December 1, 2007
The Chinese Army has targeted British companies that do business in China for Internet espionage. MI-5 has sent warning letters to over 300 firms, advising them that they run the risk of losing vital proprietary secrets through Chinese hacking. The warning casts a pall over Sino-British trade -- and perhaps trade with other nations as well: The Government has accused China of carrying out an internet spying campaign against vital parts of the economy, it has been reported. The head of the MI5 sent a letter to more than 300 senior executives at banks, accountants and legal firms earlier this week warning them of a web-based attack from Chinese state organisations. The letter warns that British firms doing business in China are being targeted by the Chinese army, which is using the internet to steal confidential information to benefit Chinese companies. It is believed to be the first time the...
Vladimir Putin continues his saber-rattling with his withdrawal from the Conventional Armed Forces in Europe (CFE) treaty. He signed into law the suspension, which will take place on December 12th, that will throw out the final Cold War treaty that kept Europe and Russia from flooding the borders with heavy arms and allowed the decades-long standoff to wind down peacefully. Putin says he wants a new treaty, one that allows Russia to defend itself: President Vladimir Putin signed a law Friday suspending Russia's participation in a major conventional arms treaty that had limited NATO and Russian military deployments in Europe. The Kremlin had been threatening all year to scrap the Conventional Armed Forces in Europe (CFE) treaty, and on Friday Putin signed a law passed this month by parliament providing for that step. The suspension takes effect Dec. 12. Putin's decision comes two days before parliamentary elections and after a...
Everyone expressed gratitude and relief at the end of the hostage crisis yesterday in Rochester, New Hampshire, when police arrested the disturbed man who created it. No one got hurt and a sick man will get the care he needs, and the community will receive protection from him as well. It demonstrated the competence and patience of the Rochester police department in resolving a standoff that only gained national attention because it took place in the campaign headquarters of Hillary Clinton. Somehow, later that evening, the Clinton campaign decided this makes Hillary look presidential, at least to Larry Sabato and the AP: And as soon as it ended, Clinton took full advantage of the opportunity she had unexpectedly been handed. In her New Hampshire press conference, she stood before a column of police in green and tan uniforms. She talked of meeting with hostages. She mentioned that she spoke to...
Hugo Chavez, facing a potentially embarrassing defeat on his dictatorship referendum this weekend, has declared the opposition a CIA operation. He now says those voting against a potential lifetime presidency for himself will have cast a vote for George Bush, and threatened to cut off oil sales to the US if the CIA continues its operations against him: A threat by Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez to stop oil exports to the United States has raised the stakes over a Sunday referendum he has called in a bid to expand his powers. Chavez told tens of thousands of supporters late Friday he was putting Venezuela's oil field and refineries under military "protection" and would halt the exports "if this (referendum) is used as a pretext to start violence in Venezuela." He accused the US Central Intelligence Agency of preparing to spread unrest during the plebiscite in an effort to topple him,...
Everyone knew that the marital woes of Rudy Giuliani would get some play in the presidential race, but the extent of official expenses involved in the extramarital affair that led to his second divorce and third marriage may come as a surprise. New York newspapers have begun to dig into the expenses of Giuliani's security details to see how much the affair cost the Big Apple -- and so far, the results have not helped Rudy put the affair behind him. First, his explanations for spreading the billings to other offices didn't wash with other NYC officials, as ABC News reports: New questions were raised today about Rudy Giuliani's explanation for submitting police security expenses to obscure city agencies while he was mayor of New York and carried on a secret affair with his mistress, who also was given use of a police driver and city car. Giuliani said Thursday...
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 cover a lot of ground, including the CNN YouTube debate, the admission from Jack Murtha of the surge's success, and much, much more! Be sure to call 651-289-4488 to join the conversation!...
Plenty of accusations have flown against CNN since the YouTube debate on Wednesday, but Los Angeles Times columnist Tim Rutten may have the most serious charge. The LA Times' media critic levels charges of corruption against the network, claiming that its emphasis on illegal immigration as a lead topic -- and the large percentage of the debate's time it took -- intended on bolstering its Lou Dobbs show against tough competition (via Hugh Hewitt): Corruption is a strong word. But consider these facts: The gimmick behind Wednesday's debate was that the questions would be selected from those that ordinary Americans submitted to the video sharing Internet website YouTube, which is owned by Google. According to CNN, its staff culled through 5,000 submissions to select the handful that were put to the candidates. That process essentially puts the lie to the vox populi aura the association with YouTube was meant to...
The New Republic has published its findings in its internal investigation -- and it goes into great detail before finally retracting the stories of its Baghdad Diarist, Scott Beauchamp. The journey fascinates far more than the destination, a point we all knew they would eventually reach. In the long and meandering path Franklin Foer recounts, some interesting assumptions take place that will not go unchallenged. Meanwhile, here's the money quote: Several weeks after the monitored call in September, we finally had the opportunity to ask Beauchamp, without any of his supervisors on the line, about how he could mistake a dining hall in Kuwait for one in Iraq. He told us he considered the detail to be "mundane" given the far more horrific events he had witnessed. That's not a convincing explanation. If the event was so mundane, why did he write about it--and with such vivid detail? In accounting...
December 2, 2007
Earlier this week, the leading Shi'ite cleric in Iraq issued a fatwa that has largely gone unnoticed by the world media, but could have an impact on reconciliation and the political gridlock in Baghdad. Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani forbade the killings of Sunnis by Shi'ites on Tuesday while meeting with Sunni clerics in an ecumenical council, and called for a renewed sense of Iraqi nationalism to replace sectarian divides in the country (via SCSU Scholars): Leading Shiite cleric in Iraq Ali Sistani Tuesday banned the killing of Iraqis, particularly the Sunnis, and urged the Shiites to protect their brother Sunnis. Sistani bans the Iraqi blood in general the blood of Sunnis in particular. His announcement came during a meeting with a delegation from Sunni clerics from southern and northern Iraq. The clerics are visiting Najaf to participate in the first national conference for Ulemaa of Shiites and Sunnis. Sistani called...
Britain's navy cannot reliably handle a medium-scale operation, let alone a major war, after decades of decline and neglect. The shocking report on the Royal Navy comes as a shock to the island nation, whose navy not only defended it for centuries but came to define the British. The current government, already embroiled in a data-loss scandal, may suffer the consequences: The Royal Navy can no longer fight a major war because of years of underfunding and cutbacks, a leaked Whitehall report has revealed. With an "under-resourced" fleet composed of "ageing and operationally defective ships", the Navy would struggle even to repeat its role in the Iraq war and is now "far more vulnerable to unexpected shocks", the top-level Ministry of Defence document says. The report was ordered by Des Browne, the Defence Secretary, who had intended to use it to "counter criticism" on the state of the Navy in...
The Des Moines Register poll, the most reliable indicator for likely Iowa caucus-goers, shows major shifts in both parties for the presidential caucuses that will take place in five weeks. Iowa apparently has gone populist in both parties, with Barack Obama and Mike Huckabee surging to new leads in the state. For the national frontrunners, this may actually be good news: Barack Obama has pulled ahead in the race for Iowa's Democratic presidential caucuses, while the party's national frontrunner Hillary Clinton has slipped to second in the leadoff nominating state, according to The Des Moines Register's new Iowa Poll. Despite the movement, the race for 2008's opening nominating contest remains very competitive about a month before the Jan. 3 caucuses, just over half of likely caucusgoers who favor a candidate saying they could change their minds. Obama, an Illinois senator, leads for the first time in the Register's poll as...
In my post below, I postulate that losing Iowa will cause little heartache for Hillary Clinton. She leads in the delegate-rich states of the coast, and Barack Obama will not be able to pick up any momentum from his opening-night win, if in fact he pulls it off. However, there is a much more substantial reason why Hillary will win the nomination -- the party Establishment: The Associated Press contacted 90 percent of the 765 superdelegates, mostly elected officials and other party officers, who are free to support anyone they choose at the convention, regardless of what happens in the primaries. Hillary Rodham Clinton leads Barack Obama by more than a 2-1 margin among those who have endorsed a candidate. But a little more than half of those contacted — 365 — said they haven't settled on a Democratic standard bearer. "The fact that under half have publicly committed shows...
A couple of commenters on the latest TNR thread wonder whether we will hold National Review Online's The Tank to the same level of scrutiny as Franklin Foer and Scott Beauchamp. I had not actually heard about this controversy until I read the comments last night. Michelle Malkin covers this topic, though, and issues some rather scathing criticisms while noting the completely different approaches between TNR and NRO: W. Thomas Smith, Jr., a former Marine and milblogger who writes at National Review Online’s The Tank (and whose work in Iraq I’ve praised and linked to here), posts a long-winded defense of bogus, shoddy reporting he published while he was in Lebanon earlier this fall. It’s painful to read because he takes nearly 1,400 words to get to the main points: 1) He claimed he had seen “some 200-plus heavily armed Hezbollah militiamen” at a “sprawling Hezbollah tent city” when, in...
December 3, 2007
Hugo Chavez suffered a humiliating defeat at the polls for his referendum on dictatorship. He unexpectedly lost a narrow plebiscite that would have made numerous changes to Venezuela's constitution, including those that would have allowed him unfettered ability for re-election and personal control over most of Venezuelan public life. But did he become the ultimate winner in this loss? President Hugo Chavez suffered a stunning defeat Monday in a referendum that would have let him run for re-election indefinitely and impose a socialist system in this major U.S. oil provider. Voters rejected the sweeping measures Sunday by a vote of 51 percent to 49 percent, said Tibisay Lucena, chief of the National Electoral Council. She said that with 88 percent of the votes counted, the trend was irreversible. ... Chavez said his respect for the outcome should vindicate his standing as a democrat. “From this moment on, let’s be calm,”...
Pakistan has waited to see whether former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif would boycott the upcoming parliamentary elections, scheduled for January 8th. As it turns out, the Election Commission has insisted that Sharif do so, ruling him ineligible to run for office, thanks to his convictions for corruption that followed the coup d'etat of Pervez Musharraf: Pakistan's Election Commission on Monday barred former prime minister and opposition leader Nawaz Sharif from a January 8 general election because of his criminal record. "His nomination papers are rejected because of his convictions," presiding election official Raja Qamaruzaman told Reuters in the eastern city of Lahore, Sharif's power base where last week he registered to run in the election. The two-time prime minister says the convictions secured against him in the wake of his 1999 ouster by the then army chief, Pervez Musharraf, were politically motivated. Sharif, who returned from seven years of exile...
The NFL and its fans have a rare opportunity to follow two teams pushing for perfection in the same season. Tonight, the New England Patriots take on history again as well as the Baltimore Ravens in tonight's Monday night game, hoping to extend their unbeaten record in 2007. Yesterday, the Dolphins managed to clear the most significant hurdle in their quest for another kind of perfection: It's going to be tough to stop the Miami Dolphins now. The last realistic obstacle in their path to imperfect immortality -- the New York Jets -- came and went Sunday, dropping a 40-13 defeat on the Dolphins as easily as Miami quarterback John Beck dropped the football -- twice -- when he wasn't throwing it to Jets defenders. After three interceptions and two lost fumbles by Beck, the Dolphins were left at 0-12 with four games to play. They are the seventh team...
Mitt Romney has decided to give "the speech" -- an address he prepared earlier this year to explain his Mormon faith and why it presents no threat to the Republic. He will deliver this oration at the George H. W. Bush Presidential Library on Thursday, hoping to dispel the remaining vestiges of doubt over his qualifications for the presidency. Entitled "Faith in America", the speech will bring the Mormon question directly into the mainstream of political commentary. At Heading Right, I question the timing of this speech. It should have come much earlier in the campaign, not at a time where it looks like a defensive maneuver against a surging Mike Huckabee in Iowa. Also, is it a mistake to try to undo bigotry with apologetics, especially when the defender of the faith is running for President? Even if it is a mistake, though, "Faith in America" will be an...
Don Imus made his return to the airwaves this morning, diminished but mostly unbowed, on WABC in New York City. The radio cowboy returns to the saddle months after his termination for using racially-insensitive criticisms of the Rutgers' women's basketball team, after which CBS Radio and MS-NBC both dumped him. While he says he learned his lesson, Imus also promises that the show itself will not change: Don Imus returned to the airwaves Monday eight months after he was fired for a racially charged remark about the Rutgers women's basketball team, introducing a new cast that included two black comedians. As he did several times in the days after his comments, Imus condemned his remarks and said he had learned his lesson. ... While Imus pledged to use his new show to talk about race relations, he added: "Other than that, not much has changed. Dick Cheney is still a...
In what would qualify as satire, the Washington Post reports that Hillary Clinton's new strategy in Iowa will focus on Obama's character rather than his policy positions. Hillary has fallen behind Obama in recent polling in Iowa, and has decided to campaign against him more aggressively. However, given the track record of the Clintons, character hardly appears to be a winning forum for the national frontrunner: With a new poll showing her losing ground in the Iowa caucus race, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) mounted a new, more aggressive attack against Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) on Sunday, raising direct questions about his character, challenging his integrity and forecasting a sharp debate over those subjects in the days ahead. Clinton has hammered Obama recently over his health-care proposal, arguing that he is misleading voters because it omits millions of people and would not lower costs. But Sunday, in a dramatic shift,...
With Mike Huckabee rising unexpectedly in Iowa against a huge Mitt Romney organization, can he duplicate that success elsewhere against Rudy Giuliani? Will his squeaky-clean Baptist minister image get a boost from a recent ethics eruption that has Team Rudy struggling to answer? USA Today paints a picture of a candidate finding his footing just as the front-runners seem to have lost theirs: Former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee, the Republican long shot who in a new Des Moines Register poll has surged to the lead for the Iowa caucuses, could hardly be more different from the candidate who has led the GOP field nationally all year. Former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani entered politics as a big-city prosecutor; Huckabee as a rural preacher. Giuliani is out of synch with the GOP's social conservative core; Huckabee is its most consistent champion. Giuliani's calling card is his leadership against terrorism after the...
