February 1, 2007
The Senate moved closer to a non-binding resolution opposing the surge strategy last night when two key members of the chamber reached a compromise on the wording in the bill. John Warner and Carl Levin have agreed to reinforce the resolution with a vow that the Senate will not stop funding the troops: Democratic and Republican opponents of President Bush's troop-buildup plan joined forces last night behind the nonbinding resolution with the broadest bipartisan backing: a Republican measure from Sen. John W. Warner of Virginia. Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) announced the shift, hoping to unite a large majority of the Senate and thwart efforts by the White House and GOP leaders to derail any congressional resolution of disapproval of Bush's decision to increase U.S. troop levels in Iraq by 21,500. Although the original Democratic language was popular within the party, it had little appeal among Republicans. Warner's...
George Bush has decided to do some Clintonian triangulating in the last two years of his presidency on issues outside the war, it now seems. He surprised observers by using a well-received speech on the economy to Wall Street executives to scold them on income inequality, which he acknowledged has grown over the last generation. While speaking to cheers when reviewing the booming economy, Bush warned them to mind the executive compensation packages that have grown exponentially: President Bush acknowledged Wednesday that there is growing income inequality in the United States, addressing for the first time a subject that has long concerned Democrats and liberal economists. "The fact is that income inequality is real -- it's been rising for more than 25 years," Bush said in an address on Wall Street. "The reason is clear: We have an economy that increasingly rewards education and skills because of that education." In...
It didn't take long for Nancy Pelosi to create the imperial Speakership. She has requested that the Pentagon supply her with military aircraft at all times, and not just for herself, but also for her staff, her colleagues, and her family: The office of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is pressing the Bush administration for routine access to military aircraft for domestic flights, such as trips back to her San Francisco district, according to sources familiar with the discussions. The sources, who include those in Congress and in the administration, said the Democrat is seeking regular military flights not only for herself and her staff, but also for relatives and for other members of the California delegation. A knowledgeable source called the request "carte blanche for an aircraft any time." "They are pressing the point of her succession and that the [Department of Defense] needs to play ball with the speaker's...
Jacques Chirac stunned reporters with his nonchalance over the prospect of a nuclear Iran. One or two little bombs didn't make much of an impression on him, he said in an interview with the New York Times and a French newspaper: President Jacques Chirac said this week that if Iran had one or two nuclear weapons, it would not pose a big danger, and that if Iran were to launch a nuclear weapon against a country like Israel, it would lead to the immediate destruction of Tehran. The remarks, made in an interview on Monday with The New York Times, The International Herald Tribune and Le Nouvel Observateur, a weekly magazine, were vastly different from stated French policy and what Mr. Chirac has often said. On Tuesday, Mr. Chirac summoned the same journalists back to Élysée Palace to retract many of his remarks. Mr. Chirac said repeatedly during the second...
With the presidential primary race well under way, the meter has started running on fundraising and spending. Ironically, deficit hawk John McCain has taken the lead on the latter, lapping his competition while doling out over $7 million for his start-up and support for Republicans in the midterms: Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) spent $7.8 million last year to assist other politicians and get his fledgling presidential bid underway, an early sign of the intensity of the spending that is expected to become a fixture of the 2008 campaign. Among those candidates who had filed 2006 year-end reports with the Federal Election Commission late yesterday, none had come close to spending so much so early on the preparations for the presidential election. Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) spent $3.4 million, ex-New York mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani (R) spent $2.4 million and ex-Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney (R) had spent $2.1 million from his...
One of the key constituencies of the new Democratic majority in the House has started to crumble. The Congressional Hispanic Caucus has split along gender lines, a rebellion against the caucus chair led by my old representative from California: A firestorm erupted Wednesday within the Congressional Hispanic Caucus when California Rep. Loretta Sanchez quit in protest of Rep. Joe Baca's chairmanship and alleged mistreatment of women. Sanchez, in her fifth term representing California's 47th District, reportedly is furious at fellow California Democrat, Baca, for alleged derogatory remarks. In an interview with Politico.com she accused him of calling her a "whore." ... Sanchez's protest of Baca's chairmanship of the caucus — which represents 21 Hispanic House Democrats — dates back to November 2006, when she voted against him for the leadership post. Four other women members, including Sanchez's sister, Rep. Linda Sanchez, abstained. Just a few weeks ago, four female lawmakers...
I'll be back on my Blog Talk Radio show again tonight at 9 pm CT, ready to take your calls and discuss the issues of the day. Topics usually will be a game-time decision, but I'll be interested in hearing your opinions on the dramatic rise and fall of the Joe Biden campaign, the Senate's attempts to pass a non-binding resolution opposing the troop surge in Baghdad, Al Franken's run at Norm Coleman's seat, and much more. Be sure to tune in, and join the conversation by calling 646-652-4889!...
John McCain has decided to eschew the competing resolutions expressing disfavor with the new White House surge strategy in favor of an open-ended series of benchmarks intended to demonstrate what progress in Iraq will look like. The resolution gives no deadlines but does describe the process by which the Pentagon should measure success. Here is the conclusion on McCain's bill: Resolved, That it is the sense of the Senate that -- (1) Congress should ensure that General David Petraeus, the Commander of Multinational Forces - Iraq, and all United States personnel under his command, have the resources they consider necessary to carry out their mission on behalf of the United States in Iraq; and (2) that the Government of Iraq must make visible, concrete progress toward meeting the political, economic, and military benchmarks enumerated in the preamble to this Resolution. McCain obviously wants to offer a way for the Senate...
February 2, 2007
It will be a light posting day today, as the hosting service for CQ had its share of problems overnight. Starting around 7:45 or so, Hosting Matters had a complete failure of some sort; the forums have no explanation, but all HM blogs went dark and didn't come back until about an hour ago or so. Unfortunately, that pretty much killed the traffic to my Blog Talk Radio show last night. It's too bad -- I thought I had a better show this time than the last, but only got a few calls. Sean from The American Mind paid another visit as I mostly focused on the Senate resolutions wending their way through committee hearings. You can listen to the show as a podcast at the CQ Radio home page, and I hope you enjoy it. I'll be back next Thursday for another installment! Addendum: It was apparently a line...
The New York Times indulges itself in the latest oddity of racial politics today regarding Barack Obama. The meme that he will struggle to find support in the black community has floated in the media for the past few weeks; I noted an article from Agence France Presse on the topic six weeks ago. At the time, African-American radio host Stanley Crouch had written a column that rejected Obama's inclusion in black America as lacking the shared background and experience of the descendants of slaves. It turns out that he's not alone: The black author and essayist Debra J. Dickerson recently declared that “Obama isn’t black” in an American racial context. Some polls suggest that Mr. Obama trails one of his rivals for the Democratic nomination, Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, in the battle for African-American support. And at the Shepherd Park Barber Shop here, where the hair clippers hummed and...
Florida has decided to end its use of electronic voting machines, reversing a decision made at the height of the controversy over the 2000 election. The state will opt for the optical-scan technology that retains the paper trail necessary to ensure the ability to conduct recounts when necessary: Gov. Charlie Crist announced plans on Thursday to abandon the touch-screen voting machines that many of Florida’s counties installed after the disputed 2000 presidential election. The state will instead adopt a system of casting paper ballots counted by scanning machines in time for the 2008 presidential election. Voting experts said Florida’s move, coupled with new federal voting legislation expected to pass this year, could be the death knell for the paperless electronic touch-screen machines. If as expected the Florida Legislature approves the $32.5 million cost of the change, it would be the nation’s biggest repudiation yet of touch-screen voting, which was widely...
A Canadian mission in London has been evacuated after someone noticed a suspicious package outside: The Canadian High Commission in central London has been evacuated and surrounding streets closed after a suspect package was found, a police spokesman said. "A suspect envelope has been found ... we are checking it out at the moment," a police spokeswoman told AFP Friday, adding: "The roads in the immediate area have been closed off as a precautionary measure." The lockdown extends to parts of Trafalgar Square, where the commission offices are located. No further details have yet been released. These kinds of discoveries are almost always false alarms. However. the British are doing the right thing by securing the area as they investigate the package. Has Turner Broadcasting started promoting the Aqua Teen Hunger Force movie in Britain? Just asking ......
The world may soon adopt "Palestinian cease-fire" as a self-evident oxymoron. Hours after announcing the latest cessation of hostilities between Fatah and Hamas, both groups conducted major attacks on the other, leaving a broadcast station in ruins and ambulances dodging bullets across Gaza: Hamas fighters blew up a pro-Fatah radio station in Gaza, ambulances were caught in the crossfire and gunmen exchanged heavy fire in deserted streets as a new wave of factional fighting raged Friday throughout the chaotic coastal territory. The resurgent violence, which has killed 10 people since Thursday, destroyed a brief truce between Fatah and Hamas and forced thousands of Gazans to huddle in their homes to escape the crossfire. In a symbol that the two sides had returned to open warfare, their respective radio stations stopped playing songs of national unity and broadcast songs about armed struggle and fighting the enemy. In this case, for those...
The producers of South Park hilariously depicted North Korean dictator Kim Jong-Il in their movie Team America: World Police in a musical sequence titled I'm So Ronery. Apparently, that song wouldn't apply to Kim's jet-setting son, whom the London Telegraph noted has the kind of latitude denied the subjects of his father's regime: The son of Kim Jong-il, North Korea's reclusive dictator, has been living in five-star luxury in the gambling haven of Macau even as his people starve, according to reports in Hong Kong yesterday. Kim Jong-nam, 35, was tracked to the Mandarin Oriental Hotel, where he has been staying on and off for three years. While the international community alternates sanctions on his father for his nuclear weapons programme with economic aid for his starving subjects, the younger Kim has been spotted gambling in Macau's numerous casinos and eating in local restaurants, according to the South China Morning...
Earlier today, I accepted an offer from the organizers of the 2007 Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) next month in Washington DC. I'll be one of the bloggers covering the event from Blogger Alley, similar to what I did at the Republican National Convention in 2004. I've not been able to attend CPAC before, and it seems more critical than ever to get involved after the midterm losses and the weakening of resolve on the war. Even with all of that, I put off the decision for a couple of weeks until we got a clearer picture of the First Mate's prognosis. It turns out that the nephrectomy was successful in eliminating the BK virus from her system. She's had at least one blood test come back completely negative, which means she can now have a transplant. At the same time, her donor -- a very generous friend of ours...
February 3, 2007
John Warner has declared that he will filibuster his own non-binding resolution on the surge to protest the conduct of Harry Reid in limiting votes on alternatives, such as John McCain's proposed language that supports the President's new stratey for Baghdad and Anbar. The GOP says they can organize all 49 Senators in their caucus, which would keep any resolution from proceeding to a vote: Sen. John W. Warner will join his fellow Republicans in voting Monday to block the resolution he wrote rebuking President Bush's Iraq war policy. "Senator Warner supports the Senate Republican leadership's effort to establish a free and open debate on Iraq on the Senate floor, including possible amendments," a spokesman for the Virginia Republican said yesterday afternoon. Earlier in the day, Mr. Warner told colleagues during a closed-door strategy meeting at the Library of Congress that he opposes the manner in which Senate Majority Leader...
The intelligence community released its National Intelligence Estimate on Iraq yesterday, a nine-page document that the Washington Post correctly characterizes as "bleak". It adopts the term "civil war" for the ongoing conflict in Iraq, and at the same time notes that the term doesn't do justice to the myriad of conflicts active in the country at the moment. However, it also warns about the effect a withdrawal would have on the region. First, though, the bad news: The U.S. intelligence community yesterday released a starkly pessimistic assessment of the situation in Iraq, warning that even if security improves, deepening sectarian divisions threaten to destroy the government and ultimately could lead to anarchy, partition or the emergence of a new dictatorship. Citing "the current winner-take-all attitude and sectarian animosities infecting the political scene," declassified judgments of a new National Intelligence Estimate predicted that Iraqi leaders will be "hard pressed" to reconcile...
It's hard out here for a Wookie. First, clone armies supposedly helping you wind up shooting up your home planet. Then you get stuck on the worst-looking hyperspace vehicle in seven systems, piloted by an undisciplined cowboy who inexplicably winds up with a galactic princess, making you a hairy third wheel. Finally, some tour guide accuses you of molesting Japanese tourists and gets you fired from your worst gig ever. Who wouldn't snap? A man dressed as Chewbacca was arrested after police said the street performer head-butted a tour guide operator in front of Grauman's Chinese Theatre in Hollywood. Frederick Evan Young, 44, of Los Angeles, California, was booked Thursday for investigation of misdemeanor battery, police Lt. Paul Vernon said. Police said the 6-foot-4 street performer was seen arguing Thursday afternoon with a tour guide who had expressed concern that the Star Wars wookie impersonator was "harassing and touching tourists"...
Yesterday, the Rudy Giuliani campaign promoted the results of polling by several groups last month, surveys which shows that Giuliani has more strength in traditionally blue states than other Republicans, especially the former "maverick" John McCain. Once expected to be the centrist candidate of choice, and even a risk for an independent bid that would capture the center from both parties, McCain seems to have ceded most of that ground to Giuliani, at least at this early stage of the campaign: StateMayor GiulianiClosest CompetitorSourceCalifornia33%19% (Gingrich)ARG - Jan. 11-17Florida30%16% (Gingrich)ARG - Jan. 4-9Illinois33%24% (McCain)ARG - Jan. 11-14Michigan34%24% (McCain)ARG - Jan. 4-7Nevada31%25% (McCain)ARG - Dec. 19-23, ‘06New Jersey39%21% (McCain)Quinnipiac – Jan. 16-22North Carolina34%26% (McCain)ARG - Jan. 11-15Ohio30%22% (McCain)Quinnipiac - Jan. 23-28Pennsylvania35%25% (McCain)ARG Jan. 4-8Texas28%26% (McCain)Baselice Jan. 17-21 The Battleground Poll, one of those cited by the Giuliani campaign, makes a less impressive case for Giuliani as the front-runner. The analysis by Ed Goeas...
Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah told an Egyptian interviewer that Iran and Syria fund, train, and control his organization as an effort to spread radical Shi'ite Islam throughout the region: "Iran assists the organization with money, weapons, and training, motivated by a religious fraternity and ethnic solidarity," Nasrallah said. "And the help is funneled through Syria, and everybody knows it." The Hizbullah leader added that his organization is ready to accept assistance from any Arab or Islamic party, like Egypt or Saudi Arabia. Responding to accusations that his organization acts as "a state within a state," Nasrallah said that the current Lebanese government has yet to fulfill its obligation of securing the release of Lebanese prisoners in Israeli jails, and getting Israeli-occupied land back. Accordingly, Nasrallah said that the people, or part of the people, are free to try and realize those goals by themselves. This comes as little surprise to...
The Northern Alliance Radio Network will be on the air today, with our six-hour-long broadcast schedule starting at 11 am CT. The first two hours features Power Line's John Hinderaker and Chad and Brian from Fraters Libertas. Mitch and I hit the airwaves for the second shift from 1-3 pm CT, and King Banaian and Michael Broadkorb have The Final Word from 3-5. If you're in the Twin Cities, you can hear us on AM 1280 The Patriot, or on the station's Internet stream if you're outside of the broadcast area. This means I will have to leave the house at some point, but I'm not looking forward to it. As I write this, the temperature outside is -9, with a wind chill pushing it to -29. We do the show in the basement of the bunker that is AM 1280 The Patriot, and so if you hear teeth chattering,...
It's hard to get surprised by Leftist characterizations of conservatives as fascists The epithet flows so freely that even members of the Senate have used it, the last time by an ex-Klansman. The latest version of the insult comes from George Soros, speaking at the Davos Economic Forum last week about the situation in Iraq. Claiming that the US needs to cleanse itself from conservatives, Soros compared the process necessary to that used by the US in Germany: He went on to say that Turkey and Japan are still hurt by a reluctance to admit to dark parts of their history, and contrasted that reluctance to Germany's rejection of its Nazi-era past. "America needs to follow the policies it has introduced in Germany," Soros said. "We have to go through a certain de-Nazification process." This is highly inflammatory and, quite frankly, anti-American. We do not purge people from the political...
My friend and radio partner Mitch Berg goes off the deep end with his Super Bowl prediction this weekend: In 1940, everyone - everyone - predicted Sammy Baugh’s Washington Redskins were going to beat the Chicago Bears in the NFL Championship game. Of course, the final result was the Bears dishing out a legendary 73-0 drubbing, a victory that set the stage for the defeat of Naziism. ... Bears 42 Clots 17. Of course, one could more easily argue that it set the stage for Pearl Harbor ... but I digress. Historical hysteria aside, the Bears have a strong defense and a good offensive line, but the Colts have Peyton Manning and a re-energized defense that shut down Tom Brady and the Patriots as if they were the Minnesota Vikings in the second half. If the Rex Grossman that played in the second half against the Saints shows up tomorrow,...
Given the more liberal tendencies of Rudy Giuliani on abortion and guns, conservatives have expressed serious misgivings about his run for the nomination. However, the main effect that a President can have on these issues involves his or her outlook on the judiciary. The federal court system has been the main battleground for both issues, with Roe specifically precluding any kind of legislative action. Court nominations have become one of the essential considerations for presidential contenders -- and it may be more important for Giuliani than any other Republican candidate. Giuliani has hinted that he would nominate jurists in the mold of Antonin Scalia and John Roberts. Today, at a visit with the South Carolina GOP Executive Committee, an audience member pressed him for his position. His campaign office has supplied us with the transcript of his answer: On the Federal judiciary I would want judges who are strict constructionists...
February 4, 2007
Nancy Pelosi got a Democratic majority in the midterm elections by promising to clean up Congress, to drain the swamp of corruption in Washington, and especially to disconnect lobbyists from legislation. That reform appears to have been derailed, as the Washington Post explains in an editorial, by Democrats more interested in keeping fundraising from lobbyists than in draining swamps: DISTURBING, though not particularly surprising, rumblings are emanating from the House of Representatives to the effect that some Democrats are balking at requiring lobbyists to disclose the campaign contributions they arrange or collect for lawmakers. This important requirement was included in the lobbying and ethics package that recently passed the Senate; Reps. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) and Martin T. Meehan (D-Mass.) have introduced the same measure in the House and want to see it included in the lobbying legislation that the House plans to take up in the next few months....
Britain's latest success against radical Islamist terror may have heralded the beginning of a major offensive by al-Qaeda against the West. Cells in the UK have received instructions to start kidnapping victims, make tapes of them pleading for their lives, and behead them: ISLAMIC terror cells in Britain have been instructed to carry out a series of kidnappings and beheadings of the kind allegedly planned by the nine terrorist suspects arrested in Birmingham last week. The “strategic” assassination instruction was issued by Al-Qaeda’s leaders in Pakistan and Iraq to dozens of their followers in this country. It was uncovered by MI5 last autumn, senior security sources say. As a result police are on standby for multiple attempts by terrorists to kidnap and then behead people across Britain. MI5 is conducting a counter-terrorism surveillance operation to prevent such an attack. The alleged attempt to kidnap and behead a Muslim soldier or...
While the US focuses on Iran as a fomenter of the violence wracking Baghdad and its environs, Iraqi officials have begun pointing west instead east as an explanation. After the worst single bombing in the last four years took 135 lives yesterday in a Shi'ite section of the capital, an Iraqi official angrily accused Syria of allowing "Saddamists" to flow freely across the border: A senior Iraqi official has said half of all insurgent attacks in Baghdad are carried out by militants from Syria. Ali al-Dabbagh said the Iraqi government has provided Damascus with evidence to back up this claim. ... Speaking on al-Arabiyah television, Mr al-Dabbagh said many of the insurgents emanated from neighbouring Syria. "Fifty per cent of terrorism enters Iraq from Syria, and we have evidence" to prove that, the Associated Press news agency reported. "The Interior Ministry and the Ministry of State for National Security gave...
George Bush went into the lion's den yesterday, addressing the new Democratic Party majority in Congress in a closed-door meeting intended to help smooth the way for bipartisanship. By all accounts, Bush did well, using self-deprecating humor to defuse the tension between the White House and Congressional Democrats. The meeting may come too late, though, to bridge the partisan gulf on the war: President Bush, forced by circumstance to reach out to some of his strongest adversaries, appealed directly to House Democrats on Saturday to work with him to reform the immigration system, limit the cost of Social Security, curb the consumption of gasoline and balance the federal budget. Visiting the Democrats' annual retreat for the first time since 2001, the president told lawmakers there are "big things" they could accomplish by working together and sought to defuse any bad blood with self-deprecating humor. He opened his public remarks with...
Progress: Some 3 million Muslims put aside their country's violent struggle with political corruption and Islamic extremists and raised their hands in prayer for global peace at one of the world's largest religious gatherings. The final prayer Sunday capped a three-day Islamic gathering on the sandy banks of the River Turag in a small industrial town just north of Dhaka, Bangladesh's capital. Pilgrims, many of whom left work early to join the prayer, streamed into the site stretching 190 acres along both banks of the river. As the crowd overflowed the space, people arrived at the site on packed boats or climbed onto the rooftops of nearby buildings. The annual gathering shuns politics, which have become increasingly bloody in Bangladesh, and focuses on reviving the tenets of Islam and promoting peace and harmony. Or, not so much: Female Muslims, with the exception of high-ranking officials, were not allowed to attend,...
Since I'm going to watch the game and check on the latest in the news, I figured I'd do a bit of a laissez-faire live blog. I'll update it during the pre-game, game, and post-game, but on a low-intensity basis. The opening Gloria Estefan number and its wretched excess convinced me I had to make at least a few comments. This should be a lot of fun, especially since I don't have the pressure of having the Steelers in the game ... which is a transparent effort to put the best possible face on the 8-8 season Pittsburgh had this year. 4:58 CT - I'm not sure what the point of the Estefan act was, but has anyone seen a weirder looking routine? I'm guessing that the theme was that even though we're rooting for different teams, we're really all the same ... spectators, I guess. 4:59 - Today's the...
February 5, 2007
Claiming that they cannot abide the occupation, Jewish academics in Britain have decided that they value the human rights of Palestinians above the right of Israel to exist. At least, that's the question as they see it: A group of prominent British Jews will today declare independence from the country's Jewish establishment, arguing that it puts support for Israel above the human rights of Palestinians. Independent Jewish Voices will publish an open letter on the Guardian's Comment is Free website calling for a freer debate about the Middle East within the Jewish community. Among the more than 130 signatories are Stephen Fry, Harold Pinter, Mike Leigh, Jenny Diski and Nicole Farhi, as well as leading academics such as Eric Hobsbawm and Susie Orbach. "We come together in the belief that the broad spectrum of opinion among the Jewish population of this country is not reflected by those institutions which claim...
The New York Times reports that the Palestinians have begun to sense what a public relations disaster their civil war has become. At the same time they demand recognition as a state, they have proven that they cannot hold one together. Of course, Palestinian academics always know who to blame for their culture of death: The fierce internal clashes between Palestinian factions have shocked many Palestinians and Arab governments, who fear that the continuing bloodshed is damaging the Palestinian image before the world, Palestinians say. “This fighting affects everyone’s morale,” said Daoud Kuttab, a Palestinian analyst who teaches at Al Quds University here. “We always felt we had this one big asset, our social unity as Palestinians, but to see it shredding, with lives being shed without much concern, is horrible. We’ve lost a lot of sensitivity to these deaths, to those killed by the Israelis and ourselves.” Even as...
Super Bowl commercials generate a lot of foolish analysis, perhaps as much foolishness as contained in the advertisements. This year provided plenty of that in several varieties, reflecting the efforts of ad agencies to make the biggest impression in their greatest competitive event. However, none of it comes close to matching the idiocy of the analysis provided by the New York Times, whose ad analyst blamed the war in Iraq for making commercials more violent: No commercial that appeared last night during Super Bowl XLI directly addressed Iraq, unlike a patriotic spot for Budweiser beer that ran during the game two years ago. But the ongoing war seemed to linger just below the surface of many of this year’s commercials. More than a dozen spots celebrated violence in an exaggerated, cartoonlike vein that was intended to be humorous, but often came across as cruel or callous. For instance, in a...
The classified portion of the National Intelligence Estimate downplays the effect of al-Qaeda in Iraq, declaring them to be a small minority of the Sunni terrorists. However, four of the sixteen intelligence agencies dissented from this view, including the intel units of the two forces fighting in Iraq. They believe that the Sunni insurgencies have been almost completely co-opted by AQI: In a division reminiscent of the intelligence debates before the Iraq war, America's war fighters and satellite imagery experts have issued a formal dissent on one of the National Intelligence Estimate's most important judgments. Disputing the view that Al Qaeda plays only a small role in the overall Sunni insurgency in Iraq, four of America's 16 intelligence agencies have obliged the Directorate of National Intelligence to provide a formal dissent to the 90-page classified Iraq assessment issued last week. Those agencies include the Treasury Department's Office of Intelligence and...
Both Shi'ite and Sunni Iraqi leaders want the US to accelerate the deployment for the new surge strategy in Baghdad. Shi'ites blame the US for not filling the power vacuum quickly enough after the Mahdi Army started to flee the capital, leaving them exposed for the Sunni bombing that killed 135 people this weekend. The Sunnis want the US in place to keep the situation from deteriorating even further: A growing number of Iraqis blamed the United States on Sunday for creating conditions that led to the worst single suicide bombing in the war, which devastated a Shiite market in Baghdad the day before. They argued that slowness in completing the vaunted new American security plan has made Shiite neighborhoods much more vulnerable to such horrific attacks. The chorus of critics said the new plan, which the Americans have barely started to execute, has emasculated the Mahdi Army, the Shiite...
We've all heard the Leo Durocher saying, "Nice guys finish last," a tenet by which Durocher lived his life as manager of both the Brooklyn Dodgers and New York Giants. Too often in sports (and business, and politics, etc etc etc) we celebrate the successes of the sharks -- those people whose drive to win pushes them past any sense of ethics and humanity, and the lesson always seems to be that only the obsessed win in life. That's why it becomes so important to tell the stories of those who reach the pinnacle without leaving their humanity behind -- and such is the case with Tony Dungy, the soft-spoken man who persevered and won a Super Bowl: Sportswriters cover so many jerks, egomaniacs and sometimes even criminals that when a person of such high quality as Dungy finds success we can't help but enjoy it. Dungy is fair, he...
Bill Ardolino, having completed his embed mission in Iraq with American forces, has begun to write about his experiences at length. His latest essay tells about his experience on a nighttime raid with US Marines and Iraqi Army forces, and presents the difficult routine of these missions: A fifth stop was another dry hole, but occupants told the Jundi that the house of the man they were looking for was a block away, so the soldiers immediately splashed down a sewage-filled side street on foot, leaving the cordon, the convoy and its crew-served heavy weapons behind. We chased them down the darkened alley, Lt. Kim struggling to communicate with the IA's about their ad hoc plan of action. The move was poorly planned but ultimately successful, as a blindfolded man was led from the quickly targeted house with no shots fired. This chaotic initiative highlights one of the strengths and...
Ralph Nader has not gone quietly into that good night, and instead might consider another round of rage against the dying of the political light. He refused to rule out another run for the White House, and punctuated it with a pithy deconstruction of the current Democratic Party front-runner: Asked on CNN's Late Edition news program if he would run in 2008, the lawyer and consumer activist said, "It's really too early to say. ... I'll consider it later in the year." Nader, 72, said he did not plan to vote for Clinton, a Democratic senator from New York and former first lady. "I don't think she has the fortitude. Actually she's really a panderer and a flatterer. As she goes around the country, you'll see more of that," Nader said. On whether he would be encouraged to run if Clinton gets the Democratic nomination, Nader said, "It would make...
