of parliament's foreign affairs committee. This confirms the handicap that the election placed on the Bush administration's attempts to force North Korea...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Moore & Friends Despondent Over Bush Victory

Two reports this morning focus on the reaction among the entertainment elite to George Bush's re-election this week to a second term as President. As one might imagine, the mood in Hollywood has taken a steeper dive than a Bennifer film in its second release week. The Washington Times' Stephanie Mansfield takes Hollywood's emotional temperature: For a rich and powerful demographic used to getting its way, Hollywood was downbeat yesterday as President Bush -- more heinous than a mid-February release date to so many celebrities and other bold-faced names -- made his gracious victory speech. ... Long decried as out of touch with "the real America," Hollywood woke up to its worst nightmare on Main Street. "This is definitely Kerry country," said Gabriel Snyder, senior writer for Variety, the industry bible. One can only imagine the despair of the Hollywood stars over the specter of glittery state dinners and policy...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

EU's Lisbon Strategy A Failure

Four years ago, under the prevailing winds of a booming global economy and the optimism generated by the collapse of the Iron Curtain, the European Union embarked on the Lisbon Strategy -- a plan to transform Europe into a single economy that would rival the US for global dominance. The Lisbon Strategy called for major reforms and investment into the EU's economic infrastructure, considered at the time to be ambitious but achievable. However, a new study conducted by a former Dutch premier has determined the Lisbon Strategy to be a failure, mostly due to the refusal of the EU's most prominent members to discipline themselves: Commissioned by EU leaders in March, the study is a mid-term review of the Lisbon Strategy -- the ambitious set of social and economic reforms agreed by European heads of state four years ago. Then, with the dot-com boom in full-swing, unemployment falling and growth...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Gulf War Syndrome Caused By Sarin Exposure: Researchers

The BBC reports that researchers working for the VA have determined that Gulf War veterans complaining of unexplained chronic illness have neural damage that indicates chronic, low-level exposure to sarin -- a possible explanation for Gulf War Syndrome: The New Scientist journal has reported a leak of a US inquiry into the ill-health of veterans of the 1991 war. The US Department of Veterans Affairs' Research Advisory Committee on Gulf War Veterans' Illnesses is due to publish its findings next week. But the magazine said researchers have found neural damage consistent with the nerve agent used by Saddam Hussein. The link is said to have been "crucial" to a change of heart by the US authorities over Gulf war syndrome. After over a decade of denying a single root cause, and a lack of evidence of such, the US government will finally concur that the Gulf War vets have a...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

A picture is worth a thousand words

The MSM continues to insist ours is a nation divided and President Bush must therefore make concessions instead of rushing forward with his agenda. No time for an essay this morning, but this will suffice: Hat tip: Sean Hannity....

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Mrs. Edwards Has Our Prayers

There is a difference between an enemy and an opponent, a distinction lost on more than a few people on both sides of our necessary and beneficial political divide. Osama bin Laden, Abu Masab al-Zarqawi, and Mullah Omar are our enemies; John Kerry and John Edwards were our political opponents, but first they are our fellow Americans. Today, the AP reports that Edwards' wife Elizabeth has been diagnosed with breast cancer: Spokesman David Ginsberg said Mrs. Edwards, 55, discovered a lump in her right breast while on a campaign trip last week. Her family doctor told her Friday that it appeared to be cancerous and advised her to see a specialist when she could. She put off the appointment until Wednesday so as not to miss campaign time. The Edwards family went straight to Massachusetts General Hospital from Boston's Faneuil Hall after Kerry and Edwards conceded on Wednesday. Mrs. Edwards...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Uncommon Foolishness At Tompaine.Com

Just when I thought I'd take an evening off from the blog, Power Line pulls me back in. Rocket Man notes some cartoonish logic and bitterness at Tompaine.com, where Greg Palast tells his readers that John Kerry really won Ohio. Any notion that he didn't apparently comes from a media conspiracy to cover up "spoilage": I know you don't want to hear it. You can't face one more hung chad. But I don't have a choice. As a journalist examining that messy sausage called American democracy, it's my job to tell you who got the most votes in the deciding states. Tuesday, in Ohio and New Mexico, it was John Kerry. Most voters in Ohio thought they were voting for Kerry. At 1:05 a.m. Wednesday morning, CNN's exit poll showed Kerry beating Bush among Ohio women by 53 percent to 47 percent. The exit polls were later combined withand therefore...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Oil Prices Begin To Drop

CNBC reports this evening that oil prices, which drove up inflation and dampened consumer confidence in the third quarter, has suddenly begun to drop significantly: Oil futures prices plunged by more than $2 a barrel Thursday, continuing a selloff that began last week amid rising U.S. supplies of crude and expectations of a surge in heating oil production before winter arrives. ... Light crude for December delivery fell by $2.06 to settle at $48.82 per barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. It was the first time prices settled below $49 a barrel since Sept. 24. Oil prices have fallen $6.35, or 11.5 percent, since last Tuesday, when Nymex futures settled at $55.17 per barrel, matching the record settlement price first set Oct. 22. Does anyone else see something fishy here? After crude prices skyrocketed in the summer, we heard all sorts of explanations as to why. Most of them...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Joan Baez Performs Birth Of A Nation

Reason's science editor Ronald Bailey bought his mother a pair of tickets to a Joan Baez concert as a birthday gift. Baez performed last night and, as one might expect, had quite a bit to say about the outcome. What Bailey didn't expect was the bizarre minstrel show that recalls Ted Danson's Friars Club debacle: However, the most remarkable and disturbing episode occurred halfway through the concert when Joan stopped singing and announced that she had "multiple personalities." One of her multiple personalities is that of a fifteen year old poor black girl named Alice from Turkey Scratch, Arkansas. Baez decided to share with us Alice's views on the election. Amazed and horrified I watched a rich, famous, extremely white folksinger perform what can only be described as bit of minstrelsyonly the painted on blackface was missing. Alice, the black teenager from Arkansas Baez was pretending to be, spoke in...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

25th Annniversary Of Islamofascism

Rusty at My Pet Jawa noticed an anniversary that escaped my notice -- twenty-five years ago, Islamic revolutionaries in Iran commandeered our embassy in Teheran and took dozens of Americans hostage. This act of war went without effective response from the USA and set the stage for our present war against Islamist terrorism. Indeed, it informs our present muscular foreign policy so much that this could be considered an anniversary of the Bush Doctrine. Rusty writes: Like the English before us, America found itself in the position of standing between the Iranian revolutionaries and their vision of the global caliphate. The US became the 'Great Satan', the obstacle, the one nation with the power to stall the inevitable coming of Sharia law to all Muslim nations (and eventually beyond). So, the jihadis declared war on that day. Their war aims were simply stated and straightforward--weaken American resolve so that jihad...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

November 5, 2004

Exit Polling Samples Not Reliable: NYT

The stone golem of the 2000 election was the hanging chad, and this time around it looks like exit polling. Two reports out today continue the post-mortems on the National Election Pool, one discounting allegations of conspiracy theories and the other boosting them. First, Jim Rutenberg of the New York Times has reviewed a clandestine copy of the pollsters' final report on the debacle, proving yet again that the NEP has major security issues. The pollsters blame sampling difficulties and the infidelity of its clients for the problems: The report, written by Joe Lenski and Warren Mitofsky and obtained by The New York Times, details systemic glitches that skewed the data in ways of which several news organizations, who paid tens of thousands of dollars for the service, were not aware. In some cases, the report said, survey takers could not get close enough to the polls to collect adequate...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

A Spectre in the Senate

Remarks made yesterday by Senator Arlen Specter, who is in line to become the new Senate Judiciary Committee chairman, have disturbed conservatives and offered hope to abortion advocates. Here is a portion of the transcript via NRO: JORDAN: Senator, you didn't talk about the Judiciary Committee, it is something you are expected to Chair this January. With 3 Supreme Court Justices rumored to retire soon, starting with Rehnquist, how do you see this unfolding in the next couple of months and what part do you intend to play on it? SPECTER: You know my approach is cautious with respect to the Judiciary Committee. I am in line, Senator Hatch is barred now by term limits and Senate Rules so that I am next in line. There has to be a vote of the Committee and I have already started to talk to some of my fellow committee members. I am...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Captain's Caption Contest #34: That Certain Je Ne Sais Quoi Edition

It's Friday, so it must be time for another Captain's Caption Contest! Now that the election is over, the surprising results have caused some of our "friends" overseas to rethink their positions regarding George Bush and the US. This group of stalwart supporters of all things American put their heads together today to determine their new strategy: What did Jacques Chirac say to Luis Zapatero, Josep Borrell, and Jose Manuel Barroso? You tell me -- enter your best caption into the comments on this post! NO e-mailed entries, please! E-mailed entries will be entered onto provisional ballots and destroyed surreptitiously by Karl Rove's evil minions. The contest will end on Sunday, November 7th at 8 pm CT, when our guest judge will select the winners. Let the games begin!...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

AP: Democrats Losing Ground In Middle America

The AP notes that the final tallies in Iowa and New Mexico show that George Bush took the former blue states from Democrats as expected, indicating that the Democrats have increasingly isolated themselves to the two coasts in the past several elections: The Democrats' defeat in Iowa reflects a larger problem for them in the Midwest and across the political map. Along with Wisconsin and Minnesota, Iowa and its seven electoral votes are part of the once-Democratic Upper Midwest that is growing more conservative with each presidential election. Kerry won Minnesota by just 3 percentage points, Wisconsin by a single point. In addition, Michigan and Pennsylvania went Democratic by 3 percentage points or less and Bush won Ohio despite its economic miseries. The close electoral vote masks the problem Democrats face in traditionally friendly territory. Iowa hadn't gone for a Republican in 20 years, and that time only during the...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Traveling ...

I'll be leaving shortly to visit family in Southern California. I plan on blogging a bit while I'm there, but the productivity may be down somewhat. It'll give me a chance to recuperate from the bruising campaign and recharge the batteries for the next four years. Tonight the Northern Alliance gang will fill in for Hugh Hewitt, so be sure to tune in!...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

November 6, 2004

Don't Let Us Stop You

While I was in flight, Michael Moore apparently issued his long-awaited response to the election results, having watched his efforts to smear George Bush and run him out of office come to naught. He exhorts his fans to keep from slitting their wrists by giving them 17 reasons to live on. This, of course, matches the hysterical tone of the rest of the Left today, who have either decided to kill themselves or move to Canada, when they're not busy claiming that vast conspiracies have stolen the election from them. Memo to Democrats: in order to support democracy, you have to accept its results, even when your side loses. If you can't do that without threatening to move away, kill yourselves, or commit violence, then you don't believe in democracy at all. You only want democracy as a cover to impose your beliefs on others, even when the majority disagree...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Specter's Folly

Arlen Specter stuck his foot squarely in his mouth just hours after winning election in Pennsylvania, suggesting in his comments to the press that under his presumed leadership of the Senate Judiciary Committee, George Bush should take care not to nominate anyone except middle-of-the-road candidates. The uproar from the conservative base has threatened to derail Specter's ascension to the chair and has caused the GOP's Senate contingent to wonder at the best option for response: Republican lawmakers and top Senate aides, speaking privately for the most part, said the uproar from the right was becoming an impediment for Mr. Specter, a Pennsylvania lawmaker who has coveted the chairmanship. They said while it was likely he would still get the post, it was no longer a certainty. "He is not out of the woods,'' said one Senate aide who is closely monitoring developments on the Judiciary Committee, echoing a sentiment expressed...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

An Unfair Comparison

A report on CNS News seems to be getting a lot of attention this morning, which states that liberal bloggers think that George Bush's re-election is "more depressing" than 9/11. After reading that incendiary headline, I took a look at the article and found out that the headline is quite misleading: Bloggers on the liberal Democratic Underground website have overwhelmingly labeled Nov. 3, 2004, the day after Election Day, "more depressing" than Sept. 11, 2001 in a poll of online members. Seventy-two percent of poll takers said they believed the day Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) conceded defeat in the presidential election was more tragic than the day more than 3,000 Americans were killed in the attacks on the World Trade Center in New York, the Pentagon in Washington, D.C., and on a hijacked plane that crashed in a Pennsylvania field. So what happened is that the nutcases at DU put...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Annan, UN Prove Their Fecklessness

Kofi Annan sought to protect the terrorists who continue their bloody grip on Fallujah by writing a letter to the governments of Iraq, Britain, and the US demanding a cessation of hostilities. The three governments reacted with scorn to the notion that Iraq should somehow live with terrorists setting up their own city-state within Iraqi borders, allowing them to maintain a base of operations with which to terrorize the entire country: In letters dated Oct. 31 and addressed to President Bush, British Prime Minister Tony Blair and interim Iraqi leader Ayad Allawi, Annan said using military force against insurgents in the city would further alienate Sunni Muslims already feeling left out of a political process orchestrated largely by Washington. "I wish to share with you my increasing concern at the prospect of an escalation in violence, which I fear could be very disruptive for Iraq's political transition," Annan wrote to...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

AP Analyzes Kerry's Prospects

The AP's Lolita Baldor and Jennifer Peter analyze the future prospects of John Kerry now that his bid for the presidency has ended, and they see big things ahead for the Massachusetts Senator: Like many presidential candidates before him, John Kerry must now decide what to do with the rest of his political life. While he relaxed at his Boston home on Friday, elsewhere friends, colleagues and presidential historians said they didn't see the Democrat fading into political obscurity like the last Massachusetts politician who ran and lost, Michael Dukakis in 1988. Instead, they said he would probably take the road less traveled by recent senators who tried and failed to take the White House, and remain a strong voice in Congress on issues he cared about. Like what? The AP continues its ignorance of Kerry's Senate record even past the election. In 20 years as a senator, Kerry got...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Iran Continues Its Defiance

Iran has defied the EU-3 yet again, concluding the latest round of talks without an agreement to end uranium enrichment and stiffarming the international community: Talks between Iran and three European Union heavyweights ended on Saturday without an agreement on Tehran's nuclear program, a source close to the negotiations said. Iran was seeking a compromise in the talks with France, Germany and Britain to avoid a dispute over its nuclear program being referred to the United Nations Security Council and avert the risk of sanctions. The EU trio wants Iran to stop enriching uranium. "At the end of difficult talks, the two parties made considerable progress toward a provisional agreement on a common approach on these issues," the French Foreign Ministry said in a statement. But a source close to the negotiations said: "Nothing is settled ... The discussions were difficult, very difficult. The Iranians struggled hard." "Everyone has to...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

If you can't beat 'em . . . .

Despite President Bush's election victory, destructive attacks on the GOP continue. Last night, a mob vandalized the North Carolina Republican headquarters. According to the AP (emphasis mine): A police officer reported Friday night that about 100 people wearing masks and gloves were walking down a street near the headquarters, police Capt. D.S. Overman said. Officers investigating that report found a second group "vandalizing and damaging" the GOP headquarters, said police Maj. D.R. Lane. The vandalism was a "planned and orchestrated event," police spokesman Jim Sughrue said. "This is not a political statement," Sughrue said. "A political statement is what we made Tuesday. This is a crime." The officers found several spent fireworks, poster boards with slogans and spray-painted expletives on the walls. At least two windows were broken and police said it appeared that the vandals tried to put incendiary devices inside the building. This is yet another example of...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

November 7, 2004

Iraq Declares Martial Law As Talks Drag On

After a series of bombings that killed dozens of people yesterday, the Iraqis declared a country-wide emergency, excluding Kurdistan. The measure placed the country into an equivalent status of martial law while the Allawi government continued its efforts to negotiate with the terrorists of Fallujah: Iraq's interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi declared martial law on Sunday and said a U.S.-led military offensive against the rebel-held city of Falluja could not be delayed much longer. ... Allawi was doing all he could to find a peaceful solution, his spokesman Thair al-Naqib said. "He still hopes that it may be possible to avoid a major military confrontation in Falluja ... He is, however, not optimistic," Naqib said. The Americans say they are only awaiting the word from Allawi, who returned from Europe on Saturday, to attack. Why does Allawi hesitate? First, the battle of Fallujah will certainly be bloody, more bloody than...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Europe Reconsiders Muslims In Wake Of Filmmaker's Murder

AP religion analyst Brian Murphy reports that tensions are rising between mainstream European society and the growing Muslim community in its midst, especially after the brutal murder of Theo Van Gogh, the Dutch filmmaker who criticized Islamic practices with regards to women. More Muslim threats against Dutch politicians followed the murder, and Europeans are beginning to ask themselves whether Muslims can ever be assimilated into their communities: But those big issues fade on the streets of many European centers. Here even in places like tolerant Amsterdam it's often expressed as a gnawing feeling that militant factions in Islamic immigrant communities are gaining ground and chipping away at values such as free speech and secular politics. "There is a general feeling that a social collision is becoming inevitable," said Jan Rath, co-director of the Institute for Migration and Ethnic Studies at the University of Amsterdam. "People think it's been...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Marines Unleashed at Last

The Marines have finally been given the green light for the assault on Fallujah. From Fox News: U.S. forces stormed into western districts of Fallujah (search) early Monday, seizing the main city hospital and securing two key bridges over the Euphrates River (search) in what appeared to be the first stage of the long-expected assault on the insurgent stronghold. An AC-130 gunship (search) raked the city with 40 mm cannon fire as explosions from U.S. artillery lit up the night sky. Intermittent artillery fire blasted southern neighborhoods of Fallujah, and orange fireballs from high explosive airbursts could be seen above the rooftops. U.S. officials said the toughest fight was yet to come when American forces enter the main part of the city on the east bank of the river, including the Jolan neighborhood where insurgent defenses are believed the strongest....

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

November 8, 2004

Rove's Analysis: Kerry Voting Record Sealed The Election

Many analysts have made a second career out of postulating how George Bush managed to beat John Kerry in the presidential election. Most of the speculation has centered on anti-gay marriage initiatives in eleven states, even though a thorough analysis of voting between 2000 and 2004 show a slight decrease in support for Bush in comparison. The one person given credit as the architect for the victory, Karl Rove, insists that the real reason is much more prosaic: Tactically, Kerry's decision to vote for the $87 billion in funding for troops and reconstruction in Iraq and Afghanistan, and then deciding in October 2003 to vote against it, was a bonanza for the president's campaign, "the gift that kept on giving," Rove said. Kerry's record in general and his shifting support for the war in Iraq caused the most problems for him among voters, Rove insisted. Exit polling has been widely...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Campaign Finance Reform Lays A Very Expensive Egg

The New York Times performs a post-mortem on the McCain-Feingold Campaign Finance Reform Act as implemented in the 2004 election cycle, and while Glen Justice never mentions the word "failure" in his analysis, the data more than suggests that verdict: The McCain-Feingold law, which did more to change how American political campaigns are financed than any legislation since the 1970's, got its first real-world test in this year's election. And now its critics are more emphatic than ever in arguing that the law has fallen short of its goals, and even some supporters are calling for revisions. ... The major advocacy groups at work in this year's elections, called 527 groups after the section in the tax code that created them, raised more than $350 million, according to PoliticalMoneyLine, which tracks campaign finance. While it is axiomatic in politics that each race will cost more than the last, and while...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

How About This: Kerry Was A Lousy Candidate?