That's the promise Rudy Giuliani makes in his Wall Street Journal column on fiscal conservatism today. Calling pork the "broken windows of the federal budget" and promising to restore accountability and common sense to federal spending, Rudy makes his case that his brand of fiscal conservatism provides the answer for Republican electoral woes, and America's financial health: With economic uncertainty weighing on the minds of many Americans, Congress is preparing to recess after another year of profligate spending, protectionist talk and promises of higher taxes. No wonder some people feel like we're moving in the wrong direction. But I'm optimistic as I look to the future. It's not our country that's moving in the wrong direction -- it's Congress, and Washington's culture of wasteful spending. Over the last decade, nondefense spending has increased by 65% -- the federal government currently spends $24,000 per household -- while the number of earmarked...
The Norm Coleman campaign takes Al Franken seriously, at least seriously enough to do their homework on the former comedian, author, and talk-radio host. If Franken wins the nomination from Michael Cerisi to challenge Coleman in the general election, he will not find Coleman unprepared. The campaign has already readied its first ad, and this one -- on Franken's attempts to triangulate on Iraq -- will leave a big mark: Here are the key parts of the transcript, all of which come from video or audio recordings of Franken over the past eighteen months: “We have to start a withdrawal, I believe, and have a timeline." (10/5/07) “I’m not sure we should set a timetable myself. I may actually, oddly enough, agree with Bush here." (6/16/06) “I neither spoke out advocating the war or against the war." (8/21/07) “Well, first of all, I never spoke out in favor of this...
Note: This post will remain on top until show time. Newer posts can be found below. Tomorrow on Heading Right Radio (2 pm CT), we have two great guests joining us. First, David Keene from the American Conservative Union joins us to discuss his personal endorsement of Mitt Romney, plus the tough season it has been for conservatives and how we can regain momentum. In the second half of our show, Kathryn Jean Lopez of National Review Online will discuss the controversy raging over the posts at NRO's The Tank and NRO's response to it. We'll get into the details and discuss what NRO can and will do from this point forward, and how its response stacks up against that of Franklin Foer and The New Republic. UPDATE: I'll be asking about Andrew Sullivan's post regarding Mitchell Prothero, too. I'd like to get more detail on the entire controversy, so...
Earlier this afternoon, Kathryn Jean Lopez joined me on Heading Right Radio to discuss the continuing controversy over reporting at The Tank by Thomas Smith. Smith wrote two posts at The Tank in September which got events spectacularly incorrect, as recapped ably by retired Washington Post journalist Thomas Edsall at the Huffington Post. Both Michelle Malkin and Rick Moran wrote highly-linked articles on NRO's reaction to the exposure of the blown stories, both castigating Smith; Michelle praised Kathryn's reaction to the challenge, while Rick insisted that Smith be fired. Andrew Sullivan added a series of posts challenging Kathryn's response, noting claims that she and NRO had been notified of the problem weeks earlier and had ignored it. For full disclosure, Kathryn has on occasion asked me to contribute to NRO for on-line symposiums on specific topics. I don't believe I've ever done anything for pay at National Review, although I...
Some have expressed frustration at the slow pace of diplomacy with Iran over its nuclear program. A recent setback in Europe created more calls for targeted military strikes against Iran's known nuclear facilities, and military-intervention advocates wondered why the Bush administration didn't strike at once. Wait long enough, and the Iranians would produce a mushroom cloud for a smoking gun. The intelligence community has a different analysis of the situation: A new assessment by American intelligence agencies concludes that Iran halted its nuclear weapons program in 2003 and that the program remains frozen, contradicting judgment two years ago that Tehran was working relentlessly toward building a nuclear bomb. The conclusions of the new assessment are likely to reshape the final year of the Bush administration, which has made halting Iran’s nuclear program a cornerstone of its foreign policy. The assessment, a National Intelligence Estimate that represents the consensus view of...
All right, I know a great satire site when I read it. Scott Ott must have contracted with the Hillary Clinton campaign for this argument, right? Only a true satirist or a complete idiot would go after a campaign opponent for his academic record -- in kindergarten! Claiming that Barack Obama didn't tell the truth when he said that his presidential run wasn't the result of some long-held plan, Hillary dug up the evidence after checking the Crayola signatures (via Best of the Web): In third grade, Senator Obama wrote an essay titled 'I Want To Be a President.' His third grade teacher: Fermina Katarina Sinaga "asked her class to write an essay titled 'My dream: What I want to be in the future.' Senator Obama wrote 'I want to be a President,' she said." [The Los Angeles Times, 3/15/07] In kindergarten, Senator Obama wrote an essay titled 'I Want...
December 4, 2007
To hear CAIR tell the story, Americans have conducted a wave of hate crimes against Muslims that put them at greater and greater risk as time goes on. They highlight every perceived injustice as a means of shaming Americans into believing that Muslims in our midst have been the greatest victims of terrorism, thanks to our innate bigotry. However, as Investors Business Daily discovered when they looked at the FBI's numbers, anti-Muslim hate crime has dropped dramatically since 9/11 -- and another group remains far more likely to be victimized: Not only are anti-Islamic hate crimes way down, but they're a fraction of overall religious hate crimes. The overwhelming majority of such crimes target Jews, something CAIR and other Muslim groups don't seem all that concerned about. In 2006, a whopping 66% of religiously motivated attacks were on Jews, while just 11% targeted Muslims, even though the Jewish and Muslim...
It looked as though the New England Patriots would lose their perfect season in Baltimore last night. On a desperation fourth-down play, Tom Brady couldn't execute the sneak to get the final yard, and the Ravens took over on downs -- except that their bench had called a time out just before the play to ice the Patriots. That one misstep encapsulated a quarter in which the Ravens gave the game back to the Pats in a nailbiter that kept New England perfect for at least another week: The New England Patriots, pushing for the first undefeated season by an NFL team in 35 years, marched into Baltimore on Monday night and nearly ended up with a bruised ego and an embarrassing loss. Thanks to willpower and sheer luck, the Patriots defeated the Ravens, 27-24, and walked off with their 12th straight victory. Behind, 24-20, with less than three minutes...
The New York Times offers an unusually pessimistic appraisal of Hillary Clinton's effect on the 2008 down-ticket races. Carl Hulse reports that Congressional incumbents and candidates have begun to fear that her nomination will energize a dispirited opposition and could cost the Democrats the seats they gained in 2006. It's not exactly a new thought, but usually it gets expressed as Republican optimism (via Memeorandum): Nancy Boyda, a Democrat who ran for Congress in this district last year, owed her upset victory partly to the popularity of the Democratic woman at the top of the ticket: Kathleen Sebelius, who won the governor’s seat. Now, with a tough re-election race at hand in 2008, Ms. Boyda faces the prospect that her electoral fate could be tied to another woman: Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton. Mrs. Clinton is a long way from winning the Democratic presidential nomination, and over the last few weeks...
After yesterday's release of the declassified National Intelligence Estimate on Iran, a number of pundits assumed that the White House had suppressed the report for months. The conclusions of the NIE -- that Iran had stopped pursuing nuclear weapons "years earlier" -- led people to believe that the Bush administration had kept it locked away so it could pursue a policy of war against Iran. As the Washington Post reports this morning, the conspiracy theorists have overreached again (via Rick Moran): While concluding that Iran's weapons program is now halted, the NIE presents a mixed view of Tehran's nuclear ambitions. It portrays Iran's ruling clerics as susceptible to international pressure, having abandoned an extensive and costly covert nuclear program in the face of threatened economic sanctions and global censure. But the report also depicts Iran as cleverly preserving its options, by making steady strides toward a civilian nuclear energy capability...
Yulia Tymoshenko will likely return to the position from which Ukrainian president Viktor Yushchenko dismissed her in a split amongst the reformers last year. Tymoshenko, seen by some as the poster woman for the Orange Revolution, reconciled with Yushchenko enough to see their parties garner a two-vote majority in parliament. Her return as Prime Minister effectively benches the pro-Russian Viktor Yanukovich: A coalition of two parties linked to Ukraine's pro-Western "Orange Revolution" proposed Yulia Tymoshenko on Tuesday as their candidate to be restored in her old job as prime minister. Members of parliament representing Our Ukraine, the party of President Viktor Yushchenko, and Tymoshenko's bloc unanimously approved the proposal in a room inside the parliament building. The coalition will now submit Tymoshenko's nomination to the president, who has 15 days to consider it and send it to the 450-seat parliament for approval. With Vladimir Putin extending his stay at the...
Activists for the campaign to spring Mumia Abu-Jamal from Death Row for his murder of a Philadelphia police officer plan to protest outside Rockefeller Center Thursday morning. The widow of the victim has written a new book, Murdered by Mumia: A Life Sentence of Loss, Pain, and Injustice, and NBC will interview her on the Today show. The Free Mumia activists want "equal time" (via Michelle Malkin): SUPPORTERS of cop killer Mumia Abu-Jamal are threatening to storm the streets of Rockefeller Center Thursday morning to protest the "Today" show. The New York-based "Free Mumia Abu-Jamal Coalition" is infuriated that Maureen Faulker [sic] - the widow of Philadelphia police office Daniel Faulker [sic], whom Abu-Jamal was convicted of murdering 25 years ago - is scheduled to appear on the show Thursday to promote her new book, "Murdered by Mumia: A Life Sentence of Pain, Loss and Injustice." The activists - who...
Congress has little courage in an election year. The Los Angeles Times reaches this startling conclusion today in a report on the prospects for fiscal responsibility in 2008. With all of Congress, a third of the Senate, and the White House up for grabs, it looks like pandering will take the place of discipline, to no one’s great shock. Fiscal responsibility means more than just jacking up taxes to match an increased spending level, as the Democrats believe. It’s more than just the Republican plan of cutting taxes, too, although that’s at least a start in the right direction. At Heading Right, I explain the option that Congress and the media have forgotten, and one on which voters must insist in the next election....
Recall the pushback when we linked to the Zogby poll that showed Hillary's support eroding at the end of November? The numbers showed Hillary losing ground against all Republican contenders, and had some correlation with Rasmussen's numbers as well. Nonsense, came the response; Gallup's polling in November -- two weeks earlier -- showed Hillary maintaining her momentum. Oops: Though both candidates maintain their leads, Rudy Giuliani continues to lose support and Hillary Clinton drops nine points in Gallup's latest poll. No text report has been posted by Gallup, but the trend for Hillary looks bad and seems to be accelerating. She had polled at 50% this summer, when she appeared invincible and her competition couldn't quit making mistakes. Now, after a gaffe-filled month capped by her attack on Barack Obama's kindergarten ambitions, Gallup has her at 39%, dropping eight points in a month. The news doesn't look good for Rudy...
At some point in our lives, most of us will have a personal encounter with someone who seems innately evil or cruel. They go out of their way to hurt people, or at least appear not to care whether they do damage with their actions or words. Most of us will assume that the person had a miserable life or some traumatic incident that turned them into a misanthrope, and with luck will avoid their destructive wake. Barbara Oakley has a different theory, one backed by some scientific research into the cerebral structure of unpleasant people -- and she believes it explains a lot about how Rome fell, Hitler rose, and her sister stole her mother's boyfriend: My sister stole my mother’s boyfriend. It wasn’t as if the boyfriend, Ted, was any great catch. At 85, he trundled about with a nose tube and oxygen tanks, hacking and snorting as...
Note: This post will remain on top until show time; newer posts may be found below. Today on Heading Right Radio (2 pm CT), we welcome Barbara Oakley, author of Evil Genes. Barbara will explain how her sister's misanthropy led to Barbara's quest to find how some people cannot avoid doing evil, both grand and petty. Her research raises intriguing ethical and moral dilemmas about the nature of self, accountability, and society's need to protect itself from predators. We'll also talk to Pete Sepp of the National Taxpayers Union, who joins us to discuss the latest initiatives in Congress, especially on energy. As Vice President for Communications, Pete Sepp has helped to develop the 362,000-member NTU's public relations and promotional strategies. He maintains a library of information on tax and spending issues for use by the media, NTU members, elected officials, and the general public. He has written and edited...
The influx of former refugees into Iraq has reached a level that concerns the UN and the central government in Baghdad. Hundreds each day return from Syria and Jordan, enough to raise concerns about the "fragile" security in areas just now recovering from sectarian violence. The UN wants to start a returning-refugee fund to ease the transition: Iraq's government acknowledged Tuesday that it cannot handle a massive return of refugees, as the U.N. announced a $11 million relief package to help the most vulnerable Iraqi families trickling back to their war-ravaged homeland. The return of refugees is a politically charged issue in this country, where the embattled government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki is eager to point to recent military gains against al-Qaida in Iraq and other militants as evidence that Iraq is now a relatively safe place. But the U.S. military has warned that a massive return of refugees...
Another Hsu fell today on the foundering Hillary Clinton campaign as one of her biggest bundlers got indicted for fraud. Norman Hsu will face federal prosecution not just for the "massive Ponzi scheme" alleged in the charges, but also for multiple campaign-finance violations. The news hits the Clinton campaign already facing a significant drop in support over the past four weeks: A federal grand jury on Tuesday indicted Norman Hsu, a top Democratic fundraiser and former fugitive accused of cheating investors of at least $20 million and using some of the money to make illegal donations to political candidates including Hillary Rodham Clinton. In the 15-count indictment returned in U.S. District Court in Manhattan, the government accused the 56-year-old clothing-industry entrepreneur of duping investors nationwide with a massive Ponzi scheme. The government said Hsu also violated federal campaign finance laws by making contributions to various political candidates in the names...
