Captain's Quarters -

In a blogpost that the Captain slapped up a few days ago --

Oh. Wait, let me introduce myself: this is Dafydd ab Hugh, guest-blogging for Captain Ed while he recuperates from winning $2.8 million in the World Series of Poker finale, playing (as is his wont for FEC reasons) under the name Tuan Le. If someone posts here under the name "Captain Ed" (including the quotation marks) in the next few weeks, it's actually the nom de plume du jour of well-known labor leader and founder of the Socialist Party of America, Eugene Debs.

I may be the most well-known blogger in the blogosphere who doesn't actually have a blog (yet; shortly). You may remember me from my high-school filmstrip series "It's All About Adhesives."

Getting back to the point at hand, in this post, Captain Ed (the original) noted that evidence is mounting that the recently elected president of Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, was in fact one of the ringleaders of the 1979 seizure of the U.S. embassy in Teheran, where embassy personnel and Marines were held captive for 444 days.

But it turns out, that's just the tip of the sandberg.

Last night (30 June 2005) on Special Report With Brit Hume, Brit's guest was Rob Sobhani, adjunct professor at Georgetown University and frequent contributor to National Review and the Wall Street Journal; Sobhani discussed several questions related to Iran, including the elfin Mr. President Ahmadinejad.

Sobhani did not personally know whether Ahmadinejad was one of the hostage takers; but he did know something about his background. After university, Ahmadinejad joined the Revolutionary Guard and was assigned to a special unit whose mission was to hunt down and assassinate Iranian dissidents and defectors. He was sent on a number of such missions.

If this has gotten any other recent airplay, I've missed it. GlobalSecurity.org has had this information up on its website for several days now:

Ahmadinejad was a senior officer in the Special Brigade of the Revolutionary Guards, stationed at Ramazan Garrison near Kermanshah in western Iran. This was the headquarters of the Revolutionary Guards’ "Extra-territorial Operations" -- mounting attacks beyond Iran’s borders. His work in the Revolutionary Guards was related to suppression of dissidents in Iran and abroad. He personally participated in covert operations around the Iraqi city of Kirkuk.

With the formation of the elite Qods (Jerusalem) Force of the IRGC, Ahmadinejad became one of its senior commanders. He directed assassinations in the Middle East and Europe, including the assassination of Iranian Kurdish leader Abdorrahman Qassemlou, who was shot dead by senior officers of the Revolutionary Guards in a Vienna flat in July 1989. Ahmadinejad was a key planner of the attack. He was reported to have been involved in planning an attempt on the life of Salman Rushdie....

Ahmadinejad, an unabashed conservative, resurrected the fervor of the 1979 Islamic Revolution during the campaign by saying Iran "did not have a revolution in order to have democracy, but to have an Islamic government." Ahmadinejad had a bloody background. He was responsible for the execution of hundreds of dissidents after the war.

[Emphasis added because my jaw is dropping]

Considering the help Ahmadinejad received from the Guardians Council in this election (vote rigging, ballot stuffing, candidate intimidation, dissident assassination), one wonders whether his job is actually to order the Iranian nuclear attacks on Israel, America, Iraq, the UK, and France (well, probably not France) that the Mullahs see getting less hazy all the time in their Magic 8-Balls.

Perhaps they worried that Rafsanjani, that unreliable fellow, might balk at obliterating half the world in the name of Allah. Considering how many heads Ahmadinejad already has hanging from his belt, he likely wouldn't hesitate any longer than it takes to say "Rumplestiltskin."

As CQ readers know, I will be leaving for Washington DC for a week-long vacation in our nation's capital. We've turned this into a family trip, with the First Mate joining me and my mother (Vayapaso) and my sister meeting us for parts of the week. None of us have been to DC before, and we're all looking forward to the trip.

My vacation started last night, as I'm taking today off to finalize some arrangements for the dogs and the house ad, of course, start packing. Vacation for a blogger doesn't mean that blogging will stop; I plan to continue posting throughout my trip, hopefully with photos of a few of the sights of DC. However, it does mean that my pace will slow down a bit. For that reason, I have invited commenter extraordinaire and long-time correspondent Dafydd ab Hugh aboard as a guest blogger. His first post, just below this one, delivers a blockbuster revelation about Iranian president-elect Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Knowing Dafydd, he will deliver many such revelations and generate plenty of controversy, and I know you'll enjoy his writing.

Much more to come later this morning. I decided to sleep in on the first day, flush with my winnings at the poker championship ... but that's another story entirely, as Dafydd will tell you.

Gallup announced yesterday that it had taken a snap poll after the speech given by George Bush on the war in Iraq from Fort Bragg. The poll showed some movement bolstering support for the war. In fact, it showed Bush picking up ten points on whether we are winning in Iraq (up to 54%), twelve points on keeping troops in Iraq until the situation improves as opposed to setting an exit date for their evacuation (now at 70%/25%), and seven points on whether Bush has a clear plan for handling the war in Iraq (up to 63%/35%).

All of these gains were made, Gallup points out, despite the fact that the speech had the lowest ratings of any prime-time presidential address in Bush's terms of office. Only 23 million people watched the speech, and Gallup notes that most of them consisted of Bush supporters. CNN also reported on the low turnout for the speech:

President Bush's latest address to the nation, urging Americans to stand firm in Iraq, drew the smallest TV audience of his tenure, Nielsen Media Research reported Wednesday.

Live coverage of Bush's half-hour speech Tuesday night from the Ft. Bragg military base in North Carolina averaged 23 million viewers combined on four major U.S. broadcast networks and three leading cable news channels, Nielsen said.

Designed largely to bolster sagging public support for the persistently bloody conflict in Iraq, the speech fell 8.6 million viewers shy of Bush's previous low as president, his August 9, 2001 address on stem cell research, which was carried on six networks.

Oddly enough, however, CNN did not report on the Gallup flash poll in its article on the speech. Neither did USA Today, which instead regurgitated the results of its previous polling while headlining its report thus -- "Speech fails to quell some viewers' unease":

LaMagna and Tomanio were among those surveyed in a USA TODAY/CNN/Gallup Poll taken Friday through Sunday. They were called again after Bush's address. In the poll, 53% said the United States made a mistake in sending troops to Iraq. That reflects significant movement since the Iraqi elections five months ago, when only 45% said it was a mistake.

The erosion of support for the president's policy was especially evident among groups Bush could once claim, according to a USA TODAY analysis of four surveys, combined to provide a larger and more reliable sample. Eight of 10 Republicans remain supportive of the war; eight of 10 Democrats already were opposed to it.

That gives the strong impression that the speech had no effect on polling, one that the Gallup poll refutes, at least in its small sample and short period for polling, both hallmarks of flash polling in general. One could argue that neither CNN nor USA Today were made aware of the Gallup poll, but that might be difficult, given Gallup's description of it in their report as a CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll:

A CNN/USA Today/Gallup instant-reaction poll shows that President Bush apparently persuaded many viewers of his speech Tuesday night to be more optimistic about the war in Iraq. Compared with their responses before the speech, people who tuned in are now more likely to say the United States is winning the Iraq war, that Bush has a clear plan for handling the war, and that the United States should keep troops in Iraq until the situation there gets better.

So why didn't either of Gallup's partners report these results?

UPDATE: CQ reader DG Bellak notes that CNN did report this, although it did not come up when I searched the CNN site. Good catch; my bad.

