Annan Won't Send U.N. Staff Back to Iraq

What a surprise -- Kofi Annan won't send more staff to Iraq:

A day after the U.N. Security Council unanimously adopted the U.S.-backed resolution, spokesman Fred Eckhard said Secretary-General Kofi Annan isn't prepared under current conditions to send back more than 500 international staffers who were ordered to leave after the bombings in August and September.

"The security situation does not permit us to send any additional staff into Iraq," Eckhard said.

What do you think of the UN's service to the Iraqis so far? After one bombing -- to which they were vulnerable because they hired former [heh] Baathists as security guards for their compound -- the UN mission packed up and went home. The terrorists chased Kofi Annan out of Iraq once before, and yet we still hear protests that we should let the UN run the reconstruction. And now they won't come back because of the "security situation", but still argue that they should have a central role in postwar Iraq.

Sorry, fellas, but you can't dial in a "central role" -- you have to roll up your sleeves and actually be inside Iraq to do this. It takes heavy lifting and sacrifice, but most of all it takes commitment. No one believes the UN has that, especially the Iraqis themselves, after watching and waiting for 12 long years for the UN to finally enforce its own resolutions, only to scream when the US, Britain, Spain, and Poland decided that 12 years was enough. When the Iraqis saw you packing your bags to go after your first setback, you had already lost. Putting you in charge means that no one would be in charge, and that is too dangerous to allow. So if you can't be part of the solution, then for goodness sake, shut up and stop being part of the problem.

Fence-Mending, Syrian Style?

The AP attempts to explain Syria's UN vote supporting the latest resolution on Iraq:

The Syrian vote was "to ease the atmosphere with America and to be in harmony with the European position," said Syrian analyst Jad al-Karim Al-Jubai. He added the U.N. vote could win Syria support from Europe in the event of a confrontation with Israel and the United States.

Syria, whose army is considered weak in the face of advanced Israeli weaponry, has not responded with force to the Israeli air raid on what Israel said was a Palestinian militant base. Syria complained to the U.N. Security Council, where any response is stalled because of the threat of an American veto.

Al-Jubai said Syria did not seek a military confrontation with Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon (news - web sites), and "went to the United States primarily to circumvent the possibility of military escalation" by Israel.

Syria, in other words, needs to have the US on friendly terms because it can no longer symmetrically threaten Israel. Prior to the first Gulf War, when Saddam was unleashed, Syria could afford to antagonize Israel and stage proxy wars in Lebanon because of its close relationship with Iraq, which had the only military that could match up one-on-one with Israel, or at least come close enough to act as a deterrent. People forget how large the Iraqi military was, especially prior to 1991, and how much power they projected regionally in the Gulf. Before Gulf War I, they were the world's fourth-largest military.

As I posted a couple of days ago, with Iraq's friendly government smashed and no big brother standing behind them, Syria cannot hope to stand up to Israel. Syria needs the US to act as a buffer in order to keep the Israelis at bay, but unless Syria starts cutting ties to terrorists like Hamas and Islamic Jihad, they will find that this US administration will not be terribly concerned about protecting them. If Syria does cut ties to these groups, terrorists will have to fall back to Iran, which will complicate their communication with the Palestinians in the West Bank and in Gaza. If they don't, with every terrorist bombing in Israel they will find the IDF becoming more and more interested in Syrian infrastructure that supports terrorists, to which they will be unable to effectively respond.

People wonder why we took on Iraq; no one really understands that neutralizing Iraq was always the key to dominating the region militarily, and therefore politically as well, for a multitude of reasons -- chief among them, demonstrating that the US has the will to finish what it starts.

Prophylactics Win The Game

[sigh] The University of Spoiled Children managed to just squeak by the Fighting Irish ... uh ... 45-14.

The Trojans eased more than two decades of frustration by cruising to a 45-14 victory before a sellout crowd of 80,795.

The victory was USC's first here since 1997 and the Trojans' second since 1981. USC's 45 points were the most the Trojans have scored at Notre Dame Stadium, and the second-most ever scored by any Fighting Irish opponent here.

The Irish stayed with the Condoms through the first quarter, but after that it was all USC, otherwise known as The Best College Team Money Can Buy.

(don't ya just love good sportsmanship?)