Hugh Hewitt and Duane Patterson link to this Jack Cafferty commentary at CNN tonight, discussing the speech Mitt Romney will give on Thursday, "Faith in America". Cafferty said that he felt the speech would be a waste of time unless Romney gave a detailed apologia regarding Mormon doctrine and practices. He based this on the supposedly secretive nature of temple practices and the small percentage of Americans who have experienced them: The specific quote from Cafferty is, "It's not like he's a Catholic or a Protestant or a Lutheran or a Methodist or a Baptist." The implication is that any minority religion would require an explanation for a candidate to be considered for public office. Cafferty said that 25% of voters in some polls would not vote for a Mormon, and unless Romney could change their minds, he had no chance of winning an election. We have two issues here...
December 5, 2007
The NIE released on Monday said that Iran abandoned its nuclear weapons effort in 2003 after international pressure forced it to change directions, a conclusion in which the intel community had "high confidence". However, two years ago, the same intel community said that Iran continued to pursue nuclear weapons -- and had the same "high confidence" level in that conclusion as well. The Wall Street Journal wonders if the intel community hasn't played a confidence game on Iran, and notes a few of the players who might have reason to do so: As recently as 2005, the consensus estimate of our spooks was that "Iran currently is determined to develop nuclear weapons" and do so "despite its international obligations and international pressure." This was a "high confidence" judgment. The new NIE says Iran abandoned its nuclear program in 2003 "in response to increasing international scrutiny." This too is a "high...
The Democrats have a new strategy on Iraq war funding that looks a lot like the old strategy: chaos. Unable to come up with a way to meddle with the successful strategy of General David Petraeus, Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi will attempt to punt on additional funding until January. At that point, they may try to dump withdrawal timetables for a series of short-term appropriations that may wind up keeping troops in Iraq longer than they promised: House Democratic Caucus Chairman Rahm Emanuel (Ill.) is examining a new approach, releasing war funds in small increments, with further installments tied to specific performance measures for Iraq's politicians. House Majority Leader Steny H. Hoyer (D-Md.) also is searching for a new approach and has been briefed on the idea of more explicitly tying funds to political progress. The new thrust has divided Democratic leaders on Capitol Hill, some of whom say...
Yesterday I asked readers to find the record of an ABC News report on Mumia Abu Jamal from almost ten years ago, one which exploded the myths of the Free Mumia movement. Incorrectly, I recalled John Stossel working that segment, or perhaps he did another piece independently, but reader Greg Lang of Soliah.com -- which follows the case of former SLA fugitive and murderer Kathleen Soliah/Sara Jane Olsen -- forwarded me the transcript of the show I remembered. Sam Donaldson reported on the 20/20 segment almost exactly nine years ago on the shooting of Daniel Faulkner, and the myths that arose from the defenders of the controversial defendant: Myth #1: The 44-Caliber Bullet DONALDSON: ... 20/20 has looked at the arguments both she and the free Mumia movement make on the key points. First, ballistics. Jamal's supporters say the bullet that killed Officer Faulkner was .44-caliber, not a .38, like...
The BBC paid for a paintball trip that included men now accused of training Islamic extremists for terrorism. The British television network included the activity in its "Don't Panic, I'm Islamic" reality series that poked fun at Western Islamophobia. In this case, however, the "joke" is on the Beeb (via Memeorandum): The BBC funded a paintballing trip for men later accused of Islamic terrorism and failed to pass on information about the 21/7 bombers to police, a court was told yesterday. Mohammed Hamid, who is charged with overseeing a two-year radicalisation programme to prepare London-based Muslim youths for jihad, was described as a “cockney comic” by a BBC producer. The BBC paid for Mr Hamid and fellow defendants Muhammad al-Figari and Mousa Brown to go on a paintballing trip at the Delta Force centre in Tonbridge, Kent, in February 2005. The men, accused of terrorism training, were filmed for a...
Barack Obama says that America needs serious rethinking of political issues. Apparently he includes child-labor laws as part of that recalculation. Time's Mark Halperin posts a new initiative by Obama on national service, entitled "A Call To Serve", that proposes a work schedule for middle-school children at which unionized Democrat adults would balk. Among the proposals: * Establish a goal of having middle and high-schoolers contribute at least 50 hours a week to community service, and reach that goal through national guidelines for service-learning and additional resources for schools to develop successful programs. * Create a new American Opportunity Tax Credit to ensure that the first $4,000 of a college education is completely free for Americans willing to complete 100 hours of public service a year. Fifty hours a week -- for community service? That's not a call, it's a sentence. When exactly will they do other tasks ... like...
Hillary Clinton has so many endorsements, she can’t keep them all straight. Her campaign may have to rely on that explanation after the AP looked through her list of ministers at a South Carolina event and found a few misrepresentations. The number of organizations endorsing Hillary appears significantly lower than implied on her web site. As campaign scandals go for Hillary, this is pretty mundane, but it does show considerable sloppiness. At Heading Right, however, I ask why Hillary can surround herself with ministers but Mitt Romney has to provide apologetics for his religion. We have a double standard at work here. Shouldn't Hillary have to explain the theological reasons she sought the endorsements of all these ministers, especially when Romney has done nothing of the sort?...
Many have linked to the latest Gallup poll that corroborates earlier findings by Rasmussen -- that public perception of the surge in Iraq has grown significantly more optimistic. One subtlety has not yet surfaced that may give the Republicans reason to hope for better success in 2008's elections: Four in 10 Americans now say the U.S. troop surge in Iraq that began earlier this year is making the situation there better. This is up from 34% four weeks ago and from 22% when Gallup first measured it in July. Since August, more Americans have tended to say the surge is making the situation in Iraq better rather than worse, but today's ratio -- 40% vs. 20% -- is the most positive yet recorded. Thirty-nine percent of Americans currently say the surge is not making any difference; this is down from 43% in September and 51% in July. This reinforces the...
One of the main authors of the recently-released NIE on Iran sang a different tune to Congress less than five months earlier. Thomas Joscelyn at the Weekly Standard notes that Thomas Fingar testified to the completely opposite conclusion on July 11th, 2007 -- that Iran continued to pursue nuclear weapons. This tends to substantiate that the change in posture came very recently: Iran and North Korea are the states of most concern to us. The United States’ concerns about Iran are shared by many nations, including many of Iran’s neighbors. Iran is continuing to pursue uranium enrichment and has shown more interest in protracting negotiations and working to delay and diminish the impact of UNSC sanctions than in reaching an acceptable diplomatic solution. We assess that Tehran is determined to develop nuclear weapons--despite its international obligations and international pressure. This is a grave concern to the other countries in the...
Note: This post will remain on top until show time; newer posts may be found below. Today on Heading Right Radio (2 pm CT), Jacki Schechner joins us to talk about politics and media. Jacki spent years as an on-air correspondent for CNN, specifically working to engage the blogosphere. We'll catch up with Jacki and talk about how media, politics, and the Internet intersect -- and how that will play out in the election. In the second half, Bill Kovacs joins us from the US Chamber of Commerce to talk about the latest global-warming legislation floating on Capitol Hill. Call 646-652-4889 to join the conversation! And don't forget to join our chat room! BONUS: I'll be on Midstream Radio with Jazz Shaw sometime in the first half of the show, which starts at 12 noon CT. Did you know that you can listen to Heading Right Radio through your TiVo...
Mike Huckabee has found out what it feels like to bark with the big dogs. No sooner had he joined the first tier of Republican presidential candidates than the issue of Wayne Dumond's parole arose. Huckabee worked to get Dumond out of prison in Arkansas for a rape conviction -- and Dumond raped and murdered Carol Sue Shields and Sara Andrasek. While Huckabee has to answer for his role in pushing for Dumond's release, he isn't alone -- and some on the Right need to explain themselves as well. Murray Waas notes that Huckabee hasn't exactly modeled openness in his response, either: Huckabee has refused to release his gubernatorial administration's records on the matter, saying that he was concerned for the privacy of Dumond's victims and that the records contain sensitive law enforcement information. The Arkansas Parole Board also refuses to make public any letters or warnings it received from...
Dan Bartlett, former White House communications director, won't keep many friends in the blogosphere after this interview in Texas Monthly. When asked about the relationship between the Bush White House and conservative bloggers, Bartlett responded that, in the words of Forrest Gump, the two were just like peas and carrots. Bartlett bragged that bloggers allowed the message to get through unfiltered -- very unfiltered (via TPM): What about the blogs? We had to set up a whole new apparatus to deal with the challenges they pose. Are they real journalists? The Washington Post, for example, has journalists who are now bloggers. Do you treat them as bloggers? Do they get credentials? Let’s think of it as a practical matter. If one of those journalists-turned-bloggers, Chris Cillizza, e-mails you to say he needs an interview, and at the same time one of the Post’s print reporters—say, Dan Balz—e-mails you and says...
December 6, 2007
The Democratic disarray continues in Congress, where leadership has no clue how to manage expectations. Once again, after promising to force the White House into commitments on troop withdrawal deadlines, they have reversed course. Instead, they will set up benchmarks on political progress that will not force any withdrawal commitments at all: Each day lately, Democrats inch closer to giving President Bush more money for the war in Iraq without any serious mandates for withdrawing U.S. troops. Democratic leaders are loath to acknowledge they’ve backed off, but lawmakers from both sides of the aisle, as well as congressional aides, say Democrats are trying to find a way to provide continued troop funding while searching for some compromises that show they’re still intent on challenging the president on the war. The possible conditions for troop funding include anti-torture rules and benchmarks for Iraqi political reconciliation, language sure to upset an impatient...
Once seen as an inevitability, Hillary Clinton may not win the first two contests in the primaries -- and that may change the entire Democratic race. Having fallen into no better than a tie with Barack Obama in Iowa, Clinton now has lost significant ground in New Hampshire. She now leads by only six points, and her momentum has completely dissipated: Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton holds a narrow lead over Sen. Barack Obama among Democratic presidential candidates in New Hampshire, a state whose primary her campaign has viewed as a potential firewall should she stumble in the Iowa caucuses, according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll. Clinton is widely seen as the party's best experienced and most electable presidential candidate, but with most Democratic voters in the state looking for a fresh approach to governing, the first-in-the-nation primary has become fiercely competitive. With New Hampshire voters set to go...
How does one address a letter to the dictator-for-life of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, Kim Jong-Il? Would it be a "Dear Jong" letter? Maybe if one comes from Texas, a fine "Howdy, partner" would suffice. Unfortunately, we may not ever know the answer -- because George Bush wrote the letter, but has not revealed its contents: In a rare move, President Bush has sent a letter to North Korean leader Kim Jong Il, the North's official news agency said Thursday without giving further details about the message. U.S. nuclear envoy Christopher Hill delivered the letter to North Korean Foreign Minister Pak Ui Chun during his recent trip to Pyongyang, the Korean Central News Agency said. North Korea has just about met its opening obligations in the agreement to end its nuclear-weapons program. Hill predicted that the Yongbyon shutdown would meet its scheduled target, which will allow the DPRK...
Our friend Barbara Oakley has an interesting follow-up to our conversation on Tuesday with this intriguing opinion piece in today's Chicago Tribune. The author of Evil Genes discusses cultural blind spots, starting with a personal anecdote regarding her adopted sons, both Balkan Muslims. She noted that they have never even thought to look at Islam critically, as they do with other religions. Similarly, Westerners have a blind spot when it comes to their belief in the inherent good of each individual: It's fashionable in the West today to assert that every culture has its blind spots, and so culturally speaking, everything is relative. But what many Westerners are unaware of, unless they have also spent time in a totalitarian state, is how much more free Westerners are to study their blind spots, to write about them and to publicly attempt to put a spotlight on them. One blind spot Westerners...
People would assume that two fire-breathers on national security may have the same objections to the just-released NIE downplaying the danger of Iran. However, while John Bolton responds with vigor in the Washington Post, Dick Cheney seems more sanguine about the conclusion that Iran has halted its drive towards nuclear weapons. Bolton presses home the thin basis for the U-turn, and blames it on the culture of the State Department: Second, the NIE is internally contradictory and insufficiently supported. It implies that Iran is susceptible to diplomatic persuasion and pressure, yet the only event in 2003 that might have affected Iran was our invasion of Iraq and the overthrow of Saddam Hussein, not exactly a diplomatic pas de deux. As undersecretary of state for arms control in 2003, I know we were nowhere near exerting any significant diplomatic pressure on Iran. Nowhere does the NIE explain its logic on this...
Mitt Romney will make one of the most anticipated speeches of the presidential campaign today at 10:30 ET, entitled "Faith in America". Thanks to the Romney campaign's agreement with Ustream, the speech can be seen live at blog sites, including here at Captain's Quarters. Romney's team has released excerpts of his speech. In it, he will explicitly reject calls to explain the specific tenets of the Mormon faith, claiming it will set up a religious test: "There are some who would have a presidential candidate describe and explain his church's distinctive doctrines. To do so would enable the very religious test the founders prohibited in the constitution. No candidate should become the spokesman for his faith. For if he becomes President he will need the prayers of the people of all faiths." That may be true in spirit, but not in actual fact. Article VI did not constrain voters from...
People sometimes underestimate Mitt Romney's persuasive speaking style and genuine warmth on the dais, and that made some difference today with his speech, "Faith in America". Before its delivery, it appeared to hold no promise for Romney's standing with voters, but would present many risks for him in legitimizing religion for political debate. Those risks remain and their potential remains to be seen. However, I believe the speech will be a net positive for Romney and his campaign. Adroitly, Romney avoided apologetics except on the nature of Jesus Christ. He then specifically denounced calls for apologetics on any faith being part of a political campaign, whether willingly or compelled. Romney went out of his way to talk about the common nature of America's "symphony of faith," calling on America to focus on our shared values than on less-meaningful differences of practice. He warned that state religions did no good for...