As Sherlock Holmes would often say, the game's afoot -- Sandra Day O'Connor has resigned from the Supreme Court:

Supreme Court Justrice Sandra Day O'Connor submitted her retirement notice to President Bush on Friday, setting the stage for a contentious battle over her replacement. ...

One of the court's two swing votes, O'Connor often sides with more conservative justices as she did in the Bush v. Gore ruling in 2000.

O'Connor's retirement puts more pressure on the Senate than a Rehnquist retirement would have done. Rehnquist has consistenly provided a conservative voice on the court, and replacing him with another conservative would probably not have concerned moderate Democrats, who want to keep their powder dry for selected battles. O'Connor, however, has voted more from the center, and replacing her with a staunch conservative might get some of those moderate Democrats to the firing lines in the political battle to come.

Many names have been bandied about over the past several weeks. I don't have a specific prediction on the nomination, but I wouldn't be surprised to see Bush nominate someone like Alberto Gonzales for a couple of reasons. First, his nomination would likely get a better reception as a replacement for O'Connor among his base than if he replaced Rehnquist. Bush has intense loyalty towards his friends and he wants to leave a legacy on SCOTUS in some form. Appointing the first Hispanic to SCOTUS has its appeal for the President with the most ethnically diverse inner circle in history.

Of course, it wouldn't surprise me if Bush nominated a staunch conservative and judicial constructionist like Michael McConnell, either. It's Bush's nature to challenge his opponents, and he isn't likely to allow the Democrats to dictate the terms of his executive appointments. This might be the opportunity he seeks to force the Democrats to extend their obstructionism to the highest levels of government, to truly smoke them out for the nation to see. If a substantial portion of the population didn't care about appellate confirmations, they certainly will take notice of a SCOTUS confirmation.

All I know is that O'Connor's resignation finally unleashes the political forces that both sides have stoked since the election. We'll see how the Senate MOU and the Gang of 14 have affected the process in short order now. Pass the popcorn, folks ... it should be a hell of a show.

The New York Times reports on the burgeoning effort by the GOP to extend its reach into a crucial Democratic demographic. Black Republicans have started to run for offices across the country, a phenomenon that threatens the last bastion of lock-step Democratic voting, and their last hope of recapturing majority status in national elections:

In Maryland, Michigan, Ohio and Pennsylvania, black Republicans - all of whom have been groomed by the national party - are expected to run for governor or the United States Senate next year. Several other up-and-coming black Republicans are expected to run for lower statewide offices in Missouri, Ohio, Texas and Vermont in 2006.

It is not clear that local Republican organizations will embrace all of those candidates, and several face primaries. But national Republican leaders have been enthusiastically showcasing those blacks' campaigns, saying that whether those candidates win or lose, the party can still gain if blacks believe that Republicans are seriously courting their votes.

"You've got a Democratic Party which I think has repeatedly demonstrated that it assumes it will win the African-American vote, but doesn't work for that vote," Ken Mehlman, chairman of the Republican National Committee, said. "It takes African-Americans for granted. And I think folks in the African-American community see that. There is a real opportunity here for the Republican Party."

Mr. Mehlman has been traveling the country raising money for black candidates, speaking at historically black colleges and promoting religion-based programs with black churches. He has created an African-American advisory panel that includes virtually all the statewide black candidates. And he recruited blacks to campaign with President Bush last year, including Mr. Swann, who was co-chairman of African-Americans for Bush National Steering Committee.

Mehlman has worked hard this year to spread the Republican agenda into areas that have traditionally been the most hostile to it. However, after decades of promises from Democrats about Great Society handouts and trillions of dollars spent on welfare, urban renewal, and quotas, the African-American community still finds itself economically and politically isolated from the American mainstream to a large extent. With the GOP holding majorities across the board after their explicit and monolithic opposition, that political isolation is as complete as it has been since the Civil Rights movement. Unfortunately, as their leaders have discovered, their bloc support for Democrats put themselves in that position.

Mehlman and the GOP could have easily discounted the African-American community as a result of their lock-step opposition, but instead opted for a long-range strategy of inclusiveness. Republicans have offered what the Democrats cannot -- real positions of power within the party, school vouchers for those trapped within the inner-city public school monopoly, and so on. A new generation of black politicians that preach self-reliance and center-right economics have suddenly arisen to counter the handout philosophy of Democrats that have trapped two generations of the poor (not just African-Americans) in the ghettoes.

Given the choice between the same tired agenda that Democrats have used on African-Americans for forty years or a new chance to rise to positions of real power on a national basis, significant numbers of the black community have opened their ears to the GOP. Until the Democrats start rethinking their entire special-interest strategy, where the needs of African-American parents in those inner cities compete against the interests of the teachers, lawyers, and labor unions that feed Democratic troughs, they risk losing their last undisputed base of electoral support.

Glenn Kessler reports on the status of Palestinian efforts to secure their territories for more far-reaching peace initiatives in today's Washington Post, and finds that the Palestinian Authority has fallen far short in even forming a unified security force under civilian control. The Palestinians still refuse to confront and disarm militants, perhaps because a majority of their official state security forces don't really exist:

Though Israel is scheduled to depart the Gaza Strip in six weeks, the badly fractured Palestinian security forces are still struggling to consolidate into a body capable of maintaining control, a top U.S. general told Congress yesterday.

Lt. Gen. William E. Ward, who four months ago was assigned to assist the Palestinians with their security services, described a difficult and at times frustrating experience of trying to reorganize a "dysfunctional" system of individual fiefdoms and an almost nonexistent chain of command. The Palestinian police also have little infrastructure or communications equipment, much of it having been destroyed by the Israelis in the past four years. ...

Ward testified that about 20,000 of the 58,000 Palestinians with security jobs show up for work. Over time, he said, the security services had turned into a "social welfare net," with payments being made to people even if they did not contribute to the day-to-day security on the streets.

Kessler doesn't ask how many of the 38,000 official security personnel avoid work due to other commitments, such as operations for Islamic Jihad, Hamas, or Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade. Somehow I doubt that all 38,000 AWOL security forces use their stipends as nothing more than a welfare check. Later in the piece, Kessler quotes General Ward as skeptical about Palestinian efforts to co-opt militant groups rather than confront and disarm them, but that large percentage of unaccountable "police" officers -- almost two-thirds -- suggests that the militants have co-opted Palestinian security, not the other way around.

Until the Palestinians get serious about putting their security forces under clear civilian control and eliminating the militias, they cannot handle the responsibilities of sovereignty and statehood. As it stands, the Palestinian territories resemble Somalia, a recognized failed state, more than they resemble even Egypt or Syria, let alone Jordan or Kuwait. The Israelis had better build a big wall to keep the chaos out when the UN forces them to transfer official sovereignty to Abbas and the gang at Ramallah.

MEMRI provides a translation of a column that ran earlier this month in the influential Saudi newspaper, Al-Jazirah. In an interesting departure from normal Arab anti-American rhetoric, the state-approved daily published this reflection on the historical benefits that the Saudi-American association has provided the oil-rich kingdom. It also argues against the pan-Arabist impulse that has destabilized the entire region of Southwest Asia:

What have the Arabs given us Saudis in comparison to what we have gained from our relations with America? I know very well that this is an extremely sensitive issue that many would hesitate to address; they are restrained by a culture of fear that prevents them from confronting controversial and sensitive issues head-on.

The late King Abdul Aziz, the founder of modern Saudi Arabia, was a resourceful and far-sighted statesman when he chose the Americans rather than the British to come and search for oil in the Kingdom. He did so despite Britain at the time being an important force in the region, with its colonies and dependencies surrounding the infant kingdom. The politics of the time plus the colonial legacies of both Britain and France made King Abdul Aziz distance himself from them and look to the New World.