[double sigh]

A New Neighbor

I've found a new neighbor, or rather she's found me! Brainstorming is a fairly new Typepad blog, with an easygoing nature but some smart commentary. Definitely drop by and check out what DC's brainstorming on now!

Forgive the Iraqi Debt

Some facts about the massive amount of debt facing the Iraqi people underscore the despicable nature of the Senate decision to convert reconstruction funds to further debt:

Iraq's overall financial burden, according to the CSIS figures, is $383 billion.

Based on these figures, Iraq's financial obligations are 14 times its estimated annual gross domestic product (GDP) of $27 billion--a staggering $16,000 per person. Measured by the debt-to-GDP ratio, Iraq's financial burden is over 25 times greater than Brazil's or Argentina's, making Iraq the developing world's most indebted nation.

Bear in mind that all of this debt was accumulated under the auspices of Saddam Hussein, a great deal of it was accumulated during the sanctions, and a lot of it is owed to Arab nations. These governments, who have protested the war by loudly proclaiming brotherhood with the Iraqis, have been curiously silent on debt forgiveness for their brethren. (Also, as a side note, Islam forbids the charging of interest on loans, especially within Islam; I don't know if Arab governments are charging interest on the debt, but it would be very, very interesting to find out.) Arab governments aren't likely to forgive debt until the West sets an example, but that seems very unlikely now:

While Russian President Vladimir Putin has acknowledged that Europe's leaders need to consider debt forgiveness, his French and German counterparts have steadfastly opposed it.

The estimated debt owed to European governments, while much smaller than that owed to Arab countries, is also of huge symbolic importance. The Europeans, among the world's richest and most powerful nations, have an historic opportunity to lead by example and help pave the way for debt forgiveness by the Arab world.

The article dates back to April 2003, and the likelihood of Europe forgiving its share of Iraqi debt after yesterday's terrible Senate action roughly equates to Jacques Chirac conducting a ticker-tape parade for George Bush through the Arc de Triomphe. Read the entire article -- there's plenty of allusions to the Versailles Treaty (which you think the French and Germans would recognize, for crying out loud), and good advice on how the West should proceed. (via QandO)

The Three Faces of the Democrats (or Four)

David Brooks has an excellent editorial in today's New York Times regarding the reconstruction loan. He separates the Democrats into three groups, and suggests a fourth for a man who's in a class all to himself:

First, there are the Nancy Pelosi Democrats. These Democrats voted against Paul Bremer's $87 billion plan for the reconstruction of Iraq. ... Their hatred for Bush is so dense, it's hard for them to see through it to the consequences of their vote. ...

Saddam Hussein would be jubilant in Pelosi's Iraq. He has long argued that America is a decadent country that will buckle at the first sign of trouble. If the Pelosi Democrats had won yesterday's vote, the Saddam Doctrine would be enshrined in every terrorist cave and dictator's palace around the world: kill some Americans and watch the empire buckle.

The second group would be the Evan Bayh Democrats, who would "say to them: Here's a credit card. Go buy yourself some treatment, and you can pay us back later. "

Lastly there are the Cantwell Democrats, who have honest political differences with the Bush administration but put their country's best interests ahead of scoring political points. We'd hope that this group would far outweigh the other factions, but Brooks isn't that optimistic:

Those are the three Democratic visions — the good, the bad and the ugly. Right now the Pelosi wing of the party is dominant, and the Cantwell wing is beleaguered. So this is a party teetering on the brink of full-bore liberal isolationism.

Who is going to pull it back? Probably not Wesley Clark. The Clark Democrats are actually the fourth category in the party: the ones who are too mealy-mouthed to take a stand either way.

Read the whole article. Brooks uses his most acid commentary on the Pelosi faction, of course, but the entire article is outstanding. (via Power Line)

The Game

Normally, I'd describe the game between Notre Dame and the University of Spoiled Children as the Annual Battle of Good versus Evil, but with so much real evil in today's world, I'm just calling it The Game this year.

Anyway, it's not looking good for the Irish so far. The Condoms just scored a touchdown, going 80 yards in 2:35, to take the lead 7-0. [sigh]

A reply to Roger Simon

I read an excellent and, as advertised, depressing short essay by Roger Simon titled Could It Be More Depressing? I wrote this back in response.