I took a peek at the headlines this morning, while I'm wrapping up my vacation in Southern California, and the one story that really caught my eye was Howard Kurtz's piece on post-election analysis by the media. If you listen to the talking heads on TV, you hear all sorts of notions about why George Bush beat John Kerry: gay marriage, evangelicals, Michael Moore, red-America brain death, and so on. Kurtz analyzes the analysts in his own somewhat cynical style: The Democrats were clueless on moral values. John Kerry was a lousy candidate. A northerner can't win anymore. The Bush team was better at manipulating the press. No one trusts the Democrats on national security. The gay marriage issue badly hurt the party. The Democrats need to move right, or left, or south, or undergo a personality transplant, or change the Constitution so Bill Clinton can run again. ... The...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

A Gift That Keeps On Giving

I'm brushing off the long-abandoned DeanWatch category, as it appears the Democrats are about to reinforce their cluelessness by replacing three-time loser Terry McAuliffe with the darling of the International ANSWER set, former Vermont governor Howard Dean: Former presidential candidate Howard Dean is considering a bid to become chairman of the national Democratic Party. "He told me he was thinking about it," Steve Grossman, himself a former chairman of the Democratic National Committee, said Monday. Grossman was a Dean backer during the former Vermont governor's failed presidential bid. Dean, who was in Albany, N.Y., Monday night to give a speech, said he hasn't decided about the top party job, noting he'd received thousands of e-mails urging him to try for it. He said he's still uncertain about his future. "It's a lot easier to run for president when you don't know what you're getting into," he said. "I will stay...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Not Just A River In Egypt, Part 37B

The Washington Post's Mike Allen reports that John Kerry is "fired up" and plans to be an activist when he returns to the Senate in the next session. In fact, he's giving the impression that he wants to give the presidency another shot in 2008: Democrat John F. Kerry plans to use his Senate seat and long lists of supporters to remain a major voice in American politics despite losing the presidential race last Tuesday, and he is assessing the feasibility of trying again in 2008, friends and aides said yesterday. Kerry will attend a post-election lame-duck Senate session that begins next week and has said he is "fired up" to play a highly visible role, the friends and aides said. If so, it would be the first time in twenty years. His previous visibility remained limited to six bills in twenty years and the Iran-Contra investigation from over seventeen...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

November 9, 2004

Are They Keeping Arafat Alive To Find The Money?

As Yasser Arafat lies dying, a conclusion that appears less in doubt each day, the AP reports that the search has begun for millions -- possibly billions -- of dollars that the PLO leader may have stashed away during his forty-year reign as Palestinian leader: In his four decades as Palestinian leader, Yasser Arafat has run a murky financial empire that includes far-flung PLO investments in airlines, banana plantations and high-tech companies, and money hidden in bank accounts across the globe. ... Forbes magazine ranked him No. 6 on its 2003 list of the richest "kings, queens and despots," estimating he was worth at least $300 million. Shalom Harari, a former top Israeli intelligence official, said Arafat may have stashed away up to $700 million, part of it for an emergency such as a new exile, especially with Israel threatening to expel him. Two names frequently come up in connection...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Zapatero: We Don't Need No Stinkin' Americans

The Sun (UK) reports in its typically urgent prose that Spanish PM Jose Zapatero has declared that the EU will become the dominant power in the world within 20 years, and pledged Spanish partnership with France and Germany to create the new hyperpower: Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero brazenly declared the ultimate aim was to challenge America. He declared: Europe must believe that it can be in 20 years the most important world power. We want to arrange the European future at the side of France and Germany. Spain sees itself with France and Germany as never before. ... Zapatero was quizzed by German magazine Der Spiegel about the EUs continuing need for US troops to deal with crises in the Balkans under the Nato umbrella. He said: Naturally it will still last some time, until we develop a closed defence policy. That can happen only after the agreement on a...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Misunderestimated No More

CNN's Carlos Watson takes an unusual tack for the mainstream media, analyzing George Bush and his history and determining him to be a political genius: Whether you are a Democrat, a Republican or an independent, it is hard not to look at President Bush's re-election victory last week and conclude that he is probably one of the three or four most talented politicians of the last half of a century. Why do I write that? Think about it. In 10 short years, George Walker Bush has won not just one but three high-profile political races that most able politicians would have lost. In 1994, with no real previous political experience, he beat a popular incumbent governor in the nation's second most populous state. Six years later, he beat a sitting vice president during a time of peace and prosperity. And last week, with a mediocre economy, an unpopular war and...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

All Hail The New Victims -- Democrats

Just when I thought it was impossible for Democrats to sink any lower in their post-election tantrums -- after all, it's hard to top secession as a political strategy for the arrested-development set -- now they have their very own psychological disorder, according to the Boca Raton News: The Boca Raton News reported Tuesday that Palm Beach, Florida trauma specialist Douglas Schooler alone has already treated 15 clients and friends with intense hypnotherapy since the Democratic candidate conceded on November 3. "I had one friend tell me he's never been so depressed and angry in his life," Schooler said. "I observed patients threatening to leave the country or staring listlessly into space. They were emotionally paralyzed, shocked and devastated," he told the daily. "We're calling it 'post-election selection trauma' and we're working to develop a counseling program for it," said Rob Gordon, the Boca Raton-based executive director of the American...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Caption Contest Winners Delayed

Sorry for the delay in the caption contest -- I will announce the winners later tonight. My vacation caused a miscommunication on this edition, which is why I still haven't announced the winners. Thanks for your patience and the gentle but pointed reminders you've sent today ......

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

You Know Aero Mexico Laughed At This One

This isn't the most pleasant article to read the day after flying in from Southern California, but it's good to keep in mind for future travel plans. Just make sure you take your own bottled water on your next flight while traveling domestically: New water quality inspections on airliners were initiated Tuesday by the Environmental Protection Agency in response to the discovery of coliform bacteria in the drinking water of one in every eight planes it tested. ... In August and September, the EPA tested drinking water aboard 158 randomly selected domestic and international passenger aircraft and found that 12.6 percent did not meet federal standards. Twenty of the planes that were tested which ranged from small commuter aircraft and jumbo jets tested positive for total coliform bacteria, signaling the possible presence of other harmful bacteria. Two planes tested positive for E. coli bacteria, which can cause gastrointestinal...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Marines Rout Fallujah Terrorists

The Marines are steadily and successfully killing terrorists and breaking things in Fallujah. The AP reports: Faced with overwhelming force, resistance in Fallujah did not appear as fierce as expected, though the top U.S. commander in Iraq (news - web sites) said he still expected "several more days of tough urban fighting" as insurgents fell back toward the southern end of the city, perhaps for a last stand. Some U.S. military officers estimated they controlled about a third of the city. Commanders said they had not fully secured the northern half of Fallujah but were well on their way as American and Iraqi troops searched for insurgents. The commander on the ground, Lt. Gen. Thomas Metz, believes al-Zarqawi escaped Fallujah before the assault. This is unfortunate, but Im certain there is still a Hellfire missile with his name on it. The Marines are advancing rapidly toward victory. Of course the...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Caption Contest Winners!

Je le regrette le jeux sont fait -- as Jacques Chirac is certainly saying now that the last Captain's Caption Contest has closed out and the winners are about to be announced. In fact, Jacqui -- do you mind if I call you Jacqui, mon ami? -- appears to be eagerly debating the wonderful entries CQ readers submitted for this week's contest: Sacre bleu! Voila, maintenant ... le winners: Captain's Award (Leap of Faith) - Nathan: "Well, his French isn't all bad. He does know how to pronounce 'Lambeau'." You Have The Conn #1 (Death Imitates Art) - ff1047: Trust me, it'll be just like "Weekend at Bernies", we can pull this off. For christs sake, the Democrats propped up a dead body as a candidate, we can prop up a dead terrorist as a "leader". You Have The Conn #2 (The Untold Story) - Brian Wohlgemuth: Luis Zapatero stands...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Ashcroft Resigns, Presents Bush With Golden Opportunity

Attorney General John Ashcroft and Commerce Secretary Don Evans resigned today, the first cabinet-level departures after George Bush's re-election. Ashcroft plans on staying until a successor is named, while the plans of longtime Bush confidante Evans were less clear. CNN has the details: In the first signs of a second-term shakeup for the Bush administration, Attorney General John Ashcroft and Commerce Secretary Don Evans have resigned, the White House announced Tuesday evening. Ashcroft's resignation will become effective upon confirmation of a successor, Justice Department officials said. There were no immediate details on when Evans' resignation would take effect. Ashcroft, a former senator and two-term governor of Missouri, has garnered criticism during his nearly four years as attorney general on issues like the Patriot Act, which backers say helps the government in its fight against terrorism and critics say infringes on civil liberties. I probably have a different view of Ashcroft's...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

November 10, 2004

Kristofian Hysteria

Nicholas Kristof would probably conclude that the cause of rainy days can and should be laid at the feet of the Bush Administration, based on his hysterical rant today about the freedom of the press. Kristof blames a rash of judges holding reporters in contempt for their secrecy on George Bush, not because any of the judges are Bush appointees (they're not), but because he sets an example of -- get this -- secrecy! Paging China! Help us! Urge the U.S. government to respect freedom of the press! It does sound topsy-turvy, doesn't it? Generally, it's China and Zimbabwe that are throwing journalists in prison, while the U.S. denounces the repression over there. But now similar abuses are about to unfold within the United States, part of an alarming new pattern of assault on American freedom of the press. In the last few months, three different U.S. federal judges, each...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Arizonans Take Security Seriously

Arizona voters passed a referendum last week that requires people to demonstrate their citizenship when registering to vote, produce ID when actually voting, and identify themselves as citizens or legal residents when receiving government services, despite the opposition of leading state politicians of both parties. Despite being outspent 5-1 along with all of the opposition, Arizonans sent a message on immigration to Washington by voting in favor, 56-44, and other states now may copy Arizona's effort: Initiative proponents, arguing that illegal immigration in Arizona is out of control, said Proposition 200's passage on Nov. 2 was a crucial first step in reducing a glut of illegal immigration and sends messages to government officials in both Washington and Mexico that illegal immigration will not be condoned. The initiative -- opposed by key elected officials in Arizona, including Democratic Gov. Janet Napolitano and Republican Sen. John McCain; several Hispanic advocacy groups; labor...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Taking On The SEIU

An anti-union watchdog group has filed a complaint against the largest government workers union in the country, alleging that the group illegally spent millions of dollars in dues on partisan political campaigns: An anti-union group is urging the Federal Election Commission to investigate one of the largest unions in the country, claiming the Service Employees International Union unlawfully spent workers' dues to elect Democrats in last week's election. The National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation said Wednesday that SEIU gave millions of dollars from members' dues to a partisan political group, America Coming Together, which in turn spent the money illegally to finance political campaigns through the Democratic National Committee. Using dues, which get extorted from workers in closed shops, for political purposes has been banned for at least the last two years. Unions have to raise money through PACs or 527s with voluntary donations in order to contribute...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

You Don't Bring Me Flowers

In response to the continuing post-mortems on the presidential election, various women's groups noted that George Bush made significant inroads with women. Exit polling showed that John Kerry only narrowly edged Bush in this demographic, 51-48, while Al Gore had claimed an 11-point gap in 2000. The groups blamed John Kerry and claimed he took them for granted: Leaders of several women's groups said Tuesday that Democrat John Kerry fell short in his bid for the White House because he didn't make a more direct appeal for support from women voters. ... "There was an assumption women would be behind the Kerry campaign," said Kim Gandy, president of the National Organization for Women. The Bush campaign referred to the liberation of Afghan and Iraqi women to appeal to women voters, said Eleanor Smeal, president of the Feminist Majority. But "Kerry never drew a very strong contrast with Bush" on women's...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Happy Birthday, USMC!

Today is the 229th birthday of the United States Marine Corps. Our brave men and women have guarded this nation since before it officially existed and have been the vanguard of American power and service to the world. Few are foolish enough to doubt their courage, their intrepidity, and their determination, and for those a quick introduction to any Marine past or present suffices to educate them. I am honored to have Marines as friends and family, including one uncle on my mother's side who fought in Viet Nam, and my father-in-law, a Marine pilot in WWII and Korea who is now deceased -- but still a Marine. Through the centuries, the Coprs (and all of our armed forces) have distinguished themselves with their honor, courage, and dedication to this nation and the pursuit of freedom and liberty nationwide. Congratulations, Marines! In your honor, I'm posting the Marines' Hymn, which...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Cleaning House In Fallujah

The AP reports that Iraqi armed forces have found the houses where terrorists led by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi beheaded their hostages, a grisly confirmation of the necessity of cleaning up Fallujah: Iraqi troops have found "hostage slaughterhouses" in Fallujah where foreign captives were held and killed, the commander of Iraqi forces in the city said Wednesday. Troops found CDs and documents of people taken captive in houses in the northern part of Fallujah, Maj. Gen. Abdul Qader Mohammed Jassem Mohan told reporters. ... "We have found hostage slaughterhouses in Fallujah that were used by these people and the black clothing that they used to wear to identify themselves, hundreds of CDs and whole records with names of hostages," the general said at a military camp near Fallujah. If nothing else, we've now confirmed that the ghouls that perform these beheadings stationed themselves in the so-called City of Mosques, and that...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Bush Picks Gonzalez

George Bush made the first Cabinet-level selection of his second term, nominating Alberto Gonzalez, Jr for Attorney General. Gonzalez will replace John Ashcroft, who resigned on Election Day. Unfortunately, given Gonzalez' history, I suspect that Gonzalez will also replace Ashcroft as a lightning rod: In tapping Gonzales for the post, Bush picked a fellow Texan who has stirred controversy himself for his role in memos condoning the possible torture of terrorist suspects and arguing that prisoners captured in Afghanistan are not protected by the Geneva Conventions. But the soft-spoken lawyer also has been described as a relative moderate whose conservative credentials are sometimes viewed with suspicion by Bush's more rightist supporters. Gonzalez didn't write the first memo mentioned, nor did he endorse it, but the Post reported that the Justice Department consulted heavily with the White House before drafting it. Both cases give ammunition to partisans in Congress for attempting...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

See Ya, Yasser

The world's first celebrity terrorist died peacefully today, a fate that he denied thousands of others during his murderous life: Palestinian Authority President Yasser Arafat, 75, the leader who passionately sought a homeland for his people but was seen by many Israelis as a ruthless terrorist and a roadblock to peace, died early Thursday in Paris. Arafat had been sick with an unknown illness that had been variously described as the flu, a stomach virus or gallstones. He flew to Paris nearly two weeks ago seeking medical treatment and was hospitalized with what Palestinian officials said was a blood disorder. He had been on a respirator since slipping into a coma November 3. A hospital spokesman said he died at 3:30 a.m. Thursday (9:30 p.m. Wednesday ET). For all the crimes he committed and people he terrorized, the most ironic legacy Arafat left was the utter poverty and degradation he...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

November 11, 2004

Minnesota Teen Democrats Take 'Moonbat' Label Seriously

Two days after John Kerry lost to George Bush, three of his teen supporters got into a dispute with a Bush-supporting schoolmate at their Minnesota Zoo School of Environmental Studies, and after some juvenile taunting, the budding Democrats beat the other teen with a baseball bat: Three high school students, one allegedly armed with a bat, were charged with attacking a pro-President Bush classmate after he reportedly said only gays would support Sen. John Kerry. ... The alleged assailants have all been charged: one with felony assault because he allegedly went to his car to get a bat during the assault, prosecutors said one with misdemeanor assault and one with disorderly conduct. In fact, both sides called the other "gay" for their political views, which still managed to outstrip the maturity level in some of the public debate from this election. Perhaps Lawrence O'Donnell counseled these young Democrats....

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Happy Veteran's Day From Captain's Quarters

Today is Veteran's Day, when we honor the sacrifice of our men and women who served and are serving to defend and protect our nation and spread liberty around the world. When I got up this morning, I wondered how I would celebrate veterans like my father, my uncles, and many friends and co-workers and the many who have served among CQ's readership. Fortunately for me, CQ reader Bob S. forwarded another e-mail from his neice's husband, a major in the Marine Corps currently stationed in Iraq. Not only does he speak eloquently regarding the Corps' birthday yesterday, but he reminds us of the spirit and sacrifice of the US fighting men and women in all branches of the service. Camp Victory, Iraq 10 November 2004 A Thought from Iraq Traditions & Reality In 1921, then-Commandant of the Marine Corps John A. Lejeune, initiated the now storied tradition of...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Arafat As Rohrschach Test

The death of uberterrorist Yasser Arafat, the man who masterminded hundreds of attacks on civilians and inspired thousands of Islamic lunatics, provides a moment of clarity and insight into the leaders of our time. While heads of state should exercise judicious diplomacy in their official reactions in order to reach out to the Palestinians that Arafat victimized almost as badly as he did everyone else, the extent of their remarks provide an interesting look at the values of so-called friends. For instance, Bush gave a carefully-crafted statement which avoided even speaking about Arafat or his deadly legacy. Instead, Bush wisely focused on the future: The death of Yasser Arafat is a significant moment in Palestinian history. We express our condolences to the Palestinian people. For the Palestinian people, we hope that the future will bring peace and the fulfillment of their aspirations for an independent, democratic Palestine that is at...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Marines Free Hostages In Fallujah

In another demonstration of the need for action, a US Marine Corps contingent freed four hostages taken by terrorists in Fallujah during their efforts to eliminate the Islamofascist and Ba'ath remnants in the city: US-led troops involved in fighting against insurgents in the Iraqi city of Falluja have found four imprisoned men believed to be Iraqi hostages. Three of the men were contractors working for the US military, a US marines spokesman said, and the fourth said he was a taxi driver. All of the men had been beaten and starved and were wearing handcuffs. ... They were found blindfolded, handcuffed and in a locked room. In the same building, marines found surface-to-air missiles, night-vision equipment, black uniforms, computers and a weapons cache. They also retrieved what they called anti-coalition propaganda and videotapes showing torture of hostages and weapons training. In a moment of farce, the BBC reports that this...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Sarin nerve gas found in Fallujah

CQ reader Jeff Miller has alterted us to Glenn Reynolds' post on sarin gas in Fallujah. According to NPR's Anne Garrels, a reporter embedded with a Marine unit in Fallujah, the Marines found a suitcase filled with cannisters labeled "sarin nerve gas." You can listen to her report here. No word yet on how many cannisters were found or the origin of said weapons. Looks like some of Saddam's "nonexistent" WMDs didn't make it to Syria after all. (Hmm . . perhaps they did leave the country but have been imported back.) I'm not surprised the terrorists had a nerve agent. I'm only confounded by the fact they didn't either use the weapons against the Marines or take them with while fleeing the city. Must have been in a real rush to get out of there. Or they have more stashed away somewhere. In the immortal words of Matt Drudge:...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Censoring Private Ryan

From USA Today: Many ABC affiliates around the country have announced that they won't take part in the network's Veterans Day airing of Saving Private Ryan, saying the acclaimed film's violence and language could draw sanctions from the Federal Communications Commission. The decisions mark a twist in the conflict over the aggressive stand the FCC has taken against obscenity and profanity since Janet Jackson flashed the world during the last Super Bowl halftime show. Steven Spielberg's Oscar-winning movie aired on ABC with relatively little controversy in 2001 and 2002, but station owners including several in large markets are unnerved that airing it Thursday could bring federal punishment. The film includes a violent depiction of the D-Day invasion and profanity. "It would clearly have been our preference to run the movie. We think it's a patriotic, artistic tribute to our fighting forces," Ray Cole, president of Citadel Communications, told...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Jimmy Carter Eulogizes Terrorist; No One Surprised

To no one's great shock, Jimmy Carter decided to wax eloquent about the world's premier terrorist at his passing. Carter continues his unbroken streak of poor judgment in his remarks on Yasser Arafat, his fellow Nobel laureate who incidentally murdered a whole lot of people, Americans included: Former US President Jimmy Carter called Yasser Arafat "a powerful human symbol and forceful advocate" who united Palestinians in their pursuit of a homeland. "Yasser Arafat's death marks the end of an era and will no doubt be painfully felt by Palestinians throughout the Middle East and elsewhere in the world," Carter said. "He was the father of the modern Palestinian nationalist movement. A powerful human symbol and forceful advocate, Palestinians united behind him in their pursuit of a homeland," he said in a statement distributed by his Atlanta, Georgia-based Carter Center. To hold up Arafat as a "powerful human symbol" after all...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Insurgents Discover That French Reporters Uphold Gallic Military Tradition

Jackie Spinner at the Washington Post hosted a live-chat Q&A on the war in Iraq and journalists' efforts to cover the action. Spinner joined the chatroom live from an Army outpost near Fallujah, and the very first question asked about the benefits of embedding reporters within military units as opposed to freelancing in a war zone: Q - Is it preferrable to report from an embedded military unit, or do you prefer to roam about the city without their protection? I presume the quality of reporting is better if you aren't chained to a branch of the military, but it certainly seems much more dangerous to move about Iraq without their security. ... A - Unfortunately, it is impossible to roam about the city without protection. The only way we can cover this offensive for now is with the military. I should note that the insurgents offered embed spots to...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Going home

My 10 year high school reunion is this weekend, so I'll be packing and driving back to Arkansas tonight. My parents only have dial-up (the horror!) so posting will be light for me this weekend....