The Republicans welcomed Harry Reid to Senate leadership today, filibustering the Warner-Levin amendment on the surge strategy in Iraq when Reid tried to push it through without allowing alternatives or amendments to come to the floor. The Democrats could not even get a majority to approve cloture, let alone the 60 votes needed, and Reid's efforts sank into failure -- at least for now: Republicans blocked a full-fledged Senate debate over Iraq on Monday, but Democrats vowed they would eventually find a way to force President Bush to change course in a war that has claimed the lives of more than 3,000 U.S. troops. "We must heed the results of the November elections and the wishes of the American people," said Majority Leader Harry Reid. Reid, D-Nev., spoke moments before a vote that sidetracked a nonbinding measure expressing disagreement with Bush's plan to deploy an additional 21,500 troops to Iraq....
Rudy Giuliani ended most of the speculation by amending his exploratory committee papers today to include a "statement of candidacy". It moves him closer to the eventual commitment to run, but Giuliani all but made that tonight on Hannity & Colmes on Fox News Channel: Rudy Giuliani, the former New York City mayor who became a national hero for his response to the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, suggested Monday that a formal presidential announcement was a matter of when, not if. "Today we just took another step toward running for president," the Republican said, hours after filing a so-called "statement of candidacy" with the Federal Election Commission, which moved him closer to a full-fledged campaign. "It's a big step, an important one. Quite honestly, we're probably ahead of schedule," Giuliani told reporters in Long Island while campaigning with a state Senate candidate. "We still have to think about a...
Continue reading "Rudy's In, Mostly" »
February 6, 2007
Even in a program full of American heroes, some oddities will emerge, and usually in the most embarrassing circumstances. Such is the case with the space program and three of its astronauts, one of whom has been arrested for plotting the murder of the second in order to secure the affection of the third. Shuttle astronaut Lisa Marie Nowak drove a thousand miles to murder Air Force Captain Colleen Shipman after discovering that her paramour, astronaut Bill Oefelein, had two-timed her: Nowak -- who was a mission specialist on a Discovery launch last summer -- was wearing a trench coat and wig and had a knife, BB pistol, and latex gloves in her car, reports show. They also found diapers, which Nowak said she used so she wouldn't have to stop on the 1,000-mile drive. Reports show that after U.S. Air Force Capt. Colleen Shipman's flight arrived, Nowak followed her...
At the end of a big championship game, the winners appear within minutes wearing T-shirts and caps proclaiming themselves as the champs. Obviously, these pieces of clothing have to be manufactured in bulk before the game in order to make that kind of deadline, and that means that half of the orders -- the ones proclaiming the wrong team as the winners -- never see the light of day. Did I say never? Well, that's overstating it, because the shirts and hats actually do wind up in the hands of those who can use them: After the final moments of the Super Bowl, when the Indianapolis Colts' coach was showered in Gatorade and hoisted atop his burliest players' shoulders, the winning players engaged in another time-honored ritual and immediately tossed on championship hats and shirts, which seemingly appeared out of thin air. These are official Reebok-sponsored, NFL-approved hats and shirts...
A Minnesota family has reeled from the impact of a double homicide in Waseca this weekend in which a father and son lost their lives and the mother has barely managed to survive. Hilary Kruger managed to give a description of the murderer to police, who arrested farmworker Mike Zebawa, who claimed that he accidentally shot three people with a shotgun, using multiple shells: When the first officer arrived in response to Alec's 911 call about 3:20 a.m. Saturday, a shotgun was leaning against a bedroom door, shells littered the upstairs hallway and the odor of gunpowder permeated the air. The officer heard Hilary's faint voice and found her on a bed, next to Alec. Her husband, Tracy, was nearby, dead on the floor. ... After her husband was shot, Kruger told her son Alec, 13, to call 911, the charges said. The intruder went downstairs, came back upstairs and...
Harry Reid has a dilemma on his hands. His control over the Senate rests on a single vote; even if Senator Tim Johnson of South Dakota recovers enough to return to the Senate, the loss of one member of Reid's caucus will allow Dick Cheney to cast the deciding vote on control of the upper chamber. While this isn't news, an article posted yesterday by the New Yorker reveals that the debate on Iraq may push the Senate's only independent to rethink his loyalty: Iraq is the reason that Lieberman calls himself an “independent Democrat.” Democratic voters in Connecticut abandoned him in last year’s primary, favoring the antiwar candidate Ned Lamont. Lieberman ran as an independent, and beat the ineffectual Lamont in the general election in large part because Republicans voted for him. In the campaign, Lieberman said that he would join the Democratic caucus if elected, and his victory...
Anne Applebaum offers her solution to global warming, one that she claims any nation serious about the issue can apply without waiting for international accords to come into force. She favors a carbon tax, applied at every level, in order to create incentives for innovation and conservation: The much-vaunted treaty [Kyoto] creates a complicated and unenforceable system of international targets for carbon emissions reduction, based on measurements taken in 1990. Critics of the American president have condemned him for failing to sign it, conveniently forgetting that the Senate rejected it 95 to 0 in 1997, a margin that reflects broad bipartisan opposition. At the same time, few of the Asian and European signatories are actually on track to meet their goals; those that will meet the targets, such as Britain, can do so because their economies rely less on industry than they once did. Canada and Japan aren't even close...
Iran blames the United States for the abduction of a diplomat by men in the uniform of the Iraqi Army, according to state news agency IRNA. ABC reports that Iraqi police captured two men involved in the incident, who got transferred immediately to the custody of the Iraqi Army: Gunmen wearing Iraqi army uniforms seized an Iranian diplomat as he drove through central Baghdad, officials said Tuesday. Tehran condemned the abduction and blamed U.S. forces in Iraq. One Iraqi government official also said the diplomat was detained Sunday by a special Iraqi army unit that reports directly to the U.S. military. But a military spokesman denied any U.S. troops or Iraqis that report to them were involved. "We've checked with our units and it was not an MNF-I (Multi-National Forces Iraq) unit that participated in that event," military spokesman Lt. Col. Christopher Garver said, adding he could not confirm the...
It has been amusing to see Democrats in Congress attempt to explain away their votes for the war in Iraq over the past year. Most of them have settled on the excuse that the Bush administration deceived them in October 2002 into authorizing military force based on the exact same intelligence that moved them to declare official American policy of regime change in 1998. The Democrats won a majority in the midterms by stoking Bush Derangement Syndrome, but for 2008 they face a daunting task -- winning elections without using the retiring George Bush as a bogeyman. John Edwards has found a solution by shifting blame yet again, and in the process exposing the "Bush lied" meme as a hypocritical dodge. In his Sunday appearance on Meet the Press, Edwards attempted to excuse his vote on the AUMF by blaming Clinton administration officials for confirming the intel coming from the...
Earlier today, I had an opportunity to participate in a conference call involving the John McCain campaign and several prominent bloggers. David All live-blogged the event, in which the McCain staff solicited our unvarnished opinions regarding McCain, his campaign efforts, his prospects for promotion through the blogosphere, and what we felt we would need from his campaign. I won't attempt to recreate David's excellent coverage, so I'll give you my overall evaluation of the event. It shows that McCain and his staff understand the need to address the skepticism (and in some cases, outright hostility) of the conservative blogosphere. Even though McCain enjoys a substantial level of support among voters at the moment, his numbers among blog readers have been abysmal. One person on the call noted that a recent straw poll put him at the same level as Fred Dalton Thompson, who is closer to running for an Emmy...
I linked to David All's live-blog of the conference call several bloggers held with the John McCain campaign earlier today. Mary Katherine Ham also participated in the call, and has a somewhat different take on the effort to engage conservative bloggers: Here's the deal. McCain wants to start a friendlier relationship with us bloggers, right? Now, when a man goes to his angry wife or ticked off girlfriend and says, "Baby, let's work this out. What's wrong?," what does she do? She yells at him, gets some things off her chest, maybe cries a little about how little he truly cares about her, right? We got that far on the call. I'm not gonna tell you who cried. But what's the next step? When you're talking to your girlfriend, even if you think she's being crazy and unreasonable (which I, for the record, do not think conservative bloggers are being),...
February 7, 2007
When the Palestinians elected the terrorist group Hamas to lead the proto-state government, the Western nations all agreed to suspend all aid payments to the Palestinian Authority to keep from funding terrorists. Eventually, frightened of domestic public opinion about the collapsing PA economy, the European Union initiated a program of direct payments to Palestinians through bank transfers, intending to play keep-away with the money to ensure that Hamas could not get it. However, the only people getting rich on this program is the bank itself, which has racked up over three million euros in the months that the program has operated: More than €3m (£2m) of EU aid for Palestinians was spent on bank charges last year in an effort to bypass the Hamas-run government, Oxfam said yesterday. The money was spent between August and December under the temporary international mechanism, a system run by the European commission that delivers...
The US has accused Iran of fomenting the Shi'ite insurgencies and supplying materiel and weapons to an even broader range of terrorists in Iraq. Recently, the US has captured five Iranian agents in Irbil as part of the wider rules of engagement for the pacification of Baghdad and Anbar, an action protested by both Iran and Iraq. Newsweek interviewed Iran's ambassador to Baghdad, Hassan Kazemi Qomi, and asked him to respond to these American accusations, among other topics -- and he didn't exactly deny them: American military officials have accused Iranian agents of supplying technology for "shaped charge" explosives to militants in Iraq. This was an explosive that Hizbullah used in Lebanon. If this was the case it would have become known. I pointed out before, that we suffer if there's insecurity in Iraq. The Islamic Republic of Iran plays a protective role. After the fall of the regime, Iran...
American nuclear expert David Albright, a former UN inspector on the North Korean impasse, has told the AP that he believes North Korea is ready to shut down its nuclear program for an end to the Korean War and "massive" energy shipments. Pyongyang will also insist on an end to the sanctions that shut down the Macau money-laundering operation connected to its counterfeiting ring: Chief North Korean disarmament negotiator Kim Kye Gwan told Albright and Joel Wit, a former State Department official, that nothing would happen until the U.S. agreed to the construction of light-water reactors that Washington promised North Korea under a 1994 deal to freeze Pyongyang's nuclear program. That deal, which also included an annual supply of half a million tons of heavy fuel oil until the reactors were built, was scrapped in 2002 when North Korea admitted it had restarted its atomic program. Albright said the North...
John Podhoretz explains the surprising popularity of Rudy Giuliani in the early stages of the 2008 presidential primary campaign, writing that Republicans want to like Rudy -- if he'll let them. In his New York Post column, Podhoretz notes more than a few of the hurdles that Giuliani faces, but insists that neither conservatives nor Giuliani want to go to war over them: Republicans not only like Rudy, they want to like him. Conservative Republicans want to like him. Socially conservative Republicans want to like him. In this respect, he represents a momentous change from prior candidates hailing from outside the party's socially conservative wing. Past "liberal" GOP candidates and would-be candidates have sought the nomination by taking strong stands counter to the views of the party's conservative base - like Elizabeth Dole opposing handguns in 2000. Those candidates, that is, were engaging in battle against the social conservatives. They...
Betsy Newmark offers an interesting comparison of the late suffragette movement and the sudden Momminess quotient in politics today, and argues that women have gone backwards in their attempt to gain political ascendancy. Instead of arguing equality between the genders, politicians such as Hillary Clinton, Nancy Pelosi, and Barbara Boxer appear to argue that giving birth creates a difference between themselves and others (in Boxer's case, even between women) in such a manner that would create a huge backlash against anyone arguing that the difference might make them worse candidates: And if women are going to use their status as mothers as a qualification for higher office, should voters then ask about their parenting skills and which candidate raised better children? After all, running as a mom means that their mommy skills are now part of the political calculus. Why should gender matter in politics today? Have we returned to...
One of the accepted facts of the entire Valerie Plame scandal has been that Plame suggested her husband, Joseph Wilson, for the Niger investigation after Dick Cheney requested the research into Iraqi attempts to purchase uranium in Africa. That timeline paints Plame as responsive to the VP's office and not an initiator of action on the "sixteen words" controversy. Byron York, who has followed the Scooter Libby trial for National Review, reports that the timeline has been proven incorrect, casting doubt on the tenor of Plame's request and Wilson's assignment: The accepted version of events is that Vice President Dick Cheney got things started when he asked for information about possible Iraqi attempts to purchase uranium in Africa. After that request, CIA employee Valerie Plame Wilson suggested sending her husband to look into the question, and after that, the CIA flew Joseph Wilson to Niger to investigate. But the new...
The campaign of John Edwards, hailed for hiring two progressive bloggers for his 2008 Presidential campaign, has now said they will reconsider that decision in light of the blogging history of Amanda Marcotte and Melissa McEwan. The episode reveals the lack of vetting done by the Edwards campaign before hiring the two bloggers, and sets back the ability of bloggers to mainstream themselves into traditional political roles: Two bloggers hired by John Edwards to reach out to liberals in the online world have landed his presidential campaign in hot water for doing what bloggers do — expressing their opinions in provocative and often crude language. ... The two women brought to the Edwards campaign long cyber trails in the incendiary language of the blogosphere. Other campaigns are likely to face similar controversies as they try to court voters using the latest techniques of online communication. Ms. Marcotte wrote in December...
The apparent firing of two bloggers by the John Edwards campaign has generated a predictable debate in the blogosphere. Those who find themselves in sympathy with Amanda Marcotte and Melissa McEwan, either because or in spite of their inflammatory attacks on Christians in general and Catholics in particular, claim that the Edwards campaign surrendered to right-wing attacks. Some go further and try to pass off the entire incident through some weird filter of relativism. Alex Koppelman and Rebecca Traister at Salon claim that the "right-wing blogosphere has gotten its scalps", and try to pass off Marcotte's earlier writings as the equivalent of Michelle Malkin's on the latter's blog -- although neither can apparently come up with an example. Media Matters has leapt to Marcotte's defense by going through the writings of Patrick Hynes, John McCain's new media coordinator, and discovering that he called Chelsea Clinton "ugly". Somehow, the writings of...