Not long after the Americans and their expertise arrived, oil was gushing from beneath the desert sands and the development of the modern Saudi state began.

Muhammed al-Sheikh argues that the commercial relationships espoused by the Americans, as opposed to the colonial impulse of the British in the period prior to World War II, allowed the two countries to work as partners to develop the oil fields that created the vast wealth enjoyed by the Saudis. That argument cuts both ways, of course. That development put billions of dollars into the bloated and contradictory House of Saud, keeping a Wahhabist tyranny in place over the Arab nation most central to Arabist thought, thanks to its stewardship of Mecca and Medina. While some of the leaders of the Sauds appreciate American and Western modernity, undoubtedly others find that Western influence dangerous -- and have funded innumerable madrassas to combat it. They have generated the Islamofascist strain of Muslims that strap on bombs to kill civilians by the dozens, hundreds, and as we saw on 9/11, thousands.

American interest in stability over democracy has contributed to this result. During the Cold War, America understandably had its sights on the more dangerous enemy of the Soviet Union and its satellites. Our energy needs dictated that we not only ensured stable access to Persian Gulf oil, but in that binary world, that we kept the Soviets from establishing a hegemony in that area. We succeeded in Saudi Arabia and Iran, until 1979, but failed in Iraq, which aligned itself with the Soviets shortly after the Ba'athists took over in the 1970s.

Now we need to focus on democracy, especially in Saudi Arabia, where the radical Wahhabist autocracy and the suppression of almost all political activity has generated a clear impetus for the Islamofascists worldwide; the majority of the 9/11 attackers came from Saudi Arabia, after all. The Saudis appear to understand this. They have started municipal elections to replace royal appointments as a halting first step for reform. This passage from the al-Sheikh column signals that they recognize the destructive nature of the message they had a large part in communicating and want to combat as another step:

We must admit that our relations with America were the cornerstone for our development and progress. In return, we must ask what we have gained from our relations with the Arab world. Speaking frankly and unequivocally, all we got from them was trouble. Our brothers, as they call themselves, conspired against us, attacked us, and used all the means at their disposal to derail our plans for unity.

History has proven that Arab nationalism is a destructive ideology. We, the Saudis, must set our priorities and carefully read history to extract its lessons while at the same time endeavoring to build something new that does not take anything for granted — as has been the case in the past — but that thoroughly debates and analyzes everything. We must rely on an ideology that treats the national interests of this country as the top priority.

That statement powerfully separates the Saudis from the Islamist/Arabist impulse. It also discounts the value of building further relationships with neighboring nations that buy into that philosophy. Such a breach puts pressure on nations like Syria, which still holds out hope of Saddam's pan-Arab dream, only with Assad at its head, as a rallying point for Stalinists and Islamofascists alike. Hopefully, this column expresses the clear direction for the next generation of the House of Saud.

Reuters went out of its way to take a potshot at America today in a completely unrelated story about a 115-year-old Dutch woman and her predilection for herring:

A Dutch woman who swears by a daily helping of herring for a healthy life celebrated her 115th birthday on Wednesday as the oldest living person on record.

Hendrikje van Andel-Schipper, a former needlework teacher, was born in 1890, the year Sioux Indians were massacred by the U.S. military at the Battle of Wounded Knee.

So is Ms. Andel-Schipper a Sioux Indian? Did she marry a Sioux Indian? Is her middle name Sue? Apparently, the answer to all these questions is No. For some reason, however, Reuters chooses to use the Wounded Knee massacre as a benchmark for the life of a Dutch woman.

Was Wounded Knee the only historical event of 1890 that Reuters could discover? Given that the article mentions the German occupation during World War II and the fact that Andel-Schipper had to sell her jewelry to eat, perhaps Reuters could have mentioned that Kaiser Wilhelm fired Bismarck that year, aggregating absolute power to himself and setting the stage for two World Wars. At least that would have some tangential relationship to Andel-Schipper.

Whoever wrote this for Reuters should be fired, along with the editor who green-lighted it. (via The Corner)

(I could actually have picked all of the categories for this post, as the Supreme Court now encompasses the entirety of human endeavor.)

Over at Patterico's Pontifications, Patterico suggests, in an update to a guest post by Angry Clam that is both angry and potty-mouthed, that a good choice to replace Sandra Day O'Connor on the Supremes would be Emilio Garza. I agree; but as always, I have my idiosyncratic reasons for doing so.

UPDATE: Patterico notes in the comments here and on his own blog that he is not suggesting Judge Garza for the Supreme Court; he is predicting that Garza will get the nod. Patterico's actual fave for the seat is Judge J. Michael Luttig, who has sat on the 4th Circus for fourteen years. Apologies, Patterico!

O'Connor was the first woman appointed to the Court. She was appointed by Ronald Reagan, but she turned out not to be reliable as a "strict constructionist." In fact, she issued many rulings that conservatives and libertarian-conservatives found very troubling, including support for a virtually unfettered "right" to abortion and recent rulings -- one in the majority, the other in the minority -- to bar the display of the Ten Commandments on public property.

If you believe in limiting the ability of unelected federal judges to decide the great issues of the day; if you prefer that such issues be decided by the people themselves, either directly through referenda or indirectly via the legislatures; or if you just want to see the ultraliberals in the Senate spasm like monkeys undergoing electroshock therapy, then you will want to see the president name a strict constructionist to replace her. (See the Wikipedia for a thumbnail discussion of what the heck that means.)

But if Bush were to replace O'Connor by some conservative male, a hue and a holler would erupt from the Democrats that the O'Connor seat is supposed to be a "female" seat. Bizarre as this sounds, it would give the Democrats a ready-made excuse to filibuster -- and it would give moderate-to-liberal Republicans (Lincoln Chafee, Olympia Snowe, Susan Collins) reason to vote against him.

But, while it's true that there are only two women on the Court, it's also true that there are exactly zero Hispanics. And as cynical as it may sound, the political damage of a "female" seat shifting to a "male" seat can be ameliorated by it also being a shift of a "white" seat to a "Hispanic" seat.

In other words, if Bush were to nominate a Hispanic, even a Hispanic male, to replace O'Connor, the opposition of feminists would be met by the support of Hispanics. Many otherwise reliably liberal Democratic senators from states with large Hispanic populations (Diane Feinstein and Barbara Boxer from California, Bill Nelson from Florida, Jeff Bingaman from New Mexico, and Harry Reid from Nevada) -- and even a notoriously unreliable Republican, John McCain of Arizona -- would come under intense pressure from their constituents to support the appointment of the first Hispanic to the Supreme Court. Even many liberal senators from states with no significant Hispanic population might conclude that it was more important to break that racial barrier than to keep a somewhat conservative XX seat from going reliably XY conservative.

But which Hispanic should Bush name? The three names that come bubbling up (probably because most people, including moi, don't know more than three Hispanics who have been talked about for Court material) are Miguel Estrada, Alberto Gonzales, and Emilio Garza.

The first two bring problems: Estrada was originally nominated to the powerful D.C. Circus Court; but he was filibustered, and he eventually got fed up with the whole affair and withdrew his name. To the Democrats, renominating Estrada would be like giving them dessert after a wonderful entré: it was T-bone steak to drive him away the first time; and now that he has demonstrated spinelessness in the face of battle, it would be key lime pie to run him off a second time.