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Terrorists Get Desperate

The AP reports that terrorists trapped in Fallujah tried to break through an American cordon to the south of the city to escape. The failed attack is another bid to take the pressure off of the Islamofascists and Saddam holdouts, as their brethren in Iraq desperately attacked all around the country to distract the Americans: Insurgents tried to break through the U.S. cordon surrounding Fallujah on Thursday as American forces launched an offensive against concentrations of militants in the south of the city. Some 600 insurgents, 18 U.S. troops and five Iraqi soldiers have been killed in the four-day assault, the U.S. military said. In an apparent bid to relieve pressure on their trapped allies, insurgents mounted major attacks in Mosul, Iraq's third-largest city 220 miles to the north. Guerrillas assaulted nine police stations, overwhelming several, and battled U.S. and Iraqi troops around bridges across the Tigris River in the...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Blackwill Abused Female Staffer: WaPo

You can scratch recently retired diplomat Robert Blackwill from the list of potential Cabinet appointees in the second Bush term. Condoleezza Rice herself scolded the architect of Bush's Iraq policy after he verbally and physically abused a female staffer, according to the Washington Post: Robert D. Blackwill, who resigned last week as the White House's top official on Iraq policy, was recently scolded by national security adviser Condoleezza Rice after Secretary of State Colin L. Powell told her that Blackwill appeared to have verbally abused and physically hurt a female embassy staffer during a visit to Kuwait in September, administration officials said. The incident took place as Blackwill was rushing to return home after a visit to Baghdad to join a campaign swing planned by President Bush. As six officials describe the incident, he arrived at the Air France counter at the Kuwait airport and learned he was not on...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

November 12, 2004

Pew Research: Moral Values Far Overblown In Exit Polling

It's probably too late to change the conventional wisdom on the presidential election now, but a Pew Research Center analysis of exit polling and their own new survey throws cold water on the notion that "moral values" provided the primary motivation for voters. Even for those who did prioritize morality first, it doesn't reflexively relate to conservative outlook: When "moral values" was included in poll questions, it was named more often than any other issue. But when voters were just asked to name the issue most important in their vote for president without being given a list of answers moral values trailed the war in Iraq and the economy, according to the Pew survey. "The advantage of the open-ended question is it tells you what's at the top of mind for voters what they're thinking," said Cliff Zukin, a veteran pollster and professor of public policy at...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Captain's Caption Contest #35: Watch Your Back Edition

It's Friday, so it must be time for another Captain's Caption Contest! With all of the hullabaloo surrounding Senator Arlen Specter's comments last week and the efforts being made to derail his ascension to the chair of the Judiciary Committee, you'd expect that he and George Bush would barely be on speaking terms. On the other hand, the two GOP stalwarts still have enough in common to work together ... or so it seems. What do you suppose this conversation was like? You tell me -- enter your best caption into the comments on this post! NO e-mailed entries, please! E-mailed entries will be sequestered in Ramallah for two years, and afterwards get slobbered on by Jacques Chirac. The contest will end on Sunday, November 14th at 8 pm CT, when our guest judge will select the winners. Let the games begin!...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Iran Lied! (Gasp!)

The AP reports that a deal supposedly hammered out by the EU is collapsing due to Iran's renuncuiation of the agreement: A deal committing Iran to suspend activities that Washington says are part of a nuclear arms program was close to collapse Friday, with diplomats suggesting that Tehran had reneged on an agreement reached with European negotiators just days ago. ... The deal leaves open the exact length of the suspension but says it will be in effect at least as long as it takes for the two sides to negotiate a deal on European technical and financial aid, including help in the development of Iranian nuclear energy for power generation. But on Friday the diplomats told The Associated Press that Iranian officials had presented British, French and German envoys in Tehran with a version of the agreement that was unacceptable to the three European powers. Well, color me shocked...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Don't Blame The Medium For The Message

The New York Times reports on the flurry of post-election conspiracy theories and, somewhat conveniently, leaves the blame at the doorstep of the blogosphere. Tom Zeller notes the proliferation of assertions that the 2004 Presidential election was somehow stolen from John Kerry in Florida and Ohio and determines that the paranoia springs from freedom of speech: In the space of seven days, an online market of dark ideas surrounding last week's presidential election took root and multiplied. But while the widely read universe of Web logs was often blamed for the swift propagation of faulty analyses, the blogosphere, as it has come to be known, spread the rumors so fast that experts were soon able to debunk them, rather than allowing them to linger and feed conspiracy theories. Within days of the first rumors of a stolen election, in fact, the most popular theories were being proved wrong - though...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Northern Alliance Radio In For Hugh Hewitt Tonight!

Tonight, the Northern Alliance Radio Network fills in for Hugh Hewitt, who has the evening off. Make sure you tune in to hear Mitch, King, myself, and the other members of the NARN gang hijack Hugh's show from 5 pm - 8 pm CT tonight. If Hugh isn't on the air in your neighborhood, you can get the show on the Internet; check out Hugh's site for more details. Of course, tomorrow we will be on the air in the Twin Cities and on the Internet in our regular time period, 12-3 CT. Be sure to catch us then as well!...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Don't Let Scowcroft Back In

Former Bush 41 advisor Brent Scowcroft published an opinion piece in today's Washington Post that should remind us all that American cluelessness in Middle East policymaking has a rich bipartisan history. Scowcroft's advice to George Bush in his second term explains why 43 famously bypassed his father's counsel in favor of prayer. The first red flag for me popped up when Scowcroft writes that our new aim in securing peace in the Middle East requires us to "reach out" to Europe in generating a new policy: But American resolve will not suffice without the willing engagement of other states, especially those of Europe and the region itself. Our appeal to the Europeans, with whom our differences over the Middle East have been significant, must be based on reaching out to them on the Palestinian peace process and Iran, and soliciting their help on Iraq. Unfortunately, what Scowcroft wants us to...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

November 13, 2004

The Result Of Desperation

Government exists to protect its citizens, and free societies give up a certain level of their liberty in order to enable their government to fulfill its mandate. The definition of protection varies, but the concept is the same; in America, we traditionally limit government to national defense and a certain level of social support for the neediest, while countries like France and Germany define protection in their cradle-to-grave social systems. But the one definition on which we all agree is the guarding of our lives and our ability to exercise our freedom. When government fails in this primary obligation, the social contract breaks down and people take action themselves for their own security -- and the chaos that results creates a further distortion in society. Vigilante justice becomes the tyranny of the strong and the law, which exists to ensure liberty and equal treatment for all, no longer functions as...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

The Games Are Too Long As It Is

Baseball has decided to postpone looking at instant replay after major-league GMs split on continuing its review: Upon further review, baseball will hold off on taking a look at instant replay. After watching umpires reverse almost every missed call in the postseason, major league general managers split 15-15 Thursday on whether to keep exploring the subject. "Based on that vote, it's unlikely we'll do anything substantive in the next year to pursue instant replay," MLB executive vice president Sandy Alderson said. In the past twenty years, baseball games have bloated from an average running time of two hours to well over three hours now. I used to be embarrassed for Los Angeles fans who ducked out after the sixth inning, but now if you have kids you can't keep them up past that time for a night game. Increased advertising time, needed to pay the skyrocketing salaries of the players,...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

How You Can Support The Troops

I got this e-mail yesterday from CQ reader and commenter LoveMyMarine, a Marine Corps wife who works on behalf of her husband and his comrades in arms. She lets us know how we can help support our troops in the field, especially the Marines that just celebrated the Corps' 229th birthday by battling to eliminate the terrorists in Fallujah. Our six year old started a banner that states simply, "THANK YOU MARINES". We were at the VRE station on Nov 10th (Marine Corps Birthday) and at the Vietnam Wall Nov 11th asking people to sign the banner, which I will be sending to Iraq along with the Christmas Care Packages for 1st Marine Division. I wonder if I could please ask you to post a link to two other worthwhile grassroots organizations? Wounded Warriors got a plug on Bill O' Reilly, but as I called to remind them, they forgot...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

VP Sent To Hospital

Vice President Dick Cheney experienced "shortness of breath" and was taken to a hospital this morning, the AP reports: "On the recommendation of his doctors, the vice president is going to George Washington University Hospital for some tests," spokesman Ken Lisaius said. "He experienced some shortness of breath Saturday morning and has had a bad cold, which could be the cause for the shortness of breath." President Bush was notified, Lisaius said. Besides wishing the best for Dick Cheney and his family on a personal level, the incapacitation of the VP would be a tough blow for the Bush Administration. Cheney provides a philosophical focus and operational expertise to the war on terror, and losing those talents even for a short time will be tough to overcome....

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

November 14, 2004

Arafat's Money Lies Hidden Still

The Scotsman reviews the legacy of poverty that the so-called hero of the Palestinian people has left his erstwhile countrymen. Yasser Arafat managed to siphon off most of the incoming aid to the West Bank and Gaza Strip, perhaps as much as three billion pounds, and even his overindulged and Machiavellian wife may not know where Arafat stashed it: IN THE poverty-stricken West Bank and Gaza, thousands languish in refugee camps. Outside Yasser Arafats former headquarters in Ramallah children beg in the streets. The late leader himself was also said to have lived frugally, but his fortune, skimmed from foreign aid and taxes and salted away in a network of secret bank accounts, has been estimated at up to 3bn. Among his officials, there was always the fear that if something happened to Arafat, no one would know where all the money was, such was the culture of mismanagement and...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Frist Takes Hard Line On Specter

Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist declined to actively support Arlen Specter, telling Fox News Sunday that Specter had to agree to back all of George Bush's judiciary nominees if he expected to chair the Senate Judiciary Committee: A Republican senator who has questioned whether an abortion opponent could win approval to the U.S. Supreme Court must agree to back President Bush's nominees if he is to head the committee acting on those nominations, the Senate's Republican leader said. Republican Sen. Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, in line to become chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, has yet to make a persuasive case that he should head the panel, Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist said on "Fox News Sunday." This issue had quieted down somewhat over the past few days, and it looked like Specter might settle into the chairmanship chastened but safely. This looks like a moderate escalation in the battle...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Iran Agrees To Halt Uranium Enrichment

The EU-3 appears to have won a major diplomatic concession from Iran as the Islamic Republic has agreed to halt its uranium enrichment program, which the UN confirmed separately: Iran has given the United Nations a written promise to fully suspend uranium enrichment, diplomats said on Sunday, in an apparent bid to dispel suspicions that Tehran wants to build a nuclear bomb. The move also would appear to blunt an American drive to take Iran before the United Nations for the imposition of sanctions. By issuing the written commitment to the United Nations nuclear watchdog agency the International Atomic Energy Agency Iran dropped demands for modification of a tentative deal worked out on Nov. 7 with European negotiators, agreeing instead to continue a freeze on enrichment and to suspend related activities, diplomats told The Associated Press. "Basically it's a full suspension," said one of the diplomats, speaking on...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

AQ Targeting US Through Mexico?

Time Magazine reports that al-Qaeda has worked on plans to smuggle nuclear weapons out of Europe and into the US through Mexico, putting border security and immigration back to the center of war strategy: A key al-Qaeda operative seized in Pakistan recently offered an alarming account of the group's potential plans to target the U.S. with weapons of mass destruction, senior U.S. security officials tell TIME. Sharif al-Masri, an Egyptian who was captured in late August near Pakistan's border with Iran and Afghanistan, has told his interrogators of "al-Qaeda's interest in moving nuclear materials from Europe to either the U.S. or Mexico," according to a report circulating among U.S. government officials. Masri also said al-Qaeda has considered plans to "smuggle nuclear materials to Mexico, then operatives would carry material into the U.S.," according to the report, parts of which were read to TIME. Masri says his family, seeking refuge from...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Learning To Be A Majority Party

Both Hugh Hewitt and myself have taken a lot of heat for our position on the Arlen Specter kerfuffle. Our readers keep reminding us of Specter's track record over six terms in the Senate as a center-left gadfly in GOP ranks. I don't want to speak for Hugh -- he can speak well enough on his own -- but I am well aware of Specter's track record, and it's not as germane as people think. In the first place, Specter's record on judicial nominations is nowhere near as bad as people like to make out. He took part in the original Borking, and Robert Bork has understandably made Specter's ascension to the chair of the Judiciary Committee a personal crusade. However, during the past term Specter supported every one of Bush's nominees -- every one. And if he blew it with Bork, he had the credibility to attack Anita Hill...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

You Thought Our Election Was Bad ...

With the death of uberterrorist Yasser Arafat, the Palestinians have the opportunity to shake off the years of corrupt strongman rule and attempt to follow the Afghanis into a functional democracy. So far, as the Telegraph reports, the Palestinians have not jumped out to an auspicious start: Fears that the struggle to find a new Palestinian leader could bring bloodshed and instability were confirmed last night when the PLO leader Mahmoud Abbas was caught in a gun battle during a visit to Gaza. Two people were killed and 10 wounded when fighting broke out as militiamen opposed to the visit confronted the bodyguards of Mr Abbas, who was yesterday named as the dominant Fatah faction's candidate for the "presidency". The Palestinians have shown no predilection for democracy or due process of law -- they've ruled and been ruled by the gun for decades. Arafat never held another presidential election after...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

November 15, 2004

AP: Muslim Extremists Increase "Fault Lines" In Islam

Using the brutal murder of Theo Van Gogh in the Netherlands and a Buddhist worker in Thailand, the AP reports that Islam has increasingly become unmoored from the wider world, and that even Muslims now concede that extremists have hijacked the Religion of Peace to excuse their murder sprees: "The fault lines are growing," said Fawaz Gerges, a professor of Middle Eastern and International Affairs at Sarah Lawrence College in Bronxville, N.Y. "It's not just between the Muslims and non-Muslims. It's also within Islam itself. It's a battle between moderate Muslims and extremist forces that threaten to hijack Islam." The most recent hot spots zigzag around the atlas from Liberia in West Africa to the Netherlands to Southeast Asia. They join a growing roster of places already feeling the strains of religious conflict and terrorism along the edges of the Islamic world regions as diverse as Chechnya, Nigeria,...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

NYT Says Republican Gains In South Erode Political Center

The New York Times's Robin Toner analyzes the political realignment taking place in the South and concludes that the nation has become more polarized since Democrats have lost ground in their traditional center of power. However, Toner uses contradictory racial arguments and ironically engages in a bigoted fallacy about Republicans to reach her conclusion: In the new Congress, only 4 of the 22 senators from the 11 states of the old Confederacy will be Democrats, the lowest number since Reconstruction; as recently as 1990, 15 of those Southern senators were Democrats. In the House, the Democrats suffered smaller but still significant losses in Texas, where a Republican redistricting plan took down a group of veteran lawmakers, including the paradigmatic Southern conservative: Representative Charles W. Stenholm, a 13-term deficit hawk and longtime leader of the Blue Dog Democrats, a group of centrists in the House. This moment has been a long...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Democratic Humor On Display

James Carville, one of the leading voices for Democrats over the past 12 years, displayed the kind of class and inclusiveness that Democrats accuse Republicans of lacking on yesterday's Meet the Press. Bill at INDC Journal points out this exchange with Tim Russert on air: MR. RUSSERT: George Bush have a mandate? MR. CARVILLE: The only politician in America I know with a mandate is Jim McGreevey, Tim. MS. MATALIN: Oh, gee. MR. CARVILLE: No, of course he does. I mean, he's going to... MR. RUSSERT: Who's running this guy's material, Mary? This... MS. MATALIN: Oh, I'm not. I'm not getting up anymore. Can you imagine the outcry if Karl Rove -- or hell, even Mary Matalin -- had made fun of James McGreevy's sexual orientation on national TV? ACT-UP would already have pickets outside Capitol Hill demanding someone get fired, and the New York Times would be clucking its...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Good News From Afghanistan

Since the mainstream media has decided that Afghanistan, without gunfire and kidnappings, is rather boring, Arthur Chrenkoff has continued his efforts to inform Americans about the excellent progress being made in the former Taliban tyranny. His work appears in both OpinionJournal and in his own blog. It's impossible to excerpt and too important to miss; be sure to read the entire article....