February 8, 2007
Israeli and Lebanese Army troops exchanged fire on the border near Maroun al-Ras, the first shots fired since the cessation of hostilities last summer. A wayward bulldozer apparently sparked the incident, and the UN has started deploying peacekeepers in the area (via Israel Matzav): Shooting erupted across the Israeli-Lebanese border last night for the first time since last summer's war, when Lebanese troops opened fire on an Israeli bulldozer that apparently crossed the UN-demarcated boundary. A Reuters correspondent at the scene and Israeli security sources said the clash began after the Lebanese troops shot in the air as an Israeli patrol crossed a security fence to search for explosives planted by Hizbullah. Israeli troops responded with tank and light weapons fire, Israeli security officials said. The exchange, the first since a ceasefire ended a 34-day war last August, broke out near the Lebanese village of Maroun al-Ras in the central...
The Guardian has an interesting look into Jordan's efforts to fight radical Islamist terrorism from the rather unique position of a Muslim monarchy. After a deadly attack on a hotel killed 60 people, mostly from a wedding reception, Jordan formed a task force with the dramatic name, The Knights of Justice. Their mission is to find and destroy al-Qaeda and other terrorist groups operating in Jordan, but they may have a tougher mission in convincing Jordanians of the necessity of the task: In November 2005 events provided proof that Jordan was not immune to the fallout of the war next door. Three Iraqi al-Qaida suicide bombers slaughtered 60 people, many of them wedding guests, in coordinated attacks on three hotels. It was the worst terrorist atrocity the country had ever suffered. A fourth Iraqi, a woman, was captured with her bomb's trigger mechanism jammed. She has been sentenced to death....
The 2008 primary campaign still seems pretty young to lend much weight to state by state polling -- but we won't let that stop us from having fun with it anyway. Quinnipiac released its results for Florida, a key state for both parties and a must-hold for the GOP. Rudy Giuliani came out on top in the poll, besting Hillary Clinton within the margin of error, the only Republican to do so: In an early look at the 2008 presidential race in Florida, former New York City Mayor Rudolph Giuliani has a razor-thin 47 - 44 percent lead over New York Sen. Hillary Clinton, while Sen. Clinton edges Arizona Sen. John McCain 47 - 43 percent, according to a Quinnipiac University poll released today. These results are close to those in a January 30 poll of Ohio voters by the independent Quinnipiac (KWIN-uh-pe-ack) University poll, where Clinton squeaks past McCain...
The US and Iraqi forces have not limited the new full-court press in Baghdad to just the foot soldiers of the insurgencies and independent militias, but also to those who give them political cover. The arrest of a near-Cabinet-level official in a raid specifically targeting the minister shows that the surge aims higher than expected: US and Iraqi forces in Baghdad have arrested the deputy health minister during a raid at his offices. The minister, Hakem al-Zamili, is a key member of the political group led by radical Shia cleric Moqtada Sadr. He is accused of aiding Shia militiamen and using ambulances to move weapons, a ministry source told the BBC. ... Iraqi officials say US and Iraqi troops broke down doors in the ministry's offices in central Baghdad in their search for Mr Zamili. The minister and some of his guards were arrested. This seems very significant. Certainly few...
After the failure to approve cloture on the single amendment allowed to reach the floor by Harry Reid, it appeared that the Democrats had decided to allow the effort to pass a non-binding resolution to die on the floor -- and blame Republicans for supposedly ending the debate. Seven Republican Senators have decided to push back against that decision, demanding that GOP and Democratic leaders reach some level of accommodation for a full debate on all proposals, a surprise that Reid attempted to ignore when it arose during yesterday's session: Senate Republicans who earlier this week helped block deliberations on a resolution opposing President Bush's new troop deployments in Iraq changed course yesterday and vowed to use every tactic at their disposal to ensure a full and open debate. In a letter distributed yesterday evening to Senate leaders, John W. Warner (Va.), Chuck Hagel (Neb.) and five other GOP supporters...
According to Kathryn Jean Lopez at The Corner, Don Imus and Tom Tancredo should take a meeting. Imus, while speaking with guest Mary Matalin, suggested that bombing Mecca might make for a good strategy: Imus this morning just suggested on his radio show that bombing Mecca (among other places) would send a message to the enemy — a true enough (it would send some message, though I'm not sure a war-ending one) but not at all advisable statement. ... Expect a CAIR press conference scheduled before noon. We've been through this before. Almost two years ago, Tom Tancredo offered the same strategy as a response to a nuclear terrorist attack in the US. Neither Tancredo nor Imus apparently realize that reprisal attacks against civilian areas is now considered a war crime. Unless Imus can point to a war-related activity occuring near the Black Stone, such an attack would be not...
The New York Times has a hot scoop on the 2008 Presidential campaign that will blow all of us away. It's a secret that may undo the efforts of Mitt Romney to challenge for the nomination. In fact, the news may wind up challenging American ideals of political access and religious tolerance in ways we have not seen in decades. Are you ready for this big scoop? Can you handle the truth? Well, okay, here it is -- Mitt Romney is a Mormon: As he begins campaigning for the Republican presidential nomination, Mitt Romney, the former Massachusetts governor, is facing a threshold issue: Will his religion — he is a Mormon — be a big obstacle to winning the White House? Polls show a substantial number of Americans will not vote for a Mormon for president. The religion is viewed with suspicion by Christian conservatives, a vital part of the...
Don't forget that I'll be back on my Blog Talk Radio show again tonight at 9 pm CT, ready to take your calls and discuss the issues of the day. Topics usually will be a game-time decision, but I'm definitely interested in discussing the contretemps over the John Edwards bloggers, as well as the John McCain outreach to the blogs and what that means for McCain and other candidates. Be sure to tune in, and join the conversation by calling 646-652-4889! BUMP: To top. Hope to talk to you this evening! I'll be joined by Beltway Blogroll writer Daniel Glover, who has covered this controversy since it started. Also, James Boyce will be on the air with Chris Bowers at 1 pm ET for his BTR show Heading Left, and the topic will almost certainly come up there as well....
We'll be discussing this on CQ Radio at 9 pm CT tonight, with Daniel Glover of Beltway Blogroll. Be sure to join the conversation by calling 646-652-4889. John Edwards had to pick between two bad choices today in order to contain the damage from the controversial prior writings of two bloggers hired by his campaign as liaisons to Internet activists. The former VP nominee, stuck between offending Christians and angering the progressive community that the two bloggers were hired to engage, made the best possible lemonade from the lemons handed him by Amanda Marcotte and Melissa McEwan. He announced that, while he was "personally offended" by their attacks on Catholic and Christian belief, he would keep them on the staff: Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards said Thursday he was personally offended by the provocative messages two of his campaign bloggers wrote criticizing the Catholic church, but he's not going to...
If you didn't catch the installment of CQ Radio tonight, you missed the best show yet. Daniel Glover from Beltway Blogroll joined me for the entire hour to discuss the John Edwards controversy in the blogosphere, and Sean from The American Mind spent the last 30 minutes making it a round table. Be sure to listen to it on podcast from Blog Talk Radio, or on my sidebar, just above the Blogads....
February 9, 2007
The warring factions in the Palestinian Authority have declared their impasse at an end, as Hamas leadership reached an agreement with Fatah president Mahmoud Abbas for a power-sharing agreement. PM Ismail Haniyeh and Hamas' international leader Khaled Mashaal agreed to split the ministries, but the endorsement of prior treaties signed by the PLO and recognition of Israel may not follow from that -- which means aid will likely not be restored: The two main Palestinian factions, Hamas and Fatah, reached "full agreement" on a national unity government that will include ministers from both groups during crisis talks yesterday in the holy Islamic city of Mecca. But while the decision on the cabinet posts represented progress, there was no agreement on persuading Hamas to accept existing peace treaties with Israel signed by earlier Palestinian administrations. Acceptance by Hamas of these accords, with their explicit recognition of the right of Israel to...
Critics of the agreement that ended the Israeli campaign against Hezbollah in southern Lebanon last summer pointed out that Hezbollah appeared free to re-arm itself without much interference. The UNIFIL forces that were supposed to keep the peace wound up explicitly stating that disarming Hezbollah fell outside of their mission, and that responsibility lay with the Lebanese Army. At the time, that force made it clear that they would not start a civil war by stripping Hassan Nasrallah and his organization of its arms, but would instead concentrate on moving back into the sub-Litani region with as little conflict as possible. That appears to have changed, possibly spurred by Nasrallah's attempts to bring down Fuad Siniora's government. The Lebanese authorities have seized a shipment of weapons meant for Hezbollah, and they do not intend on giving it back to them: The Lebanese militant group Hezbollah has said a lorry intercepted...
The acting Inspector General of the Defense Department has issued a long-awaited report on the intelligence analysis provided by Douglas Feith during the period between 9/11 and the invasion of Iraq. According to Thomas Gimble, Feith and others did not violate laws or policies at the Department of Defense, nor did they mislead Congress -- but Gimble still concludes that their activities were "inappropriate": A Pentagon investigation into the handling of prewar intelligence has criticized civilian Pentagon officials for conducting their own intelligence analysis to find links between Saddam Hussein and Al Qaeda, but said the officials did not violate any laws or mislead Congress, according to Congressional officials who have read the report. The long-awaited report by the Pentagon’s acting inspector general, Thomas F. Gimble, was sent to Congress on Thursday. It is the first major review to rebuke senior officials working for Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld for...
CBS News interviewed me after the conference call hosted by the John McCain campaign, involving several prominent conservative bloggers, including myself. David Miller interviewed Power Line's Paul Mirengoff as well, and wrote an interesting article about the intersection of political campaigns and independent bloggers -- a timely piece, given the controversy over John Edwards and his recent hires. Miller asked me what I thought the campaign hoped to accomplish by engaging with bloggers who had expressed serious criticism of their candidate: Republican John McCain's campaign faces a different problem: Despite leading in polls of GOP primary voters, many conservative bloggers don't like him and don't trust him. In particular, they take issue with the campaign finance overhaul law he co-sponsored in 2002. A frequent complaint on blogs is that the measure curtails free speech and — hitting closer to home — contains provisions that threatened to severely restrict the activity...
One of the great parts about doing the Northern Alliance Radio shows on Saturdays has been the terrific people I have met during our three-year run. One of the nicest is Matt Reynolds, our crack producer for the last few months. Matt and his wife Amber have entered into the adoption process to add a baby from Guatemala to their young family, but as anyone who has knowledge of international adoptions can attest, it costs a lot of money to successfully complete an adoption. Tomorrow night, we will attend a fundraiser for Matt and Amber at the Maple Grove Evangelical Free Church from 6-9 pm. Chipotle is donating the catering, which means we will have some excellent and healthy Mexican food for attendees. Here is Matt's description of the festivities: Fundraising Fiesta for Hezekiah is on Feb 10th from 6-9 pm with a silent auction and a Mexican dinner. If...
February 10, 2007
The Northern Alliance Radio Network will be on the air today, with our six-hour-long broadcast schedule starting at 11 am CT. The first two hours features Power Line's John Hinderaker and Chad and Brian from Fraters Libertas. Mitch and I hit the airwaves for the second shift from 1-3 pm CT, and King Banaian and Michael Broadkorb have The Final Word from 3-5. If you're in the Twin Cities, you can hear us on AM 1280 The Patriot, or on the station's Internet stream if you're outside of the broadcast area. Last week, we had the Oh Crap I Live In Minnesota edition. This week, it's the Balmy Weather edition -- you have to be balmy to be out in it. It's -9 now, but the weatherman promises it will be +11 at some point today ... probably while I'm in the studio. Be sure to call and join the...
The Mecca accord which appears to have halted the slide towards civil war in the Palestinian territories -- at least momentarily -- has not produced any movement towards peace with Israel. In fact, it appears that Hamas has won a victory for its policy on Israel, which means that even the weak prospects for peace under Mahmoud Abbas appear dead: Officials from Hamas and Israel dashed hopes yesterday that a Palestinian unity deal reached in the Saudi holy city of Mecca would end a crippling economic embargo or lead to a resumption of Palestinian-Israeli peace talks. "Our battle with the Israeli enemy is still on," Fathi Hamad, a Hamas leader in Gaza's Jebaliya refugee camp, told thousands of supporters. He urged militant groups to resume attacks on Israel and denied that Hamas would respect past peace deals with the Jewish state -- a central element of the accord between Hamas...
The Washington Post reports on an odd development in the 2008 Presidential primary race to acquire endorsements early in the cycle. The populist personal-injury attorney turned politician, John Edwards, had locked up the backing of the American Association for Justice in 2004 when he ran for President. Now, however, the litigator's group has decided to keep an open mind, and even bypassed Edwards for the keynote speech in favor of Joe Biden: In the last presidential election, John Edwards had the powerful support and deep pockets of the nation's trial lawyers behind him. But when the lawyers gather for their winter conference today in Miami Beach, it will be Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr. (D-Del.) delivering the meeting's keynote speech. Edwards, a trial lawyer who became a senator and now a presidential candidate, will be there, too. But the North Carolina Democrat no longer has a lock on the backing...
American officials have begun to get closer to revealing the evidence of Iranian involvement in attacks on US troops in Iraq. Several sources within the Pentagon have talked with reporters about the issue, informing them of the details, including the manufacture of specific weapons found on insurgents. The New York Times leads with the story this morning: The most lethal weapon directed against American troops in Iraq is an explosive-packed cylinder that United States intelligence asserts is being supplied by Iran. The assertion of an Iranian role in supplying the device to Shiite militias reflects broad agreement among American intelligence agencies, although officials acknowledge that the picture is not entirely complete. In interviews, civilian and military officials from a broad range of government agencies provided specific details to support what until now has been a more generally worded claim, in a new National Intelligence Estimate, that Iran is providing “lethal...