About Gonzales, there are two more substantial objections: first, he is far from being reliably strict-constructionist; in fact, many think he would be even worse than O'Connor. As some Republican senatorial staffer quipped, "Gonzales is Spanish for Souter," referring to Bush-41 appointee David Souter: thought to be conservative, Souter was nominated by GHWB to the Supreme Court after less than three months on the Circuit Court; he subsequently "grew in office" to become one of the most liberal justices in the joint.

But even worse than that, Ramesh Ponnuru pointed out in National Review Online that because Gonzales was White House Counsel for four years (arguing on behalf of President Bush) and is now Attorney General, he would have to recuse himself from half the cases that come before the Court... and especially from any case involving partial-birth aboriton, affirmative action, turning over classified documents to Congress or to news agencies, or any case involving the war on terrorism -- military tribunals, the treatment of detainees at Gitmo, the War Powers Act, and so forth, all cases where Gonzales himself argued on behalf of the Bush administration. That's pretty much every case of moment for the next several years!

So that leaves Emilio Garza: a solid strict constructionist with fourteen years on the 5th Circuit (appellate) Court and well known to the Bush family, since it was Bush-41 who appointed him to the Circus Court in 1991.

So that's my story, and I'm sticking to it: Garza for the Supremes!

First, why is this even important? Because language frames thought. I won't go as far as George Orwell in the "Newspeak" chapter of Nineteen Eighty-Four; I don't believe that absent a word for a concept, the concept itself becomes literally unthinkable. But I do believe language structures thought, changing how we think about an idea.

So creating a new word for Islamic terrorism changes how we perceive it, which affects how we fight it. This is especially true when the new word is actually a contraction of two other words, Islamic and fascism, into Islamofascism. The shortening restricts the ability to think critically about the alleged connection, short-circuiting rational thought and heading straight for the emotional centers.

Or as Orwell put it, "Comintern is a word that can be uttered almost without taking thought, whereas Communist International is a phrase over which one is obliged to linger at least momentarily."

The point here is twofold: first, somewhat trivially, the Islamists who commit acts of terror are not typically Fascists, or even lower-case-f "fascists." The Muslim Brotherhood allied with Adolf Hitler in the 1930s, but that was primarily because Hitler was such a strident Jew hater.

Most of the militant Islamist groups around today simply have no economic ideas, plans, or principles. Yet the distinguishing characteristic of fascism -- what differentiates it from garden-variety socialism, racism, and antisemitism -- is intensely economic: fascism is totalitarianism that operates through corporatism. As my pal and co-writer Brad Linaweaver explains it:

The Communists gathered up all the corporate heads and took them out to be shot; the fascists gathered up all the corporate heads and took them out to lunch -- where they were told to obey orders or be shot.

Precisely none of the Islamic countries or terrorist organizations who want to destroy us is a corporatist state; none is fascist.

The word "Islamofascist" is just an example of using Nazi or fascist as an all-purpose intensifier to mean anything bad. It cheapens the historicity of the real fascists. What's next, discussing the Communofascism of North Korea?

But the more important point is that the word "fascism" has a magical power: it overwhelms every other word you connect it to. In the real world, "Islamofascism" transsubstantiates into (islamo)-FASCISM! Kaboom!

The danger we face is Islamism and the willingness to murder hundreds of thousands in the name of jihad. What matters is the religion itself and the militancy by which it's spread -- not some putative connection to Mussolini or Hitler. To understand the jihadi, we need to confront the true source of the danger: the death cult that animates the slayer-of-thousands.

What we don't need is to hide it behind the big, black shadow of a different boogieman, and one that -- unlike Islamism -- doesn't even exist in any signficance anymore. Rather than intensifying our perception of what actually assails us, tacking that silly predicate on the end actually diminishes the intensity, fuzzing up the picture. If we lose focus and forget the real danger, as 9/11 recedes into the past, we will be tempted to just shrug it off and go back to the Clintonian "situation normal, all f---ed up" response.

And a word like Islamofascist pushes us in just that direction. In fact, it sounds exactly like something the Comintern might come up with to attack pro-democracy Moslems, like the brothers who run Iraq the Model.

The proper word that truly describes the enemy to his poisoned core is militant Islamist; and that is the word I will use.

AP reports that it has reports showing that inmates at Gitmo initiate violence against the guards at Camp X-Ray, and incidents of retaliation result in disciplinary action. Rather than the unfortunate victims of American oppression that Amnesty International has painted, the detainees actively attempt to provoke guards into confrontations, showing the dangerous nature of Gitmo's inmates:

Military authorities have previously disclosed some incidents of guard retaliation at Guantanamo Bay, which resulted in mostly minor disciplinary proceedings. What emerges from 278 pages of documents obtained by The Associated Press is the degree of defiance by the terrorism suspects at Guantanamo.

The prisoners banged on their cells to protest the heat. They doused guards with whatever liquid was handy from spit to urine. Sometimes they struck their jailers, one swinging a steel chair at a military police officer.

And the American MPs at times retaliated with force punches, pepper spray and a splash of cleaning fluid in the face, according to the newly released documents that detail military investigations and eyewitness accounts of alleged abuse.

This report confirms that abuse occurs at Gitmo, all right. It's just that the abuse comes from the Islamist terrorists detained there who have nothing much to lose from lashing out. American servicemen make good targets for these detainees, since they have to act within military regulations regardless of how their prisoners behave. For instance, this incident resulted in a non-commissioned officer losing his stripes for coming to the aid of his fellow soldiers:

Some prisoners at the U.S. base in eastern Cuba have gone on the attack, as in April 2003 when a detainee got out of his cell during a search for contraband food and knocked out a guard's tooth with a punch to the mouth and bit him before he was subdued by MPs. One soldier delivered two blows to the inmate's head with a handheld radio, the documents show.

"Several guards were trying to hold down the detainee who was putting up heavy resistance," recounted a translator who saw the incident. "The detainee was covered in blood as were some of the guards."

The soldier who struck the inmate, and was dropped in rank to private first class as a result, described it as a close call. "The detainee was fighting as if he really wanted to hurt us. ... We all saved each other's lives in my opinion," he wrote.

Of course, these servicemen know the rules that govern their actions and should be held accountable when they break the rules. If that report represents the incident fairly, however, it doesn't sound very reasonable to expect the Americans to play by the Marquess de Queensbury rules, especially when a prisoner gets loose and tries to attack others. I find it hard to blame the guard who tried to knock out a terrorist bent on biting and punching his way out of the cellblock.

More seriously, a guard threw Pine-Sol into a detainee's eyes after the Islamist threw spit at him. That certainly has no excuse, and the investigation recommended disciplinary action against him. The report does not give the final resolution of that case. In case after case, the AP found similar reaction. Whenever complaints of abuse have come to investigators, disciplinary action gets initiated when those allegations are found credible, such as the Pine-Sol incident that another MP reported to authorities.

Once again, while we see that American soldiers are indeed human and occasionally allow circumstances to get the best of them, Gitmo has maintained a remarkable sense of discipline and professionalism. When violations occur, the camp's leadership takes action to punish those who commit them and keep others from repeating them. It sounds as if Camp X-Ray has a remarkable record in detention, one that many state and federal civil detention institutions in the US might envy. It completely belies the notion of Gitmo as an "American gulag," and exposes those who make those allegations as ill-informed tools of Islamist propaganda.