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Powell Resigns

As expected, Secretary of State Colin Powell has submitted his resignation and will leave the Bush Administration in January, CNN reports this morning. No one seriously expected Powell to stick around through a second Bush term, and some speculation has him taking over the World Bank. Now, Washington and the media have already begun the guessing game surrounding the open position. The AP offers John Danforth as the leading candidate: Most of the speculation on a successor has centered on U.N. Ambassador John Danforth, a Republican and former U.S. senator from Missouri, and national security adviser Condoleezza Rice. I'd expect Rice to get the nod over Powell, but Danforth is an intriguing selection. He probably would sail through the confirmation process, while a Rice nomination might provide yet another platform for Democrats to demagogue on Iraq. Of course, now that the election is over, denying them that platform is less...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

CIA Shake-Up Reveals Democratic Hypopcrisy ... Again

Less than six months after the release of the final report from the 9/11 Commission, new CIA Director Porter Goss promises to deliver what the panel recommended and the Democrats demanded -- a shake-up of the intelligence community that received such harsh criticism for its overreliance on technology and closemindedness. Now that Goss has actually taken action, however, Democrats have been howling about the "purge" at Langley. Today, though, Goss picked up important political support for the housecleaning from the one Republican that every Democrat hailed during the election cycle: Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) yesterday supported CIA Director Porter J. Goss's shake-up of the intelligence agency, which he described as "dysfunctional" and not providing President Bush with the information needed to conduct the war on terrorism. Reacting to stories about potential resignations of CIA officials in response to actions taken by Goss and his staff, McCain, appearing on ABC's "This...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

UNSCAM Put $21B In Saddam's Pockets

The Senate Committee on Government Affairs has discovered that corruption in the UN Oil-For-Food program put over twenty-one billion dollars into Saddam Hussein's hands, more than double the previous estimates, which already boggled the mind: Saddam Hussein's regime made more than $21.3 billion in illegal revenue by subverting the U.N. oil-for-food program more than double previous estimates, according to congressional investigators. "This is like an onion we just keep uncovering more layers and more layers," said Sen. Norm Coleman (news, bio, voting record), R-Minn., whose Senate Committee on Government Affairs received the new information at hearing Monday. New figures on Iraq's alleged surcharges, kickbacks and oil-smuggling are based on troves of new documents obtained by the committee's investigative panel, Coleman told reporters before the hearing. The documents illustrate how Iraqi officials, foreign companies and sometimes politicians allegedly contrived to allow the Iraqi government vast illicit gains. The findings...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Sun Offers Free Operating System

Sun Microsystems announced today that its long-awaited new version of its Solaris operating system would be priced to compete strongly against Microsoft Windows. In fact, in contrast to the expensive XP, Sun plans to offer its operating system for free: After investing roughly $500 million and spending years of development time on its next-generation operating system, Sun Microsystems Inc. on Monday will announce an aggressive price for the software - free. ... "Hewlett Packard sells a printer at a low price and makes a lot of money on printer cartridges. Gillette gives you the razor and makes a lot of money on the blades," said Scott McNealy, Sun's chief executive. "There are different ways to drive market penetration." Solaris 10 will be unveiled Monday at an event in San Jose, though it won't be formally released until the end of January. It will work on more than 270 computer platforms...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Rice Gets the Nod

ABC reports President Bush will nominate Condoleezza Rice to replace Colin Powell as secretary of state. I think most of us expected this announcement, and I believe it's a good move, overall. Addendum from Ed: Whiskey and I agree on the selection of Dr. Rice, which is also being reported by the AP. She's up to speed, she knows the players, and will provide powerful representation for George Bush overseas -- more so than Powell, who was assumed to be at odds with Bush's policies on the use of American power in Southwest Asia. One of the big tasks ahead of Dr. Rice mirrors that of Porter Goss at CIA: cleaning out the partisan career bureaucrats that have acted to defeat Bush's foreign policy. Bush has apparently decided not to simply acquiesce to the inevitability of only middling control of State, which has been the reality for both Democratic and...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Atlantis Found?

According to Reuters, an American researcher claims to have found the lost city of Atlantis in the waters off Cyprus: Robert Sarmast says a Mediterranean basin was flooded in a deluge around 9,000 BC which submerged a rectangular land mass he believes was Atlantis, lying about 1 mile beneath sea level between Cyprus and Syria. "We have definitely found it," said Sarmast, who led a team of explorers 50 miles off the south-east coast of Cyprus earlier this month. Deep water sonar scanning had indicated man-made structures on a submerged hill, including a 3-kilometer-long wall, a walled hill summit and deep trenches, he said. But further explorations were needed, he added. "We cannot yet provide tangible proof in the form of bricks and mortar as the artifacts are still buried under several meters of sediment, but the circumstantial and other evidence is irrefutable," he claimed. Now I'm no marine archaeologist...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Another Example Of Bipartisan Cluelessness

Last week, Brent Scowcroft demonstrated that Democrats don't hold a monopoly on cluelessness. That same day, another Bush 41 advisor showed off his own cluelessness on terrorism. James Baker urged Israel to release a Palestinian who masterminded several of the attacks that murdered scores of Israeli civilians (via Power Line and LGF): uring an interview with host Larry King on CNN last night, James. A Baker, the former U.S. secretary of state, who currently serves as the Bush administration's special envoy on Iraqi debt, called on the Israeli government to release Marwan Barghouti, the jailed Palestinian leader who is serving five life sentences in an Israeli jail for ordering attacks against Israel. Israel has ruled out any early release for the popular Barghouti, often mentioned as a successor to Yasser Arafat, who died on Thursday. Israeli foreign minister Silvan Shalom was quoted yesterday saying that Barghouti would remain in prison...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

November 16, 2004

And The Winner For Best Switchblade Artist Is ...

The First Mate hates awards shows like the Oscars or the Emmys. She not only feels like they're self-congratulatory tripe, but that they bore her to tears. She hates the speeches most of all. Most of the time, I agree, although I watch the Oscars every year, probably due to some deep-seated masochistic impulse. Fortunately, the world of hip-hop has provided a new way of making the awards exciting -- by stabbing the losers: A fight broke out near the stage at the Vibe awards ceremony as rapper Snoop Dogg and producer Quincy Jones were preparing to honor Dr. Dre., and one person was stabbed, authorities and witnesses said. Dozens of people sitting near the stage Monday inside a hangar at the Santa Monica Municipal Airport began shoving each other as the show wound down about 7:30 p.m., a photographer who covered the event for The Associated Press said. News...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

ACLU Succeeds In Attack On Boy Scouts

The ACLU has won another victory against that oppressive paramilitary organization that threatens the liberty of every American. Branch Davidians? Al Qaeda? The Vibe Awards? No -- the Boy Scouts. The Pentagon settled a lawsuit with the ACLU by ordering its bases not to officially sponsor any Scout group as long as the organization requires a belief in God: The settlement, announced Monday, came in a 1999 lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union of Illinois, which says American military units have sponsored hundreds of Boy Scout troops. "If our Constitution's promise of religious liberty is to be a reality, the government should not be administering religious oaths or discriminating based on religious beliefs," said ACLU lawyer Adam Schwartz. The Pentagon said it has long had a rule against sponsorship of non-federal organizations and denied that the rule had been violated. But it agreed to send a message to...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Marine Shoots Wounded Iraqi, Film At 11

An NBC News embed videotaped a Marine shooting an apparently wounded Iraqi POW in a Fallujah mosque yesterday, giving American audiences a front-row seat to an apparent war crime and sending antiwar activists into paroxysms of recrimination: The U.S. military is investigating whether a Marine shot dead an unarmed, wounded insurgent during the battle for Falluja in an incident captured on videotape by a pool reporter. The man was shot in the head at close range Saturday by a Marine who found him among a group of wounded men. The wounded men were found in a mosque that Marines said had been the source of small-arms and rocket-propelled grenade fire the previous day. ... The Marines told the pool reporter that the wounded men would be left behind for others to pick up and move to the rear for treatment. But Saturday, another squad of Marines found that the mosque...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

An Unclear Picture In Pyongyang

The BBC reports this morning that pictures of North Korea's personality-cult leader seem to be disappearing from their prominent displays around Pyongyang: Some portraits of North Korean leader Kim Jong-il have reportedly been taken down in Pyongyang, news agencies quoted diplomats as saying on Tuesday. The portraits were removed from some public buildings, the diplomats said. ... An unnamed diplomat told the Russian news agency Itar-Tass that at receptions hosted by the North Korean foreign ministry, guests had recently only seen pictures of Kim Jong-il's father, Kim Il-sung, and a mark on the wall where a portrait of the North Korean leader used to hang. "Only a light rectangular spot on the yellow whitewashed wall and a nail have remained in the place where the second portrait used to be," the diplomat said. The French news agency AFP quoted a diplomat as saying that one place where pictures of Mr...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

The Honor Of Radical Islam

Islamofascist terrorists apparently butchered their second female captive, CARE worker Margaret Hassan, as Al Jazeera claims to have a videotape of her murder: Kidnapped aid worker Margaret Hassan was believed to be dead Tuesday after a video received by Al-Jazeera television showed a hooded figure shooting a blindfolded woman in the head. ... The video shows a militant firing a pistol into the head of a blindfolded woman wearing an orange jumpsuit, Al-Jazeera spokesman Jihad Ballout said. "She was presumed to be Mrs. Hassan," he told The Associated Press. The station initially said it would air parts of the video, but Ballout then said it would not. Kidnaping civilians as hostages paints a cowardly enough picture of Islamist lunatics, and carving their heads off for the camera makes them look almost infantile in their perversity. Putting a bullet into a woman's hooded head is so cowardly that it takes one's...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Matthews Meltdown Continues

Chris Matthews, speaking on Hardball last night, made the ridiculous assertion that the Islamist lunatics in Fallujah are ... well, I'll let Chris tell ya: MATTHEWS: Well, let me ask you about this. If this were the other side, and we were watching an enemy soldier, a rivalI mean, theyre not bad guys, especiallyjust people that disagree with it. Theyre in fact the insurgents fighting us in their country. I guess Matthews is singing from the Michael Moore hymnal these days, turned to page 147, "Iraqi Minutemen, We Praise Thee". As for them not being bad guys, tell that to Nicholas Berg and Margaret Hassan....

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Looks Like A Link To Me

Those who keep claiming that Saddam Hussein had no links to terrorism have yet another report from which to avert their eyes. The AP reports that Congressional investigators keep documenting more destinations for the $21 billion Saddam stole from the UN Oil-For-Food program: Saddam Hussein diverted money from the U.N. oil-for-food program to pay millions of dollars to families of Palestinian suicide bombers who carried out attacks on Israel, say congressional investigators who uncovered evidence of the money trail. The former Iraqi president tapped secret bank accounts in Jordan where he collected bribes from foreign companies and individuals doing illicit business under the humanitarian program to reward the families up to $25,000 each, investigators told The Associated Press. So Saddam stole money from the UN, most of it from the US and the West, and put a significant chunk of it into the pockets of the families that...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

November 17, 2004

Kerry Can't Stop Hoarding Money

The AP (in the Boston Herald) profiles John Kerry in today's edition in his return to the Senate after losing the presidential election two weeks ago. The story focuses on Kerry's equivocating on a possible Presidential run in 2008, but the real blockbuster isn't Kerry's unrealistic notions of a do-over but the $45 million he never spent during this last election cycle: Sen. John Kerry, who has $45 million left from his record-breaking Democratic campaign, hinted on Tuesday that he may try again for the presidency. On his first workday back in the Senate since losing his White House bid, Kerry remained far from the spotlight, granting interviews to hometown reporters and joining the depleted corps of Democrats as they elected the party's new Senate leaders. The news of the $45M nest egg surely has to dismay his supporters, especially with the less-rational of them claiming that the race was...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

PETA: A Subsidiary Of Comedy Central

PETA has launched a new campaign that threatens to reveal the organization as a union of performance artists instead of animal-rights activists. Their latest crusade is to convince the world that fish are intelligent individuals with hopes and dreams that should be spared from the dinner table: Touting tofu chowder and vegetarian sushi as alternatives, animal-rights activists have launched a novel campaign arguing that fish contrary to stereotype are intelligent, sensitive animals no more deserving of being eaten than a pet dog or cat. Called the Fish Empathy Project, the campaign reflects a strategy shift by People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals as it challenges a diet component widely viewed as nutritious and uncontroversial. "No one would ever put a hook through a dog's or cat's mouth," said Bruce Friedrich, PETA's director of vegan outreach. "Once people start to understand that fish, although they come in different...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Hillary Will Run For Re-Election Before Presidential Bid

Hillary Clinton told aides that she will run for re-election to the Senate in 2006 even if she plans a run for the Presidency in 2008, according to the New York Times: Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton has decided to run for a second term in the Senate in 2006, despite arguments by some Democrats that such a move could complicate her potential bid for the presidency in 2008, her advisers said on Tuesday. ... The disclosure of her re-election plans seemed intended to stanch what aides said was rising speculation among Democrats, particularly since Senator John Kerry's loss two weeks ago, that she might need to forgo the Senate race to focus entirely on running for the White House. "It's not an issue," said Howard Wolfson, an adviser to Mrs. Clinton. "Senator Clinton has said she is running for re-election. She is raising money and moving forward." Mandy Grunwald, her...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Iranians Have Nuke Plans, NYT Hasn't Got A Clue

A group of Iranian exiles claim that the Khan network of Pakistan has already given the Iranian mullahcracy the necessary plans for nuclear weapons as well as a small amount of weapons-grade uranium, making the Iranian claims of developing nothing other than a peaceful nuclear-energy program suspect: Iran obtained weapons-grade uranium and a design for a nuclear bomb from a Pakistani scientist who has admitted to selling nuclear secrets abroad, an exiled Iranian opposition group said on Wednesday. The group, that has given accurate information before, also said Iran is secretly enriching uranium at a military site previously unknown to the U.N., despite promising France, Britain and Germany that it would halt all such work. "(Abdul Qadeer) Khan gave Iran a quantity of HEU (highly enriched uranium) in 2001, so they already have some," Farid Soleiman, a senior spokesman for the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), told reporters....

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Powell vs Hillary: A Tactical Mistake

My friends at the New York Sun report that the Empire State GOP is pressing Colin Powell to run against Hillary Clinton for her Senate seat in 2006. Republicans like Rep. Peter King wax enthusiastic about having a high-profile candidate like General Powell to stand up to the Clinton machine, especially one who has benefitted from relatively positive press coverage during most of his career. Rep. Vito Fossella has started a "draft Powell" movement to entice the retired Secretary of State to join the fight against the odds-on favorite for the 2008 Democratic Presidential nomination. I agree that Powell makes an impressive candidate for any office, but in this case, the GOP may be walking into a trap. To paraphrase John Kerry, the 2006 Senate race is the wrong fight at the wrong time, and for the national GOP, Powell is the wrong man. In running for re-election in 2006...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Marines Find Sarin In Fallujah

Big Trunk at Power Line points readers to a slideshow on USA Today's website that reveals a disturbing find in the soon-to-be former terrorist stronghold in the Sunni Triangle. The second image presented is this: The caption on this photograph reads: "Marines discover 40 vials of suspected Sarin gas while searching a house in Fallujah, Iraq. It was secreted in a briefcase hidden in a trunk in the courtyard of the house. Two mortar tubes, three mortar rockets, compass and fire maps were also found." So here we have the WMD for which we sought, hidden in Fallujah either by foreign al-Qaeda terrorists or, more likely, remnants of the Saddam Hussein regime that knew where to get them. I'm no expert, but I think that 40 vials of this chemical could ruin the day for thousands of Iraqis, American troops, or people anywhere in the world that the terrorists could...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Democrats Tee Off On Kerry

Earlier today I wrote about the $45 million John Kerry left in his primary election fund instead of spending it on his election or other Democratic races. The AP now reports that Kerry also left an additional $15 million unspent from his federal general-election funds, and his fellow Democrats are now demanding to know why: Democratic Party leaders said Wednesday they want to know why Sen. John Kerry ended his presidential campaign with more than $15 million in the bank, money that could have helped Democratic candidates across the country. ... "Democrats are questioning why he sat on so much money that could have helped him defeat George Bush or helped down-ballot races, many of which could have gone our way with a few more million dollars," said Donna Brazile, campaign manager for Al Gore's 2000 presidential race. Brazile is a member of the 400-plus member Democratic National Committee, which...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

November 18, 2004

How Europeans Resemble Radical Muslims

Irshad Manji writes a brilliant op-ed piece in today's New York Times giving her impressions of the difference between Europe and North America in how liberal Muslims are treated. She also includes her thoughts on the role of religion in Western life, one of the best rational answers I've yet seen. Manji, who has traveled extensively between North America and Europe, and writes about the difference between the two in how they react to Muslims. For North Americans, she writes, the issues revolve around radicals who use Islam to justify terrorism. In Europe, they're much more concerned about headscarves than terrorists: To get there, allow me to observe key differences between the debate over Islam in Western Europe and North America. In Western Europe, the entry point for this debate is the hijab - the headscarf that many Muslim women wear as a signal of modesty. By contrast, the entry...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Bipartisanship On Ag Secretary?

CNN reported last night that Karl Rove has had conversations with Senator Ben Nelson (D-Nebraska) about replacing Ann Veneman as Secretary of Agriculture. Nelson, a centrist in one of the reddest states in America (Bush +33), might join Norman Mineta as the other Democrat in George Bush's second-term Cabinet: President Bush's top political adviser, Karl Rove, spoke to Nelson about the possibility in a telephone conversation last Friday, according to the two sources familiar with their conversation. Nelson has thus far declined to accept what the sources described as an offer or solicitation. Nelson told CNN he could not confirm or deny that an offer from Rove was made, adding that he is "happy" in his current job. But when pressed as to whether he would consider the job if Bush offered it, Nelson said, "Any time the president talks, you listen." Nelson will be pressured by Democrats to decline...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Banning The Bell: National Chains Disconnect From The Communities They Serve

The Boston Globe reported yesterday that the Salvation Army, the pre-eminent charity for supporting the most downtrodden among us, can no longer ring its bells or put its trademark red kettles outside Target or Best Buy stores as the national chains get positively Grinchy about their no-solicitation policies: As the Salvation Army kicks off its annual red-kettle program today, a growing number of retailers, from Best Buy to Target, are banning Salvation Army bell ringers from their doors -- to avoid having to choose between competing charities and out of concern for customers, they say. That's created a schism in the retail world, with rival chains banking on kettle-carrying volunteers to set them apart as more civic-minded. Hugh Hewitt wound up devoting almost all of his radio show last night to this topic, as listeners overwhelmingly reacted negatively to this new policy. Most of the ire was directed at Target,...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Only Prosecution Will Stop It

Ohio has discovered two verified cases of voter fraud, a husband and wife who voted by absentee ballot and then voted again at the polls, claiming their ballots had been lost. They also have identified at least 18 other possible cases of intentional double-voting. The AP reports that Buckeye State election officials have yet to decide how to handle the case: Prosecutors were trying to determine Wednesday whether charges should be filed against a couple in Madison County accused of voting twice. In addition, Summit County election workers investigated possible double votes found under 18 names. ... The couple who voted twice in Madison County cast absentee ballots in October, then voted in person on Election Day, county elections director Gloria Herrel said. The couple said election workers told them their absentee votes were lost, prosecutor Steve Pronai said. In Summit county, typically the votes were made by absentee ballot...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

More Progress In Iraq

Two breaking stories demonstrate the level of success that the combined Iraqi-American forces have achieved in their pacification mission throughout the Sunni Triangle. First, US troops in Fallujah have found the base of operations used by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi and his al-Qaeda group: U.S. troops sweeping through Fallujah on Thursday said they believe they have found the main headquarters of the insurgent group headed by Jordanian terrorist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. In video shot by an embedded CNN cameraman, soldiers walked through an imposing building with concrete columns and with a large sign in Arabic on the wall reading "Al Qaida Organization" and "There is no God but Allah and Muhammad is his messenger." Inside the building, U.S. soldiers found documents, old computers, notebooks, photographs and copies of the Quran. The terrorists apparently left so quickly that they had to leave their documentation behind, which may allow the Coalition forces many...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Guardian Insults American Soldiers