CBS News has discovered the Dan Bartlett kerfuffle in the blogosphere, and Matthew Felling interviewed me earlier this morning for Public Eye. He gives conservatives a somewhat broad platform from which to defend ourselves, reaching out to Glenn Reynolds and Jonah Goldberg as well. Here's Matthew: "Regurgitate?" Really? Coming from a former Bush aide? Oh no he din’t. That’s basically the equivalent of calling White House reporters ‘stenographers.’ (And we've learned you don’t go there.) I figured that this wouldn’t sit well with right-wing bloggers. But I wasn’t quite sure. So I pulled a Captain Renault and e-mailed some "usual suspects.” I'll let readers venture to Public Eye to read the responses. I actually picked up the phone and did a traditional interview with Matthew -- and he'll return the favor next Tuesday on Heading Right Radio. He also reports on a very testy exchange between a Washington Times reporter...
Note: This post will remain on top until show time; newer posts may be found below. Today on Heading Right Radio (2 pm CT), we welcome two great guests from Americans for Tax Reform. In the second half, Grover Norquist joins us to talk about his assessment of the Republican presidential candidates on fiscal matters, including his positive remarks on both Rudy Giuliani and Mike Huckabee. In the first half, we'll speak with Brian Johnson about the new Index of Worker Freedom report card, and what it means for the American economy. Call 646-652-4889 to join the conversation! And don't forget to join our chat room! Did you know that you can listen to Heading Right Radio through your TiVo service? Click here for the instructions. Also, you can subscribe to Heading Right Radio through iTunes now by clicking this link:...
After the massive coverage that our setbacks in Iraq received from the mainstream media, one would expect that success would at least receive equal treatment. (No, actually, I didn't, but bear with the rhetorical argument.) Anyone with those expectations would have to face crushing disappointment, according to the Media Research Center. The MRC discovered an intriguing and completely predictable direct proportion between deaths and media coverage in Iraq: Now, all three networks have become more optimistic in their on-ground reporting from the war zone, admitting that the surge in troops and new counterinsurgency tactics have reduced the violence. But as the news from the war front improves, a Media Research Center study finds ABC, CBS and NBC are less likely to tell viewers about it. .... Back in September, as reporters voiced skepticism of General Petraeus’ progress report, the networks aired a total of 178 Iraq stories, or just under...
Despite the surprising conclusion of the American intelligence committee that Iran suspended its push for nuclear weapons, both France and Germany insisted that Iran represents a real threat. Nicolas Sarkozy still wants to impose harsher sanctions, although Angela Merkel would not commit to supporting another round at the moment. The two EU powers want Iran to end its uranium enrichment: "Iran continues to represent a threat," Mrs Merkel said during a joint news conference with Mr Sarkozy in Paris. She did not specifically express support for a new UN sanctions resolution against Iran, which the US is calling for. .... Mr Sarkozy said he agreed with his German counterpart that Iran still posed a danger, and that he supported the push for more sanctions. "Notwithstanding the latest elements, everyone is fully conscious of the fact that there is a will of the Iranian leaders to obtain nuclear weapons. "What made...
December 7, 2007
Democrats not only have decided on surrender for Iraq war funding, they have come up with their redeployment strategy. The AP reports that House Democrats will pass an omnibus funding bill without any funds for the mission in Iraq. Senate Democrats will instead add it in and blame Republicans for threatening a filibuster, after which the House will "reluctantly" pass the funding in conference: Democrats controlling Congress sent the most explicit signals yet on Thursday that they are resigned to providing additional funding for the war in Iraq before Congress adjourns for the year. Conceding that President Bush is in a strong position as Congress seeks to wrap up its work, Democrats are cooking up a pre-Christmas endgame that would deliver tens of billions of dollars for operations in Iraq and Afghanistan on conditions acceptable to the White House. The Iraq funding would ultimately be attached by Bush's Senate GOP...
Pakistani army troops overran regional Taliban leader Maulana Fazlullah 's command headquarters yesterday in Swat as part of its offensive. Fazlullah had fled before the army captured Imam Dheri, but he left behind his stash of liquor: Security forces captured Imam Dheri, headquarters of pro-Taliban militant leader Maulana Fazlullah, and the Khwazkhela area in Swat, officials said on Thursday. The army also blew up the houses of Fazlullah and his spokesman Maulana Sirajuddin, besides seizing several weapons, computers and some bottles of liquor from the site, army officials said. The liquor was believed to be seized at militants’ checkposts from people. Earlier, troops backed by tanks and gunship helicopters advanced towards Imam Dheri and seized control of a madrassa run by Fazlullah, and an adjacent mosque without any resistance. De-mining experts have started combing the area for landmines and booby traps. In Khwazkhela, the troops have taken control of a...
The opposition parties in Pakistan cannot agree on a joint list of demands to present to Pervez Musharraf in return for their participation in next month's parliamentary elections. Benazir Bhutto has expressed skepticism regarding the benefits of a boycott in any case, and Nawaz Sharif may find himself forced into contesting the election in order to keep up with his rival: Pakistani opposition parties have failed to reach agreement on demands to set the government to ensure their participation in next month's election, making a united opposition boycott increasingly unlikely. Former prime ministers Nawaz Sharif and Benazir Bhutto, both recently back from years in exile, are trying to forge a "charter of demands" to present to President Perez Musharraf to ensure a fair election and their participation. A boycott by the two main opposition parties and smaller allies would deprive the vote of credibility and prolong instability that has raised...
The Washington Post reports on the anguish of the Democrats in fixing the Alternative Minimum Tax (AMT), one of the dumbest ongoing fiscal issues over the last several years. Why the anguish? Democrats can't find another tax to replace the AMT revenue this year. The Democrats in this article act as though they have only one choice in dealing with the AMT, which is to play a shell game and find another way to tax Americans. Even the Republicans in the article, gleeful over forcing Democrats to violate Paygo, seem to forget that other options exist for fiscal responsibility. At Heading Right, I remind Congress that the budget "hole" supposedly blown by the AMT fix amounts to a whopping 1.67% of the federal spending plan for next year. Congressional anguish over fixing the ludicrously broken AMT apparently has clouded their minds so much that they've forgotten about the option to...
The hate-crime expansion legislation that Ted Kennedy attached to the military spending authorization bill has disappeared, thanks to a veto threat by the White House. The suddenly-relevant and somewhat ascendant Bush administration forced a conference committee to drop the controversial amendment, with House Democrats unwilling to force a confrontation they would lose with the President: House and Senate negotiators yesterday nixed a measure to expand hate-crime protections, removing it from a Pentagon policy bill that is now likely to pass both chambers by wide margins. Negotiations on the defense authorization bill had bogged down, with House Democratic leaders worried that they did not have enough votes to pass the bill if it included the hate-crime measure. The bill, which has been vigorously supported by gay rights groups, would have extended hate-crime protections to victims based on gender, sexual orientation or disability. ... House Democrats already faced a loss of support...
Good news, men -- master shoe designer Manolo Blahnik has created a new line of men's footwear. If you don't recognize the name, your wives or girlfriends can explain that his designs are highly prized and very expensive. Now, possessors of the Y chromosome can have the access to Blahnik's genius, as represented in this new design: Men, we've waited years for this opportunity. Now we can also wear open-toed slingbacks with a low heel: Well, guys, listen up. There's a man who wants you to put on a pair slingbacks. And they're blue suede, open-toed, and cost about as much as a flat screen TV. This week, Manolo Blahnik, the Spanish designer famous for making women swoon over $700 stilettos, announced he's putting out a line of men's shoes. Among the styles: Afiyet, the aforementioned blue suede number, and Bir, a sandal made of leopard-print leather. "There are some...
Kathryn Jean Lopez updates National Review Online readers about NRO's investigation into the reporting of W. Thomas Smith at The Tank, a subsidiary blog of NRO. Kathryn retracted two of Smith's pieces last weekend after Thomas Edsall at the Huffington Post raised serious questions about Smith's reporting. Now NRO has decided that they cannot stand by any of Smith's reports from Lebanon: Having reviewed his work, we cannot vouch for the accuracy of his reporting. In general, too much of Smith’s information came from sources who had an incentive to exaggerate the threat Hezbollah poses to Lebanon — and these sources influenced his reporting for the whole of his trip. While we agree that that threat is very real, our readers should have had more information about Smith’s sources so that they could have better evaluated the credibility of the information he was providing. I apologize to all of our...
Two viewpoints on the "Faith in America" speech by Mitt Romney have arisen since its delivery yesterday. Either people believe it to be a masterpiece or unnecessarily divisive. Two columns today make these cases in particularly clear manners. Peggy Noonan and E.J. Dionne write impressively for both cases, with former speechwriter Noonan opting for masterpiece: Mr. Romney gave the speech Thursday morning. How did he do? Very, very well. He made himself some history. The words he said will likely have a real and positive impact on his fortunes. The speech's main and immediate achievement is that foes of his faith will now have to defend their thinking, in public. But what can they say to counter his high-minded arguments? "Mormons have cooties"? Romney reintroduced himself to a distracted country--Who is that handsome man saying those nice things?--while defending principles we all, actually, hold close, and hold high. His text...
The CIA finds itself under fire today after the New York Times forced Director Mike Hayden to admit that the agency destroyed two videotapes in 2005 showing terrorists undergoing waterboarding. The agency had previously denied any such tapes existed to all but a handful in Congress. Now the revelation could have far-reaching consequences, including on the conviction of Zacarias Moussaoui: The Central Intelligence Agency in 2005 destroyed at least two videotapes documenting the interrogation of two Al Qaeda operatives in the agency’s custody, a step it took in the midst of Congressional and legal scrutiny about the C.I.A’s secret detention program, according to current and former government officials. The videotapes showed agency operatives in 2002 subjecting terror suspects — including Abu Zubaydah, the first detainee in C.I.A. custody — to severe interrogation techniques. They were destroyed in part because officers were concerned that tapes documenting controversial interrogation methods could expose...
He got to show his sensitive side during the CNN/YouTube debate, and now he gets to show his toughness. Mike Huckabee released his immigration plan last night, and it moves him much more towards the enforcement-first position favored by most Republicans and some Democrats as well: Released Friday, Huckabee's plan takes a tough stance — similar to those of his GOP rivals — though he has been more forgiving of some here illegally: As Arkansas governor, Huckabee attempted to make children of illegal immigrants eligible for scholarships and in-state college tuition. Huckabee defended that Arkansas effort at a debate last month: "In all due respect, we are a better country than to punish children for what their parents did. We're a better country than that." His new immigration plan does not address education, health care or other services provided to illegal immigrants that strain communities in early-voting Iowa and other...
Note: This post will remain on top until show time; newer posts may be found below. Today on Heading Right Radio (2 pm CT), we'll have the Week in Review with Duane "Generalissimo" Patterson! We go long on Fridays to 90 minutes, hopefully like the Steelers will go long on the Patriots on Sunday and end the unbeaten season for Tom Brady. I'll be wearing my Steelers cap while we discuss Mitt Romney's speech, the Democrats collapse on Iraq, the resolution of the NRO controversy and lessons learned from TNR's, the CIA destruction of videotapes containing interrogations of Abu Zubaydah and others, and the NIE on Iran. Call 646-652-4889 to join the conversation! And don't forget to join our chat room! Did you know that you can listen to Heading Right Radio through your TiVo service? Click here for the instructions. Also, you can subscribe to Heading Right Radio through...
Many readers at Captain's Quarters lived through the multiple transplants that the First Mate had over the last three years. Literally, this blog began because she went into the hospital for a week with kidney failure in October 2003, and I needed something to take my mind off of the pressures of her illness. CapQ readers have supported us in prayers, good thoughts, and celebration when she successfully underwent a pancreas transplant and two kidney transplants, the latest of which came on March 30th of this year. Both kidney transplants came as tremendous gifts from friends we knew in Marriage Encounter. Rarely does anyone have a friend willing to put his or her life and health on the line to save one's own -- and it's beyond remarkable to have that happen twice in three years. The FM would not be here today without them, as she never could have...
Michael Hayden tried last night to defuse the controversy over the 2005 destruction of videotapes depicting the waterboarding of al-Qaeda terrorists by claiming that the CIA had worked with Congress in doing so. Not so fast, say Silvestre Reyes and Pete Hoekstra. Hoekstra chaired the House Intelligence Committee and Reyes took over Jane Harman's position on the committee -- and neither have any recollection that the CIA notified them at all: The CIA did not tell Congress about the destruction in 2005 of videotapes recording aggressive CIA interrogations of two Al Qaeda suspects until this year, the top two members of the House Intelligence Committee said in an angry letter Friday to CIA Director Michael V. Hayden. Anticipating an upcoming New York Times article revealing the destruction, Hayden said in a memo to employees on Thursday that congressional oversight committees had been notified about the existence of the tapes and...
December 8, 2007
Slowly the media outlets have begun to acknowledge the dramatic success of the surge strategy in Iraq. Some of them use unusual methods of measurement; for the Washington Post, the activity of cabbies demonstrated the return to normalcy in Baghdad. For the BBC, it comes down to a very British -- and Arabic -- method of measure: For the American soldiers patrolling Baghdad's southern suburb of Dora these are days of trial by tea. For in many houses they enter in this largely Sunni part of the city, hot sweet tea is offered and they know that refusal can offend. It does not stop at tea either. As a goodwill gesture, the soldiers have taken to buying roast chicken, cheese, bread, and the Iraqi delicacy called samoun - bread dipped in sweet syrup - as they make their rounds of Dora. ... Nearby Dora market is thriving. Back in April...
The decision to destroy the tapes of interrogations that included waterboarding two al-Qaeda terrorists came from the director of the clandestine services of the CIA and in opposition to requests from both Congress and the White House. Jose Rodriguez, the Director of Operations, made the decision without consulting the CIA's attorneys or the DCI, Porter Goss. While a member of Congress and head of the House Intelligence Committee, Goss had demanded that the CIA retain all such recordings: White House and Justice Department officials, along with senior members of Congress, advised the Central Intelligence Agency in 2003 against a plan to destroy hundreds of hours of videotapes showing the interrogations of two operatives of Al Qaeda, government officials said Friday. The chief of the agency’s clandestine service nevertheless ordered their destruction in November 2005, taking the step without notifying even the C.I.A.’s own top lawyer, John A. Rizzo, who was...