The Democrats wasted no time coming out on the offensive against George Bush and the upcoming Supreme Court nomination. Senators from the minority caucus isseud warnings yesterday that they fully intend to continue their obstructionist tactics unless Bush meets with them in person to get their prior approval on any candidate:

Capitol Hill braced yesterday for the first Supreme Court confirmation fight in nearly 11 years, and Democrats warned President Bush to consult them "face-to-face" before offering a replacement for Justice Sandra Day O'Connor. ...

Sen. Charles E. Schumer, New York Democrat and a member of the committee, told reporters it would be "a shame" if Mr. Bush makes his nomination "without real face-to-face, back-and-forth consultation." Democrats argue that this is the correct meaning of the Senate's constitutional "advice and consent" role.

No it isn't, and no Senate has ever demanded such a process from a President in American history. The Democrats have continued twisting the words of the Constitution and the precedent of over 200 years in an effort to simulate power that the electorate has denied them. In our history, advice and consent came out of the confirmation process within the Senate, not from some pre-approval standard that Schumer and the rest of the Democratic caucus now demands. These demands just provide the latest excuse that the Democrats will offer to claim any nominee as an "extraordinary circumstance" and attempt a filibuster.

In order to be successful in that endeavor, the Democrats have to properly set the stage. Yesterday, they launched their masters of hyperbole to do just that. Ted Kennedy and the abortion-rights lobby didn't even wait for the ink to dry on Justice O'Connor's resignation:

"If the president abuses his power and nominates someone who threatens to roll back the rights and freedoms of the American people, then the American people will insist that we oppose that nominee -- and we intend to do so," Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, Massachusetts Democrat and member of the Judiciary Committee, said.

Excuse me, but how does nominating a justice equal an "abuse of power"? While the Constitution explicitly gives restrictions on those who seek elective office -- mostly age restrictions -- it gives no such prerequisites for a Supreme Court justice. In fact, one does not even have to be a lawyer to be nominated and confirmed to SCOTUS, although no one in this age would dream of trying to nominate a layman. (Captain Ed for SCOTUS!) Kennedy uses the phrase "abuse of power" to deliberately make it sound as if Bush will try something illegal in nominating someone to fill the opening.

However, if Kennedy gets hyperbolic, then the abortion-rights groups sound positively insane:

A group of liberal activists reserved a room across the hall from the Senate chamber yesterday to add their warnings, calling the abortion rights as upheld by Justice O'Connor the most fundamental American freedom.

"On Independence Day weekend -- as we all celebrate the freedoms that make America so special -- there is no freedom more fundamental to our rights than the ability for women to decide whether and when to parent," said Karen Pearl, interim president of Planned Parenthood Federation of America.

So that's why our Founding Fathers created the first representative, democratic republic -- so that women could get abortions! Now I recall that every Fourth of July, we set off those fireworks and gave thanks that we escaped the evil tyranny of England, who had outlawed Planned Parenthood. Meanwhile, the FEC restricts political speech and New London confiscates private property to give it away to rich developers, but thank God some generic Higher Power that we can celebrate our most fundamental freedom, one that is so fundamental that one cannot even find a mention of it in our Constitution.

Why would George Bush take advice from this gang of idiots? In fact, why does anyone?

The grassroots effort to convince the G-8 nations to rescue Africa got off to a shaky start this morning in Tokyo, the launching pad for the concert series designed to produce political pressure on the richest nations act now. Only 10,000 showed up for the debut concert in Tokyo:

he Live 8 global music marathon to raise awareness of African poverty began in Japan on Saturday, as Bjork and Good Charlotte joined local bands in a concert that failed to generate much interest in Asia's only G-8 nation.

Added to the Live 8 list at the last minute, the concert in Japan drew only about 10,000 people, all of whom were selected in a lottery. The venue in this Tokyo suburb normally holds about 20,000.

Even so, organizers said that considering they had less than a month to prepare, it was a good showing.

The Tokyo venue came as a surprise; last night, I and several other bloggers participated in a conference call with Live 8 organizers that featured Dr. Benjamin Chavis, who now heads up the Hip-Hop Summit Action Network and represents the genre in Live 8 leadership. Tokyo, as far as I can recall, did not receive any mention. London was mentioned several times as the kickoff for the tour.

As impressed as I was by Bob Geldof, and there is no doubting that he and Bono make impressive cases for Live 8, yesterday's call left me with some doubts as to the depth of the team at the second level. Dr. Chavis makes a good spokesmen for the effort, but he doesn't have the grasp of detail and of the politics involved in creating the across-the-board support required to get African aid levels to where they want. Omitting Tokyo is only one of the details we didn't hear. When Geldof spoke to bloggers, he presented Live 8 in very practical terms, both politically and economically. Dr. Chavis' talk sounded much more facile, more slogans and gimmicks than red meat.

Still, I believe that we need to find a way to stabilize the African continent, if for no other reason than to eliminate the influence that Islamists have exercised through gang warfare in places like Somalia. That requires political reform on Africa's part, because no one, including me, wants to see another $400 billion sinkhole for Western aid like Nigeria again. In the end, if we want to see a self-sufficient and democratic Africa, which is in everyone's best interest, we need to find an effective manner to assist them to get there. Sir Bob Geldof, I think, has the right concepts. But the Devil is in the details, and we're hearing less of them, not more, as we go along.

Visit the Live 8 website for more updates. If you watch the concerts live, they have an arrangement for text messages from cell phones to display over the stages at the various events. The web site will give directions on how callers can show their support, live for all to see, while the concerts go on.

The British government has started to research ways to ration energy use, not just for commercial ventures and government facilities but for each and every person in the UK. The Telegraph reports that Tony Blair's ministers have started thinking about imposing a system of "personal carbon allowances" that residents can barter or trade as they see fit, but which would restrict access to all forms of energy for consumers:

Every individual in Britain could be issued with a "personal carbon allowance" - a form of energy rationing - within a decade, under proposals being considered seriously by the Government.

Ministers say that increasingly clear evidence that climate change is happening more quickly than expected has made it necessary to "think the unthinkable". ...

Under the scheme for "domestic tradeable quotas" (DTQs), or personal carbon allowances, presented to the Treasury this week, everyone - from the Queen to the poorest people living on state benefits - would have the same annual carbon allocation.

This would be contained electronically on a "ration card", which could be the proposed ID card or a "carbon card" based on supermarket loyalty cards.

It would have to be handed over every time a form of non-renewable energy was purchased - at the filling station, or when buying tickets for a flight - for points to be deducted.

High users of energy would have to purchase points from low users, or from a central "carbon bank", if they wanted to use more energy.

Rationing has never led to efficient use of resources, and imposing such a system will lead to massive amounts of cheating, black-market trades, and a further growth in crime that can only be addressed by expansion of police powers. Rather than creating competitive pressure in the open market by subsidizing renewable energy resources -- an approach which has its own problems -- Britain wants to choose an even dumber approach to solve a problem that hasn't yet been proven to exist.

This is yet another example of the kinds of solutions developed when nanny-staters get put in charge. Imposing top-down rationing requires the abrogation of free-market principles, chiefly the suddenly-endangered notion of private property. High energy users already pay more for their energy, because they have to buy more of it from the private producers who sell it. This new system will create a high-level tax that will only put more of a drag on the British economy. That also will contribute to higher unemployment, which means more crime, more police needed, and so on.

Don't be surprised when someone proposes a similar system for the Unites States. Let's hope that American lawmakers have better sense than some of their British counterparts.