The British daily The Guardian covers the news from the liberal point of view in the grand British tradition of partisan reporting; its counterpart, the Telegraph, does the same for Conservatives. I normally enjoy reading both papers as they unapologetically highlight the news from their own honest perspectives, unlike our own newspapers that fake objectivity while slanting their product. Also, I find that the Guardian usually features better writing than many of their American cousins. One of my least favorite parts of the Guardian are their in-house editorial cartoons, drawn crudely by Steve Bell. They're mostly dull, unimaginative, knee-jerk leftist hack jobs. (In fact, editorial cartooning is the one journalistic area in which I feel Americans far excel.) Today's Bell cartoon seems especially egregious to me, as you'll see: I have no beef about the image of George Bush, although I think the hairy knuckles around the turkey's neck lacks...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Kerry To Share The Wealth

Under a great deal of pressure since the DNC discovered his hoarded campaign funds, John Kerry has agreed to give a substantial portion of it to the DNC in order to fund party-building efforts in the next two years: Under friendly fire, Sen. John Kerry likely will donate a substantial portion of his excess presidential campaign cash to help elect Democratic candidates in 2005 and 2006, advisers said Thursday. Party leaders, including some of Kerry's top campaign aides, said this week they were surprised and angry to learn that he had more than $15 million in accounts from the Democratic primaries. They demanded to know why the money wasn't spent to help Kerry defeat President Bush or to aid congressional candidates. There were no easy answers to those questions, officials close to Kerry acknowledged Thursday, but they sought to assure Democrats in a series of telephone calls that the four-term...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Osama Impotent: Central Command

The deputy commander at Central Command told a press conference today that the Pakistani Army has cut off Osama bin Laden from his organization to such an extent that bin Laden can no longer direct terror operations (via Drudge): Pakistan's military has been so effective in pressuring al-Qaida leaders hiding in the tribal region of western Pakistan that Osama bin Laden and his top deputies no longer are able to direct terrorist operations, a senior American commander said Thursday. "They are living in the remotest areas of the world without any communications other than courier with the outside world or their people and unable to orchestrate or provide command and control over a terrorist network," said Lt. Gen. Lance Smith, deputy commander of Central Command. "They are basically on the run and unable to really conduct operations except, in the very long term, provide vision and guidance as...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Only A Judge Couldn't Have Foreseen This

You can file this story under criminal stupidity -- on the part of a Twin Cities judge. The Pioneer Press reports that a convicted sex offender has molested again, this time raping his girlfriend's daughter after Judge Joseph T. Carter gave him custody despite his criminal record: Even though Justin Paul Farnsworth was a convicted sex offender, a Dakota County judge agreed to give the Hastings man primary custody of his girlfriend's daughter and the couple's two other children. The judge said it was in the "best interest" of the children. On Wednesday, Farnsworth, 31, was charged with sexually molesting the girlfriend's daughter just three weeks after gaining permanent custody of the girl, who is younger than 10. The little girl cried to neighbors about the sexual abuse and Farnsworth admitted molesting the girl for months, telling police that "whatever she said, I did," according to the criminal complaint....

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

The French Fought in Iraq . . .

. . . . . for the enemy. The BBC reports that three Frenchmen died fighting for the terrorists in Iraq. All were young men of Arab origin. (Note: This does not indicate a profile! We would never be so politically incorrect as to suggest such.) At least a dozen other Frenchmen have traveled to Iraq to join the insurgency, but this report is probably grossly underestimated. At this rate, the only Frenchmen with military experience will be those making such a mess of the Ivory Coast and those fighting for the Islamofacists. Democrats will continue to insist our efforts are not legitimate without help from that courageous nation....

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Time to Spy

According to the USA Today, CIA Director Porter Goss told the new chief of operations to be aggressive. Sounds like a cheer from my high school cheerleading days . . . Be aggressive! Be, be aggressive! But I digress. Seriously, what have our spies been doing if not spying? Well, theres been tell-all books to write and a Kerry campaign to support with dramatically-timed leaks. Theyve been much too busy to actually spy on our enemies and need a well-placed boot in the [explicative deleted]. Granted, there are many hard-working, self-sacrificing, patriotic agents out there, but the agency as a whole has been ineffective and lately, almost treasonous. A source tells the USA Today that Goss new espionage plan involves deploying undercover officers to penetrate terrorist groups and rogue states such as North Korea and Iran. The paper reports: The risky new strategy would be a sharp departure from the...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Washington Post Fires Ted Rall

In a move eerily foreshadowed by my complaint about Steve Bell and The Guardian, the Washington Post has announced that they will no longer carry Ted Rall's despicable editorial cartoons. After a career of crude scribbles conveying even cruder sentiments, Rall's cartoon depicting a developmentally disabled student taking over a classroom as an allegory for the election provided the final straw for the Post: WashingtonPost.com is no longer running the cartoons of hard-hitting liberal Ted Rall. Rall said he thinks the site dropped his work because of a Nov. 4 cartoon he did showing a drooling, mentally handicapped student taking over a classroom. "The idea was to draw an analogy to the electorate -- in essence, the idiots are now running the country," he told E&P. "That cartoon certainly drew a significant amount of negative comment from our users," said WashingtonPost.com Executive Editor Doug Feaver when contacted by E&P. But...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Strib And Minnesota Bar Try Covering For Judge Carter

Tomorrow's Star Tribune carries a defense for Judge Jospeh T. Carter, who granted permanent custody of three little girls to a known registered sex offender, one of which wasn't even related to him. As I wrote earlier and as anyone with a working cerebrum could guess, the sex offender wound up raping the unrelated young girl for months before she finally sought help from a neighbor. The Strib reports on the response from Minnesota Bar Association president David Stowman. Stowman spoke on behalf of Judge Carter, who has declined to comment on the case. Carter's decision was based on "numerous factors", according to Stowman: Farnsworth's prior sexual assault was 10 years ago, and the Dakota County Community Corrections Department has since described him as a "success story." The court-appointed evaluator conducted a custody study that recommended that Farnsworth be awarded custody of the 9-year-old girl. The girl's...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

November 19, 2004

Another Great Moment In Education (UK Edition)

When Robin Williams taught his students the principle of carpe diem in The Dead Poets Society, he did so through impassioned speeches about truth and beauty, as well as an unhealthy dose of rebellion. When an unnamed teacher at a Manchester high school tried inspiring her students to seize the day, she evoked Bruce Willis' Armageddon instead of anything inspirational, and wound up scaring the hell out of a bunch of teenagers: A schoolteacher, attempting to motivate her pupils into making the most of each day, told them a meteorite was about to smash into the Earth and that they should all return home to say goodbye to their families. ... The unnamed female teacher made the announcement to around 250 pupils at St Matthew's Roman Catholic High School during their regular morning assembly. Saying she had bad news, the teacher announced that a meteor would strike the Earth in...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Common Sense From An Uncommon Source

In a surprising development, the Illinois Supreme Court has smacked down an attempt to use the tort system to put gun manufacturers out of business. In an unanimous ruling, the seven justices told lawyers that gun manufacturers have no responsibility for the crime committed by others with their products: The Illinois Supreme Court threw out two lawsuits accusing gunmakers of knowingly letting weapons fall into the hands of gang members and other criminals, in a ruling Thursday that the manufacturers cannot legally be blamed for street violence. ... "The mere fact that defendants' conduct in their plants, offices and stores puts guns into the stream of commerce does not state a claim for public nuisance," the court said. "It is the presence and use of the guns within the city of Chicago that constitutes the alleged nuisance." The city sought $433 million, the amount it claims it paid in law...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Pakistan Bags Another One

Our Pakistani allies have racked up another high-profile al-Qaeda capture, this one wanted for the attempted assassination of Pervez Musharraf and the murder of an American diplomat's family. Osama Nazir planned and executed several bombings of Christian targets and served as an important AQ conduit: Osama Nazir, considered an important catch, was nabbed from the industrial city of Faisalabad in central Punjab province on Tuesday, a senior security official told AFP. "He is the most important Pakistani Al-Qaeda operative who was facilitating foreign Al-Qaeda operatives for attacks in Pakistan," the official, who asked not to be identified, said. "He is a prized catch and was a main link between foreign Al-Qaeda operatives and local jihadi (Islamic militant) groups." Nazir headed a group of 24 militants and masterminded the March 2002 attack on a Church in Islamabad's high security diplomatic enclave in which five people including a US diplomat's wife and...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Digital Downloads To Rescue Music Industry?

The music industry has warned that they face certain economic doom thanks to Internet piracy. Their trade organization, the RIAA, has pressed forward with an aggressive strategy of lawsuits designed to punish individuals who download music illegally as well as force CD manufacturers to include intricate and intrusive security measures. However, the Guardian reports that at least one major record company credits the Internet for reversing their steep declines: The music group EMI today said the music industry was bouncing back from the effects of internet piracy, with lawsuits against file traders having had an "educational and deterrent" effect. Although the global music industry recorded a decline of 1.3% in the first half of 2004, that figure represented a 9.6% improvement on the same period in 2003. ... EMI, the world's third largest label and home to artists including Radiohead and Norah Jones, said its digital music revenues had more...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Centrisity Promoting Benefit For Ailing Friend

Local blogger Flash from Centrisity is promoting a benefit for a friend, Ron Rice, who is struggling with esophageal cancer. The American Legion in Chanhassen will be hosting a spaghetti dinner, silent auction, and bake sale tonight from 4 - 9 pm. If you're in the area, be sure to drop by and give a hand. If you can't be there, perhaps you can reach out in other ways. Flash has the contact information you need to help....

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

The Gloves Are Off

In a welcome development, joint US-Iraqi forces have decided that mosques are no longer privileged areas after seeing so many of them used as terrorist bases in Fallujah. A Baghdad mosque used to exhort Sunnis to join the insurgency was raided earlier today and a firefight broke out: Iraqi forces, backed by U.S. soldiers, stormed one of the major Sunni Muslim mosques in Baghdad after Friday prayers, opening fire and killing at least three people, witnesses said. In the battle for control of Mosul, Iraqi forces raided several areas overnight, killing 15 insurgents, Iraqi and U.S. military officials said. ... About 40 people were arrested at the Abu Hanifa mosque in the capital's northwestern Azamiyah neighborhood, said the witnesses, who were members of the congregation. Another five people were wounded. The message should be clear to terrorists and the would-be lunatics: no hiding place is safe from the new Iraqi...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Iranians Flip-Flop On Nuclear Agreement

In a rhetorical flourish that recalls the best (or worst) of the Clinton Administration and the John Kerry campaign, Iran apparently has decided to stop their refinement of uranium into weapons precursors only after they've made enough of it to turn into weapons: Iran is preparing large amounts of uranium for enrichment, a process that can be used to make nuclear weapons, days before its promise to freeze all such activities takes effect, Western diplomats said on Friday. "The Iranians are producing UF6 (uranium hexafluoride) like hell," a diplomat on the governing board of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) told Reuters. "The machines are running." ... On Sunday, Tehran promised France, Britain and Germany it would freeze its enrichment program in a bid to ease concerns that its nuclear plans are aimed at producing atomic weapons -- a charge it denies -- and to escape a referral to the...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Judge Carter Broke Policy To Hand Child To Sex Offender

In a follow-up to yesterday's story on Judge Joseph T. Carter's decision to give permanent custody of an unrelated 9-year-old girl to a registered sex offender, the Pioneer Press reports today that Carter broke the rules by not appointing a child advocate in the process: A court-appointed evaluator who recommended earlier this year that convicted sex offender Justin Farnsworth get custody of his girlfriend's daughter said Thursday he now wishes a Dakota County judge had appointed a child advocate to speak on the child's behalf. Evaluator David Jaehne, a West St. Paul attorney, said he spoke with the girl and visited the Hastings home before recommending she permanently live with Farnsworth, 31. "I always talk to the kids. I always go to the home. I interview neighbors," Jaehne said. But Jaehne said he didn't appear in court. He filed his report to Judge Joseph T. Carter, who last month awarded...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

November 20, 2004

With Specter Humbled, 109th Senate May Be Smooth Sailing

John Tabin wrote in today's American Spectator that the groundswell of outrage surrounding Arlen Specter's comments and pending chairmanship of the Senate Judiciary Committee has had a salutary effect on the GOP. Tabin argues convincingly that the debate has caused Specter to retreat substantially on his independence of action: If Specter makes trouble for conservative nominees during the next two years, his betrayal, he must now realize, will have consequences. His fellow Senators were nearly willing to throw away precedents to deny him his chairmanship because of conservative mistrust of the kind of things Specter might do as Judiciary Chairman; Specter would be a fool to give them an immediately recent record to point to. As liberal Sam Rosenfeld wistfully put it on the American Prospect's blog earlier this week, "Arlen Specter the independent and outspoken senior senator from Pennsylvania has already lost out on the chairmanship, and at best...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

The Face Of Victory

UPI reports on the changing face of liberated Iraq by featuring sergeant in the new Iraqi Army, Ismin Norhan. The 19-year-old non-commissioned officer is trained, tough, and motivated for victory. And, by the way, she's a woman: Norhan's brown hair is pulled back into a bun and tucked under an army cap, unlike the heads of virtually every woman she checks, which are covered by long scarves. She commands at least eight privates as a sergeant. And she speaks English. "It's good for me to be here," Norhan said. "People are surprised when they see me, but I like the work." ... It's not easy to be a woman in the fledgling military corps, which is under attack by insurgents and fighting other security problems. Norhan says many people look her in the eye and say it's not suitable for a woman to work outside the house. In Iraq's traditional...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Another Kristofian Fantasy

Nicholas Kristof once again takes the germ of a good idea and twists it into senselessness. Kristof starts off his latest column by pointing out the damage that the lack of competition in House races has done to the electorate. As he notes, getting elected to the House once often means lifetime employment: The U.S. electoral system looks increasingly dysfunctional, and those of us who used to mock the old Soviet or Iraqi "elections" for lacking competition ought to be blushing. In Arkansas, 75 percent of state legislative races this year were uncontested by either the Republicans or by the Democrats. The same was true of 73 percent of the seats in Florida, 70 percent in South Carolina, 62 percent in New Mexico. And Congressional races were an embarrassment. Only seven incumbents in the House of Representatives lost their seats this month. Four of those were in Texas, where the...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Impeach Judge Carter (Updated Response)

As part of my focus on the case of Justin Farnsworth, a convicted sex offender given custody by Dakota County Judge Jospeh T. Carter of an unrelated 9-year-old girl Farnsworth raped for months, I have sent letters to my representatives at the Minnesota Legislature urging them to impeach the judge. To the honorable Senator Mike McGinn and Representative Tim Wilkin, As one of your constituents, I must express to you my profound disappointment and dismay with the performance of Judge Joseph T. Carter in Dakota County. In a decision earlier this year, Judge Carter granted custody of three little girls to Justin Paul Farnsworth, who lived with the girls' mother. At the time, both Judge Carter and the court-appointed investigator, David Jaehne, knew that Farnsworth was a registered sex offender who had raped a 13-year-old girl ten years earlier. Despite this information, Judge Carter granted custody to Farnsworth of not...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

November 21, 2004

Congress Acts To Protect Private Act Of Conscience

Congress passed its $388 billion spending authorization last night, adding in a provision that Democrats in both the House and Senate could not strip from the bill. The amendment punishes government agencies at all levels that act against doctors and insurers who refuse to provide or cover abortions: Congress made it a little easier for hospitals, insurers and others to refuse to provide or cover abortions. A provision in a $388 billion spending bill passed by the House and Senate on Saturday would block any of the measure's money from going to federal, state or local agencies that act against health care providers and insurers because they don't provide abortions, make abortion referrals or cover them. "This policy simply states that health care entities should not be forced to provide elective abortions, a practice to which a majority of health care providers object and which they will not perform as...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Ten Weeks To Victory

The Iraqi government has set January 30th as their Election Day, promising to conduct balloting in every area of the country regardless of the so-called insurgency: Iraq's Electoral Commission on Sunday set national elections for Jan. 30, and a spokesman said ballots would be cast nationwide, including in areas now wracked by violence. ... Farid Ayar, spokesman of the Independent Electoral Commission of Iraq, said areas still beset by violence including the insurgent strongholds of Fallujah and Ramadi, as well as northern Mosul will participate in the elections. "No Iraqi province will be excluded, because the law considers Iraq as one constituency, and therefore it is not legal to exclude any province," he said. The Islamofascists and the Ba'ath remnants stepped up their bloody campaign to destabilize liberated Iraq in September, also hoping to affect the election in the United States. So far their efforts have met with...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

French Troops Open Fire At Ivory Coast Demonstration

Charles at LGF points his readers to a long video (in two parts) that shows a number of people being shot at a rally in the Ivory Coast. As rallies go, this one looked rather unremarkable until the shooting starts -- and then all you see is chaos for a few minutes. After the shooting stops, you see the carnage, including several extremely graphic scenes of dead people. (I'm not kidding -- one person has his head blown completely apart in the ninth minute of the second part. Don't watch it unless you really think you can handle it.) From what I've seen thus far, it appears to show French troops shooting indiscriminately at African civilians. A number of deaths appear to have occurred at this incident, including several women. In fact, it seems like most of the dead were women, but that may have been because the cameraman focused...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Minnesota Education Dollars At Work

The Grotmonster alerts us to an essay written last Friday by a student at St. Olaf College, an hour south of the Twin Cities and about two light years from reality. In an effort to make us all question the value of a Minnesota education, English and history major Megan Sutherland informs her fellow Olafians that between Osama bin Laden and John Ashcroft, she fears the one that hasn't murdered 3,000 people: As I write this article I can only hope that John Ashcroft doesn't show up at my door. This is not to say that Osama Bin Laden is a cuddly teddy bear. Rather, I aim to point out that Bin Laden has motives for his actions. Motives which have been bypassed, simplified and just plain misconstrued by the current administration. Further, just because Bin Laden attempts to highlight his objections through violent means does not mean his underlying...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Where Have We Heard This Before?