Al Gore joked during the 2000 presidential campaign that his mother sang him to sleep with the union jingle, "Look For The Union Label". Barack Obama could have used a lullaby like that, as he took criticism from organized labor over the choice of venue for his Oprah Winfrey campaign rally. The Verizon Wireless Arena in Manchester, New Hampshire has no union representation, despite the best efforts of organizers (via Memeorandum): Barack Obama’s presidential campaign deeply concerned organized labor by booking its big rally Sunday with superstar Oprah Winfrey at the non-union Verizon Wireless Arena. But an agreement reached tonight ensures no picket line will be set up at the event, saving Obama from an uncomfortable choice and potential embarrassment. A union representing organized stage hands has been trying unsuccessfully to gain a foothold at the arena since it opened six years ago. State and national labor officials informed the...
For an administration eager to promote policies of free trade and free markets, the Bush White House seems unwilling to live by its consequences. Instead of allowing the mortgage market to operate freely, the Treasury Department will force lenders to freeze adjustable-rate mortgages at artificially low interest rates to keep bad loans from defaulting -- at least for now. The five-year freeze essentially removes the obvious inherent risk of ARMs, forcing lenders to further subsidize those who chose unwisely. Mark Steyn takes up the topic in today's column (via McQ at QandO): Last week the Bush administration decided to "freeze" for five years the interest rates of certain types of mortgages. You've probably caught the tail end of news stories about "subprime" home loans, lots of foreclosures, etc. Never a happy moment when the bank takes the farm. So now the government has stepped in and said that, if you...
Sean Penn endorsed Dennis Kucinich for President, after tipping off news agencies of a major political announcement earlier this week. While his choice of candidate may not suprise many, it should have surprised John Edwards. After all, Penn had already given him twice as many greenback endorsements as Kucinich (via the Political Machine): Academy Award-winning actor Sean Penn endorsed Dennis Kucinich for president in San Francisco Friday. Penn made what had been billed as a "major political statement" at San Francisco State University. Andy Juniewicz, National Press Secretary and senior advisor to Kucinich told NBC11 that Penn made the endorsement at an open-to-the-public event sponsored by The San Francisco State College Democrats. The NBC report includes a slideshow entitled "The Many Faces of Sean Penn". Well, perhaps we can at least say two-faced. FEC records show that Penn had donated $4,600 to John Edwards -- two days after donating $2,300...
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, the Volume I guys have the day off, so King, Mitch, and I will rotate through between 11 am - 1 pm. We'll cover the week's hottest issues -- and I'll ask King about the Treasury action to freeze ARM rates. Be sure to call 651-289-4488 to join the conversation!...
General John Batiste has spent the last few years speaking out against the continuing efforts of the US in Iraq. Today, in the Washington Post, the former commander has decided that the surge strategy has succeeded in rescuing the US mission, and that Iraq really is the center of the war on terror. Batiste writes a joint op-ed column with Pete Hegseth announcing that he now supports the Bush administration's pursuit of stability in Iraq (via Worldwide Standard): First, the United States must be successful in the fight against worldwide Islamic extremism. We have seen this ruthless enemy firsthand, and its global ambitions are undeniable. This struggle, the Long War, will probably take decades to prosecute. Failure is not an option. Second, whether or not we like it, Iraq is central to that fight. We cannot walk away from our strategic interests in the region. Iraq cannot become a staging...
December 9, 2007
The CIA briefed four Congressional leaders, including Nancy Pelosi, on the controversial practice of waterboarding over five years ago. Not only did no one object to the practice during the September 2002 briefing, but one attendee asked the briefer whether the technique was tough enough: In September 2002, four members of Congress met in secret for a first look at a unique CIA program designed to wring vital information from reticent terrorism suspects in U.S. custody. For more than an hour, the bipartisan group, which included current House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), was given a virtual tour of the CIA's overseas detention sites and the harsh techniques interrogators had devised to try to make their prisoners talk. Among the techniques described, said two officials present, was waterboarding, a practice that years later would be condemned as torture by Democrats and some Republicans on Capitol Hill. But on that day, no...
NATO and Afghan forces captured two Taliban leaders in Musa Qala, the only city held by the Taliban in Afghanistan. Their capture comes amid the long-awaited push to liberate Musa Qala and end its ten-month loss. The Taliban has been forced into the city center, and the coalition forces have patiently kept up the pressure: Two senior Taleban leaders have been captured in heavy fighting for the southern town of Musa Qala, the Afghan defence ministry has said. Afghan and Nato forces are trying to recapture the town, the only major centre in Taleban hands. ... The heavy blows from the ground and the air seem to have forced the Taleban to pull back closer to the centre of Musa Qala, but they say they withdrew from two frontline villages because of civilian casualties there. Nonetheless, Taleban commanders have said they will defend the town from fortified positions covered by...
Rasmussen's polling in Michigan has Mike Huckabee surging to the top of the leaderboard, a significant showing in what could be a critical state. The January 15th primary holds a significant number of delegates and could be seen as a harbinger of the other large states in the Super Tuesday races three weeks later: Mike Huckabee’s surging campaign has created a three-way toss-up in Michigan’s Republican Primary. The latest Rasmussen Reports telephone survey finds Huckabee earning 21% of the vote. Former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney, the son of a former Michigan Governor, attracts 20% support while former New York City Mayor is the top choice for 19% of Likely Republican Primary Voters. Trailing the Michigan frontrunners are Fred Thompson at 9%, John McCain at 8% and Ron Paul at 7%. Tom Tancredo and Duncan Hunter split 2% while 15% are not sure how they will vote. Michigan’s primary is scheduled...
Joe Biden told ABC News this morning that the destruction of tapes by the CIA warrants a special prosecutor for the investigation. He reminded George Stephanopolous that he had voted against Michael Mukasey for Attorney General because of his answers on the legality of waterboarding, and that he cannot be trusted to investigate the actions taken by the CIA to destroy evidence of its use: A Senate Democratic leader said Sunday the attorney general should appoint a special counsel to investigate the CIA's destruction of videotaped interrogations of two suspected terrorists. Sen. Joe Biden, a Democratic presidential candidate and chairman of the Senate Foreign Affairs Committee, cited Michael Mukasey's refusal during confirmation hearings in October to describe waterboarding as torture. .... "I just think it's clearer and crisper and everyone will know what the truth ... if he appoints a special counsel, steps back from it," said Biden, D-Del. "I...
On Friday, I wrote about Michael Larson, a twelve-year-old boy who needs a kidney transplant to survive. His mother Leah has allowed me to tell Michael's story in hopes that we can find a living donor with type B or type O blood to give the gift of life to Michael. I intend to write every few days on Michael and transplants, but after Friday's post, I received an e-mail from Amy Kissling, a CapQ reader and a living donor herself, asking if she could tell her story. I have written this because you might be donating a kidney to a loved one. I have no medical experience but having done this myself, I can share with you what the experience was like for me. Not on a personal or spiritual level, but just what you can expect to happen to you, your body and your kidney. What follows are...
Today the Pittsburgh Steelers meet the undefeated New England Patriots in Foxboro. The Patriots face the toughest remaining test this year in their quest to match and surpass the 1972 Miami Dolphins. Miami, meanwhile, faces off against Buffalo not far away to maintain its perfect season of futility. Anthony Smith predicts a Steeler win: Certainly, Steelers second-year safety Anthony Smith thinks so. The big discussion in the Patriots locker room Thursday was Smith's bold guarantee of victory. "We heard about it," Brady said. "Coach always says we do our talking on Sundays. I'm glad they feel that way. I hope they feel that way. We'll see who comes out ahead on Sunday." Belichick, whose quotes always seem to be in lockstep with Brady, added, "I would expect when Pittsburgh walks out there, they're going to expect a win. I can't imagine they would approach it any differently. My prediction? Steelers...
December 10, 2007
If anyone attempted to e-mail me over the last 24 hours, I probably didn't receive the message. A large message with multiple attachments remained on the server yesterday, and I went over my limit on the mailbox. If you sent me something important yesterday, you may need to re-send it....
Not being a lawyer, this question will exist more as a philosophical one, much as we treated it on Saturday's Northern Alliance broadcast. Mitch Berg and I debated the efficacy of gun-free zones in the wake of the Omaha mall shooting that left nine people dead, but before the two shootings at New Life church facilities that left eight dead. In at least the first shooting, the perpetrator conducted his murder spree in a commercial facility whose owners had marked it as a gun-free zone, a designation that keeps concealed-carry licensees from bringing their weapons into the building. We both wondered if that decision opened the owners to legal liability for forcing people to disarm themselves without having enough security to protect them. D.J. Tice, one of the more thoughtful columnists at the Minneapolis Star-Tribune, listened to our show and found the argument intriguing. He wondered, though, why we don't...
NATO forces, accompanied by Afghan troops, made it to the center of Musa Qala today. The Taliban have retreated to the city center, pressed in on all sides by a long-awaited NATO offensive on the only major piece of ground held by the Taliban in Afghanistan. The liberation of the city will come after 10 months of Taliban rule: Afghan troops Monday entered the town of Musa Qala which had been captured by Taliban rebels 10 months ago and become a key insurgent base, the NATO-led force said. "The ANA (Afghan National Army) have entered the district centre. They are in the centre of the town," a spokesman for the NATO-led force, Major Charles Anthony, told AFP. The Afghan defence ministry issued a statement saying the Afghan and NATO troops had entered the Musa Qala district, of which the town is the centre, and had started cleaning up operations. Musa...
For a nice change of pace, the Republican presidential candidates met for their 8.476th debate of the 2008 primary race, but this time for Univision, translated into Spanish. Unlike their previous debate, the candidates played nice with each other and even with Hillary Clinton. The debate, therefore, hardly displayed much spice: The Republican presidential field gingerly defended tough immigration policies before a Hispanic audience even as candidates acknowledged that their party has lost support from the fastest growing minority group in the U.S. There were few differences voiced among the candidates and not a single candidate attacked any of his rivals, a sharp contrast to recent Republican debates. Rather, it seemed that the evening was a discourse between the Republican Party and the Hispanic community, as moderators asked about immigration, health care, education and Latin American politics, and Republicans sought to show they shared values with their questioners even as...
The Democrats have insisted that the "paygo" rules enforce fiscal discipline, except when they don't. They gave up on paygo when they voted for the AMT patch that will save middle-class taxpayers from a $50 billion Congressional mistake. The Wall Street Journal explains that paygo never really represented fiscal responsibility, but instead presented Democrats with a fig leaf for taxation. Why so? It turns out that paygo doesn't apply to an overwhelming majority of the federal budget: domestic spending and entitlements. At Heading Right, I point out that the rules only restrict the most Constitutionally legitimate parts of the federal budget while allowing the greatest amount of leeway for the priorities of the Democratic Party. Until paygo applies to the entire federal budget, it's nothing more than a three-card Monty i terms of fiscal discipline. No wonder the Democrats gave it up so easily....
How has Hillary Clinton prepared herself to become the Democratic nominee for President? She hasn't held an executive office, nor has she entered the diplomatic service. She has only one and a third Senate terms for experience. However, she has nurtured a network of supporters and contributors, and as the Los Angeles Times reports, Hillary has used her Senate power to keep them enriched: Since taking office in 2001, Clinton has delivered $500 million worth of earmarks that have specifically benefited 59 corporations. About 64% of those corporations provided funds to her campaigns through donations made by employees, executives, board members or lobbyists, a review by the Los Angeles Times shows. All told, Clinton has earmarked more than $2.3 billion in federal appropriations for projects in her state since her election to the Senate, much of it for public works projects funded in conjunction with fellow Democratic Sen. Charles E....
If Hillary Clinton can run on the Pork ticket, Steny Hoyer makes a fine running mate. The Washington Post reports that Hoyer made the Top Ten Porkers List for 2008, based on an analysis of funding requests pending for next year's budget. And, like Hillary, Hoyer does not forget his contributors when it comes to spreading out the taxpayer dollars: Even as House Majority Leader Steny H. Hoyer has joined in steps to clean up pork-barrel spending, the Maryland congressman has tucked $96 million worth of pet projects into next year's federal budget, including $450,000 for a campaign donor's foundation. Hoyer (D) is one of the top 10 earmarkers in the House for 2008, based on budget requests in bills so far, according to Taxpayers for Common Sense, an independent watchdog group. ... Consider the $450,000 that Hoyer inserted into a 2008 education spending bill for the California-based InTune Foundation...
The latest national intelligence estimate (NIE) on Iran has come under considerable criticism for ist conclusion that the mullahs stopped pursuing nuclear weapons in 2003. Not only have Americans questioned the sudden reversal of the analysis, but even the Europeans wonder what the CIA has been drinking of late. The British have "grave doubts" about the veracity of this conclusion, and openly speculate that the CIA fell into a disinformation trap: British spy chiefs have grave doubts that Iran has mothballed its nuclear weapons programme, as a US intelligence report claimed last week, and believe the CIA has been hoodwinked by Teheran. The timing of the CIA report has also provoked fury in the British Government, where officials believe it has undermined efforts to impose tough new sanctions on Iran and made an Israeli attack on its nuclear facilities more likely. The security services in London want concrete evidence to...
In a striking retreat, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby will not pursue any appeals of his conviction for obstruction of justice and perjury. His attorney says that the "burden ... of complete vindication" proved too much for Lewis and his family. However, given the short period of time since his conviction and sentence commutation, it appears more that Lewis doesn't believe he can achieve any kind of vindication, at least not through the courts: Former White House aide I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby is dropping his appeal in the CIA leak case, his attorney said Monday. Libby, the former chief of staff to Vice President Dick Cheney, was convicted of perjury and obstruction for lying about his conversations with reporters about outed CIA operative Valerie Plame. "We remain firmly convinced of Mr. Libby's innocence," attorney Theodore Wells said. "However, the realities were, that after five years of government service by Mr. Libby...