MS-NBC analyst Lawrence O'Donnell announced on last night's McLaughlin Group that the person who outed Valerie Plame to Robert Novak was none other than Democratic bete noir, Karl Rove:

Now that Time Inc. has turned over documents to federal court, presumably revealing who its reporter, Matt Cooper, identified as his source in the Valerie Plame/CIA case, speculation runs rampant on the name of that source, and what might happen to him or her. Tonight, on the syndicated McLaughlin Group political talk show, Lawrence O'Donnell, senior MSNBC political analyst, claimed to know that name--and it is, according to him, top White House mastermind Karl Rove.

Here is the transcript of O'Donnell's remarks:

"What we're going to go to now in the next stage, when Matt Cooper's e-mails, within Time Magazine, are handed over to the grand jury, the ultimate revelation, probably within the week of who his source is.

"And I know I'm going to get pulled into the grand jury for saying this but the source of...for Matt Cooper was Karl Rove, and that will be revealed in this document dump that Time magazine's going to do with the grand jury."

Lawrence O'Donnell hardly qualifies as the most stable or reliable source for this kind of information. CQ readers will recall O'Donnell's meltdown on the Joe Scarborough show during the final lap of the election. Paired up with John O'Neill of the Swiftvets, he couldn't even allow O'Neill to talk, calling him names like "creepy liar" every time O'Neill tried to respond. (You can listen to it here.)

O'Donnell later explained that his close personal friendship with John Kerry wouldn't allow him to extend any courtesy to O'Neill. I'd say that bias makes him a lousy source for this revelation as well, considering the animosity that Rove generated among Kerry's inner circle during the last election. If it turns out to be Rove, we'll know soon enough when Time makes the documents public. However, I doubt that O'Donnell has a clue as to what those documents really say and what they can prove.

Basically, when Lawrence O'Donnell says Good morning, I'd still check the windows for the current weather.

...Then he's off the hook legally.

Again, a caution: I'm neither a lawyer, nor a law-school grad, nor a law-school admittee, nor even a wanna-be lawyer. (I was in the Navy once, so you can call me a sea lawyer.) I am, however, reasonably literate; so I will presume to give legal advice, secure in the knowledge that I have, in fact, nothing to lose!

As Himself noted in Creepy Liar Strikes Again, Lawrence "Creepy Liar" O'Donnell now implies (without much credibility, and without explicitly making the claim) that the original leaker of Valerie Plame's name to Robert Novak was Karl Rove. O'Donnell says that e-mails from Time, Inc. between reporter Matthew Cooper and his editors at Time Magazine will prove this, though he does not claim to have actually seen the e-mail himself.

So far as I can tell, O'Donnell, who is a producer of the NBC series the West Wing and also MSNBC's "senior political analyst" -- though I'm not sure why, as his political credentials are rather scant -- has never had any association with Time Magazine, nor does it appear that he is on the e-mail list now. So I can only assume he got his information from the Newsweek article "the Rove Factor?" by Michael Isikoff.

Isikoff claims that two attorneys "who asked not to be identified because they are representing witnesses sympathetic to the White House" claim that Karl Rove is "one of Cooper's sources." What this means isn't clear: if Cooper called Rove to ask him whether Bush wants to find out who leaked the name, and if Rove said yes, then Rove would be one of his sources.

In fact, even Isikoff himself admits he has no idea what Rove did or did not say to Matthew Cooper:

Cooper and a Time spokeswoman declined to comment. But in an interview with NEWSWEEK, Rove's lawyer, Robert Luskin, confirmed that Rove had been interviewed by Cooper for the article. It is unclear, however, what passed between Cooper and Rove....

But according to Luskin, Rove's lawyer, Rove spoke to Cooper three or four days before Novak's column appeared. Luskin told NEWSWEEK that Rove "never knowingly disclosed classified information" and that "he did not tell any reporter that Valerie Plame worked for the CIA." Luskin declined, however, to discuss any other details. He did say that Rove himself had testified before the grand jury "two or three times" and signed a waiver authorizing reporters to testify about their conversations with him. "He has answered every question that has been put to him about his conversations with Cooper and anybody else," Luskin said.

So it certainly is by no means clear that Rove was actually the leaker who told Novak (or Cooper) that Plame was the CIA agent who sent her hubby on the little trip to Niger. If he were, then Cooper would have been free (due to the waiver) to tell the world.

It is noteworthy that not even Lawrence O'Donnell claims that Rove was the one who outed Plame: even he says only that "Karl Rove was Matt Cooper's source" but doesn't elaborate -- source for what? We already knew Rove spoke to Cooper, which means we already knew he was one of Cooper's sources.

But let's play a little thoughtgame: suppose it turned out that Karl Rove was actually the person who outed Ms. Plame. Would Rove be "prosecuted," as a couple of people on the right and a few million people on the left insist? Well... not likely. The reason is the way the law itself is written.

The applicable section of the U.S. Code is "Section 421. Protection of identities of certain United States undercover intelligence officers, agents, informants, and sources." There are three classes of leaker covered by this law.

Section (c) refers to persons engaged in "a pattern of activities intended to identify and expose covert agents." Consider this the "Philip Agee" subsection, and it clearly does not apply to Rove.

Sections (a) and (b) differ slightly. The first applies to "whoever, having or having had authorized access to classified information that identifies a covert agent," while the second applies to "whoever, as a result of having authorized access to classified information, learns the identify of a covert agent."

Note that bit about having "authorized access to classified information" that discloses the name of a covert agent. Here is the rub: the disclosure occurred in or before July 2003... and at that time, Karl Rove was the Special Advisor to the President. This was a political position; he was Bush's chief political advisor. But in this position, it is extremely unlikely that Rove had any authorized access to CIA personnel files whatsoever, since those are extremely highly restricted (for reasons that should be obvious), and Rove did not have any kind of a national-security or defense position.

Which means that even if it were to eventuate that Rove was the guy who leaked the Plame name, he would almost certainly not be a "covered person" as far as Section 421 is concerned: however he might have found out about her CIA employment, it would have to have been by means other than "authorized access to classified information that identifies a covert agent."

This would not stop Bush from firing Rove, if he so chose; but it would stop any sort of prosecution -- whether the leaker was Rove or someone else who likewise had no authorized access. Which is probably why nobody has been indicted: likely, the leaker, whoever he was, learned about Plame on the D.C. cocktail circuit, where evidently it was common knowledge.

So however desperately much the Left wants to see Rove "frog-marched out of the White House in handcuffs," as Joseph Wilson, ambassador and yet another creepy liar, put it, it simply is not going to happen.

So this is what the Center of Democracy looks like!

The First Mate and I landed in DC this afternoon, arriving at Ronald Reagan Airport around 4:30 pm. After the normal confusion of deplaning, we quickly collected our luggage and got our rental car, a Mazda compact that surprisingly handled all of our baggage. Due to a fundamental misjudgment of local geography, I booked our room in Gaithersburg, about 40 minutes outside of the sites we want to see, but the hotel is comfortable and affordable. The drive took so long that I had almost convinced myself that I had gotten lost, but the correct off-ramp appeared and we found ourselves checked in, exhausted.

We ate at a lovely steak place called Sir Walter Raleigh's in Gaithersburg. It featured a generous salad bar and a casual atmosphere, and the 12-ounce sirloin I ordered came cooked to perfection. The only flaw in the entire dinner was when we found out that this establishment will close down at the end of the month. I didn't ask why, but it can't be the food or the service. In fact, due to their impending shutdown, the waiter gave us a 25% discount on the meal -- fortunately after I collected cash from my mother and my sister to put the entire meal on my credit card. (Trust me, they'll get it back this week.)