The Ukraine has adopted American-style democracy in more ways than one. The Associated Press reports that their presidential election results have a mismatch between the vote count and the exit polling done, in part, by the US: Ukraine's prime minister was leading the nation's run-off presidential election, according to partial vote tallies released Monday, but his Western-leaning challenger held the advantage in an exit poll funded partly by the United States. ... With 69 percent of precincts counted following Sunday's election, Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych had 48.58 percent of the vote, compared with Viktor Yushchenko's 47.78 percent, the Central Election Commission said. About 2 percent voted against both candidates. But an exit poll conducted by anonymous questionnaires under a program funded by several Western governments said Yushchenko had received 54 percent of the vote compared with the Kremlin-praised Yanukovych's 43 percent. A second exit poll, however, showed Yushchenko's margin was...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

November 22, 2004

LA Times, AP Misleading On Civil-Rights Prosecutions

The headline in today's Los Angeles Times boldly proclaims that "Study Finds Enforcement of Civil Rights Laws Plummets," reporting on a new study by Syracuse University's TRAC data-collection project. Below the eye-grabbing banner, the story keeps its hyperventilating tone going, implying that the Bush Administration has abandoned civil rights: Federal enforcement of civil rights laws has dropped sharply since 1999 even though the level of complaints received by the Justice Department has remained relatively constant, according a study released Sunday. Criminal charges alleging civil rights violations were brought last year against 84 defendants, down from 159 in 1999, according to Justice Department data analyzed by the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse, or TRAC, at Syracuse University. In addition, the study found that the number of times the FBI or other federal agencies recommended prosecution in civil rights cases had fallen by more than one-third, from over 3,000 in 1999 to just...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

No Need For 28th Amendment

William Safire picks up on the Amend for Arnold enthusiasm coming from California and writes an impassioned argument for allowing foreign-born naturalized citizens to run for President. He makes the only argument that carries any water whatsoever -- that the Constitutional bar effectively creates two classes of citizens with unequal standing: Article II of the Constitution directed that in the future only "natural born" citizens would be eligible for the nation's highest office. There may have been reason for suspicion of the foreign-born as the nation was in formation, but that nativist bias has no place in a nation proud of its "golden door." When an immigrant is naturalized, his or her citizenship becomes as natural as "natural born." The oath taken and the pledge of allegiance given make the immigrant 100 percent American, with all the rights, privileges and obligations appertaining thereto. All except one - the right to...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Twisted To The End

Brazil has discovered the papers of the notorious Nazi doctor, Josef Mengele, in a Sao Paulo police station. Apparently unknown to the police for the past quarter-century, the collection of letters and diaries by the sadistic monster of Auschwitz will be displayed for public viewing at the National Police Academy in Brasilia. They reveal Menegele as a committed Nazi and an unapologetic monster whose work in exterminating Jews and conducting bizarre and horrible medical experiments captured his complete enthusiasm. Even at that, however, Mengele indulged in some measure of self-delusion: Of his own actions in "selecting" whether victims at Auschwitz were to live to work or to be experimented upon, or to be dispatched in the gas chambers, he wrote: "I gave life in Auschwitz, I did not take it." Mengele also continued to cast Jews as his personal bogeyman, even while giving them grudging respect for having survived the...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Paging Michael Moore! Mr. Moore To Moonbat Central!

Today's New York Sun reports that a significant part of the funding for the new Bill Clinton Presidential Library in Little Rock came from a source more associated with conspiracy theories about the Bush Administration: President Clinton's new $165 million library here was funded in part by gifts of $1 million or more each from the Saudi royal family and three Saudi businessmen. The governments of Dubai, Kuwait, and Qatar and the deputy prime minister of Lebanon all also appear to have donated $1 million or more for the archive and museum that opened last week. Democrats spent much of the presidential campaign this year accusing President Bush of improperly close ties to Saudi Arabia. The case was made in Michael Moore's film "Fahrenheit 9/11," in a bestselling book by Craig Unger titled "House of Bush, House of Saud," and by the Democratic presidential candidate, Senator Kerry. Why do the...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

NIMBY (Doesn't) Come Home To Roost

The New York Times editorial board takes aim at the practices of the US Census Bureau when it comes to counting prisoners. The census takers count prisoners as residents of the city/county where the prison is located rather than in their home towns and states which, according to the NYT, shortchanges the urban areas from which the criminals come: The citizens of large cities like New York, Chicago and Los Angeles have helped to pay the cost of building and maintaining state prisons, which provide much-needed jobs in many rural districts. They did not, however, count on also giving these generally underpopulated areas extra political influence as well. The nonvoting inmates - sometimes called "imported constituents'' - are often counted in rural districts where legislators vote against the interest of their home cities. Their presence in the census count of prison neighborhoods distorts population statistics and creates legislative districts that...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Context

In the disputed shooting of a wounded "insurgent" on 13 November, critics of the liberation of Fallujah accused a Marine of committing a war crime, despite the fact that terrorists have attacked Iraqi and US forces after playing dead a number of times. The Australian Broadcasting Corporation reports on another such incident today, providing even more context for the action on 13 November: The US military says Marines in Fallujah have shot and killed an insurgent who engaged them as he was faking being dead, a week after footage of a marine killing an apparently unarmed and wounded Iraqi caused a stir in the region. "Marines from the 1st Marine Division shot and killed an insurgent who while faking dead opened fire on the marines who were conducting a security and clearing patrol through the streets," a military statement said. The Geneva Convention, which antiwar activists and pundits accused the...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Faithophobia Dumbs Down Maryland Education

Fox News reports that Maryland educators have such a fear of anything religious that they have begun rewriting history to remove any references to faith in the classroom -- beginning with Thanksgiving: Young students across the state read stories about the Pilgrims (search) and Native Americans, simulate Mayflower (search) voyages, hold mock feasts and learn about the famous meal that temporarily allied two very different groups. But what teachers don't mention when they describe the feast is that the Pilgrims not only thanked the Native Americans for their peaceful three-day indulgence, but repeatedly thanked God. "We teach about Thanksgiving from a purely historical perspective, not from a religious perspective," said Charles Ridgell, St. Mary's County Public Schools curriculum and instruction director. School administrators statewide agree, saying religion never coincides with how they teach Thanksgiving to students. Every time I think I've heard the dumbest education excuse, along comes another one...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Support Our Troops

This holiday season thousands of American troops will be deployed away from their homes and loved ones. If you wish to offer support but aren't sure how to go about it, the Department of Defense has launched a new website "America Supports You." The troops welcome gifts like care packages, phone cards, and messages. Although the DoD is not allowed to endorse any particular charitable organization, the website offers links and information about such groups. Even a simple Thank you will mean a lot to our men and women overseas. Click here to send yours....

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Did Britain Stop A 9/11-Style Attack On London?

The French press service AFP and the UK service ITV report that unnamed sources in the British government claim that the UK prevented a specific Islamist plot to hijack commercial aircraft for suicide missions on London: British security services have foiled an Al-Qaeda plot to fly planes into targets in London in a September 11-style attack, Britain's independent ITV News network reported. "This is the story of what could have been a nightmare averted," said ITV's political editor Nick Robinson. "A story not of failure, but of success." "That, at least, is what I am told by a senior authoritative source who says that the security services managed to avert a plot to fly planes into Canary Wharf here, and also into Heathrow Airport," he said. AFP provides no specifics on the plot, not even if it was a recent development or something that happened a while ago. Hopefully more...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

The Last Act Of A Hero

Saturday's Seattle Times profiled the last actions of a Marine Corps sergeant that had already served with distinction, but who wound up giving his life to save his fellow Marines: Sgt. Rafael Peralta built a reputation as a man who always put his Marines' interests ahead of his own. He showed that again, when he made the ultimate sacrifice of his life Tuesday, by shielding his fellow Marines from a grenade blast. ... One of the first Marines to enter the house, Peralta was wounded in the face by rifle fire from a room near the entry door, said Lance Cpl. Adam Morrison, 20, of Tacoma, who was in the house when Peralta was first wounded. Moments later, an insurgent rolled a fragmentation grenade into the area where a wounded Peralta and the other Marines were seeking cover. As Morrison and another Marine scrambled to escape the blast, pounding against...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

November 23, 2004

Guantanamo On The Hudson?

Lawyers have descended upon New York City to file a flurry of lawsuits over the measures taken by the Big Apple to ensure security during the Republican National Convention. Both the New York Times and the AP file reports today describing the mass detention of 1800 protestors as a "Guantanamo" that amounted to cruel and unusual punishment: The federal lawsuit claims protesters and bystanders alike were rounded up in mass arrests without cause; were kept without access to their lawyers or families at an old bus depot used as a temporary detention center; and were exposed for days to cruel and inhuman conditions. The lawsuit asks for unspecified damages. "All that was missing were the orange jumpsuits," lawyer Jonathan C. Moore said. "Under the guise of terrorism and the fear of terrorism, we are all losing our rights." The Times reports an even more hysterical set of allegations: The suit,...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Earle Doth Protest Too Much

Ronnie Earle took his fight against Tom DeLay to the pages of the New York Times today, excoriating the House GOP for a rule change which would allow DeLay to keep his leadership position even if indicted by Earle on corruption charges. Earle, the district attorney for Travis County, complains that the Republicans have unfairly tarred him as a political hack and used that excuse to change the rules: The thinly veiled personal attacks on me by Mr. DeLay's supporters in this case are no different from those in the cases of any of the 15 elected officials this office has prosecuted in my 27-year tenure. Most of these officials - 12 Democrats and three Republicans - have accused me of having political motives. What else are they going to say? For most of my tenure the Democrats held the power in state government. Now Republicans do. Most crimes by...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

UN Seraglio In The Congo Getting Little Attention

Michelle Malkin points her readers this morning to a Reuters report that frankly makes Abu Ghraib look like a tea party. The UN peacekeepers in the Congo have abused and raped scores of refugees while supposedly protecting them from Islamofascist terrorists, in some cases extorting sexual favors for basic necessities: The United Nations is investigating about 150 allegations of sexual abuse by U.N. civilian staff and soldiers in the Congo, some of them recorded on videotape, a senior U.N. official said on Monday. The accusations include pedophilia, rape and prostitution, said Jane Holl Lute, an assistant secretary-general in the peacekeeping department. Lute, an American, said there was photographic and video evidence for some of the allegations and most of the charges came to light since the spring. Photographs? Videos? It sounds like Abu Ghraib, from which the media and the UN took the sick actions of a few low-ranking soldiers...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Northern Alliance Team Takes The Sprirt Of America Challenge!

The Northern Alliance is proud to sponsor a team for the Spirit of America "Friends of Iraq" Challenge. SoA provides support and provisions for our fighting men and women in Iraq who want to help rebuild the country and create the kind of friendship with freedom-loving Iraqis that can transform the region. You can donate with the Northern Alliance team at this link. We're competing with other bloggers to raise more funds than any other team, and the NARN guys have targeted Jeff Jarvis for defeat. Jeff has his big team of media stars, while the Northern Alliance has ... er ... me. And Mitch. Yeah, we're a couple of great looking guys -- okay, I'm lying, we have faces made for radio. But we do have the movie-star looks of The Elder and Saint Paul at Fraters Libertas, the financial wizardry of King Banaian at SCSU Scholars, and...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Rather Resigned

CBS has announced Dan Rather's resignation from the anchor and managing editor positions for CBS Evening News. CBS calls it "retirement," even though in the same breath they announce that Rather will continue to work for 60 Minutes as an investigative reporter: Dan Rather, embattled anchor of the "CBS Evening News," announced Tuesday that he will step down in March, on the 24th anniversary of taking over the job from Walter Cronkite. The veteran anchor has been under fire in recent months for his role in a "60 Minutes Wednesday" story that questioned President Bush's service in the National Guard, which turned out to based on allegedly forged documents. Rather, 73, said he will continue to work for CBS, as a correspondent for both editions of "60 Minutes." Two years ago, this announcement would have been a blockbuster. By this point, the reaction will mostly focus on why CBS waited...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

UN: Billing The Victims For The Investigation

Iraq has formally protested a decision by the UN to use $30 million of the money that Turtle Bay kept for administrative services to investigate the massive corruption of the Oil For Food program -- and themselves: Iraq has protested a U.N. decision to use $30 million in revenue from the U.N. oil-for-food program for Iraq to help pay for the investigation of alleged corruption in the humanitarian effort. In a letter obtained Tuesday by The Associated Press, Iraq's U.N. Ambassador Samir Sumaidiaie argued that Security Council resolutions don't support the use of oil-for-food money "for an investigation into the internal practices of the United Nations in carrying out its duties." ... Last month, Secretary-General Kofi Annan told the council that money for the probe headed by former U.S. Federal Reserve chairman Paul Volcker would come from an account earmarked to pay U.N. administrative and operational costs for the embattled...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Ukraine Convulses

The botched election in the Ukraine appears to have touched off a popular uprising, threatening the pro-Russian existing government with a pro-Western putsch. Both sides have appealed to the police and army to weigh in on their side in order to get their grip on power: Ukraine's pro-western opposition leader called last night on army and police units to join his revolution as thousands of supporters braved sub-zero temperatures and driving snow to confront riot police outside the presidential palace. In scenes reminiscent of the fall of the Iron Curtain in 1989, more than 200,000 anti-government demonstrators cheered on Viktor Yushchenko and called for his pro-Kremlin rival to accept electoral defeat. Many later broke away from the main protest in a sea of orange opposition flags to surround the presidential building in Kiev, the capital, where they were met by the police line. The demonstrators chanted "Police, join the people!"...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Irritating All The Right People

Americans left miserable by watching their Presidential candidate lose set up a website titled Sorry Everybody!, in which various pictures have been posted with apologies for George Bush's re-election. As my good friend and colleage Rocket Man notes at Power Line, SE! has to be one of the silliest excuses for Internet traffic in recent memory. Or at least it was, until someone set up Apologies Accepted, where people around the world posted pictures of themselves accepting the regrets of sore losers in the US. Rocket Man posted a picture of a young woman from Red China professing her love of Blue America, a revealing insight into the kind of people to whom these apologies appeal. (Her smirk certainly must have helped the entry get past the Chinese Internet censors.) Apologies Accepted does provide a service for Americans who want to see the quality of the opposition we face to...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

A Problematic Proposal

Korea scholar Nicholas Eberstadt has a new Weekly Standard column on the nK problem, and its a must read. He opens with the following evisceration of the current non-strategy: The current U.S. approach to the North Korea problem is demonstrably flawed; arguably, even dangerously flawed. Just what is wrong? After nearly four years in office, the curious fact remains that the Bush administration plainly lacks a strategy for dealing with the North Korean regime. Instead, it merely confronts Pyongyang with an attitude. President Bush and his inner circle regard Kim Jong Il and his system with an admixture of loathing, contempt, and distrust--as well they might. Unfortunately, a mechanism for translating that point of view into effective action was manifestly absent from the statecraft of Bush's first-term administration. Long on attitude ("axis of evil") but short on strategy, the administration on North Korea was at times akin to a rudderless...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Spirit Of America Update!

In just a few short hours since we started our challenge, we have raised over $4,000 in donations from Northern Alliance readers for the Spirit of America/Friends of Iraq Bloggers Challenge! Joining our team are a slew of blogfriends, including Bogus Gold, Pioneer Press columnist Craig Westover, Hobbs Online, Mad Anthony, Margaret and ol' what's-his-name at Our House, Peoples Republic Of Minnesota, and our mentor Hugh Hewitt. You can continue to donate at this link. So far, we're leaving Jeff Jarvis in our dust, but Jeff's a pretty sneaky competitor. I think he's waiting until we get overconfident and get arm-weary, like George Foreman at all-you-can eat night at Fuddruckers fighting Ali for the championship. Jeff's betting that his rope-a-dope will give him the title, but our readers are smarter than that! But just in case you're thinking about giving Jeff a hand, remember what I told you about...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

November 24, 2004

Someone Sounds Desperate

A new statement by the leading terrorist in Iraq, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, sounds a desperate tone as he lashes out at Muslim intelligentsia for not supporting his gang of butchers. According to the AP, Zarqawi also sounds pretty pessimistic these days: An audiotape purportedly made by Jordanian terrorist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi lashed out Wednesday at Muslim scholars for not speaking out against U.S. actions in Iraq and Afghanistan, saying they have "let us down in the darkest circumstances." ... "You have let us down in the darkest circumstances and handed us over to the enemy... You have quit supporting the mujahedeen," he said. "Hundreds of thousands of the nation's sons are being slaughtered at the hands of the infidels because of your silence." Zarqawi obviously doesn't read the New York Times or watch CBS News. If he did, he wouldn't report that Muslims have quit supporting the mujahedeen. The party...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

The Victim Party Continues Its March From Reality

The Democratic Party continues its crusade for victimhood and the further poisoning of the political environment, asking for a recount of the presidential election in Ohio while making wishy-washy allegations of fraud: The Ohio Democratic Party announced this week that it is supporting a third-party-led effort to force the battleground state to recount its presidential vote. The organization, whose decision is expected to give more legitimacy to the recount push, complained that Ohio voters faced long lines at the polls Nov. 2, that some voting machines malfunctioned and that some absentee ballots were never delivered. If that's the basis for their request, then someone needs to explain how recounting the ballots that were cast addresses any of those concerns. It's a further attempt by the Democrats to make Ohio the new Florida, giving them an extension on the martyrdom on which they've based their entire political strategy for the past...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Danforth: Why Have The UN?

America's UN ambassador John Danforth expressed his frustration and that of many in the US after watching the UN again bravely decide to dither while the Sudan burns: John C. Danforth, the United States ambassador, assailed the General Assembly on Tuesday, saying its decision to avoid voting on a resolution denouncing human rights violations in Sudan called into question the purpose of the Assembly. "One wonders about the utility of the General Assembly on days like this," he said. "One wonders if there can't be a clear and direct statement on matters of basic principle, why have this building? What is it all about?" Mr. Danforth's blunt-spoken exasperation was prompted by a ruling earlier Tuesday in the General Assembly's committee on social, humanitarian and cultural affairs to take no action on a measure citing human rights violations in Sudan, which the United States has called genocide. The purpose of the...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

On the road again

I'm heading for home after work, so no blogging tonight. We only have dial up service in our town . . . you know where you use the phone and something called a "modem." But I'll suffer through and blog this weekend for those who don't participate in the post-Thanksgiving shopping insanity!...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

From A Freeze To Just A Chilly Experience

Iran has once again thrown its recent capitulation on uranium enrichment in doubt. Now the mullahcracy insists that an exemption must be made for two dozen centrifuges so that Iran can continue its research -- the same research which caused all the concern regarding their nuclear ambitions: Iran is demanding that it be allowed to make an exception in its commitment to freeze all uranium enrichment activities so it can operate about about two dozen centrifuges, diplomats said Wednesday. The Iranians have told the International Atomic Energy Agency the U.N. nuclear watchdog that they want to operate the centrifuges "for research purposes," the diplomats told The Associated Press. They have asked the IAEA to exempt around 24 of the devices from the agency seals meant to ensure the enrichment program is completely at a standstill, one of the diplomats said. The IAEA had no immediate comment. But another...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

No Shrimp Left Behind

Congress is spending its lame-duck session trying to pass the remainder of its funding bills before heading home for the holidays. In order to spread some Christmas cheer, lawmakers have stuffed the budgetary goose with plenty of pork, including a measure that Senator John McCain dubbed the No Shrimp Left Behind Act: The spending plan awaiting President Bush's signature is packed with them, doling out $4 million for an Alabama fertilizer development center, $1 million each for a Norwegian American Foundation in Seattle and a "Wild American Shrimp Initiative," and more, much more. Despite soaring deficits, lawmakers from both parties who approved the $388 billion package last weekend set plenty of money aside for home-district projects like these, knowing they sow goodwill among special interests and voters. They also raised the ire of Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., a pork-barrel critic who took to the Senate floor to ask whether shrimp...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Israelis Get Serious About Aviation Security