When the US invasion of Iraq deposed Saddam Hussein, it ended the very tangible support for terrorists provided by the Iraqi tyrant: payment for Palestinian suicide bombers. Saddam paid families of suicide bombers $25,000 each after a successful attack against Israeli or Western targets, a kind of life insurance for the terminally unstable. Now a leading Arab bank appears to have picked up where Saddam left off, and is issuing life insurance policies for suicidal jihadis. Der Spiegel reports on what happened after a Palestinian suicide bomber blew himself up in a Jerusalem bus: A few weeks after the suicide bombing, the phone at the home of Bassam Takruri's parents rang. On the other end of the line was a representative of Muassafat Usar al Shuhada, or "The Organization of Martyr Families." He told Bassam's mother that the family had received money, but that they would have to open an...
He only has two years of national office under his belt, and has not even faced a credible opponent. He has few legislative accomplishments for his resumé, and no executive experience at all. For the Democratic Party in 2008, that apparently makes Barack Obama the #2 candidate for the Presidential nomination behind Hillary Clinton, a position Obama assumed with his official announcement of candidacy a few minutes ago: Democrat Barack Obama declared himself a candidate Saturday for the White House in 2008, evoking Abraham Lincoln's ability to unite a nation and promising to lead a new generation as the country's first black president. The first-term senator announced his candidacy from the state capital where he began his elective career just 10 years ago, and in front of the building where in another century, Lincoln served eight years in the Illinois Legislature. "We can build a more hopeful America," Obama said...
Just when Liberal politicians thought it safe to go into the water, it turns out that Adscam still may lie beneath the calm surface of Canadian politics. The National Post reports this morning that Adscam witnesses may have lied to either the Gomery Inquiry or to a Parliamentary committee, and some in the Commons want to pursue perjury charges (via Newsbeat1): MPs went behind closed doors Wednesday night to decide whether to pursue perjury charges against half a dozen politicians and bureaucrats who said one thing at the Gomery inquiry and another when they testified before the Commons public accounts committee. The MPs on the committee were confronted with the decision when they received a report that compared "discrepancies" in the testimony of key witnesses. The witnesses appeared first at the committee's hearings into why the sponsorship program went off the rails in 2003 and were later called to testify...
Nancy Pelosi and the Democrats won their majority in part on the promise to clean up Congress. In particular, they railed against the influence of lobbyists and their ability to curry favor with legislators through free trips and other perks. The new majority passed a slew of new rules that supposedly ended these abuses, but as it turns out, all they did was require more featherbedding: The 110th Congress opened with the passage of sweeping new rules intended to curb the influence of lobbyists by prohibiting them from treating lawmakers to meals, trips, stadium box seats or the discounted use of private jets. But it did not take long for lawmakers to find ways to keep having fun while lobbyists pick up the tab. In just the last two months, lawmakers invited lobbyists to help pay for a catalog of outings: lavish birthday parties in a lawmaker’s honor ($1,000 a...
February 11, 2007
Imagine my surprise when the New York Times ran an op-ed yesterday on the evils of an overly large federal government and the wisdom of following the Constitutional framework for sovereign states united in common defense. Gar Alperovitz writes approvingly of Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger's latest speech comparing California to the nation-states of Athens and Sparta, and warns that America is getting too big to be a "functional democracy", recommending regional interstate alliances on such issues as health care and environmentalism: SOMETHING interesting is happening in California. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger seems to have grasped the essential truth that no nation — not even the United States — can be managed successfully from the center once it reaches a certain scale. Moreover, the bold proposals that Mr. Schwarzenegger is now making for everything from universal health care to global warming point to the kind of decentralization of power which, once started, could...
Am I the only conservative with misgivings regarding John Howard's proclamation about Barack Obama? Howard, the Prime Minister of Australia and a great friend to the United States, wants to wage an aggressive war against al-Qaeda and radical Islamist terrorists. Australians have been brutally targeted twice in Bali, with hundreds of them dead from suicide bombers, and their proximity to Indonesia makes them well aware of the dangers of appeasement to Muslim extremists. However, I think Howard went too far today in involving himself in the next American election: Australia's conservative prime minister slammed Barack Obama on Sunday over his opposition to the Iraq war, a day after the first-term U.S. senator announced his intention to run for the White House in 2008. ... Australian Prime Minister John Howard, a staunch Bush ally who has sent troops to Iraq and faces his own re-election bid later this year, said Obama's...
Conservatives have mistrusted John McCain for five years, ever since he teamed with Russ Feingold to pass the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act. The pair intended on ending checkbook politics by restricting the rights of groups to advertise their political arguments while mentioning incumbents in the final 60 days of a campaign, among other restrictions. Well, time has a way of changing things. The Washington Post reports today that McCain has reversed himself in fact if not in policy by actively pursuing some of the same checkbooks the BCRA supposedly excluded from politics: Just about a year and a half ago, Sen. John McCain went to court to try to curtail the influence of a group to which A. Jerrold Perenchio gave $9 million, saying it was trying to "evade and violate" new campaign laws with voter ads ahead of the midterm elections. As McCain launches his own presidential campaign, however,...
Can Rudy Giuliani inspire the Republicans in the bluest of regions but with the reddest of blood? He seems to have answered that question in Sacramento, where the enthusiasm for his speech contrasted sharply with the polite but tepid response to one given earlier by the Republican Governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger: Rudolph W. Giuliani came west to learn whether his brand of Republican politics has a chance among party members significantly more conservative than himself. By the time he had received a fourth standing ovation Saturday at the California Republican Party convention, the answer seemed clear. Equating the U.S. fight against terrorism with the Civil War and the Cold War, Giuliani told about 750 of his party's faithful that failure in Iraq would turn that country into a "massive headquarters for terrorism." "Having had a job where I didn't have any choice but to make a decision," the former mayor of...
The proponents of man-made climate change want to force an end to the debate over the causes of global warming. Some want to treat skeptics as if they were Holocaust deniers or heretics of old. However, some scientists still have their doubts about whether global warming is real, and whether man has any impact on it at all: Twenty years ago, climate research became politicised in favour of one particular hypothesis, which redefined the subject as the study of the effect of greenhouse gases. As a result, the rebellious spirits essential for innovative and trustworthy science are greeted with impediments to their research careers. And while the media usually find mavericks at least entertaining, in this case they often imagine that anyone who doubts the hypothesis of man-made global warming must be in the pay of the oil companies. As a result, some key discoveries in climate research go almost...
February 12, 2007
The death of Saparmurat Niyazov gave Turkmenistan an opportunity ti shake off decades of rule by personality cult and to allow Turkmen to make a step or two towards democracy and self-rule. Unfortunately, the results show that the cult leaders remain in control, as the vote appears rigged to elect Gerbanguly Berdymukhamedov, a Niyazov confidante, as his replacement: Turkmenistan held the first officially contested presidential elections in its history on Sunday, conducting a carefully choreographed vote almost certain to be won by a confidant of the reclusive Central Asian nation’s former autocratic leader, who died seven weeks ago. The election was organized by the tightly controlled state after Saparmurat Niyazov, the only president in the nation’s 15-year history, died on Dec. 21. It was not formally monitored by international observers, who sent small teams of experts that are not expected to make any public statement about the government’s conduct. But...
My, how quickly five lifetimes fly by! The notorious Baader-Meinhof terrorist Brigitte Mohnhaupt has won parole from Germany and will be released shortly. Despite involvement in nine murders and being sentenced to five life terms, a German court has decided that she poses no risk to society: A former member of the Baader-Meinhof gang is to be freed on probation after serving 24 years for her involvement in kidnappings and murders in the 1970s. A German court ruled that Brigitte Mohnhaupt, 57, qualifies for early release after serving a minimum proportion of her five life sentences. The group, also known as the Red Army Faction, were behind kidnaps and killings in West Germany. ... The BBC's Steve Rosenberg, in Berlin, says she was once described as the most evil and dangerous woman in West Germany. Well, that was back at the tail end of an era that still believed in...
Yesterday I wrote about the Washington Post article that reported on the financial alliances John McCain has begun to build with financiers he previously criticized for their involvement in 527s. Later that evening, I received a note from the McCain campaign complaining that the Post article had been unfair in its treatment of McCain, and I offered an opportunity for a rebuttal. I had planned to add it to the original post, but it makes more sense to offer it as a separate thread for CQ readers: The story's headline and central premise are inaccurate. This notion that there is a wide gulf between McCain the reformer and McCain the candidate is not borne out by the facts. Sen. McCain recognizes that if the FEC and Congress do nothing on 527s then Democrats and Republicans alike will use them. This is hardly an endorsement of 527s and the article would...
The Democrats can forget about the 2008 primary being a love-in. The same weekend that Barack Obama threw his hat into the ring, he also aimed a few brickbats at the front-runner over her vote on the war in Iraq. Obama wants to make a clear delineation between himself and Hillary Clinton as the obvious standardbearer for the Left: Senators Obama and Clinton banged heads over the Iraq war yesterday, marking their first dustup since the start of the presidential campaign. Just a day after officially announcing his candidacy in Illinois, Mr. Obama took aim at Mrs. Clinton's vote to authorize the war, saying, "I think the war was a tragic mistake and it never should have been authorized." Mrs. Clinton's vote is the one issue that has been dogging her thus far in the campaign. Otherwise, enthusiastic crowds have been giving her standing ovations on her proposals covering everything...
In a sign that the international sanctions have begun to bite, Iran has softened its tone and reached out to European diplomats for a new round of talks. They're not offering anything but that softer tone as a carrot, however: Facing the prospect of broader international sanctions, Iran's president and national security chief on Sunday offered to resume negotiations over their country's nuclear program and eased up on some of the contentious rhetoric of the past, including threats to destroy Israel. In Munich, Ali Larijani, Iran's top nuclear negotiator, briefly met with European diplomats for the first time since talks collapsed in September and said Iran was willing to return to formal discussions. He also said his country had "no intention of aggression against any country," adding that Iran "posed no threat to Israel" in particular, despite past vows from Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to wipe Israel "off the map."...
Well, this is about as pithy as it gets: Several potential Republican presidential candidates, including Arizona Sen. John McCain and former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney as well as Giuliani, have supported Bush's plan to add more than 20,000 troops to U.S. forces in Iraq. The major Democratic candidates have opposed the move. Several are senators who have advocated a nonbinding resolution condemning the buildup. "In the business world, if two weeks were spent on a nonbinding resolution, it would be considered nonproductive," Giuliani told the lunch crowd, setting off a burst of laughter. He called the concept "a comment without making a decision." America, he added, is "very fortunate to have President Bush." "Presidents can't do nonbinding resolutions. Presidents have to make decisions and move the country forward, and that's the kind of president that I would like to be, a president who makes decisions." That's the difference between legislators...
Once again, the folks at GOP Bloggers take the temperature of the conservative blogosphere in another straw poll of primary candidates. Results will be reported by state and blog, which gives CQ readers a chance to see where the candidates stand with our own community. Obviously this is not scientific, but it's always interesting to see the results:...
The six-party talks on North Korean nuclear disarmament have apparently reached a breakthrough. The Chinese offered a new agreement that appears to have won over all six nations, and a fresh resolution could be signed as early as tomorrow: There is new hope that North Korea may be nearing a nuclear disarmament agreement. A compromise was reached that would give North Korea one million tons of fuel oil and electricity, ABC News' Martha Raddatz has learned. The major sticking point in the six-party-talks in Beijing had been North Korea's demand for an energy package. The country had requested two million tons of fuel oil and two million kilowatts of power before it would agree to begin shutting down its nuclear program. While the deal gives North Korea half of what it initially demanded, it's twice as much fuel oil as was offered to Kim Jong Il during the Clinton adminstration's...
Amanda Marcotte resigned her position in the John Edwards presidential campaign today after spending the last week defending her past essays on her group blog. Having weathered the initial storm, Marcotte apparently decided that the controversy would prove too distracting for the Edwards campaign: One of the chief campaign bloggers for Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards quit Monday after conservative critics raised questions about her history of provocative online messages. Amanda Marcotte posted on her personal blog, Pandagon, that the criticism "was creating a situation where I felt that every time I coughed, I was risking the Edwards campaign." Marcotte said she resigned from her position Monday, and that her resignation was accepted by the campaign. Kate Bedingfield, a spokeswoman for the Edwards campaign, confirmed that Marcotte was "no longer working for the campaign." She declined additional comment. ... "No matter what you think about the campaign, I signed on...
February 13, 2007
The London Telegraph takes a look at the reality behind the rhetoric that surrounds Fidel Castro's Cuba and sees a simmering tension between the haves and the have-nots on the island. Far from being a worker's paradise free from class distinctions, the Cuban currency games have created an underclass that breeds resentment: In the hushed tones that all Cubans adopt when they talk about their ailing leader Fidel Castro, who six months ago was forced to hand over the reins of power to his younger brother Raul after undergoing emergency surgery for intestinal bleeding, Carlos explained the continuing frustration of a nation still firmly under Communist rule. "Fidel has starved us," he whispered. "Yes, there is a lack of food but it is more than that. We are starving for information, for opportunity, for freedom. We want to enjoy the same things as those people over there," he said as...
In his on-off-on campaign against radical Islamist terrorists, the actions of Pakistan's Pervez Musharraf sometimes call into question his tenacity against militant Islam. He faces another such moment in Islamabad, the Pakistani capital, as hard-line imams have build a madrassa illegally on public land. They have threatened a wave of terrorism if Musharraf dismantles it, drawing a line in the sand at the heart of Pakistan: A children's library in Pakistan's capital Islamabad has become the frontline of a tense standoff between President Pervez Musharraf's government and Islamist extremists. Scores of burka-clad female students are occupying the public library in protest at plans to demolish Jamia Hafsa, a religious school that houses 7,000 students but was illegally built on public land. The protesters, aged between seven and 30, have threatened to violently resist any police operation to end their sit-in; some have threatened to become suicide bombers. ... The madrasa...