As a 40-year-old man who has studied 20th century history, I had always felt that the world in general had learned its lesson about anti-Semitism, and while general hatred of Jews may exist, it mainly existed in repressive Muslim societies. One of the benefits of liberating Iraq would therefore have been an opportunity for Arabs and Jews to work together in a mutually beneficial relationship, as a model for the region that could transform the Middle East.

Unfortunately, while the radicalization of some moderate Muslims was to be expected, the Western response to anti-Semitic actions and speech has left me profoundly disappointed. Jacques Chirac blocks an EU resolution protesting Mahathir's remarks, while France convulses with more anti-Semitic violence than its seen since WWII. American media are barely budged by Mahathir's remarks. Members of Congress openly express preference for Arab dictatorships and kleptocracies and argue for abandoning Israel, the only functioning democracy in the region (apart from Turkey).

I share and understand your pessimism. The only comfort I can offer is that we are fortunate to have the right men in executive office in America and Britain, the primary defenders of Western civilization. Hopefully, we will continue to have that fortune, or be lucky enough that whoever replaces them understands the daunting task of defending our way of life. Western civilization cannot afford to surrender the Jews a second time to barbarism in order to avoid fighting it.

Let's hope more people realize that than not.

Read Roger's article, but also read through the responses. The fear that history may be repeating itself is palpable.

Three Americans Jailed in Bizarre Mexican Land Dispute

This story underscores the difficulty in doing business with Mexico, a country that has never fully respected private property rights and whose law enforcement efforts have always been a bit questionable:

Three U.S. citizens, including a man dying of cancer, have been jailed here and face up to 14 years in prison in a land dispute involving a member of President Vicente Fox's cabinet. ... Ames and his wife lived together on the land until Jean Ames died in 2000 at age 92. Then, in May of this year, Ames was served with an eviction notice by the university, giving him nine days to vacate the property and ordering him to pay nearly $40,000 in back rent -- $1,000 a month since the death of his wife. Ames said he was stunned and angry.

In this case, a 92-year-old widower has been ordered off of his land by the Mexican government due to some sophistry by officials who claim that his wife was the only one entitled to a lifetime residence by the terms of the couple's grant to the school that now owns the land. The Ames' granted the land to the government-run school in order to guarantee themselves and their caretakers security for their lifetimes. The Mexican propensity for nationalizing private property creates an extortionate pressure for people like the Ames and their caretakers to enter into deals like that. Other Americans have not been so fortunate in their dealings with Mexico regarding private property:

The case is one of a number of land disputes involving Americans who live or own property in Mexico. Earlier this year an American couple was forced off land they owned in the southern state of Chiapas by local residents wielding machetes. Three years ago scores of U.S. citizens lost millions of dollars in investments when they were evicted from oceanfront homes they bought in Ensenada in the western state of Baja California. U.S. officials at the time blamed the losses on a lack of consistency and transparency in Mexican property laws. At least half a dozen more major disputes are pending over property owned by Americans along the Caribbean coast.

The Mexican economy, which has caused such hardship and poverty for its own citizens and a host of economic and social problems for states in the American Southwest, will never improve until the Mexicans stop confiscating private property and nationalizing industries. No one will invest money in Mexico while the government maintains the Castro-like ability to wipe out ownership at whim. Make no mistake: liberty starts with private property rights, and this is a good example of why. Three Americans are in jail on trumped-up charges simply because the government had the ability to confiscate the property at whim. That this isn't front-page news in the US speaks volumes about our traditional media; it focuses on John Ashcroft as the root of all oppression and misses real oppression on our doorstep almost completely.

Saudis may be feeling the crosshairs

Recent public statements seem to indicate that the Saudis may increasingly be specifically targeted in the war on terror, as the FBI starts talking about the Saudis more as suspects than allies:

John Pistole, assistant director of the FBI's counterterrorism division, told a Senate hearing recently that the bureau has raised concerns with the Saudi government that paying legal bills and bond for Saudis being questioned in the terror probe could influence their testimony.

``To us, that is tantamount to buying off a witness, if you will. So that gives us concern if the government is supplying money for defense counsel,'' Pistole said.