The BBC reports that Israel has finalized a deal to fit its commercial aircraft with antimissile systems to defend against terrorist attack. El Al will fit the invisible-flare system initially on its high-risk flights -- but not to the US or Europe: The Flight Guard system has been developed by Israel's largest defence firm, Israel Military Industries, and Elta, a subsidiary of Israel Aircraft Industries. It is expected to be installed on six El Al jets if initial tests prove successful, and eventually on the rest of the airline's 30-strong fleet, Haaretz reported. While one supposes that terrorists would target flights to Europe and the US over those to Asia and Africa, none of the Western nations to which El Al flies will approve the new system. The US and Europe reportedly want to wait for infra-red jamming systems, rather than the invisible-flare system which Israel will purchase at a...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Ukrainian Election Results Certified; US Rejects Them

The Ukraine certified its presidential election results, naming Russia's handpicked successor to the outgoing administration the winner. Meanwhile, the US pushed its Russian relationship further by rejecting the results and calling for a review of the election: Ukraine's election commission declared the Kremlin-backed prime minister, Viktor Yanukovych, the winner of the country's bitterly disputed presidential election, sharpening a crisis sparked by the opposition candidate's allegations that the vote was fraudulent. ... Prime Minister Yanukovych got 49.61 percent of Sunday's vote, against Yushchenko's 46.61 percent, the commission said in giving its final results. Secretary of State Colin Powell announced afterwards that the United States would not accept the results of the election: Secretary of State Colin Powell said Wednesday the United States cannot accept the results of elections in Ukraine, which the opposition says was marred by fraud. Powell warned "there will be consequences" for the United States' relationship with Ukraine...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

North Korea Sending Signals That Something Big Has Changed

Two wire service reports indicate that North Korea has made major changes in its normally fanatical approach to its sovereignty and security. Reuters informs its readers that the hermit nation has suddenly developed a sense of urgency about restarting the six-nation talks that Kim Jong-Il previously joined with great reluctance: North Korea wants urgently to restart six-party talks on its nuclear programs but is still demanding of its certain conditions be met, a top U.N. official told South Korea's Yonhap news agency on Thursday. North Korea still agreed with the format of the talks, it quoted Jean Ping, president of the U.N. General Assembly, as saying. Officials told him during a visit that Pyongyang was committed to denuclearizing the Korean peninsula, it said. "North Korea not only agreed to the format of the talks but also believes that the talks should restart urgently," Ping was quoted as saying. North Korea...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

November 25, 2004

Zarqawi Lieutenant Arrested, With Chemical And Biological Weapons

Abu Saeed, identified by Iraqi and American sources as a key lieutenant to terrorist mastermind Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, was arrested earlier this week by Coalition forces in Mosul, where insurgents had recently stepped up their activity. Not only did the Coalition capture Saeed, but they also captured material he worked towards deploying -- like anthrax: A lieutenant of Iraq's most feared terrorist leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi was captured a few days ago in Mosul, and Iraqi troops searching suspected terrorist hideouts in Fallujah discovered a laboratory with manuals on manufacturing explosives and toxins including anthrax, Iraq's national security adviser said Thursday. Also, the U.S. military said it discovered the "largest weapons cache to date in the city of Fallujah." The weapons including anti-tank mines and a mobile bomb-making lab were found inside a mosque used by an insurgent leader. Troops also found documents detailing hostage interrogations, the...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Our Friends, The Yemenis

The Yemenis showed their commitment to the fight against terrorism by setting free over a hundred al-Qaeda operatives, on their promise to be good little boys and stop killing people: Yemeni authorities have released 113 militants belonging to the Al Qaeda network including at least five once accused of involvement in the deadly bombing of the USS Cole after they recanted their extremist views, security officials said Thursday. The militants once accused in the USS Cole bombing were later cleared. The 15 Yemeni militants convicted in August of involvement in the 2000 bombing, which killed 17 U.S. sailors, were not released. The 113 men were released during the past two weeks after signing pledges not to carry out terror acts or criminal activities. Wow -- they signed pledges? How tough on crime can the Yemenis get?...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

President's Thanksgiving Day Proclamation

President George Bush issued this proclamation for the holiday, titled In Focus: Thanksgiving 2004. All across America, we gather this week with the people we love to give thanks to God for the blessings in our lives. We are grateful for our freedom, grateful for our families and friends, and grateful for the many gifts of America. On Thanksgiving Day, we acknowledge that all of these things, and life itself, come from the Almighty God. Almost four centuries ago, the Pilgrims celebrated a harvest feast to thank God after suffering through a brutal winter. President George Washington proclaimed the first National Day of Thanksgiving in 1789, and President Lincoln revived the tradition during the Civil War, asking Americans to give thanks with "one heart and one voice." Since then, in times of war and in times of peace, Americans have gathered with family and friends and given thanks to God...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Being Thankful

Last year, I wrote a long blog essay about all of the reasons I'm thankful this season. Instead of writing an essay this year, I thought I'd just hit the reasons themselves ... I'm thankful that this year, as in the past few years, my son's in-laws are gracious and loving enough to invite us to their family celebration. We have been truly blessed by our daughter-in-law Missy, her parents Gene and Linda, brother Michael and sister Deanne, and all of their extended family. (Her uncle is Sean from Everything I Know Is Wrong.) They've been wonderful to our son and to us. Even though our family is all out on the west coast, we have been fortunate to become part of a second family in Minnesota. I'm also thankful for all of my family out in California -- my mom and dad are both still around and in great...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

November 26, 2004

A Tale Of Two Mercenaries, Not One

The ABC News Show 20/20 featured a story last week on campus cheaters -- those who pay others to do their work while collecting their degrees. The Scotsman highlights one of the cheaters, Wal-Mart heiress Paige Laurie, who sailed through the University of Southern California by hiring Elena Martinez to do her work: Elena Martinez, her former room-mate at the University of Southern California, claims Ms Laurie paid her $20,000 over three years to write essays and complete assignments on her behalf, freeing the tycoons daughter for celebrity engagements. "I thought about quitting a lot of times, but I didnt know how. I was dealing with someone really powerful," Ms Martinez told ABC televisions 20/20 programme. "I rarely got a bad grade, but if I did, shed say, this was horrible. She was pretty picky." ... Her alleged fraud began one night during her first term in 2000, when she...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

ACLU Objects To Passport Modernization

With so many of the 9/11 terrorists able to get through our legal immigration processes, the US government created new requirements for a modernized passport system that would resist counterfeiting and manipulation. The proposed changes include embedding a chip in the cover that can be read at immigration checkpoints and compared to the information inside the passport, allowing border security to catch anyone coming into the US with falsified papers. However, the ACLU has launched objections to the practice, claiming that the new technology will point out Americans abroad and allow others to "skim" private information from the passport: Privacy advocates say the new format - developed in response to security concerns after the Sept. 11 attacks - will be vulnerable to electronic snooping by anyone within several feet, a practice called skimming. Internal State Department documents, obtained by the American Civil Liberties Union under the Freedom of Information Act,...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Was Ransom Paid For Afghan Hostages?

Reuters reports this morning that new questions have arisen regarding the release of three hostages from the grip of Islamist kidnappers in Afghanistan. According to an unnamed Afghani government source, a ransom was paid to the terrorists in exchange for their hostages, a move that the US warned against earlier and that all other governments deny making: A government official, meanwhile, said he understood the hostages were freed on Tuesday after the payment of a ransom, but he did not know by whom it was paid or to whom. "As far as I understand money has been given," he said, speaking on condition of anonymity. The United States had warned again paying a ransom for the release of the hostages -- Annetta Flanigan of Northern Ireland, Shqipe Hebibi from Kosovo and Philippine diplomat Angelito Nayan -- saying that compromises would only provoke more kidnappings. A former British journalist now running...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Supreme Court To Weigh Marijuana, Federalism

The AP reports that the Supreme Court will hear arguments Monday of an appeal of the Ninth Circuit's ruling that federal anti-marijuana laws do not apply when marijuana is used for medicinal purposes and does not cross state lines. The case promises to shed light on the current court's support of federalism and states' rights: On Monday, the Supreme Court will hear arguments in a case that will determine whether Raich and similar patients in California and 10 other states can continue to use marijuana for medical purposes. At issue is whether states have the right to adopt laws allowing the use of drugs the federal government has banned or whether federal drug agents can arrest individuals for abiding by those medical marijuana laws. California passed the nation's first so-called medical marijuana law in 1996, allowing patients to smoke and grow marijuana with a doctor's recommendation. The Bush administration maintains...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Ukrainian Protests Escalate Into Blockade

Several reports from the Ukraine describe an escalation of the political crisis that resulted from the former Soviet republic's presidential election, with protestors now blockading government buildings and forcing the existing government to negotiate with the pro-Western challenger and former prime minister. The Guardian (UK) tells its readers that the five-day protest continues to grow in power and scope: Thousands of Ukrainian opposition supporters today blockaded government buildings in protest at the outcome of the disputed presidential elections, as European envoys arrived in the ex-Soviet republic to seek a solution to the impasse. ... Today, the protests intensified as demonstrators linked arms to prevent Mr Yanukovich and his staff from entering the cabinet building where he carries out his duties as prime minister. "The prime minister could not get into his office in the government building and so could not hold his planned meetings," a government official said. The development...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

2004 Weblog Awards Under Way

My friend and fellow convention blogger Kevin at Wizbang! has started the 2004 Weblog Awards, featuring many categories, including several new ones for this year. I've been fortunate enough to be nominated in just about every applicable category, with the possible exception of Best Essayist. If anyone wants to add more voices to the nominations already entered, feel free -- but the better use of the site would be to discover some excellent blogs that you may have missed before. Voting starts on December 1st, and if memory serves, Kevin allows one vote per day per category. It's one election where "vote early and often" isn't intended as irony. Kevin puts a lot of effort and sweat into running the site, so be sure to check it out. Thank you to everyone who nominated me for awards already -- it shows that I'm already a lucky blogger, indeed....

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Jailed Palestinian Takes A Pass

Marwan Barghouti, currently serving multiple life terms in Israel for his role in planning and execution of several civilian bombings, has withdrawn his name from consideration in the upcoming election to replace Yasser Arafat. His Fatah faction of the PLO reportedly pressured him to endorse Mahmoud Abbas instead: Jailed Palestinian leader Marwan Barghouthi has decided not to run in Palestinian presidential elections, an official said on Friday, following pressure from the ruling Fatah faction to support Mahmoud Abbas. Cabinet minister and group member Qaddoura Fares, who visited him earlier in prison, said Barghouti had called to endorse Abbas, leader of the Palestine Liberation Organization, to succeed Yasser Arafat for president in a Jan 9. ballot. "In order to maintain the unity of the movement..(Barghouti) is calling upon the sons of the movement and his supporters to support the movement's nominee Mahmoud Abbas," Qaddoura told reporters in the West Bank town...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

They'll Be Coming Around Soon Enough Now

Even the diehard Bush haters may be regaining their senses. Jonathan Chait lashes out at the Democrats rather than George Bush for not only losing this election but setting themselves up to lose the next one as well. Chait goes after the three Democrats sucking up the political oxygen thus far regarding the next election -- Howard Dean, Hillary Clinton, and John Kerry. Chait sees disaster in each and all three: This week's topic is Candidates Who Obviously Covet the 2008 Democratic Nomination and Who Must Be Stopped at All Costs From Obtaining It. ... As we speak, Deaniacs are reconstituting in their yoga studios and organic juice bars, plotting in their benevolent, cheerful but fundamentally misguided way to make Dean the leader of the Democratic Party. Why would this be such a disaster? Because, remember, the Dean campaign advanced two novel theories about national politics. The first...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Redneck Counterculture

Iowa Hawk has posted a hilarious paroday how blue state teenagers are rebelling against their parents by adopting a red state lifestyle. Here's a taste: "I'm not sure where we went wrong," says Ellen McCormack, nervously fondling the recycled paper cup holding her organic Kona soy latte. "It seems like only yesterday Rain was a carefree little boy at the Montessori school, playing non-competitive musical chairs with the other children and his care facilitators." "But now..." she pauses, staring out the window of her postmodern Palo Alto home. The words are hesitant, measured, bearing a tale of family heartbreak almost too painful for her to recount. "But now, Rain insists that I call him Bobby Ray." Even as her voice is choked with emotion, she summons an inner courage -- a mother's courage -- and leads me down the hall to "Bobby Ray's" bedroom, for a firsthand glimpse at the...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

November 27, 2004

UN Admits It Can't Protect Refugees

The United Nations issued a report yesterday that confirms its inability to protect the refugees it shelters, leading to sexual abuse, slavery, and worse, according to the AP. As many of us in the blogosphere have written, the UN lacks the political will and influence to do more than open camps willy-nilly and stand around hoping for the best: The United Nations is failing to protect millions of people displaced by conflict in Sudan's Darfur region and violence in other hotspots around the world, a U.N. report said Friday. The world body's approach to the problem of people who have fled their homes but not crossed any international borders "is still largely ad hoc and driven more by the personalities and convictions of individuals on the ground than by an institutional, systemwide agenda," the report said. Of particular concern in this report is the situation in Darfur, where government-back Arab...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Ukraine Executive Loses The Parliament

Reuters just reported that the Ukrainian parliament just issued a no-confidence vote for the Central Election Commission which declared Viktor Yanukovych the winner last week in their presidential election: Ukraine's parliament on Saturday expressed no confidence in the Central Election Commission overseeing a disputed presidential election run-off. The assembly, by a large majority, said the commission had failed to fulfil its duties under Ukraine's constitution and laws. In an emergency session, deputies cited many irregularities during the Nov. 21 ballot. The executive appears to have become almost completely politically isolated now, with its sympathetic Supreme Court ruling against it, the people in the streets blockading governmentg buildings, television stations refusing to broadcast their "lies", and now Parliament rejecting the election results. Outgoing President Kuchma and Yanukovych will be lucky to get a chance to re-run the election at this rate. They may soon regret not jumping on that offer by...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Era Of Cheap Chinese Labor Coming To A Close

The abundance of impoverished rural Chinese formed the basis of China's economic boom over the past two decades, as the Communist regime brought cheap labor in trainloads from the boondocks to the cities, paying them pittances for exportable goods. Due to the extreme poverty of their home villages and the traditional respect for authority in Chinese culture, the workers dutifully and docilely produced tremendous amounts of material for sale all over the world, especially in America. The resultant economic expansion meant greater prosperity for China and a gradual relaxation of its tightly-controlled economy into more Westernlike, capital-based economy. Now, the Washington Post reports that China may wind up a victim of its own success. The workers who once stoically endured any conditions for the hope of a reliable salary have suddenly begun conducting work stoppages and riots, turning the "worker's paradise" into a nightmare for the Communists: Heralded by an...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

The Fight Of Their Season

No, I'm not talking about the Ron Artest riot in Detroit -- I'm talking about the annual battle of Good vs Evil, the Forces of Light vs The Forces of Darkness ... the annual Notre Dame/USC football game. The Los Angeles Times reports that the Fighting Irish have had their difficulties this year, and they're looking for a little redemption: Three victories over bowl-bound teams and two wins over squads in the top 10 are normally confidence builders for most college football programs. Not at Notre Dame. The glass is either full or empty for the Irish, who consider a season that doesn't include at least seven wins and a bowl championship series game unacceptable. ... The Irish have had more ups and downs this season than Magic Mountain's newest thrill ride. They upset highly ranked Michigan and Tennessee after losing to Brigham Young in the season opener, a...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Northern Alliance Roundtable On Ukraine Crisis

We had a great first hour on the Northern Alliance Radio Network this afternoon, with King Banaian, Rocket Man, Brian Ward, Mitch Berg, and myself all discussing the Ukrainian political crisis. Thanks to Instapundit, many Internet listeners caught the last part of the hour. If you missed any or all of what we think was one of our best hours, I've posted the segments in MP3 format, which you should be able to downstream: Segment 1 Segment 2 Segment 3 Segment 4 Don't forget to check out our stream, as the show continues until 3 pm CT. It also repeats four times a day during weekdays, at 9 and 3, on this same stream....

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Bush Administration Champions Democracy Over Expediency

CQ reader Peter Ingemi points out an important perspective on the American reaction to the Ukrainian political crisis. In their election, the Kuchma government candidate, Viktor Yanukovych, actually represents the closest partner we would have in the war on terror. Yanukovych has pledged to increase troop strength in Iraq and mirrors Putin's resolve to conduct a forward strategy in the fight against Islamist terror. Viktor Yuschenko speaks of pulling Ukrainian troops from Iraq, where they comprise the sixth-largest segment of the Coalition. One would expect the Bush Administration, therefore, to have sat quietly and hoped for Yanukovych to come to power regardless of the means. That focus on expediency has been an unfortunate hallmark of American foreign policy for decades, a leftover of our Cold War-style binary approach to the world. Instead, both Colin Powell and George Bush spoke strongly about their rejection of the election's results and the need...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Fighting Irish Take On The Trojans -- Live Blog!

6:14 pm CT - I hear from my Uncle Ted and Aunt Judy, who are at the Colisseum for the Notre Dame/USC football game, which I humbly call the Annual Battle of Good Vs. Evil. On our visit to LA last month, Ted foolishly bet me a six-pack of a good regional beer on the outcome. I expect to be tasting the sweet nectar of Henry Weinhardt's Dark in the coming weeks. At any rate, they're sitting up in the nosebleed section, and they tell me that it's overcast, cold (for LA), and the field will likely be slippery. Sounds like great Notre Dame weather to me ... 7:01 - Keith Jackson, Dan Fouts, and Todd Harris will be working the game for ABC's broadcast. It's a great team for a great game ... 7:05 - You may ask why I'm allowed to be home on a Saturday night, watching...