Hillary Clinton apparently feels the heat from Barack Obama already. Campaigning in New Hampshire, where her husband won the nickname of Comeback Kid with his second-place finish in 1992 after the first of the bimbo eruptions, she hid behind Bill's, er, skirts to pump up her own candidacy: As she made her first outing to New Hampshire as a presidential candidate last weekend, Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton left her husband at home, yet she tried to tap his old political magic at nearly every turn. Mrs. Clinton, Democrat of New York, mentioned Mr. Clinton at least eight times on Saturday — at one point talking about “Bill’s heart surgery” to illuminate her own travails with health care bureaucracy — and a few times on Sunday, most memorably when she said of Republicans, “Bill and I have beaten them before, and we will again.” For the first time in her bid...
Fans of the NFL might have figured that any coach with a 14-2 record in the regular season would have had no worries about his employment in the 2007 season. For most teams, that would have been true, but apparently not in San Diego. Marty Schottenheimer finds himself unceremoniously dumped by the Chargers after one of its best seasons: Marty Schottenheimer performed well enough to go 14-2 last season despite what team president Dean Spanos called a "dysfunctional situation" between the coach and his general manager. Less than a month after San Diego's NFL-best 14-2 season was wrecked in a home playoff loss to New England, Spanos said the exodus of assistant coaches -- the two coordinators became NFL head coaches and two assistants became coordinators -- contributed to an "untenable" situation that resulted in the coach being fired. Schottenheimer is due more than $3 million for the final year...
Hot Air noted a new message from al-Qaeda's second in command, Ayman al-Zawahiri, which pledges allegiance to Mullah Omar and the Taliban. He urges Muslims to unite behind Omar, but makes no mention of his AQ chief Osama bin Laden, who has gone silent for a long period of time: In a message released Monday, al Qaeda's No. 2 leader called on Muslims to unite under Taliban leader Mullah Omar, stop trying to form secular governments and instead follow strict Islamic Sharia law. The message from Ayman al-Zawahiri, the top aide to al Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden, appeared on an Islamist Web site. ... Al-Zawahiri pledged allegiance to Mullah Omar and called on all his followers to reject animosity and differences and come together under Mullah Omar's banner. Mullah Omar is the elusive, shadowy Taliban leader who slipped away in the early days of the war in Afghanistan. The...
The Telegraph reports this morning that rifles imported from Austria by Iran have surfaced among insurgents in Iraq. Steyr-Mannlicher exported 800 of its high-powered HS50 models, capable of piercing body armor, to the National Iranian Police Association for their anti-narcotics efforts: Austrian sniper rifles that were exported to Iran have been discovered in the hands of Iraqi terrorists, The Daily Telegraph has learned. More than 100 of the.50 calibre weapons, capable of penetrating body armour, have been discovered by American troops during raids. The guns were part of a shipment of 800 rifles that the Austrian company, Steyr-Mannlicher, exported legally to Iran last year. The sale was condemned in Washington and London because officials were worried that the weapons would be used by insurgents against British and American troops. This appears to aubstantiate the findings of the Department of Defense, presented this weekend, that Iran has actively supplied weapons to...
Well, so much for the whole 72 virgins thing and the radical Islamist desire to die in martyrdom: The story tonight in Iraq is not the arrival of more U.S. troops, but the departure of one of the country's most powerful men, Moqtada al Sadr and members of his army. According to senior military officials al Sadr left Baghdad two to three weeks ago, and fled to Tehran, Iran, where he has family. Al Sadr commands the Mahdi Army, one of the most formidable insurgent militias in Iraq, and his move coincides with the announced U.S. troop surge in Baghdad. Sources believe al Sadr is worried about an increase of 20,000 U.S. troops in the Iraqi capital. One official told ABC News' Martha Raddatz, "He is scared he will get a JDAM [bomb] dropped on his house." Sources say some of the Mahdi army leadership went with al Sadr. This...
Today brings news from all three major Republican primary candidates in the 2008 Presidential race. It started with a formal announcement from Mitt Romney of his candidacy for the nomination, followed by an unusual endorsement for Rudy Giuliani, and winds up tonight here at CQ with a preview of an in-depth interview I conducted with Governor Tim Pawlenty, John McCain's national co-chair of his exploratory committee. I'll be playing the entire interview on my Thursday night talk show, CQ Radio: TP: On campaign finance reform, you have a lot of conservatives who are concerned about it from a First Amendment standpoint. I think it is fair to say that some reforms were in order, because you have interest groups that were wielding so much clout, leading to so many scandals that a cleaning up of the process, or at least an improvement of the process was in order. I don't...
February 14, 2007
The capture of more than a hundred sniper rifles in Iraq that had previously been sold to Iranian police agencies had the manufacturer backpedaling yesterday. The London Telegraph reports that the Austrian government and the Steyr corporation both denied any responsibility or knowledge of an arms transfer from Teheran to Iraqi insurgents: Austria yesterday washed its hands of any responsibility after it was revealed that powerful sniper rifles it sold to Iran had been acquired by insurgents in Iraq. The Daily Telegraph revealed yesterday that American troops had recovered more than 100 Steyr HS50 Mannlicher rifles, part of a consignment of 800 sold to Iran by Austria last year, during a series of raids in Iraq. Astrid Harz, a spokesman for the Austrian foreign ministry, said yesterday that the sale had been "checked very thoroughly" and what happened to the rifles after they were delivered to Teheran ostensibly for use...
Two prominent black politicians from South Carolina endorsed Hillary Clinton over Barack Obama yesterday, but one of them Bidenized himself by declaring the Democrats losers if they nominated a black man for President. Robert Ford told the Associated Press that he wouldn't "kill himself" by endorsing Obama: Two key black political leaders in South Carolina who backed John Edwards in 2004 said Tuesday they are supporting Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's bid for the Democratic presidential nomination. State Sens. Robert Ford and Darrell Jackson told The Associated Press they believe Clinton is the only Democrat who can win the presidency. Both said they had been courted by Illinois Sen. Barack Obama; Ford said Obama winning the primary would drag down the rest of the party. "It's a slim possibility for him to get the nomination, but then everybody else is doomed," Ford said. "Every Democrat running on that ticket next year...
The Italians prevented a literal blast from the past when they arrested 15 remnants of the Red Brigades overnight. The group may have seemed defunct, but apparently at least one cell remained operational, and it planned to attack their "capitalist" target, a Milan newspaper, in the near future: It began with the chance discovery in a Milan basement of a very unusual bicycle. Chief Superintendent Giuseppina Suma described how, following a tip off, police had examined the bike and found "a minute camera in the front light and a radio transmitter under the saddle". It was the start of a three-year investigation that led this week to more than 80 raids in four Italian cities and the arrest of 15 people for alleged offences that seemed like echoes of an anguished past. Italians opening their newspapers yesterday could be forgiven for thinking they had fallen into a time warp and...
... and they come from across the political spectrum. From conservative hard-liners such as John Bolton to Bush critic and Presidential wanna-be Joe Biden, the White House has come under heavy criticism for different aspects of the deal: The deal that could lead North Korea to shut its main nuclear reactor came under criticism from both ends of the political spectrum immediately after it was announced on Tuesday. From the right, hardliners argued that the United States should have held out until North Korea agreed to fully declare and dismantle its entire nuclear program. From the left, Democrats argued that the deal was no better than one they said the United States could have gotten four years ago, before North Korea tested a nuclear bomb. If the agreement holds — pacts with North Korea have a history of falling through — it could put the United States and Japan on...
Confidential campaign documents have again surfaced from the Rudy Giuliani campaign that will embarrass the candidate and provide fodder for his opponents. A month after a recent campaign strategy book fell into the hands of the New York Observer, a private evaluation of Giuliani by his mayoral campaign in 1993 wound up on The Smoking Gun yesterday: Sometimes in politics, the most damaging accusations come from your own staff. Rudolph W. Giuliani learned that lesson again yesterday when a "vulnerability study," including warnings about his "weirdness factor" and other perceived liabilities, surfaced from his second campaign for New York mayor, 14 years ago. Last month, the New York Daily News obtained a secret blueprint for Giuliani's expected Republican presidential bid that detailed concerns such as his liberal views on social issues and his messy divorce from his second wife, Donna Hanover. The 1993 report by two aides in Giuliani's mayoral...
France has conducted a series of raids overnight that have netted eleven suspected al-Qaeda terrorists. The investigators followed the men over the last few months as an off-shoot of a wider counterterrorism mission: French counterterrorism police arrested 11 suspects as part of efforts aimed at dismantling an alleged al-Qaida-linked recruiting network to send radical Islamic fighters to Iraq, police officials said Wednesday. Nine suspects were detained in and near the southern city of Toulouse before dawn Wednesday, following the arrest of two others at Orly airport in Paris who had just been sent home by Syrian authorities, police said. Two of the suspects, mostly aged in their 20s, had sought to enter Iraq through neighboring Syria, but were detained by police there and remanded into French custody, police said. An investigation was continuing. This ring did not just work to send jihadis to Iraq. They also found evidence that the...
He's acknowledged as the philosophical leader of the conservative movement, and led the Republican revolution of 1994 to start a 12-year run of GOP control of Congress -- a period that ended in last year's midterm elections. Now he's rumored to be considering a Presidential campaign and consistently scores highly among blog readers, even though he insists that he wants to focus on his ongoing, myriad projects. Newt Gingrich continues to be one of the most intriguing figures in American politics, and I will be interviewing him for tomorrow's CQ Radio show at 9 pm CT. Barring any last-minute schedule conflicts -- and those things happen -- the former Speaker and I will discuss the state of conservatism today, and its prospects for the 2008 election. We'll also catch up with his projects, which include a new 527, American Solutions for Winning the Future, as well as an event with...
National Review asked a number of political junkies to identify their political "Valentines" as a celebration of Valentine's Day today. Top-drawer conservative writers such as Mona Charen, Lucianne Goldberg, and Kathryn Jean Lopez all contribute to the symposium, and were kind enough to include me as well. I don't think CQ readers will find themselves shocked at my choice: One never forgets their first love, and it serves as a comparison for those that follow. For me, politics has been no different. While I have appreciated political figures over the years, such as Newt Gingrich, Rudy Giuliani, and John McCain (who I supported in 2000), none have ever had the same effect on me. Perhaps, someday, another Reagan will appear. Until then, I’ll remember the man who inspired my love of politics. Interestingly, this was the only Valentine received by the Gipper. Lady Margaret Thatcher got three of them, including...
As the new Democratic majority took control of Congress, bloggers across the spectrum generally agreed the Democrats had three options to satisfy their anti-war base and stage a meaningful objection to the war in Iraq. First, they could end all funding for the war, which would leave them with the responsibility for everything that followed afterwards. Second, they could issue no-confidence motions in an attempt to humiliate George Bush into withdrawing from Iraq. Third, they could run so many investigations into war management that it would force the Pentagon to use its resources on fighting political battles rather than wage war. Unfortunately, none of us considered a fourth option -- a slow bleed of funding that will allow Democrats to defund the war while blaming the White House for mismanaging the remaining resources: Top House Democrats, working in concert with anti-war groups, have decided against using congressional power to force...
While the debate rages over the location of Moqtada al-Sadr, the Guardian (UK) reports that the upper command structure of the Mahdi Army has also bugged out to Iran. A senior official in the Iraqi government tells Michael Howard that they have left Iraq to "regroup": Senior commanders of the Mahdi army, the militia loyal to the radical Shia cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, have been spirited away to Iran to avoid being targeted in the new security push in Baghdad, a high-level Iraqi official told the Guardian yesterday. On the day the Iraqi government formally launched its crackdown on insurgents and amid disputed claims about the whereabouts of Mr Sadr, the official said the Mahdi army leadership had withdrawn across the border into Iran to regroup and retrain. "Over the last three weeks, they [Iran] have taken away from Baghdad the first and second-tier military leaders of the Mahdi army," he...
The new surge strategy has hit the streets of Baghdad, and thus far, it seems the Iraqi street has not hit back. The AP reports that the Shi'ite neighborhoods on which the new surge has concentrated has either welcomed the soldiers or shrugged at their presence: The Baghdad neighborhoods targeted by the Americans — Shaab, Ur and Baida — lie north of the Shiite militia stronghold of Sadr City, which had been off-limits until Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki lifted his protection of the notorious Mahdi Army, the largest Shiite militia. Last year, U.S. soldiers came under intense sniper fire in those neighborhoods from Mahdi Army militiamen who were expanding into Shiite areas outside Sadr City. This time, however, Iraqis watched in curiosity as some 2,500-3,000 troops — or an entire Stryker brigade — fanned out in the area, going house-to-house looking for weapons or suspected militia fighters as part of...
February 15, 2007
Remember the wedding between Hamas and Fatah, and the big reception held by the Saudis in Mecca? It seems that the bride and groom have started consulting lawyers already: In another sign of tension with Hamas over a possible national unity government, the Palestinian Authority’s president, Mahmoud Abbas of the Fatah faction, canceled a televised speech scheduled for Thursday night, his aides said Wednesday. In the speech, Mr. Abbas was to have told Palestinians about his talks with Hamas leaders in Mecca, Saudi Arabia. But those talks, which ended last Thursday with a proclamation of success, left many details unresolved, including who would fill key posts like interior minister, which controls the Hamas-dominated parallel police force, known as the Executive Force. The details of a political program for the new government are also unclear. ... Reuters reported that another Abbas aide, who was not identified, said: “Hamas has made several...