I see that Dafydd has already written a few excellent posts, and I know you will see even more from him this week. I will also post updates on my travels here in DC as well as keep up with the breaking news, mostly in the early mornings and later evenings. Tuesday will bring a special book review and an interview with the author, so keep an eye out that morning for what I think will be a fascinating series of posts.

Keep checking in for more updates!

After generating months of controversy from his remarks about 9/11 victims being "little Eichmanns" to disputes over his alleged Native American heritage and claims that he falsified key parts of his curriculum vitae, Ward Churchill has embarrassed University of Colorado innumerable times. However, it hasn't kept CU from giving Churchill a merit increase for his performance (via LGF):

University of Colorado professor Ward Churchill was awarded a 2.28 percent merit pay increase this week for work performed in 2004, a little less than his department's average recommended salary increase for professors.

A statement released by CU said pay increases for Boulder campus faculty are approved by interim Chancellor Phil DiStefano and based on reviews and recommendations by committees at the department, school or college, and administrative levels.

Churchill's increase was finalized Thursday. The average recommended increase for ethnic studies department faculty was 3.21 percent, according to the CU statement.

"In 2004, Professor Churchill taught a higher number of courses than required, received A's and A-pluses on his student evaluations, completed numerous publications and served as administrative chair of the department," the statement said.

Let me get this straight. An employee of CU currently under investigation for employment fraud, plagiarism, and fabrication still remains eligible for annual merit increases? In the private sector, one would have to wait for the end of the investigation before anyone would dare put that request through to Human Resources. Since CU runs on state money, that means that Colorado taxpayers not only continue to fund Churchill's lunacies -- but now they have to pay more for them as well.

Obviously tenure doesn't explain the entire problem with Churchill's continued employment in academia.

UPDATE: Okay, okay, University of Colorado. I got ya, Momo.

The Minneapolis Star Tribune runs an opinion piece by Mark Fitzgerald today bemoaning the loss of confidence for the media in today's market. He notes the recent Pew polling that shows that less than half of Americans believe that the press protects American democracy. Fitzgerald also laments the case of Diana Griego Erwin, the latest example of Exempt Media columnists that simply made up sources to create stories which matched her preconceived notions of how the world should work -- in this case, dozens of times -- with all those editorial layers about which we hear endlessly allowing it to continue for years.

Fitzgerald wonders how the press can recover from these debacles to once again capture the confidence of the American public. His answer -- to bash Bush even more:

How did we in the press fall from defender of democracy to an institution the public sees as either too arrogant or too accommodating, too much a scold or too silly to be taken seriously?

Part of it is a national mood beyond the media's control. In some ways this is the nation divided Blue and Red that Fox News or Air America portray. But Americans have also taken an unexpected turn away from news of politics and terrorism in the years since 9/11 and the invasion of Iraq. In its place is an intense, almost hysterical, focus these days on celebrity -- think Brangelina or TomKat -- and even on curious non-stories like the Runaway Bride.

But the press itself bears the largest responsibility for its present low estate. With their audiences shrinking, the news media are desperately chasing after readers and viewers with the light news they think will sell -- and abdicating the central mission of a free press to hold authority accountable.

First off, you have to love this effort. It's the public's fault, because after 9/11 suddenly we all became less interested in the news. Was that your experience? Did you spend the weeks after 9/11 desperately trying to turn off Fox News, MS-NBC, and other news channels?

But more than that, Fitzgerald points to the central problem with the press, the reason why people have learned to mistrust it. The central mission of a free press isn't to "hold authority accountable" -- it's to report the truth. If the truth holds authority accountable, then so be it, but to say that the press should automatically take opposition to all authority reveals a bias and a desire for foregone conclusions, the same impulse that got the best of Erwin. Fitzgerald makes clear where that bias should lead:

"It is a newspaper's duty to print news, and raise hell," Wilburt Storey thundered when he ran the Chicago Tribune during the Civil War. A century and a half later, there's another war under another Republican administration, but there hasn't been much hell raised by the press lately -- and Americans are disturbed by it.

In the Pew survey, 40 percent of the respondents said the news media were "too critical" of America -- but 38 percent also opined that the media were "too easy" on President Bush. Americans outside the Beltway see how this White House sets a daily news agenda, and how few journalists seem to have the courage or the enterprise to defy it.

Fitzgerald leaves a bit more out of this Pew poll than he includes. The people claiming that the press is too easy on Bush are primarily Democrats -- which should come as no surprise. 47% of all respondents, though, say that press criticism of the military weakens the country's defenses, a statistic that Fitzgerald conveniently leaves out. 72% believe that the press consistently favors one political party over the other. And three-quarters of all respondents think that the press is much more concerned about pandering to its audience rather than keeping them informed.

Fitzgerald hearkens back to Watergate and My Lai in his call for greater press efforts to get the Bush administration:

For instance, this administration came to Washington determined to conduct the public's business behind closed doors with unprecedented levels of secrecy -- and it has pulled it off without much challenge from the media. It is striking how a press that so cherishes the mythology of Woodward and Bernstein uncovering the mysteries of Watergate rarely mentions that the White House 30 years later is a far more secretive place. ...

Small voices can still have an outsize impact. While big media have deployed an army of reporters and cameramen covering Iraq from the ground and from Washington, it was a journalist working alone and outside the pack, Seymour Hersh, who uncovered the abuses at Abu Ghraib military prison.

No, it was the Army that uncovered the abuses at Abu Ghraib, not Hersh. Hersh sensationalized them, but the Army had already begun its investigation long before Hersh wrote about the scandal. What Hersh did was to claim that a night shift of undisciplined idiots somehow indicted the entire American military effort, and a willing press that has decided its primary mission is to embarrass and torpedo the Bush administration followed suit.

Mostly, however, the appearance of this column in the Strib makes for amusing reading. No major daily in the US has a better track record of hysterical anti-Bush rhetoric from its editorial board than the Twin Cities' primary daily. Whether it reverses itself on issues like filibusters, or gives its blessing to Gitmo-Nazi analogies, the Strib has served at the vanguard of Bush hatred. As a result, not only have people lost confidence in the newspaper, they're cancelling it in droves. In the past month, the Strib has started to deliver papers to homes that don't subscribe in an attempt to bolster its readership numbers for advertisers. I used to see a freebie once every couple of months, usually a Sunday paper, which served as a reminder of the value of home delivery. In the last month, I have received delivery at least three times a week; last week, it was almost every day.

Do you sense desperation? I certainly do.

Fitzgerald may simply be arguing for the hair of the dog that bit the press in order to alleviate its hangover, but it's bad advice. If the media wants to win our confidence, it needs to stop advocating for its own politics and start reporting the truth. Quit using single anonymous sourcing to spread rumors and gossip, do complete research, and treat all sides fairly. That will go a long way to creating the trust that the press has abused in the 30 years since Watergate.

The New York Times takes on Africa in its op-ed pages today, offering not only a house editorial but an opposing opinion piece that dashes a bit of cold water on the Times' idealistic approach. The unsigned editorial offers praise for the work already done by the Bush administration on Africa, but insists that more money and effort needs to be forthcoming from the G-8 in order to rescue the continent:

An unusual and mutually reinforcing set of possibilities is converging around this week's summit meeting of the world's richest countries in Scotland. If Mr. Bush is truly the compassionate conservative he says he is, he will not let the moment pass with the United States continuing to contribute far less than its share to the international effort to include Africa in the prosperity of the 21st century. ...