Hugo Chavez suffered a narrow but humiliating loss at the polls last week for his referendum on changing the Venezuelan constitution into a roadmap for dictatorship. His acknowledgment of the defeat gained him praise from world leaders for his commitment to democracy. However, Newsweek now reports that Chavez tried to manipulate an overwhelming loss into a victory -- only to be stopped at the threat of a military coup (via QandO): Most of Latin America's leaders breathed a sigh of relief earlier this week, after Venezuelan voters rejected President Hugo Chávez's constitutional amendment referendum. In private they were undoubtedly relieved that Chávez lost, and in public they expressed delight that he accepted defeat and did not steal the election. But by midweek enough information had emerged to conclude that Chávez did, in fact, try to overturn the results. As reported in El Nacional, and confirmed to me by an intelligence...
Former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif dropped plans to boycott Pakistan's parliamentary elections after failing to convince other opposition parties to join it. Instead, his party will contest for seats in the assembly while Sharif remains ineligible for office on the basis of convictions reached after his removal from office by Pervez Musharraf: Pakistan's election campaign began in earnest Monday, a day after former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif dropped threats to boycott the ballot to protest the authoritarian rule of President Pervez Musharraf. Sharif is drawing up plans to tour the country to stump for his Pakistan Muslim League-N party, even though election authorities have rejected his own candidacy, said Sadiq ul-Farooq, senior party official. The two-time premier will travel to the cities of Faisalabad, Multan, Rawalpindi, Quetta, Karachi and Peshawar in the coming days, ul-Farooq said. The only significant party boycotting the elections is Jamat-e-Islami, the party of radical Islamists....
Note: This post will remain on top until show time; newer posts may be found below. Today on Heading Right Radio (2 pm CT), we welcome Val Prieto of Babalu Blog to explain his latest "Cambio" project. In the second half, John Randall of the NRSC joins us to talk about the latest in the 2008 Senate races and the latest issues hitting the NRSC radar! Call 646-652-4889 to join the conversation! And don't forget to join our chat room! Did you know that you can listen to Heading Right Radio through your TiVo service? Click here for the instructions. Also, you can subscribe to Heading Right Radio through iTunes now by clicking this link:...
You can almost write the headlines yourself: "Congressman Forgoes Pork, Women And Minorities Hardest Hit". The Star Tribune tries that on John Kline, the Republican representing Minnesota's Second Congressional District -- my own, in fact. They manage to make a virtue look like a vice in noting his conversion to anti-pork activism, and line up a few complainers to make the point (via True North): As Congress lurches toward a budget showdown before Christmas, Minnesota Rep. John Kline is at the center of an ideological food fight over the role of pork-barrel "earmarks." The Lakeville Republican calls the system of special funding for pet projects a "corrupting" influence in Congress, and says he won't take any. That has left officials in his rapidly growing suburban district wanting federal dollars to complete projects from the Cedar Avenue Transitway to the expansion of Hwy. 212 in Carver County. While some appreciate the...
I believe in the jury system, I really do. An overwhelming amount of the time, juries get it right, proving the wisdom of the common individual. No system achieves perfection, as we saw with the O.J. Simpson murder trial, and now we have another example in the strange mistrial in the Holy Land Foundation prosecution. Michael Fechter interviewed several of the jurors, and found the reason why a jury refuted its own reported verdicts -- an out-of-control juror who thinks Hamas and the founding fathers of this nation have a lot in common (via Memeorandum): While several jurors favored acquittals, just one out of the 12 did most of the knocking down. In fact, interviews with three HLF jurors - speaking publicly for the first time - suggest that juror William Neal's stridency may have changed the trial's outcome. Neal even claimed credit for steering jurors away from convictions in...
ABC News has an explosive interview with one of the men who interrogated al-Qaeda terrorist Abu Zubaydah -- and he admits to waterboarding him. John Kiriakou says that he thinks waterboarding is torture, but that its use saved countless American lives and stopped perhaps dozens of attacks: A leader of the CIA team that captured the first major al Qaeda figure, Abu Zubaydah, says subjecting him to waterboarding was torture but necessary. In the first public comment by any CIA officer involved in handling high-value al Qaeda targets, John Kiriakou, now retired, said the technique broke Zubaydah in less than 35 seconds. "The next day, he told his interrogator that Allah had visited him in his cell during the night and told him to cooperate," said Kiriakou in an interview to be broadcast tonight on ABC News' "World News With Charles Gibson" and "Nightline." "From that day on, he answered...
December 11, 2007
Two bombings rocked Algiers today, killing at least 27 people. The bombs targeted the Algerian capital's judiciary and UN refugee offices, and at least one of the explosions came from a suicide attack. That puts suspicion on the al-Qaeda affiliate, the GSPC: Two bomb attacks in the Algerian capital -- one on the UN refugee agency office and one in front of the Supreme Court -- killed at least 27 people Tuesday, officials and other sources said. Interior Minister Yazid Zerhouni said a suicide bomber was used in at least one of the two attacks -- the latest in a series this year which have mostly been claimed by Al-Qaeda. "The death toll is very high," the minister told reporters. Zerhouni said a suicide bomber triggered the explosion outside the Algiers office of the UN Higher Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in the attack. The GSPC (now calling itself al-Qaeda in...
Our neighbor, Rep. David Obey of Wisconsin, has demanded that the White House start approving some Congressional pork if he wants funding for Iraq. Senator Robert Byrd believes fiscal responsibility means increasing domestic spending if the nation has to spend more money on defense and foreign aid in a time of war. Both represent the Democratic petulance regarding the White House demand for a stripped-down omnibus bill: A Democratic deal to give President Bush some war funding in exchange for additional domestic spending appeared to collapse last night after House Appropriations Committee Chairman David R. Obey (D-Wis.) accused Republicans of bargaining in bad faith. Instead, Obey said he will push a huge spending bill that would hew to the president's spending limit by stripping it of all lawmakers' pet projects, as well as most of the Bush administration's top priorities. It would also contain no money for the wars in...
Jeanne Assam carried her pistol with her to church on Sunday. She did so legally, having received a license to carry a concealed weapon. If a weapon in church seems incongruous, it also became providential on this particular Sunday, as Assam stopped an assault that may have killed many more people than it did (via Memeorandum and many CapQ readers): Assam said she believes God gave her the strength to confront Murray, keeping her calm and focused even though he appeared to be twice her size and was more heavily armed. Murray was carrying two handguns, an assault rifle and over 1,000 rounds of ammunition, said Sgt. Jeff Johnson of the Colorado Springs Police Department. "It seemed like it was me, the gunman and God," she said. Assam worked as a police officer in downtown Minneapolis during the 1990s and is licensed to carry a weapon. She attends one of...
Unfortunately, it's the wrong half. Previous NIEs did not acknowledge a shutdown of the Iranian nuclear weapons program in 2003, but the new one fails to recognize its restart in 2004. The Iranian opposition group that exposed the program in the first place will publicly state that the ODNI's new estimate ignores evidence of the program's continuance at new facilities: The Iranian opposition group that first exposed Iran's nuclear-fuel program said a U.S. intelligence analysis is correct that Tehran shut down its weaponization program in 2003, but claims that the program was relocated and restarted in 2004. The claim, to be made public today by the National Council for Resistance in Iran, joins a broad pushback by conservative hawks who say the U.S. analysis has wrongly given the impression that Iran's nuclear-fuel program doesn't present an urgent threat. In recent days, Republican lawmakers have called for a review of the...
With less than four weeks to go before the Iowa caucuses, the presidential campaigns have begun pulling out all stops for the first contest of the primary season. Mitt Romney has gone negative first, stunned by a rapid rise by Mike Huckabee and a potential embarrassing loss in a state where he invested heavily. His switch to the negative underscores the importance of Iowa to his overall strategy, and perhaps reveals a hint of desperation. As negative attacks go, this is really fairly mild. Candidates should have the ability to compare records and policies without getting accused of unfair personal attacks, and this lands squarely in the former category. However, Iowans don't care much for negative advertising as a rule, and as I explain at Heading Right, being the first to launch them implies a certain back-against-the-wall quality....
The story of the CIA's tape destruction took another twist today. Earlier, Mark Mazzetti had written that the destruction of the tapes angered the CIA's legal counsel, John Rizzo. Today, Mazzetti and Scott Shane report that the CIA's attorneys gave permission to destroy the tapes of interrogations that included waterboarding: Lawyers within the clandestine branch of the Central Intelligence Agency gave written approval in advance to the destruction in 2005 of hundreds of hours of videotapes documenting interrogations of two lieutenants from Al Qaeda, according to a former senior intelligence official with direct knowledge of the episode. The involvement of agency lawyers in the decision making would widen the scope of the inquiries into the matter that have now begun in Congress and within the Justice Department. Any written documents are certain to be a focus of government investigators as they try to reconstruct the events leading up to the...
Christopher Hitchens proposes a radical solution to the problem of spin-cycle NIEs and interagency feuding. Rather than continue with efforts to reform the intelligence community, Hitchens argues for the elimination of the CIA and rebuilding our intel efforts from the ground up. It seems like a radical step during a time of war, but the agency may now have angered enough people on both sides of the aisle to make it possible: And now we have further confirmation of the astonishing culture of lawlessness and insubordination that continues to prevail at the highest levels in Langley. At a time when Congress and the courts are conducting important hearings on the critical question of extreme interrogation, and at a time when accusations of outright torture are helping to besmirch and discredit the United States all around the world, a senior official of the CIA takes the unilateral decision to destroy the...
According to a new Gallup poll, the supposed hurdle for Mormons in a presidential campaign has been somewhat overstated. Only one in six Americans, including a fairly equal representation of Democrats and Republicans, would refuse to vote for a well-qualified Mormon: A new Gallup Poll finds about one in six Americans, including similar proportions of Republicans and Democrats, indicating they would not support their party's nominee for president if that person were a Mormon. The poll was conducted in the days immediately following a major speech by Republican presidential candidate and former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, in which he attempted to quiet voter concern about his Mormon religion. The speech appeared to be a response to the political situation in Iowa, where former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, who has made his Christian faith a centerpiece of his Republican presidential campaign, has taken the lead in the Iowa caucus polls. According...
I haven't commented on the Larry O'Donnell volcanic rant about Mormonism, mostly because I have found O'Donnell repugnant ever since his volcanic rant at John O'Neill in 2004. However, one has to take notice of hypocrisy so bald and cowardice so exposed as his admission to Hugh Hewitt on last night's show. Why does O'Donnell go after Mormons? They don't fight back: HH: Would you say the same things about Mohammed as you just said about Joseph Smith? LO’D: Oh, well, I’m afraid of what the…that’s where I’m really afraid. I would like to criticize Islam much more than I do publicly, but I’m afraid for my life if I do. HH: Well, that’s candid. LO’D: Mormons are the nicest people in the world. They’re not going to ever… HH: So you can be bigoted towards Mormons, because they’ll just send you a strudel. LO’D: They’ll never take a shot...
Note: This post will remain on top until show time; newer posts may be found below. Today on Heading Right Radio (2 pm CT), we welcome back Barbara Oakley, author of Evil Genes: Why Rome Fell, Hitler Rose, Enron Failed and My Sister Stole My Mother's Boyfriend, to discuss the concept of free will in light of her research on neurological sources for evil. I'll also talk about the latest in the presidential races, including an interesting poll on the effect of Mormonism on voter decisions. Call 646-652-4889 to join the conversation! And don't forget to join our chat room! Did you know that you can listen to Heading Right Radio through your TiVo service? Click here for the instructions. Also, you can subscribe to Heading Right Radio through iTunes now by clicking this link:...
The endorsement season seems in full swing now, and this time Santa's dropped a big gift to Mitt Romney -- the National Review endorsement. When William F. Buckley's venerable journal speaks on effective conservatism, people listen, and Mitt's team has reason to cheer: Our guiding principle has always been to select the most conservative viable candidate. In our judgment, that candidate is Mitt Romney, the former governor of Massachusetts. Unlike some other candidates in the race, Romney is a full-spectrum conservative: a supporter of free-market economics and limited government, moral causes such as the right to life and the preservation of marriage, and a foreign policy based on the national interest. While he has not talked much about the importance of resisting ethnic balkanization — none of the major candidates has — he supports enforcing the immigration laws and opposes amnesty. Those are important steps in the right direction. Uniting...
December 12, 2007
Had the Republicans lost their two special election contests to replace deceased GOP House members, one would see the papers filled with analyses of the coming debacle for Republican hopes in 2008. Now that they have won both handily, expect most to either ignore the races altogether or chalk up the wins to local Republican strength. However, pundits cannot easily dismiss the lessons from the race in Ohio: Republicans retained two House seats in special elections Tuesday, including a hotly contested Ohio race that the two parties spent nearly $700,000 trying to win. ... State legislator Bob Latta decisively defeated Democrat Robin Weirauch in Ohio’s 5th District, leading by 56 to 43 percent with 90 percent of the vote in. The special election was held to replace the late Rep. Paul Gillmor (R). In Virginia’s 1st District, GOP state Del. Rob Wittman won a landslide victory over Iraq war veteran...
Has Bashar Assad struck again? A car bomb killed a Lebanese Army general expected to take command of the military in the settlement over the presidency. It recalls the string of assassinations against anti-Syrian political figures, most notably Rafik Hariri, that almost certainly have their origin in Damascus. However, this case may be somewhat different: A car bomb attack killed one of Lebanon's top military generals and at least two others Wednesday, the military and state media said, putting even more pressure on the country's delicate political situation. The target of the attack, Brig. Gen. Francois Hajj, a top Maronite Catholic in the command, was considered a leading candidate to succeed the head of the military, Gen. Michel Suleiman, if Suleiman is elected president. Hajj, 55, also led a major military campaign against Islamic militants over the summer. The blast is the first such attack against the Lebanese army, which...