Al Franken gave his listeners an expected going-away Valentine yesterday by announcing that he would seek the Democratic nomination for Norm Coleman's Senate seat. Franken had plowed the ground for this move since the 2004 election, and spent most of last year raising money for the DFL (Minnesota's Democratic Party) in order to bolster his credentials as a serious candidate. However, even some in the DFL apparently consider the comedian a bad joke as a candidate: As he announced his candidacy for the U.S. Senate Wednesday, Al Franken confronted the central question he may face in the early going -- whether a lifelong comic should be taken seriously. "Minnesotans have a right to be skeptical," Franken said in a video message on his campaign website that declared his run for the U.S. Senate seat now held by Republican Norm Coleman. "I want you to know: Nothing means more to me...
The controversy over the whereabouts of Moqtada al-Sadr has ended. An advisor to Nouri al-Maliki confirmed on the record that Sadr is in Iran, as the US reported earlier (via Michelle Malkin): An adviser to Iraq's prime minister said Thursday that radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr is in Iran, but denied he fled due to fear of arrest during an escalating security crackdown. Sami al-Askari said al-Sadr traveled to Iran by land "a few days ago," but gave no further details on how long he would stay in Iran. A member of al-Sadr's bloc in parliament, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of fear of reprisals, said al-Sadr left three weeks ago. "I confirm that Muqtada al-Sadr is in Iran on a visit," said al-Askari. "But I deny that his visit is a flight." Sadr's supporters insist that he is still in Iraq, but no one has seen the...
Eli Lake makes an important point in today's New York Sun about Hillary Clinton's zeal to restrict the military options of President Bush against Iran. When Hillary pronounced that Bush would have to come to Congress before launching any sort of attack against another country, specifically Iran, she seems to have forgotten the precedent set by her own husband eight years ago, and defended by her in October 2002: "It would be a mistake of historical proportion if the administration thought that the 2002 resolution authorizing force against Iraq was a blank check for the use of force against Iran without further congressional authorization," Mrs. Clinton said. "Nor should the president think that the 2001 resolution authorizing force after the terrorist attacks of 9/11 in any way authorizes force against Iran. If the administration believes that any, any use of force against Iran is necessary, the president must come to...
Since I'm under the weather today, I figured I'd watch President Bush give what's billed as an "important address" in the global war on terror to the American Enterprise Institute. 9:07 - He invokes Jeane Kirkpatrick and endorses the policy of the "universality of freedom". I'd say he will return to the focus on democratization ... 9:10 - He says he welcomes debate on wartime strategy, but that we should all agree that it is better to fight terrorists overseas on their turf rather than here on ours. Bush also went into a review of the cells discovered in other nations, and that those examples should prompt us to recognize that terrorists have not given up. 9:12 - Bush chose the surge strategy because it provides the best chance of success in Iraq. He's arguing why success is important, but that may no longer be the operative question. His critics...
Since I'm kicking back at home nursing a case of the creeping crud, I had an opportunity to participate in a conference call with officials at the Office of Management and Budget regarding the status of the federal spending database and website. The site, which has an interim announcement and commentary page, resulted from the efforts of Tom Coburn and Barack Obama in the previous session of Congress to create accountability for federal spending, and Congress mandated that it be operational by January 2008. Clay Johnson, Deputy Director for Management, Office of Management and Budget, and Robert Shea, Associate Director for Management, addressed a few of the bloggers who helped push the project last year. NZ Bear and Robert Bluey joined me for the update. Both men gave an optimistic view of the project, but wanted help in determining how the final project should look. They have made the wise...
Perhaps Norm Coleman just read the polling taken by KSTP-TV in the wake of Al Franken's announcement that the former Air America host will run for his Senate seat. The local ABC affiliate decided to test the waters in Minnesota for Franken, and they found that only 3500 of the 10,000 lakes feels warm enough for a Franken dip: U.S. Sen. Norm Coleman would win easily if he ends up facing comedian Al Franken in Minnesota's U.S. Senate race in 2008, according to an exclusive 5 EYEWITNESS NEWS/SURVEY USA poll. The popular comedian announced that he would seek the seat Wednesday on the last episode of his radio show. The poll shows Coleman getting 57 percent of the vote and Franken getting 35 percent. The poll also looked at a possible matchup between Coleman and attorney Mike Ciresi, who is also expected to seek the DFL nomination. Coleman also wins...
See lengthy update. One of the more tiresome aspects of Presidential campaigns is the Kabuki dance performed by the candidates regarding their status. Rudy Giuliani has come in for more criticism than most, although he has shown clearly that he intends to run for the Republican nomination. He made it even more clear on the Larry King show last night on CNN: Mr. Giuliani has behaved like a presidential candidate for months, forming an exploratory committee, raising money, building a campaign staff and making appearances around the country. But until now, he has repeatedly stopped short of a definitive statement of his intentions — even joking about his nondeclarations in recent days. Republican activists and consultants, citing his early withdrawal from the 2000 Senate race, said he needed to put to rest fears that he might not follow through. But in characteristic fashion, Mr. Giuliani said he would do things...
See updates -- NBC backing away from capture. Eight months ago, American forces killed the founder of al-Qaeda in Iraq, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who had run the organization since the American invasion three years earlier. Tonight, the Iraqis have his replacement in custody (via Hot Air): The leader of al-Qaida in Iraq was wounded and an aide was killed in a clash Thursday with Iraqi forces north of Baghdad, the Interior Ministry spokesman said. The clash occurred near Balad, a major U.S. base about 50 miles north of the capital, Brig. Gen Abdul-Karim Khalaf said. Khalaf said al-Qaida in Iraq leader Abu Ayyub al-Masri was wounded and his aide, identified as Abu Abdullah al-Majemaai, was killed. Sources tell NBC News that al-Masri is in custody. The new surge in Baghdad and Anbar intended on making the lives of terrorists more difficult. It seems to have succeeded in the case of...
As I have promised this week, we will have a blockbuster program tonight on CQ Radio, my BlogTalkRadio show at 9 pm CT tonight. During this week, I have conducted interviews with former Speaker Newt Gingrich and current Governor Tim Pawlenty. Pawlenty talked with me about his efforts as national co-chair of John McCain's presidential exploratory committee, discussing the points of conservative discontent with the Senator. Pawlenty is engaging and thoughtful, and his perspective on the campaign is intriguing. Newt Gingrich may have been one of the most challenging interviews I've ever conducted. Brilliant, outspoken, and with an excellent sense of history, Gingrich pulls no punches in this conversation. He analyzes the midterm elections, calls conservatives to arms to make a positive case for the agenda, and castigates the presidential candidates for jumping the gun on the electoral cycle. Our first topic is the critique he released today on...
February 16, 2007
Ed Morrissey: What do you see, going back to the election here, what do you see as John McCain's toughest hurdles in winning the nomination and how do you see yourself as being part of the solution to help him overcome them? Tim Pawlenty: Well I think Senator McCain is going to do very well in this process because people are going to -- you know, evaluate him again not just in a vacuum compared to their idea of the perfect, but they are also going to -- and I think he is, like I said in my view, a once in a generation leader. Someone who is I think right for the time both for the nation and for our party. But I think his biggest challenge is going to be to make sure that that his message of commonsense conservatism actually is heard by republican activists and republican...
Ed Morrissey: Well lets talk a little bit about the couple of issues that have -- conservatives concerned about John McCain's campaign. Tim Pawlenty: Sure. Ed Morrissey: That would be Campaign Finance Reform, which he pushed in 2002 and got passed the BCRA and integration reform which he partnered up with Ted Kennedy on last year, it didn't go through but it's certainly probably going to go through this year. Tim Pawlenty: Yeah, on Campaign Finance Reform, you know, you have the -- a lot of conservatives who are concerned about it from a first amendment standpoint. I think it is fair to say that some reforms were in order because you have interest groups who were -- you know, yielding so much cloud and leading to -- I think -- back in old days number of scandals, that some cleaning up of the process or with improvement in the...
Below is the transcript of the interview I conducted of Tim Pawlenty, broadcasted yesterday on my CQ Radio show. I've broken it up into three posts. Be sure to listen to the podcast on my site for the live interview and my commentary. Ed Morrissey: This is Ed Morrissey and I'm welcoming Governor Tim Pawlenty, Minnesota Governor and National co chair of the John McCain for President campaign. Welcome Governor Pawlenty. Tim Pawlenty: Well thank you Ed and of course at this point I'm just co chair of the exploratory committee because Senator McCain hasn’t yet announced his candidacy. But we are hoping that he will soon. Ed Morrissey: That's a good point to make. And that brings me to actually my first question. It seems to me that the presidential cycle has really been expended and accelerated in this particular 2008 campaign. Does it seem that way to you...
The latest attempt to end the sanctions that have crippled the Palestinian Authority appear to have failed. The White House informed Mahmoud Abbas that all Palestinian Authority Cabinet ministers would have persona non grata status until the new unity government complies with the Quartet demands to recognize Israel and reject violence: American officials have told the Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, that they will boycott all ministers in a new coalition cabinet unless the government meets international conditions, including recognition of Israel, Palestinian officials said yesterday. The warning indicates the extent of Washington's unease at the agreement reached in Mecca last week between the rival Palestinian groups, Hamas and Fatah. It comes just before a meeting in Jerusalem on Monday between the US secretary of state, Condoleezza Rice, the Israeli prime minister, Ehud Olmert, and Mr Abbas. The boycott means that any Fatah leaders who join the new government will be...
Scientists have made the first practical eye prosthetic that restores vision, the London Telegraph reports. Six patients have been able to distinguish light patterns and even recognize shapes after the implant of the Argus II system: A bionic eye that can restore sight to the blind could be on the market within two years, according to scientists. The first six patients to try the revolutionary devices have learnt how to detect light, distinguish between objects and perceive direction of motion. American scientists were this week given approval to test a more advanced version of the electronic retinal implant on up to 75 subjects. The breakthrough offers new hope to millions of people around the world who have lost their vision to degenerative eye diseases, particularly those with macular degeneration - the most common cause of blindness in western countries. Up to 15pc of over-75s are affected by the condition. It...
The Washington Post needs better headline writers. Today's story on Republican defections to the anti-surge resolution in the House implies that a massive revolt has taken place in the GOP over the war. Instead, we find out that around 6.5% of the caucus will vote with the Democrats: Broad Swath of GOP Defecting on Iraq Vote From the moderate suburbs of Delaware to the rural, conservative valleys of eastern Tennessee, House Republican opponents of President Bush's latest Iraq war plan cut across the GOP's ideological and regional spectrum. Numbering a dozen or more, these House Republicans have emerged as some of the most prominent opponents of the plan to increase troop presence in Iraq. They admit to being a ragtag band, with no scheduled meetings and little political cohesion. "We aren't organized at all," said Rep. Jim Ramstad (R-Minn.), whose district includes suburbs of the Twin Cities. "It's about as...
William "Dollar Bill" Jefferson, under investigation for corruption, has been assigned to the House Homeland Security Committee, the Washington Post reports. The Congressman's last brush with security was having subpoenas served on his office and FBI agents raiding it, after earlier finding $90,000 in his freezer: Rep. William Jefferson, the Louisiana Democrat who's facing an ongoing federal corruption probe, is being granted a spot on the Homeland Security Committee, according to Democratic aides. The appointment will be announced Friday, according to one aide who requested anonymity because the decision isn't yet official. Jefferson was removed from his seat on the Ways and Means Committee, one of the most important panels in Congress, by Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi (Calif.) last summer in an attempt to show how seriously Democrats viewed the allegations of corruption. But the move by Pelosi, who was still minority leader at the time, infuriated members of the...
Howard Kurtz profiles Michelle Malkin in today's Washington Post -- if you'll forgive my pun -- and, as usual, Kurtz writes a balanced and interesting article on one of the most intriguing New Media figures. The portrait of a committed, passionate, and tough voice matches with my own experience with Michelle: Is this merely how the war of ideas is waged in an anything-goes digital culture? Or is Malkin an especially inflammatory practitioner, torching her targets with such books as "Unhinged: Exposing Liberals Gone Wild"? Over lunch at a Filipino cafe at Union Station, Malkin, who has two young children, is charming one moment and pugnacious the next. She says she loves the intellectual freedom of the blogosphere, where "you can respond, you can reveal people to be the liars and slanderers they are." Between bites, though, you can catch a glimpse of amazement that "a small-town girl from South...
The Democrats passed the House resolution objecting to the new surge strategy in Iraq even as American soldiers began to apply it in earnest. House leadership had predicted a wave of Republican support for the non-binding proposal, but in the end they could only get 17 Republicans to cross the aisle -- and managed to lose two of their own: After four days of emotional debate over the extent of presidential powers in wartime and the proper role of Congress, the House of Representatives adopted a resolution today denouncing President Bush’s plan to send more American troops to Iraq. The 246 to 182 vote in favor of the non-binding but nevertheless important measure set the stage for a crucial Senate debate on Saturday on how to debate the administration’s Iraq policy, or indeed whether it should be debated at all. There had been virtually no doubt about the outcome in...
I'll be joining Rob Breckenridge on CHQR's The World Tonight at 9 pm CT. We'll be discussing the presidential campaign as well as Al Franken's announcement for the Minnesota Senate. I imagine that today's vote in the House might get a mention, too. Be sure to tune in on the Internet stream if you don't live in the Calgary area. UPDATE: As always, I had a lot of fun with Rob. We did two segments tonight, and we covered quite a bit of territory. The best part, though, was being able to say, "I talked with Newt Gingrich yesterday, and he said ..."...
February 17, 2007
The Northern Alliance Radio Network will be on the air today, with our six-hour-long broadcast schedule starting at 11 am CT. The first two hours features Power Line's John Hinderaker and Chad and Brian from Fraters Libertas. Mitch and I hit the airwaves for the second shift from 1-3 pm CT, and King Banaian and Michael Broadkorb have The Final Word from 3-5. If you're in the Twin Cities, you can hear us on AM 1280 The Patriot, or on the station's Internet stream if you're outside of the broadcast area. Today Mitch and I will certainly be discussing the House non-binding resolution, along with Jim Ramstad's aisle-crossing to support the Democrats on declaring defeat. We'll also be watching the Senate, which will take up the House resolution today in a rare Saturday session. We may also play parts of the Newt Gingrich interview I conducted on Thursday, the entirety...