A year ago, this probably would have been buried ... the fact that the FBI has started talking about this tells me that the Saudis aren't cooperating as much as the government would like. If more stories such as this start popping up in the news, it will mean something very significant. Now that we can use Kuwait, Qatar, and Iraq as military staging points, the radical Wahhabi Saudi government becomes less critical to our success and more of a liability, especially since Wahhabism is at the root of al-Qaeda political philosophy. The Saudis may already have gotten the message, and the announcement earlier this week of free local elections may be meant to keep them in play with Washington.

UPDATE: There's also this story connecting terror funds to Saudis (via Instapundit):

The probe of the Herndon groups is the largest federal investigation of terrorism financing in the world, authorities have said. And the unsealing of Kane's report marks the first time the government has alleged the main purpose of the Virginia organizations, set up primarily with donations from a wealthy Saudi family, was to fund terrorism and hide millions of dollars.

I'm sensing a bit of a sea change ...

Man who accused officers of assault denies he's an informant

A journalistic kerfluffle of another sort has erupted in Minneapolis, as the man who has accused Minneapolis police officers of sodomizing him with a toilet plunger denies that he is a police informant:

"I'm not an informant, never will be," Stephen C. Porter said, responding to a story in the Star Tribune that reported he'd worked for the police. He asked his friends to believe his word. "Stick with me, I need you," he said. He added that his friends no longer talk to him.

Members of the community were outraged that the Star Tribune printed the story that Porter worked with police in the past, and questioned the motivation of both the newspaper and its sources:

Spike Moss, vice president of The City Inc., lambasted the media for reporting that Porter was a confidential informant for Jindra.

"Why would you participate in a setup to get him killed?" Moss said.

In an interview before the news conference, the Rev. Randolph Staten of the Coalition of Black Churches said that by publicly identifying Porter as an informant, Porter's life has been placed in jeopardy.

"What are the police trying to do, get him killed?" Staten said.

The Star Tribune stood by its sources, which managing editor Scott Gillespie said were "multiple", and its decision to run the story. It's difficult to see how the newspaper could have acted differently, given that they had this information in hand, and I'm no fan of the Strib. The coverage on the Porter story has been, until now, very one-sided; witnesses have been talking on and off the record, details of the allegations have been specific and revolting, and community reaction has been angry and is not abating. The charges lend themselves to a one-sided treatment anyway, because the police and FBI investigators cannot comment for the record on their progress or lack thereof without getting accused of a "rush to judgment", by either side. The Strib then comes across information that may call some of this into question, and I don't think they had a choice in the matter, I think they're forced to print it once it's properly sourced. If they hadn't, and it came out later that they sat on it, they would rightly have been accused of bias, especially anti-law-enforcement bias.

On the other hand, the only place this information could come is from within the Minneapolis Police Department, and that means one of two things, neither of them good: either it's false and some people in the MPD are out to torpedo Porter ... or it's true, and some people in the MPD are out to torpedo Porter. Publicly outing someone as a police snitch puts their life in serious danger, and in this situation it also manipulates the community into a state of apathy towards Porter, if not outright antipathy. But it does more community damage than whether or not people like Porter, too. Whether or not it's true that Porter is/was a snitch, after seeing him outed by elements within the MPD, how many people in Minneapolis will be coming forward to assist the police, especially in confidence? Would you trust them to keep your name secret? The damage that a few individuals have done to law enforcement in Minneapolis may take years to assess.

Oh, please

In the middle of this story about General Boykin apologizing for offending Muslims, a Saudi official makes the following statement:

Asked about the general’s church comments, Adel al-Jubeir, the foreign affairs adviser to Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah, told reporters Friday: “If true, outrageous. I thought they were insensitive. I thought they were unbecoming of a senior military official, and certainly unbecoming of a senior government official.”

Of course, there has been no comment forthcoming, other than participating in a standing ovation, for these comments from a Prime Minister of an Islamic nation:

Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad on Thursday told a summit of Islamic leaders that "Jews rule the world by proxy" and the world's 1.3 billion Muslims should unite, using nonviolent means for a "final victory." ...

The prime minister, who has turned his country into the world's 17th-ranked trading nation during his 22 years in power, said Jews "invented socialism, communism, human rights and democracy" to avoid persecution and gain control of the most powerful countries.