The writers' strike grinds on in Hollywood, with no end in sight for the work stoppage in the entertainment industry. As the days pass, some wonder whether the strike will affect the Oscars -- and if so, what the effect will be. What would an Academy Awards show do without writers? No official cancellation announcements have been made, but with three prominent award shows just around the corner -- the Golden Globes airs in January, the Grammy's in early February and the Academy Awards just a few weeks later -- industry insiders have been speculating about how the shows will air without a team of writers in place to craft the monologues and introductions. Former head writer for the Oscars Bruce Vilanch told Variety that an Academy Awards ceremony sans writers would certainly make for interesting -- if not dull -- television. "There might be an Oscar show, but I...
The Taliban lost their grip on the only significant Afghan territory they held, Musa Qala, earlier this week. Most of their forces withdrew rather than fight the combined NATO and Afghan forces that took back the Helmand city. Their effort to shift to a fallback position in Sangin, a neighboring town, has also failed: Afghan soldiers backed by NATO air power killed more than 50 Taliban fighters during a two-day battle with militants who tried to attack a southern Afghan town near the one they were routed from this week, Afghanistan's Defense Ministry said Wednesday. Afghan soldiers fought the insurgents in Sangin, a town in Helmand province that neighbors Musa Qala, which Taliban fighters had controlled since February before abandoning it this week in the face of an offensive by Afghan, British and U.S. forces. "When the terrorists were defeated in Musa Qala, they escaped to Sangin and started firing...
Rep. Pete Hoekstra (R-MI) tells Eli Lake that the CIA's explanations for the destruction of interrogation tapes and the reversal of the NIE conclusions on Iran haven't satisfied him at all. CIA Director Michael Hayden testifies today before Hoekstra's House Intelligence Committee, and he shouldn't expect many softballs from the ranking Republican. Hoekstra wants to know why the intelligence community has dashed its credibility: Following a 90-minute closed-door hearing yesterday in the Senate, Mr. Hayden told reporters that he laid out narrative for why the tapes were destroyed. But because both the recording and the destruction took place before he became director of the CIA, he could not provide all the answers to the questions from the Senators. The chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, Senator Rockefeller, a Democrat of West Virginia, said yesterday questions remained unanswered. Mr. Hoekstra also told The New York Sun that he told...
The new Attorney General takes to the pages of the Los Angeles Times to call for immediate action to solidify FISA reforms. Michael Mukasey emphasizes the critical nature of FISA in the war on terror and lauds the compromise legislation passed almost unanimously by the Senate Intelligence Committee. However, that bill has now stalled, thanks to attacks from the Left against Democrats who supported it, and Mukasey wants to see it passed: The Senate Intelligence Committee's bill is not perfect, and it contains provisions that I hope will be improved. However, it would achieve two important objectives. First, it would keep the intelligence gaps closed by ensuring that individual court orders are not required to direct surveillance at foreign targets overseas. Second, it would provide protections from lawsuits for telecommunications companies that have been sued simply because they are believed to have assisted our intelligence agencies after the 9/11 attacks....
Hillary Clinton has begun to shift resources to New Hampshire as part of a firewall strategy after seeing Iowa slip from her grasp. However, it may be too late for the Granite State to contain the collapse of her once-invincible primary campaign. CNN shows a dead heat now in New Hampshire, as Hillary has squandered her lead: Barack Obama has chipped away at Hillary Clinton’s lead in New Hampshire, and the two Democratic presidential hopefuls are now locked in a statistical tie less than one month before the first-in-the-nation primary, a CNN/WMUR Poll released Wednesday shows. Clinton has dropped 5 percentage points since the CNN/WMUR November survey, while Obama has gained 8 percentage points, according to the poll conducted by the University of New Hampshire Survey Center. Clinton is now at 31 percent to Obama’s 30 percent. A loss here would prove devastating to Hillary. She has had a consistent...
The Des Moines Register can be forgiven for trying to drum up viewership for the 10th Republican presidential primary debate this year, three weeks before the Iowa caususes. The Register will sponsor the debate this afternoon, taking place at the odd and relatively inaccessible time of 1 pm CT, and they can use all the viewers they can muster during the workday. The chances of "seismic" revelations at this point seem very remote: The Des Moines Register's presidential debates, set for today and Thursday, are the last meetings of the candidates before the leadoff Iowa caucuses and most meaningful of the dozens already held this year, campaign strategists agree. Republicans, scheduled to debate today, will meet with the caucus campaign in flux as better-known candidates aim for former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, the surprise leader in Iowa with three weeks until caucus night. .... "With just over 20 days left...
Note: This post will remain on top until show time; newer posts may be found below. Today on Heading Right Radio (2 pm CT), we have two guests to talk about the Mumia Abu Jamal case. First, Maureen Faulkner joins us to discuss her new book, Murdered by Mumia: A Life Sentence of Loss, Pain, and Injustice, in which the widow of the murdered Philadelphia police officer explains the case, the impact of the murder on her family, and the impact of Mumia's ascension to hip left-wing cause has had on her personally. In the second half of our show, I'm pleased to have Shaun Mullen join us. Shaun worked as city editor at the Philadelphia Daily News at the time of the murder and has some unique perspective to share with us. Shaun's take on this case may surprise some, but not anyone aware of Shaun's incisive commentary --...
... certainly not the viewer. I'm with Fred Barnes. We got a series of campaign slogans, not a debate. He called Carolyn Washburn "Nurse Ratchet," and Mort Kondracke echoed my depiction of Washburn as a schoolmarm. Nothing much happened in 73 minutes, as I noted in my moment-to-moment commentary at Heading Right. Without much tension on stage, or even interest, the candidates had to push against air most of the debate. Earlier, I wrote about what the top-tier candidates had to do today, but they had very little opportunity to score points for themselves or each other. Nothing said today on the stage had been left unsaid before today. That said, all of them took some positives away from this race. Fred Thompson showed up for the debate, and scored points against Washburn's silliness in the most interesting and spontaneous part of the debate. McCain relaxed and was himself. Rudy...
I've written before that in both politics and romance, desperation does not act as an aphrodisiac. The Hillary Clinton campaign has gone past the stench of desperation to the reek of flop sweat as they see their inevitability collapse into incoherence. Hillary's New Hampshire co-chair warns that surging Barack Obama will get peppered with questions about his admitted high-school drug use: Billy Shaheen, the co-chairman of Hillary Clinton's campaign in New Hampshire, raised the issue of Sen. Barack Obama's past admissions of drug use in discussing the relative electability of the Democrats seeking the presidential nomination today. ... "The Republicans are not going to give up without a fight ... and one of the things they're certainly going to jump on is his drug use," said Shaheen, the husband of former N.H. governor Jeanne Shaheen, who is planning to run for the Senate next year. Billy Shaheen contrasted Obama's openness...
I'll be interviewed on C-SPAN2 sometime after 10 pm CT tonight. The topic will be the Republican debate earlier today. Normally we'd live-blog this at Heading Right, but thanks to the odd time the Des Moines Register chose for this debate, most of our correspondents won't be able to watch it live. I'll post my debate analysis after my Heading Right Radio show concludes. (I'm TiVoing it, as it will run during the show itself.) Be sure to catch my telephone interview during Capital News Today. UPDATE: Thanks to an extended Senate session, they had to pre-record the interview, which I just completed. C-SPAN2 will play it after they replay the debate, which is on right now -- actually just finishing up. I'm guessing that they'll run this around 11 pm CT. UPDATE: It looks like it will be more like 10:30 pm CT. It's coming up soon. Sorry for...
December 13, 2007
He's the hottest candidate in the Republican race at the home stretch before the primaries begin. He has the biggest headlines, and the biggest controversies. Now he returns to Heading Right Radio at a special time on Thursday. Governor Mike Huckabee will appear live on the December 13th show, scheduled to begin at 6 pm ET. We'll take calls and keep a close eye on the webchat, too! In the meantime, feel free to post your questions for Governor Huckabee in the comments on this post. Don't miss this late-breaking item, either -- the founder of the Minuteman Project has endorsed Huckabee. Will this build any confidence for Huckabee among illegal-immigration activists? UPDATE & BUMP: I'll push this to the top. Post your question for Huckabee, and make sure you're around today at 6 pm ET for his Heading Right Radio appearance....
Russia has negotiated a payment schedule with Iran and will complete the Bushehr nuclear power plant, both nations announced today. The move comes in the wake of the NIE that reversed years of intelligence analysis and declared Iran's nuclear weapons program halted. The Russians appear happy to accept that conclusion, even if Britain and Israel strongly disagree: Russia and Iran have settled all differences over the construction of the Bushehr nuclear power station and agreed on a time-table for its completion, the Russian contractor building the station said on Thursday. "We have resolved all the problems with the Iranians," said Sergei Shmatko, president of Atomstroiexport. "We have agreed with our Iranian colleagues a timeframe for completing the plant and we will make an announcement at the end of December." Russia's role in building the Bushehr plant on the Gulf is at the centre of a diplomatic dispute. Western powers, which...
Pervez Musharraf will lift the emergency decree he imposed six weeks ago, but only after amending Pakistan's constitution to keep his actions during the PCO from judicial challenge. It serves as a tacit admission of his violation of the constitution during his reign as military dictator and especially in his emergency rule: Attorney General Malik Mohammed Qayyum told The Associated Press that the president, who has acknowledged that he breached the constitution, will amend the charter to protect his decisions from legal challenges. Qayyum said government legal experts were finalizing the changes and that they would be announced before Musharraf lifts the emergency on Saturday, but provided no details. "The president will lift the emergency to restore the constitution and the fundamental rights," he said. Pakistanis have demanded a restoration of the constitution as a prerequisite to engaging in the electoral process. The secretive nature of the changes puts into...
The Democrats promised a new approach to legislation when they took control of Congress at the beginning of the year. No one knew that the new approach would mean doing almost nothing and blowing off budgeting until almost the end of the first quarter of the new fiscal year. Democrats in particular didn't think it meant having the Senate undo almost all of their work while under Democratic leadership. Now the Democrats have fallen into a public family feud, with members in both chambers bitterly criticizing each other for their failures. Here's the House: House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Charles B. Rangel (D-N.Y.) accuses Senate Democratic leaders of developing "Stockholm syndrome," showing sympathy to their Republican captors by caving in on legislation ... And the Senate: Reid, in turn, has taken to the Senate floor to criticize what he called the speaker's "iron hand" style of governance. And the...
George Bush should send nice Christmas cards to Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid. The pair have done more for Bush's reputation that the three Republican-controlled Congresses that preceded the 110th. The Democratic leadership have made George Bush more relevant and more Republican than ever before -- and their latest surrender on the budget underscores it: House Democratic leaders yesterday agreed to meet President Bush's bottom-line spending limit on a sprawling, half-trillion-dollar domestic spending bill, dropping their demands for as much as $22 billion in additional spending but vowing to shift funds from the president's priorities to theirs. The final legislation, still under negotiation, will be shorn of funding for the war in Iraq when it reaches the House floor, possibly on Friday. But Democratic leadership aides concede that the Senate will probably add those funds. A proposal to strip the bill of spending provisions for lawmakers' home districts was shelved...
Robert Novak tells readers today that Barack Obama has managed to do what the "vast right-wing conspiracy" could not -- show how the Clintons operate against their political opponents. The rapidly collapsing Hillary Clinton campaign's desperation has forced them to go public with accusations they normally whisper, because their whispering campaign has proven ineffective against Obama: David Axelrod, the seasoned Chicago Democratic operative who is chief strategist for Sen. Barack Obama's presidential campaign, was taken by surprise in the last minute of CBS's "Face the Nation" on Dec. 2. Howard Wolfson, Sen. Hillary Clinton's spokesman, accused Obama of running a "slush fund." In fact, the Clinton campaign was spreading that story privately months ago. Last summer, a senior Clinton aide told a famous Democrat believed to favor Obama that the Illinois senator was using his "leadership" political action committee to spread money around the country to grease his presidential prospects....
The rumors of impending economic death still appear to be exaggerated. According to the Labor Department's figures, spending rose sharply in November as consumer confidence increased. The price of gasoline figured in some of that increase, but even with that factor removed, the rise of spending increased three times from October: Wholesale prices and retail sales jumped in November and jobless claims fell last week. Wholesale prices shot up 3.2 percent, the biggest jump in 34 years, propelled by a record rise in gasoline prices. Meanwhile, consumers put aside worries about the weak economy in November to storm into the shopping malls, pushing up retail sales by the largest amount in six months. The Labor Department reports that new claims filed for jobless benefits dropped to 333,000 last week, an encouraging sign that the job market is holding together despite problems in the economy. .... Half of the November increase...
The intelligence community suspected that the fervor to protect the nation from terrorist attack would fade as they succeeded in doing so. That conundrum has proven true, as the agency takes fire for intel methods that had consensus support in the months after the 9/11 attack. It continues as the newspaper most responsible for anti-intelligence backlash now reports on the effect they've had on national security efforts (via Memeorandum): For six years, Central Intelligence Agency officers have worried that someday the tide of post-Sept. 11 opinion would turn, and their harsh treatment of prisoners from Al Qaeda would be subjected to hostile scrutiny and possible criminal prosecution. Now that day may have arrived, after years of shifting legal advice, searing criticism from rights groups — and no new terrorist attacks on American soil. The Justice Department, which in 2002 gave the C.I.A. legal approval for waterboarding and other tough interrogation...