After the House approved the non-binding resolution calling the surge strategy a failure before the military implements it, the Senate prepared a rare Saturday session to vote on the bill. Harry Reid wants to have no debate or alternative resolutions and will force a cloture vote around 12:45: Determined to check President Bush, Democratic critics of the Iraq war hope a strong House vote critical of the administration's troop buildup will pay dividends in the Senate. But Republicans are insisting on an alternative that rejects any reduction in troop funding, making it unlikely Democrats will prevail in a test vote Saturday. "Americans deserve to know whether their senator stands with the president and his plan to deepen our military commitment in Iraq, or with the overwhelming majority of Americans who oppose this escalation," Majority Leader Harry Reid said Friday on the eve of the Senate showdown. ... Earlier this month,...
With all of the focus on Baghdad and the surge, the second portion of the President's new strategy has gotten little attention. Four thousand Marines have begun arriving in Anbar, the power base for al-Qaeda in Iraq, in order to clear the province of these terrorists. They may find their job a little easier than first thought, as the savagery of AQI has turned many tribal leaders against the extremists: Sunni tribes in troubled Anbar province have begun working closely with U.S. and government forces, contributing nearly 2,400 men to the police department and 1,600 to a newly organized tribal security force, authorities say. U.S. troops are training and equipping the new tribal forces, which are called Emergency Response Units (ERUs), and are charged with defending the areas where they live, according to the local U.S. commander. By a U.S. count, 12 of the Ramadi area's 21 tribes are cooperating...
John McCain enjoys wide popularity in Arizona as one of the two Republicans it sends to the Senate, the other being Jon Kyl. He regularly gets 70% or above in approval ratings, and has made himself almost as much of an institution as Barry Goldwater there. However, trouble has been brewing for his Presidential aspirations as Republican organizers in Arizona have begun planning some unpleasant surprises for their favorite son: No doubt about it, Senator John McCain, the Arizona Republican who would like to be president, is a popular man in his state, having won re-election in 2004 with about 76 percent of the vote. But a vocal slice of the state’s most conservative Republicans, reflecting concerns about Mr. McCain held by some conservatives nationwide, are agitating against him in a way that they hope might throw off his incipient presidential campaign. In a recent telephone poll by Arizona State...
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice made an unannounced trip to Baghdad to personally observe the start of the new surge strategy. Rice told reporters that she's "pleased" with the initial implementation, and that the increased American troops will have a big impact on the city's security: U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice arrived Saturday in Baghdad to assess the security crackdown there, she told reporters traveling with her on the unannounced visit. Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki and Rice will discuss security and reconstruction in various provinces across the war-ravaged nation. She will meet with U.S. and other Iraqi officials, an embassy spokesman said. The secretary is scheduled to visit Israel and the Palestinian territories after the talks in Baghdad. Rice said she had been told the Iraqis are "doing the job alongside their coalition counterparts and they are off to a good start." The military command has taken a...
The unbelievable cynicism of John Murtha's "slow bleed" plan to end the war in Iraq has not gone unnoticed by the Washington Post. The editorial board excoriates Murtha in no uncertain terms not just for his plan to elevate the Democrats on the backs of the troops in Iraq, but also for his ignorance on Iraq (via Instapundit): Mr. Murtha has a different idea. He would stop the surge by crudely hamstringing the ability of military commanders to deploy troops. In an interview carried Thursday by the Web site MoveCongress.org, Mr. Murtha said he would attach language to a war funding bill that would prohibit the redeployment of units that have been at home for less than a year, stop the extension of tours beyond 12 months, and prohibit units from shipping out if they do not train with all of their equipment. His aim, he made clear, is not...
As CQ readers know, I like to watch the Oscars just to keep up with the outrageous commentary and the silly politics that always accompany the awards. I've live-blogged the ceremonies the last two years, mostly just for the fun of indulging in some snark. This year, however, I have a better option -- and so do you. Michael Medved will come to the luxurious Saint Paul Hotel for a banquet dinner and running commentary for the Oscars on Sunday, February 25th. I'll be live-blogging from the hotel, but if you're in town, you should join us there for the best possible Oscar experience. Tickets are on sale now at The Patriot at the above link -- and they will go fast. And, for those of you who read down this far into this post, I have a surprise. We will give away a pair of tickets on the show...
The Senate is holding their cloture vote as I post this. So far, the Democrats have gotten four Republicans to cross the aisle -- John Warner, Chuck Hagel, Olympia Snowe, and Susan Collins. Joe Lieberman crossed from the Democratic caucus, making a net of 3 for the Democrats -- and they need a net 10. Norm Coleman crossed. Dems +4. This surprises me; Coleman told us specifically that he supported the surge in Anbar, and this resolution makes no mention of supporting that portion of the operation. It's a major disappointment. 1:19 PM CT - Cloture fails, 56-34. The resolution has been withdrawn by Harry Reid. UPDATE: The AP reports this as "Republicans foiled a Democratic attempt to rebuke President Bush". UPDATE II: Allahpundit has this update: The only Republicans to vote with the Dems last time were Coleman and Susan Collins. Joining them today: John Warner, Olympia Snowe, Arlen...
Gladys Reyes is a young girl that attends my son's old middle school in West Saint Paul, where my son's mother-in-law teaches Gladys and many other students. Gladys, however, is not in school at the moment. The sixth-grader instead is in the hospital after being the victim of a horrible traffic accident: A fund has been set up to help an eleven-year-old West St. Paul girl who was struck by a van and dragged nearly 500 yards. The accident left Gladys Reyes badly injured and forced doctors to amputate her right arm. She remains in critical condition at Regions Hospital. The alleged hit-and-run driver, 33-year--old Mauricio Sanchez, of St. Paul, has been charged with two counts of criminal vehicular operation resulting in great bodily harm. Bail is set at 100-thousand dollars, and he could face five years in prison. Reyes is a sixth-grader at Heritage Middle School in West St....
February 18, 2007
I guess if we're going to have to have an early primary race, we'll have to have early primary polls. CBS indulges us with its latest poll of Republican primary voters, although in the end that sample seems very small. CBS News polled 1142 adults, only 314 of which were Republican primary voters, too small to make a substantial national correlation. For what it's worth, then, here's how CBS sees Republican primary voters swinging: Senator John McCain of Arizona and former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani – two of the front-runners for the Republican Presidential nomination in 2008 – both enjoy favorable views from both Republican primary voters, a new CBS News poll finds, but early on in the race, voters favor Giuliani in a head-to-head match up. Views of Giuliani are especially positive among both moderates and the conservatives that he and McCain are courting. ... If the...
Hillary Clinton, stung by attacks from the Left on her vote to authorize the war in Iraq, has heeled around and now demands an immediate end to the effort. A video on her campaign web site demands that the US begin its retreat in 90 days, or else Congress will force a Constitutional showdown with George Bush: U.S. Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, the early front-runner for the Democratic presidential nomination, has called for a 90-day deadline to start pulling American troops from Iraq. Clinton, the wife of former President Bill Clinton, has been criticized by some Democrats for supporting authorization of the war in 2002 and for not renouncing her vote as she seeks the U.S. presidency in next year's election. "Now it's time to say the redeployment should start in 90 days or the Congress will revoke authorization for this war," the New York senator said in a video...
An award-winning children's book faces a boycott for including the word "scrotum". The book, The Higher Power of Lucky, tells the story of a 10-year-old orphan whose scrappy spirit is intended to encourage young readers. Librarians have objected to the vocabulary: The word “scrotum” does not often appear in polite conversation. Or children’s literature, for that matter. Yet there it is on the first page of “The Higher Power of Lucky,” by Susan Patron, this year’s winner of the Newbery Medal, the most prestigious award in children’s literature. The book’s heroine, a scrappy 10-year-old orphan named Lucky Trimble, hears the word through a hole in a wall when another character says he saw a rattlesnake bite his dog, Roy, on the scrotum. ... The book has already been banned from school libraries in a handful of states in the South, the West and the Northeast, and librarians in other schools...
Investors Business Daily reports on a poll they conducted earlier this month that appears to contradict the conventional wisdom that the midterms were a referendum on the war. In fact, the IBD poll shows that sentiment has actually built towards a commitment to victory in Iraq, and they angrily denounce John Murtha and the defeatists (via Power Line): There's a reason the founders of this country designated a single commander in chief and placed the responsibility to wage war in the hands of the president. We saw recently the futility of having 100 commanders in chief when the Senate tried to pass a resolution of disapproval of the war in Iraq and couldn't agree on the terms of our surrender. Now it's the House of Representatives' turn, led by Rep. John Murtha, who believes the fine young men and women we send to defeat terror and our sworn enemies are...
This weekend did not go so well as I'd hoped. It began with the maintenance light flashing on my car on Friday afternoon, and it's ending with the two of us in a hotel. The car will be fine; it turned out to be nothing more than routine work, but I had to rent a car for the weekend to get by. We're not so lucky with the house, unfortunately. A month or so ago, I wrote about a pipe failure near the water heater, and about six months ago another pipe failure within the wall. Our house has the polybutylene plumbing that has been the subject of class-action lawsuits, and after twenty years, it has apparently run out of life. Another pipe spouted a pinhole leak this morning, and we had to shut down the water. We've decided to bite the bullet and replace all of the PB pipe,...
Terrorists bombed the Friendship Express, a new train service between Pakistan and India commemorating their peace treaties, killing 64 and wounding many more. Two blasts tore through two passenger cars, leaving a trail of destruction: Explosions aboard an Indian passenger train bound for Pakistan killed at least 64 people and wounded 50 early Monday, and explosive devices have been found, according to railway officials. Two blasts ripped through two passenger coaches, as the Samjhauta Express passed through Panipat, about 80 kilometers (50 miles) north of New Delhi, said Northern Rail spokesman Rakesh Saxena. Three unexploded bombs were found near the train tracks, Saxena said. The train eventually continued to Pakistan without the two destroyed cars. The bombers may have killed dozens of people, but they could not stop the Friendship Express. With any luck, this will serve as an analogy for the entire war on terror....
February 19, 2007
Spring in Afghanistan usually means another Taliban offensive, and NATO forces expect an unusually energetic effort from the radical Islamists this year. The truce given by Pakistani leader Pervez Musharraf to the tribes of Waziristan has given the Taliban more latitude in building up their forces for the offensive, a situation that Condoleezza Rice finds disappointing: Fears that Taliban militants are preparing to launch a spring offensive from Pakistan's tribal areas are straining relations between President Pervez Musharraf and his US-led allies. American officials are increasingly vocal about the dangers of Taliban safe havens inside Pakistan and in particular North Waziristan, one of Pakistan's semi-autonomous tribal agencies, where General Musharraf struck a controversial peace deal last September. American generals say cross-border incursions have soared since then. On Friday Condoleezza Rice, the US secretary of state, spoke of "problems and disappointments" with the situation in Waziristan. Pakistan is hitting back at...
Following up on the story I posted below on Condoleezza Rice's "disappointment" with Pakistan over its truce with tribal leaders in Waziristan, the New York Times reports on how that truce has allowed not just the Taliban but also al-Qaeda to make a comeback. A series of blows to AQ by the US and its allies had relegated Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri to mostly inspirational roles among jihadists. Now Zawahiri, at least, has become much more operational, thanks to the breathing room provided by the Musharraf deal: Senior leaders of Al Qaeda operating from Pakistan have re-established significant control over their once-battered worldwide terror network and over the past year have set up a band of training camps in the tribal regions near the Afghan border, according to American intelligence and counterterrorism officials. American officials said there was mounting evidence that Osama bin Laden and his deputy, Ayman...
The Iraqi government faces many issues, but perhaps none as intractable as oil revenues. The proper division of monies from oil production has plagued the National Assembly and sectarian relations since the end of the Saddam Hussein tyranny. The Kurds and the Shi'ites, freed from Saddam's grip, want to use the oil revenue from their sectors to directly benefit themselves. The lack of such resources in Sunni-controlled territory fuels the Sunni insurgents, afraid that they will be left destitute in a federal system. Now, however, it appears that the Sunnis may have more resources than first thought. The New York Times reports that Western engineers have discovered significant fields of oil and natural gas in Anbar: In a remote patch of the Anbar desert just 20 miles from the Syrian border, a single blue pillar of flanges and valves sits atop an enormous deposit of oil and natural gas that...
John McCain and Mitt Romney spent their weekends jogging -- to the right. McCain made his clearest statement yet on abortion, and Romney backpedaled from his previous stand on allowing gays to openly serve in the military. Both men appear to understand that the primaries will require significant support from social conservatives in the GOP, a group both men have eschewed at times during their careers. McCain's statement will probably end his reputation as a Republican maverick: Republican presidential candidate John McCain, looking to improve his standing with the party's conservative voters, said Sunday the court decision that legalized abortion should be overturned. "I do not support Roe versus Wade. It should be overturned," the Arizona senator told about 800 people in South Carolina, one of the early voting states. McCain also vowed that if elected, he would appoint judges who "strictly interpret the Constitution of the United States and...
The Russians have decided to delay their assistance to the Iranians on the construction and operation of the Bushehr reactor that has the West infuriated with both nations. Moscow has not come to its senses about giving radical Islamists the nuclear cycle, however. They're just refusing to work until the Iranians catch up on their bills: Russian officials have warned work on an Iranian nuclear plant may be delayed because Iran is late with payments. ... Under the Bushehr deal, Russia would have started fuel shipments by March, launched the plant in September and begun to generate electricity by November. Russia's Federal Nuclear Power Agency spokesman Sergey Novikov said the "launch schedule definitely could be affected" by the delay in payments. One unnamed Russian official told Associated Press Iran was blaming "technical reasons" for the delay. Iran has not commented officially. Officially, the West dropped its objections to the Bushehr...