But so far there has been a discouraging gap between Mr. Bush's generous declarations and the money Washington has actually made available to Africa. The White House has failed to push the Republican-controlled Congress to fully finance Mr. Bush's aid programs and failed to spur its own aid appointees to get the money flowing to where it is most urgently needed.

At this point, America's total worldwide spending on all forms of foreign aid still amounts to only a relatively stingy 0.16 percent of this country's gross national income, one of the lowest proportions in the developed world. Most European countries represented at this week's summit meeting are already giving substantially higher percentages of their smaller national incomes. Many have promised to double those percentages between now and 2010. Mr. Bush needs to commit Washington to a substantially faster rate of increase to make America once again a leader in global development.

The Times uses the official government aid figures without noting the substantial private contributions towards African relief raised by NGOs. Other nations tax their citizens at much higher rates and eat up the disposable income which Americans use for purposes such as private donations. That reflects the American preference for self-directed use of funds, while Europeans prefer to use government as the conduit.

As Larry Elder demomstrated ably in Capitalism magazine in January, Americans contributed 35% of all foreign aid in 2004, once private donations get factored into the equation. Private donations to foreign aid equal 2.2% of our GDP -- and that doesn't count the volunteer hours served, nor does it include our infrastructure assistance to relief efforts, such as the use of our military to deliver the aid to the needy. The 0.16% figure is so incorrect as to be deliberately misleading, especially when admitting -- as the Times does -- that the Bush administration has steadily increased the amount going towards Africa.

However, money isn't really the problem, nor is more of it the primary solution, as William Easterly writes opposite the editorial:

It's great that so many are finally noticing the tragedy of Africa. But sadly, historical evidence says that the solutions offered by big plans are not so easy. From 1960 to 2003, we spent $568 billion (in today's dollars) to end poverty in Africa. Yet these efforts still did not lift Africa from misery and stagnation.

Why don't big plans work? Because they miss the critical elements of feedback and accountability. If consumers like a product, its maker prospers; if they don't, the company goes out of business. If voters complain about public services to their local politician, the politician either fixes the problem or gets voted out of office. It doesn't always work, but it works well enough for rich people to get potato chips and paved roads.

For the poor, Professor Sachs and the United Nations Millennium Project propose everything from nitrogen-fixing leguminous trees to replenish the soil, to rainwater harvesting, to battery-charging stations, for, by my count, 449 interventions. Poor Africans have no market or democratic mechanisms to let planners in New York know which of the 449 interventions they need, whether they are satisfied with the results, or whether the goods ever arrived at all.

After $568 billion has gone down the tubes in Africa -- an mind-boggling amount -- clearly that solution has been tried and found wanting. Money may be needed, but very obviously the conditions on the ground keep it from the uses that would rescue the continent from itself. Pushing more money into the existing political systems there only serves to keep despots in power and criminals in control of the aid we send. It is Oil-For-Food, only on a much grander scale.

That's one of the reasons that Sir Bob Geldof's Live 8 approach seemed different. Yes, they want more money and debt forgiveness, but for the first time, a populist group seemed to understand the need to condition the aid on political reform. The G8 will have to force Africa to reform itself, and unfortunately, there are only two ways to leverage that: money or force. Therefore, we have to prepare to spend some money in order to get the political reform African nations need to bootstrap themselves into self-sufficiency and out of the abject poverty into which their strongmen have consigned them.

Instead of looking at this as aid, perhaps it's better to look at it as financial incentives -- and we need to be tough about releasing the funds for it. No democracy, no money. Let those nations who truly reform benefit, and the pressure on others from the example will work its magic on their more recalcitrant neighbors. We may find that much less money will actually be needed to make that work, in the long run.

I received this in e-mail today from The Mahaka Surf Report, a blog that I had not yet read. While I'm pausing from my busy day seeing the sights of Washington DC, the capital of freedom and liberty, perhaps this can serve as a reminder of the brave men and women who have made it that. I pray Caelestis makes it back home, safe and sound, at the end of his tour of duty. I also pray that we Americans remember how fortunate we are to have someone like him defending and representing us. I hope Mahaka doesn't mind my reproducing this in full.

Today I leave for the war

Well it's time to go and do what I have been called to do. Today I head for to the war for the third time and I have some things to say. To me this is a blessing, a calling from God to do what I can to help our brave men and women in uniform. Also this post is for my family as some of them still don't understand why I am on my third trip to Iraq. First of all:

K, you have been the best sister a brother could ever have, you and I had some good fights when we were kids, but you were always there if I truly needed you. We don't see eye to eye on anything political, and you are one of those people calling for our troops to come home now. I love you, but you are wrong in this count, you have three boys and if we don't do this right, it will have to be done again and it could be your boys next time. When I'm in Iraq, I think about my three nephews and how I don't want to see them in DCU's in the next decade, I want to fight our enemies in their country until they either surrender or become so ineffective they aren't a threat to any of us. I don't want my nephews fighing a fight that I couldn't finish, I want them to go to college or play professional soccer, or be beach bums. However,if they choose to become soldiers I would be proud to be in the same chain that links all military personnel past present and future, the chain that holds America together. That being said I would prefer they not have to fight the war I have seen, I would prefer they not lose any friends like I have and I wish that they would never lose their innocence by having to kill another human being. War takes so much out of a person, it changes us in ways that are almost never positive and I would not want your boys to have to go through what I have. I hope one day you understand, that I don't do this for the money, that Bush is not Hitler, and that the people of Iraq deserve as much a chance at a better life as we were given. You and G and the boys will be on my mind the entire time I am in Kirkuk.

Mom, I was the baby of the family and I know you still view me as that little boy that wouldn't eat his green beans and only wanted peanut butter. I am still that little boy inside, but I am so much more now, I am a husband and a veteran, and now a successful man with my own family. I chose to go back to Iraq this time, because I believe in a better world. At 30 I am more of an idealist now than I was at 20, I believe one person can make a difference. I know you will worry about me the entire time I am gone, but you won't tell me how scared you are. I just wanted to say it's ok, I am on the path that brings me the greatest happiness. No matter what happens to me, I am doing what I believe is my destiny, I come from a family of warriors, your family and Dad's were all warriors, it's what they knew. I am a product of their collective service to nation, this isn't about adventure or money or some deathwish, it's about doing the right thing. The men and women and especially the children of Iraq are worth fighting for, when I see them I know that any sacrifice I can make is worth it. What kind of man would I be if I refused to help someone in need? How could I live my life knowing that someone was being tortured and I stood by and sipped my latte and refused to get off my ass? I don't know if you will ever understand what drives me Mom, just being able to help one Iraqi is worth my life. People on this planet are so hell bent on persecuting others, they are so concerned with appearing strong that they prey on the weak and the helpless. Mom, the people of Iraq were helpless and being crushed by a petty clone of Adolf Hitler, now they have hope where before they had none. Iraq is a mess, but it is a mess because freedom is messy, we had to fight a Civil War that nearly killed 500,000 of us just to make all men and women free. Iraq is already having to fight a soul searing conflict with itself to find itself. How could we abandon these people to this chaos? I will continue to support this cause until we win, we lose, or I am knocked out of commission. I cannot call myself a man and abandon the men, women and children of Iraq to brutal butchers, I've made my choice. You'll be in my heart everyday.

Dad, you are my hero, I don't know if I've ever told you that, but you are. You served in Vietnam and came back and made a life for yourself and your family. You did everything you could to provide for K and I, you worked extra hours to make sure we never went without. You never took sick time even though you were out in the elements everyday, you are the definition of