Last night, I appeared on C-SPAN2 (via telephone) to discuss the presidential debate earlier that day in Iowa. The appearance time shifted around that evening as Congress unexpectedly stayed in session into the evening, and rather than conduct a live interview, we taped it instead. Some CapQ readers may have missed it, and so I've created a YouTube of the segment: C-SPAN2 shows a clip from MS-NBC's Hardball in this segment proving that the Left and Right can agree on one thing: Carolyn Washburn. I tried being gentle, but Chris Matthews and his guests don't pull their punches. You may have missed my appearance last night, but don't miss Mike Huckabee's appearance on Heading Right Radio tonight! We're on at 6 pm ET....
The long-awaited opening of the federal budget to Internet researchers has arrived. The new website envisioned and enabled by the Coburn-Obama Act in 2006 has officially launched at USAspending.gov, offered by the government and designed by OMB Watch. The Washington Post reports on the creation of the site: Robert Shea is a Republican insider with a head for business and a yen for federal program performance standards. Gary Bass is a government watchdog with a mean bite who wants openness and knows how to get it. Official antagonists, political opposites, brought together by a wild, crazy idea: federal budget transparency. Online and searchable. Free for the asking. Today, the White House budget office officially launches USASpending.gov, a Web site that shows taxpayers where their dollars go and which legislators, contractors and regions get the most. The site was created by Shea, associate director of the Office of Management and Budget....
I'll do something today I've mostly avoided this year -- watch the Democratic presidential debate. I consider the party debates to be mostly internal affairs, and have contented myself to dissecting transcripts after the fact. With this being the last major debate before the Iowa caucus, I'm going to take the time to peek in on the Democrats to see whether (a) they do any unusual damage to themselves, and (b) whether the Des Moines Register learned any lessons from yesterday's debate. You can keep up with the debate at Heading Right, where I will live-blog the show. My final analysis will appear in this post after the debate's conclusion. UPDATE: Well, if this debate gives any indication, I haven't missed much. Partly this comes from the Washburn model of debate, which reduces everything to 30-second sound bites. That has some relation to yesterday's debate, but Washburn got weaker and...
Recall the embarrassment Hillary Clinton suffered when she tried to explain she'd been named after Sir Edmund Hillary after he'd climbed Mount Everest -- only to have it pointed out that she had been five years old at that time? Well, she still seems a little confused about her birth date. Here's an interesting passage in today's debate: HC: We've got to enlist the American people the way we did in a previous generation for the Apollo program. As a little girl, I remember being thrilled about that, and feeling there was something I could do. [Shrugs] My fifth-grade teacher said it was to study math and science, but it gave me an idea of actually contributing to my country. Hillary Clinton was born in 1947. Assuming she started the first grade as a six-year-old as most kids do, she would have been in the fifth grade in 1957-1958. The...
Today on Heading Right Radio (5 pm CT/6 pm ET), Governor Mike Huckabee will join us live! Gov. Huckabee has appeared twice before on Heading Right Radio, and this time he joins us as a frontrunner for the Republican presidential nomination. We'll talk with him about his newfound top-tier status, what that means for his campaign, and how it has affected fundraising and national strategy. He's come under a lot of fire, and we'll give him a chance to answer the criticism that comes with his rise in the polls. UPDATE: Tom Bevan from Real Clear Politics will join me in the first half of the show. He's been in Iowa covering the debates, and we'll talk about who won, who lost, and what Tom hears from the ground in Iowa. Note: This post will remain on top until show time; newer posts may be found below. Call 646-652-4889...
If you missed the live broadcast of Heading Right Radio today, featuring a live interview with Governor Mike Huckabee, you missed an interesting look at the sudden frontrunner for the upcoming Iowa caucus. Huckabee has risen so suddenly, seemingly out of nowhere, that most people only know him through the headlines. We asked him about those controversies tonight, and Huckabee gave us some thoughtful answers. Here's a sample: On Mormons qualifying for the presidency: "It shouldn't have anything to do with whether people vote for Romney or not." On questions about religion: "Interestingly, I think I have been asked far more in-depth questions about my faith than Mitt Romney or anybody else has." On immigration: "Every person who lives in this country ought to live with his head held up, and not in fear of each other or our own government. ... The laws are broken. Fix the law, fix...
December 14, 2007
Readers may have misspent part of their youth watching the cartoon series "Scooby Doo", which (like the Road Runner series) made an entire television show recycling one plot line over and over again. Despite being ghost hunters, they always discovered a hoax, with a typical villain being Old Mister Withers. He would end the episode saying something like, "If it wasn't for those darned kids, I've have gotten away with it!" Apparently that sentiment extends to journalists. David Hazinski, a former NBC correspondent, decides that he doesn't like those darned kids messing with Journalism. In yesterday's Atlanta Journal-Constitution, he calls for self-regulation of the news media to shut out bloggers and other consumers from providing content (via Instapundit): The premise of citizen journalism is that regular people can now collect information and pictures with video cameras and cellphones, and distribute words and images over the Internet. Advocates argue that the...
Pity poor Nancy Pelosi. She and Harry Reid promised to make 2007 an annus horribilis for George Bush in many ways. Instead, the two Congressional leaders have stymied themselves through hardline tactics and divisive rhetoric. They have not been able to deliver on their biggest promise -- an end to the war in Iraq, even with Reid declaring defeat on the floor of the Senate. Yesterday, Pelosi lashed out at Republicans, saying that they "liked" war (via Memeorandum): House Speaker Nancy Pelosi lashed out at Republicans on Thursday, saying they want the Iraq war to drag on and are ignoring the public's priorities. "They like this war. They want this war to continue," Pelosi, D- Calif., told reporters. She expressed frustration over Republicans' ability to force majority Democrats to yield ground on taxes, spending, energy, war spending and other matters. "We thought that they shared the view of so many...
For those who long for some of that old-time religion, the presidential primaries have given them a concentrated dose of it. At times, this race has resembled a revival more than a campaign. With even Joe Biden -- Joe Biden! -- quoting lyrics from a spiritual at yesterday's debate, one might wonder who will select Neil Diamond's song about a faith-healer for a campaign theme song, and when. Charles Krauthammer wonders who will have the guts to end the revival: Mitt Romney declares, "Freedom and religion endure together, or perish alone." Barack Obama opens his speech at his South Carolina Oprah rally with "Giving all praise and honor to God. Look at the day that the Lord has made." Mike Huckabee explains his surge in the polls thus: "There's only one explanation for it, and it's not a human one. It's the same power that helped a little boy with...
Sean Lengell starts off his Washington Times article on the energy-bill compromise with a bit of undeserved triumphalism. Although not inaccurate in a narrow sense, the agreement on the energy bill to remove an onerous tax doesn't quite equate to surrender, but rather an uncommon occurrence in the Beltway -- an actual process of consensus legislation: Senate Democrats yesterday bowed to Republicans and stripped a proposed tax increase for oil companies from a broad energy bill, clearing the way for passage of the measure that includes the first increase in vehicle gas-mileage standards in 32 years. The bill, designed to make the nation less dependent on fossil fuels and which calls for greater use of renewable energy sources, passed 86-8 and now heads back to the House for final approval. "Compromise can be frustrating, it can be exasperating, and it can be maddening," said Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, Nevada...
Don't look now, but the Republican presidential race has become extremely interesting. Fueled by apparent discontent with the top-tier candidates, Mike Huckabee has zoomed out of nowhere to become the hottest candidate in the race. He now leads in South Carolina according to CNN's polling, and Rasmussen now shows him leading in Florida, a stronghold for Rudy Giuliani all year: Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee surged to the top among Republican presidential candidates in South Carolina, while Sen. Hillary Clinton's lead over Sen. Barack Obama among Democrats narrowed since July in that state, according to a new poll. The CNN/Opinion Research Corporation poll of South Carolinians was released Friday Huckabee was the choice of 24 percent of South Carolina Republicans in the survey conducted by telephone between Dec. 9 and 12. When the same poll was conducted in July, Huckabee was in the lower tier with just 3 percent of...
The NATO/Afghan coalition won an important victory this week in Musa Qala, held by the Taliban for almost ten months. Not only did they eject the Taliban from their one strategic position in Helmand, they also shut down an important source of funds for their continued fight against the democratic government in Kabul. Although the victory got plenty of play in the blogosphere, Investors Business Daily notices that it barely received a mention from the mainstream media: Far from just an important Taliban command post, Musa Qala was also a training base for both Afghan and foreign Islamist militants. Azimi has said hundreds of foreign terrorists had gathered there. That makes this week's victory a big win in the global war on terror. On top of that, though, is the fact that the town was home to as many as 70 heroin labs, profits from which were used to fund...
Last Friday, I introduced readers to Michael Larson and his mother, Leah. Michael, in the words of his teachers, is "a great kid" with a serious problem -- end-stage renal disease. Michael had to have his kidney removed and is now on dialysis at an age where boys usually spend their days playing baseball, or at this time of year, sledding and playing hockey. Instead, Michael and his mom have to worry about whether Michael can stay healthy enough for the average five-year wait for a cadaver donor. Given the extraordinary gift that my wife received twice of live-donor kidneys from our friends, I wanted to pay that forward in some small way by helping Michael find his own live donor. My first post prompted an excellent essay from CapQ reader Amy Kissling, who shared her personal story of organ donation for her friend. That prompted another reader, Paul, to...
Note: This post will remain on top until show time; newer posts may be found below. Today on Heading Right Radio (2 pm CT), we'll have the Week in Review with Duane "Generalissimo" Patterson! We go long on Fridays to 90 minutes, and we'll go long on Huckabee's surprising surge, the debates that weren't, the latest in Democratic surrenders, and much, much more. Jim Geraghty of NRO's Campaign Spot joins us again as well. Call 646-652-4889 to join the conversation! And don't forget to join our chat room! Did you know that you can listen to Heading Right Radio through your TiVo service? Click here for the instructions. Also, you can subscribe to Heading Right Radio through iTunes now by clicking this link:...
A funny thing happened on the way to the coronation; the queen tripped over herself and lost her crown. That could well be the story in the Democratic primaries if the Obama surge in recent polling holds. Hillary Clinton, once thought invincible, has spent the last five weeks reminding everyone why she has such high negatives, and the inexperienced Illinois Senator has reaped the rewards. In New Hampshire, Obama has now edged ahead of Hillary among likely voters: Barack Obama has come from behind to turn the Democratic presidential race in New Hampshire into a toss-up, according to a new Monitor opinion poll. The results - which show Obama with a one-point edge over Hillary Clinton - mirror other polls released this week, indicating that Clinton's once-imposing lead has evaporated in the run-up to New Hampshire's Jan. 8 primary. The poll suggests that the Democratic race could hinge on the...
How bad was the last debate in Iowa? So bad that Iowa Republicans want the candidates to use valuable campaign time to add another debate in the week before the Iowa caucus. The Politico reports that we won't see Carolyn Washburn again: Dissatisfied with the debate here Wednesday that drew widespread scorn, Iowa Republicans will discuss on Friday the possibility of holding another forum before the January 3rd caucuses. The debate this week, sponsored by the Des Moines Register and Iowa Public Television, was to have been the final gathering of the GOP contenders, but one well-placed Iowa Republican said tonight that they were interested in getting the candidates back together ... It's uncertain if all of the hopefuls would agree to an additional joint gathering or if there is even time enough to get one scheduled. But that Republicans are even mulling the prospect says much about just how...
Congress has finally authorized spending for the Iraq war without the demand to end the success of the Petraeus strategy. On a 90-3 vote in the Senate, the defense authorization bill finally left Congress and will make its way to the White House, with the money itself still not appropriated. That may take another Friday evening to produce: The Democratic-led Congress authorized more Iraq war spending on Friday, sending President Bush a defense bill requiring no change in strategy after failing again to impose a timetable for U.S. troop withdrawals. The defense policy bill, approved 90-3 by the Senate, also expanded the size of the U.S. Army and set conditions on the Bush administration’s plan to build a missile defense system in Europe. The measure already had passed the House and now goes to Bush, who is expected to sign it into law. It authorizes Pentagon programs expected to cost...
December 15, 2007
Pervez Musharraf lifted the emergency decree under which he ruled for six weeks as promised. The action clears the way for national elections in the second week of January, but the nation's largest Islamist party withdrew its candidates from the parliamentary races, claiming fraud: President Pervez Musharraf lifted Pakistan's six-week-old state of emergency and restored the constitution Saturday, easing a crackdown that has enraged opponents and worried Western supporters. Information Minister Nisar Memon said Musharraf had signed the order lifting the emergency. He called it a "historic day" and said next month's parliamentary elections would cement the country's return to democracy. .... Jamaat-e-Islami — Pakistan's largest Islamic party — withdrew its 130 candidates for Parliament and 450 nominations for provincial assemblies in protest against Musharraf's dismissal of judges, spokesman Ameerul Azim said. "This is a fraud election. We are boycotting unless the judges are restored," he said. Thus far, JI...
Arnold Schwarzenegger will declare a fiscal state of emergency in California after badly miscalculating the deficit condition in the Golden State. Last August, he predicted that the state would have a $4.1 billion reserve at the end of this fiscal year, but a legislative analyst predicted in November that California would have a $10 billion deficit. Schwarzenegger now says it's even worse than that: Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger said Friday he will declare a "fiscal emergency" in January to give him and the Legislature more power to deal with the state's growing deficit. Schwarzenegger made the announcement Friday after meeting with lawmakers and interest groups this week to tell them California's budget deficit is worse -- far worse -- than economists predicted just a few weeks ago. The shortfall is not $10 billion, but more than $14 billion -- a 40 percent jump that would put it in orbit with some...
Mitt Romney has picked up his second impressive conservative endorsement in a week. This time, Judge Robert Bork has thrown his support to the former Massachusetts governor, following on the heels of the National Review endorsement. Mike Allen at The Politico, another Cerritos guy kicking around in politics, thinks this carried considerable street cred among conservatives, and he's right. Bork had these comments to accompany his endorsement: Joining Romney for President, Judge Bork said, "Throughout my career, I have had the honor of serving under several Presidents and am proud t