Continue reading "Fighting Irish Take On The Trojans -- Live Blog!" »

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

November 28, 2004

FBI: Madrid, 9/11 Attacks Linked

The FBI has informed Spain that they have established direct links between the Madrid rail bombings and the 9/11 attacks that touched off the Western response to Islamofascist terror. The AP and ABC reports that the FBI has identified the al-Qaeda leader who helped plan and gave approval to both terrorist plans: The FBI has told Spanish investigators that one of three men believed to have planned the Sept. 11 attacks from Spain in the summer of 2001 also gave the order to carry out the Madrid blasts, the newspaper ABC reported. ... Investigators have long concluded that the Sept. 11 attacks were partially planned in Spain in July 2001. Hijacker Mohammed Atta, believed to have piloted one of the airliners that crashed into New York's World Trade Center, visited Spain two months before the attacks and met two men. One was Ramzi bin al-Shaibah, who is being held by...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Sistani Fights Delay In Iraqi Vote

One of the topics we left in the green room for yesterday's Northern Alliance Radio Network program was the calls for a delay in the Iraqi elections, now set for January 30. In the end, we felt that the Ukrainian political crisis was a larger and more urgent story, but the general consensus in the studio was that a postponement would be equivalent to a retreat in the face of terrorism. Apparently Ayatollah Ali Sistani agrees with us, and he has made clear that the Iraqi national elections should be held on schedule: Over the past week, a movement spearheaded by Sunni Arabs to delay the elections has gathered momentum, as they have argued that the nation remains too violent to allow safe voting. Responding to those calls, the Shiite cleric Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani has insisted on keeping the Jan. 30 date. All along, he has argued that elections...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

White House Delays Rice Confirmation Hearings

Does the White House anticipate problems with the nomination of Condoleezza Rice in the US Senate? Richard Lugar told Fox News Sunday that his offer of an early hearing in the lame-duck session was refused, postponing her confirmation debate until the new Senate session takes office in early January: At the urging of the White House, a key Senate panel will put off consideration of the nomination of Condoleezza Rice to be secretary of state, the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee said on Sunday. Sen. Richard Lugar, an Indiana Republican, said he had suggested "a very early time" for his committee to take up the nomination, which must be approved afterward by the full U.S. Senate. "The White House suggested that that would not be appropriate -- that is, in December," Lugar said on "Fox News Sunday." "So we'll not be having hearings in December. But we'll have...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Pakistan Withdraws From Wana

Pakistan has decided it has done all it can with troops in the South Waziristan area of the border regions with Afghanistan and has withdrawn its checkpoints and most of its troops: The Pakistani army announced Saturday that it would withdraw hundreds of troops from a tense tribal region near Afghanistan where Osama bin Laden and his top deputy were believed to be hiding. The withdrawals from the South Waziristan area come after several military operations by thousands of troops against bin Laden's al Qaeda organization and its supporters in recent months. Although the Pakistanis claim that no trace of Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri has been found, some still believe the terror masterminds to be hiding in that region. Pakistan, however, has alienated the local tribes during its missions to seek out and destroy al-Qaeda assets in the region, and this move looks like an attempt to mollify...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Memo To Hysterical American Leftists: This Is What Vote Fraud Looks Like

The London Telegraph reports today on the details of the fraud perpetrated by those at least supporting Viktor Yanukovych in the Ukrainian presidential elections last weekend, and possibly even sanctioned by the Kuchma government. For those Americans who think that voter fraud consists of long lines at polling precincts, this story should provide a revelation: It was 5.30pm on election day in Ukraine when the thugs in masks arrived armed with rubber truncheons. Vitaly Kizima, an election monitor at Zhovtneve in Ukraine's Sumy region, watched in horror as 30 men in tracksuits stormed into the village polling station. "They started to beat voters and election officials, trying to push through towards the ballot boxes," he told The Telegraph. "People's faces were cut from blows to the head. There was blood all over." The thugs - believed to be loyal to the pro-Russian presidential candidate Viktor Yanukovich from his stronghold, Donetsk...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Ukraine May Impose Martial Law

Ukraine's outgoing Kuchma executive may declare martial law in an attempt to end the massive rallies and protests springing from the electoral fraud of last weekend, the Ukrainian news service Ukrayinska Pravda announced: Yushchenko warns of a possible attempt to break up the rallies and declare emergency law about 20:00. Victor Yushchenko has warned that the authorities are considering declaring emergency law and moving to break up the rallies in Kiev. "Already for two days there has been talk about introducing emergency law which would allow them to break up this demonstration and raze the tent city around 20:00" - Yushchenko said at the rally in Kiev's Independence Square. According to my friend and colleague King Banaian, this may already have come to pass. He's posted links to Tulip Girl on the ground there, and Yuschenko's news service reports further that police have gathered for unknown reasons at the local...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

40 Years Later, Germans Confront Their Immigrant Problem

Forty years after opening the floodgates to Turkish immigration -- and allowing them to form their own subculture without either side working towards integration -- the murder of Theo Van Gogh has finally prompted Germany to insist on assimilation from its Muslim population, the AP reports: Fears that growing alienation between immigrants and majority Germans could lead to strife have prompted politicians including Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder to send a message to Muslims immigrants: Learn German, fit in, commit to democratic rules. In Neukoelln, where 80 percent of elementary school students are not German, some civic leaders say the debate underscores something they have said for some time: Immigrants are not going to conform to mainstream German society over time. "Pointing out the problem doesn't make you a racist," said Leopold Bongart, who has taught German language courses in Neukoelln since the 1970s. "We told ourselves that the process in many...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

UN Warned To Outlaw Terrorism Or Risk Irrelevancy

The London Telegraph reports that a blue-ribbon panel of "wise men" appointed by Kofi Annan will deliver a report on Thursday warning the United Nations to outlaw terrorism and define it as any attacks intended to target civilians: After decades of argument over whether one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter, a group of international "wise men" will this week tell the United Nations to outlaw all terror attacks on civilians or risk losing its moral authority. In a report to be unveiled on Thursday, seen in part by The Telegraph, a panel appointed to reform the UN said it must send "an unequivocal message that terrorism is never an acceptable tactic, even for the most defensible of causes". One would think that the UN would already have defined terrorism, but in fact the General Assembly has refused to pass a definition of terrorism -- out of support for...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

November 29, 2004

My Annual NCAA Playoff Plea

Chris Dufresne's column in the Los Angeles Times provides the springboard for my annual gripe regarding Division 1-A college football. The season winds up this weekend as the last of the regular season peters to an end, bringing us possibly 5 undefeated teams and yet another month of arguing who "deserves" to play for the national championship: Utah and Boise State have already clinched undefeated regular seasons. Neither has a stake in the national title race because they play in non-BCS conferences the Mountain West and Western Athletic. Meanwhile, in the so-called "power" conferences, Pittsburgh of the Big East can clinch a major bowl bid next week even if it loses to South Florida and finishes with a 7-4 record. ... Two-loss Michigan has already wrapped up a Rose Bowl bid and a two-loss team is going to win the Atlantic Coast Conference and a $16-million bowl berth. If...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Democrats Vulnerable In 2006: Washington Times

Amy Fagan analyzes the Democrats' election chances in the 2006 Senate races and comes to much the same conclusion I did a week ago -- that the worst of the Republican realignment may still be ahead of them: Democratic senators in the states that President Bush won will face a tough road to re-election in 2006, Republicans say, with their sights set most eagerly on two Democrats named Nelson -- Sens. Ben Nelson of Nebraska and Bill Nelson of Florida. ... In Nebraska, Gov. Mike Johanns, a Republican, looks like Mr. Nelson's probable challenger for 2006, and Mr. Bush is expected to campaign on his behalf. In Florida, Republicans will be gunning for Mr. Nelson and hope to recruit a big name such as term-limited Gov. Jeb Bush to challenge him. "These two definitely are going to be watching their backs," said David Mark, editor of Campaigns & Elections magazine....

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

College Diversity Programs Target The Symptom, Not The Disease

Today's Washington Post editorial decries the sudden dropoff in enrollment for African-Americans at the University of Michigan after a long legal battle upheld the college's affirmative-action programs. The Post tries to blame the publicity surrounding the lawsuit for the stark decline, but in the next breath notes that the falling enrollments belong to a national trend: Post staff writer Michael Dobbs reports that numerous other large universities are reporting declining black enrollments; these include many campuses in the University of California system, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and the private University of Pennsylvania. The University of Georgia experienced a 26 percent drop in African American freshmen this year, Ohio State University a 29 percent drop and the Urbana-Champaign campus of the University of Illinois a 32 percent drop. The Post correctly deduces the problem -- a failing public-school system -- but then continues to advocate the same...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Miami Herald Unravels Florida Paranoia

CNN reports that the Miami Herald investigated the latest "stolen election" theories regarding Florida in 2004, specifically that fraud occurred in Democratic counties that wound up going for George Bush overwhelmingly over John Kerry. The Herald's recount of ballots from these counties will disappoint the tinfoil-hat brigade on the Left that remain convinced that Kerry really won Florida: A newspaper's review of ballots cast in three north Florida counties where registered Democrats far outnumber Republicans showed just what officials reported: The counties' voters did on Election Day as they often do, voting for a Republican for president. The Miami Herald review goes against Internet-fed rumors questioning whether there was a conspiracy against Sen. John Kerry in those counties. ... Reporters for the newspaper went over more than 17,000 optical scan ballots cast in three rural counties mentioned by doubters: Suwannee, Lafayette and Union. All three are overwhelmingly Democratic in registration,...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Kuchma Wants Elections

The French news agency AFP reports that outgoing Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma has embraced the idea of re-running the last round of the elections in order to resolve the political crisis gripping Ukraine: "If we really want to preserve peace and agreement, and really want to build a legitimate democratic society that we so often talk about... then let's hold new elections," the Interfax news agency quoted Kuchma as telling reporters on Monday. If true, this represents a major victory for Viktor Yushchenko and the pro-Western opposition to Kuchma and his hand-picked successor, Viktor Yanukovych. Much depends on the conditions for a new election -- whether the discredited Central Election Commission runs it again after the disastrous results from its last outing eight days ago. More international observers will be needed, and I suspect that more Western media will attend to the election anyway. Yuschenko and his Orange Movement appear...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

O'Reilly Spins For Rather

Bill O'Reilly issues a scathing editorial on all those who dared to criticize Dan Rather over the forgeries used in the 60 Minutes story on George Bush's Air National Guard service. According to O'Reilly, Rather's torment at the hands of critics using (gasp!) the First Amendment to speak out against him shows that the American system of innocent until proven guilty has been utterly discarded. What a load of horse puckey. The ordeal of Dan Rather goes far beyond the man himself. It speaks to the presumption of guilt that now rules the day in America. Because of a ruthless and callow media, no citizen, much less one who achieves fame, is given the benefit of the doubt when it comes to allegations or personal attacks. The smearing of America is in full bloom. The presumption of innocence relates to criminal proceedings, Bill, not media criticism. Criticism doesn't equate to...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

The Man O'Reilly Should Be Honoring

Today's Chicago Sun-Times chronicles the aftermath of the election for the most notable of Kerry's Band of Brothers -- the one who openly campaigned against him. Mary Laney reports that Stephen Gardner now finds himself broke and unemployed as a result of speaking out against a man he finds "dangerous": "They said I had a political agenda. I had no and have no political agenda whatsoever. I saw John Kerry on television saying he was running for the Democratic nomination for president, and I knew I couldn't ever see him as commander in chief -- not after what I saw in Vietnam, not after the lies I heard him tell about what he says he did and what he says others did." Gardner explains he was sitting at home in Clover, S.C., when he first saw Kerry on television. It was before the primary races. For 35 years, Gardner says,...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

November 30, 2004

No, Seriously, We Had Our Fingers Crossed The Whole Time

You'll never guess what Iran did this morning: Iran reiterated Tuesday it was only prepared to freeze its uranium enrichment activities for a few months and would not, as the EU and Washington want, permanently mothball facilities which could make atomic bombs. The comments, made by Iran's chief nuclear negotiator, were a further blow to European Union efforts to persuade Tehran to scrap enrichment for good and were likely to fuel U.S. concerns that Iran secretly plans to produce nuclear weapons. Iran, which insists its nuclear program is solely for electricity generation, Monday escaped possible U.N. sanctions after agreeing to suspend all activities which could be used to make bomb-grade material. What? Iran reversed itself? Why, that's unprecedented! It hasn't happened since as far back as last week. What exactly have the EU-3 negotiators accomplished in this silly waltz with the Iranian mullahcracy? They had Iran sign off on an...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Momentum Builds For New Ukrainian Election

The major players in the Ukrainian political crisis all seem to be moving towards the same solution to defuse the massive rejection of the fraud-ridden polling last weekend. Yesterday, both current President Leonid Kuchma and his protege and nominal winner of the discredited election, Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych, agreed in principle to a new election. Today, Germany reports that Russian President Vladimir Putin agreed to "respect" a new election in Ukraine: Russian President Vladimir Putin agreed in a telephone conversation with German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder on Tuesday to respect the results of any new election in Ukraine, the German government said. The three-sentence statement from the government suggested a softening of Moscow's position and appeared to increase the likelihood of a new poll to resolve a week-old crisis triggered by the country's disputed presidential election on Nov. 21. ... "The chancellor and the Russian president were in agreement that the...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

SCOTUS Harshes California's Mellow

The Supreme Court heard arguments yesterday in reviewing the constitutionality of California's medicinal-marijuana laws, and at first blush, it looks as though the justices on all sides view the state's-rights argument with deep suspicion: The effort by advocates of the medical use of marijuana to link their cause to the Supreme Court's federalism revolution appeared headed for failure at the court on Monday. During a lively argument, the justices expressed little inclination to view drug policy as a states' rights issue by which California and other states that have adopted "compassionate use" marijuana measures could displace federal regulation of homegrown marijuana distributed to patients without charge and without crossing state lines. ... Mr. Barnett said that relatively few people would meet the medical criteria for legal marijuana use, and that any impact on the overall market for marijuana would therefore be "trivial." The administration, by contrast, has predicted that 100,000...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Third Circuit OK's Banning Of Military Recruiters From Colleges

The Third Circuit Court of Appeal issued a non-sequitur in its decision yesterday striking down the Solomon Amendment, which barred federal funds from universities and colleges that ban military recruiters from their campuses. In its decision, the court incoherently equated colleges with the Boy Scouts: A three-judge panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, in Philadelphia, found that educational institutions have a First Amendment right to keep military recruiters off their campuses to protest the Defense Department policy of excluding gays from military service. The 2-to-1 decision relied in large part on a decision in 2000 by the United States Supreme Court to allow the Boy Scouts to exclude gay scoutmasters. Just as the Scouts have a First Amendment right to bar gays, the appeals court said, law schools may prohibit groups that they consider discriminatory. The 1995 law at issue in the decision, the...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Negotiations Collapse In Kyiv

Negotiations that appeared to promise an end to the Ukrainian political crisis, or at least a means to that end, collapsed today as the opposition led by Viktor Yashchenko pulled out of the talks. Yushchenko's allies claim that the Kuchma government used the negotiations to "cheat": Ukraine's opposition on Tuesday pulled out of talks to try to end a confrontation over last week's disputed presidential election and vowed to use "people power" to secure victory. "The authorities, Kuchma and Yanukovich, used the talks to cheat," opposition leader Taras Stetskyv told thousands of supporters of losing presidential candidate Viktor Yushchenko in central Kiev. "That is why the Committee for National Salvation (opposition group) has decided to pull out of the talks. We are stopping talks with the authorities. We will talk with them only from the position of people power." The Reuters report does not make clear what Stetskyv meant by...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Campaign Finance Reform In A Nutshell (Where It Belongs)

A small case of campaign-finance comingling here in Minnesota provides an excellent object lesson as to why the McCain-Feingold reforms do nothing to eliminate checkbook politics. The Star Tribune's Dane Smith reports on a $300,000 personal contribution made by Matt Entenza, the DFL House minority leader, to a 527 that essentially laundered the money: Faulting both major political parties for an elaborate "shell game," national campaign experts say it may be difficult if not impossible to trace the path of $300,000 that DFL House Minority Leader Matt Entenza contributed to a national "527" organization, which in turn spent generously on campaigns and voter registration in Minnesota. Minnesota Republican Party officials are trying to build a case that the Entenza donation to the 21st Century Democrats was improperly reported and illegal, and that the money was spent directly on behalf of DFL House candidates in Minnesota through a 21st Century political...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Ridge Resigns From DHS

The Washington Times reports that Tom Ridge will resign as director of the Department of Homeland Security at a press conference scheduled for 2:45 ET this afternoon: Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge has informed the White House and department staff that he has resigned, U.S. officials said today. In an e-mail circulated to senior Homeland Security officials, Ridge praised the department as "an extraordinary organization that each day contributes to keeping America safe and free." He also said he was privileged to work with the department's 180,000 employees "who go to work every day dedicated to making our company better and more secure." As the Times notes, the US has not had another terrorist attack under Ridge's watch. Despite taking on such a difficult and unwieldy task, he has performed extremely well. We all owe a debt of thanks to Ridge....

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

How To Help Stephen Gardner (Update: Millenium Responds)

Many people wrote to me after the post about Stephen Gardner's financial woes about how they can assist him during this tough period. I'm sure the best solution would be a good job, but to tide him over -- especially during the holiday season -- Stephen has a PayPal account to which you can donate. Simply log into your PayPal account and send whatever you can afford to this e-mail: sgardner5@carolina.rr.com. You can also snail-mail a check to this address: P.O. Box 908; Clover, SC 29710. The Power Line guys and Tony Snow are the ones who got this information. (Hey, Trunk's getting a signed photograph -- how does he rate, anyway?) Big hat tips to them for staying on this story. I've already sent my donation; hopefully, many more will follow. UPDATE: I've corrected the e-mail address, and re-sent my donation accordingly. It's correct as shown now. UPDATE II:...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Bye, Ty: Notre Dame Fires Willingham

In a move that could hardly be called unexpected after Saturday's third consecutive beating by USC, Notre Dame fired its football coach, Ty Willingham. Willingham amassed a record of 21-15, but couldn't break .500 over the past two seasons: Coach Tyrone Willingham was fired by Notre Dame on Tuesday after three seasons in which he failed to return one of the nation's most storied football programs to prominence. Willingham went 21-15, including 6-5 this season. The Fighting Irish lost 41-10 to No. 1 Southern California on Saturday. "We simply have not made the progress on the field that we need to make," athletic director Kevin White said. "Nor have we been able to create the positive momentum necessary in our efforts to return the Notre Dame program to the elite level of the college football world." The university took action just before students planned demonstrations calling for the removal of...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

A Question Of Values

The Netherlands admitted today that Dutch doctors have carried out euthanasia without requests from the patients or their families. The hospital where these killings took place had requested that the government promulgate a "protocol" for killing newborns they judged doomed, and the admission formed part of the request: A hospital in the Netherlands - the first nation to permit euthanasia - recently proposed guidelines for mercy killings of terminally ill newborns, and then made a startling revelation: It has already begun carrying out such procedures, which include administering a lethal dose of sedatives. The announcement by the Groningen Academic Hospital came amid a growing discussion in Holland on whether to legalize euthanasia on people incapable of deciding for themselves whether they want to end their lives - a prospect viewed with horror by euthanasia opponents and as a natural evolution by advocates. Unfortunately, opponents also saw it as a natural...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

UN Proposes New Paths To Greater Irrelevancy

The UN has proposed sweeping changes to its structure and its regulations based on the long-anticipated report from Secretary General Kofi Annan's blue-ribbon team. Those changes include enlarging the Security Council and reforming the Human Rights Commission, but also requires nations to get UN approval before taking pre-emptive action to protect themselves: The United Nations on Tuesday proposed the most sweeping changes in its history, recommending the overhaul of its top decision-making group, the Security Council, and holding out the possibility that it could grant legitimacy to pre-emptive military strikes. In this case, however, "granting" legitimacy involves arrogating unto itself all authority to grant permission for action in the first place: But it acknowledged that a new problem had risen because of the nature of terrorist attacks "where the threat is not imminent but still claimed to be real: for example, the acquisition, with allegedly hostile intent, of nuclear weapons-making...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »

Kerry Flip-Flops On Concession

For those who argued that an official recount demand from the Ohio Democratic Party did not implicate John Kerry by association, the Kerry campaign removed all doubt by joining in a legal fight to require all counties in Ohio to abide by the recount demands: Sen. John F. Kerry's presidential campaign asked an Ohio judge yesterday to allow it to join a legal fight there over whether election officials in one county may sit out the state's impending recount. A pair of third-party presidential candidates, who said that reports of problems at the polls on Election Day are not being addressed, are forcing the Buckeye State to recount its entire presidential vote. But David A. Yost, a lawyer for Delaware County, just outside Columbus, won a temporary restraining order last week blocking any recount there. He told the Columbus Dispatch that a second count would be a poor use of...

« October 2004 | December 2004 »