Mahathir added that "1.3 billion Muslims cannot be defeated by a few million Jews," but he suggested using political and economic tactics instead of violence. ...

The leaders gave Mahathir a standing ovation afterward.

When I see an equal condemnation of this speech from the Saudi government, then I'll pay attention to their critique of General Boykin. Until then, ha.

Why does this entire episode remind me of the flap over Patton's speeches to British women's groups during World War II?

Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes ...

Over the weekend, I'll be testing some design changes, some of which you may have already seen -- I've switched fonts from Palatino to Arial in my posts for better readability, and to Geneva on the sidebar items to be able to read them at all. This makes the page longer, but I've cut the numbers of days displayed to three now. I will be switching between two- and three-column layouts and two different, very cool Alicia-designed logos, so be sure to let me know what you think!

Hugh Hewitt links to the Captain's Quarters

I'd like to give a salute to any visitors being referred from Hugh Hewitt's excellent story on the General Boykin/LA Times scandal. Welcome aboard!

Who voted for this idiotic amendment?

Find out who voted for oppressing the Iraqis and undermining our efforts to get their debts forgiven.

You can add me to the list

Instapundit directed me to a Balloon Juice post about the Senate conversion of $10 billion in Iraqi reconstruction into a loan.

A loan.

Iraq currently struggles under almost $200 billion in debt, most of it to France and Germany for Saddam's military hardware. Prior to this, the Bush administration had been working towards agreements to retire some or all of this debt, efforts which may or may not have ever been successful. They would have allowed the Iraqi people to avoid shouldering the cost of their own prison and bleeding themselves dry to pay back Saddam's enablers and co-conspirators. The 51 senators who committed this embarrassment have made this nightmare a certainty now. Not only that, but now they will have to pay for their own liberation, after 12 years of being starved almost into genocide by the Western nations, ahead of investing in their own indepedence, their own security, and their own ability to discourage terrorists from gaining a physical and intellectual foothold.

I'm not prepared to say that this is traitorous, as some do, but it is so incredibly self-defeating and hypocritical it staggers the mind to conceive. Democrats in particular have been chanting the "No Blood for Oil" message since last year, but now they're out to grab all they can get. Before the war, they claimed to be opposed to war in order to protect the civilian population, but they have no compunction now about sucking their blood while they're struggling to stand on their own feet for the first time in decades. So much for being the party of compassion!

And for a laugh, check out Senator Evan Bayh's twisted logic on why he co-sponsored this amendment:

One of the amendment's co-sponsor, Sen. Evan Bayh, D-Indiana, said it was designed not to saddle Iraq with more debt, but to encourage other nations, including France and Germany, to forgive debts incurred during Saddam Hussein's dictatorship.

"How would they feel if the rest of the world had demanded repayment of Nazi debt, or Vichy debt?" Bayh asked.

Senator, what makes you think that France and Germany, who bitterly opposed the war precisely to protect those credits, will agree to simply erase all that debt so that the United States can get their $10 billion back? On which planet does this make any sense at all? The Vichy and Nazi arguments made perfect sense yesterday, when we weren't imposing our own debt onto the backs of the abused Iraqis. Now it's just a cruel joke, since the Nazis imposed severe debt on the Vichy government in the form of reparations after June 1940, effectively forcing the Vichy French to pay for the German occupation. If this is the level of intellectual thought available in the Democratic Party, let's all hope that they spend the next election cycle learning some very hard lessons.

In the meantime, let's hope that sense and compassion rules the day at the conference committee and this amendment gets the treatment it deserves, and that the 51 senators who pulled this stunt get clear messages from their constituents about their behavior.

UPDATE: I've sent a modified version of this post to Minnesota Senator Mark Dayton, who voted for the loan amendment. If you'd like to contact your Senator, click here to find the correct web page.

Thank you, Alicia!!!

It's not often that you run across people who do thoughtful things just because they're truly nice people. I'm lucky to have "met" Alicia through our efforts at blogging on Typepad. Alicia runs the excellent and intriguing Twilight Café, where I encourage you all to visit any chance you get. She's been kind enough to surprise me with a new banner, which is now posted proudly at the top of my blog here.

Isn't that great? Thank you, Alicia -- I feel like a real blog now!

The LA Times Unleashes Another Firestorm

As if it hadn't been burned enough with the 'get-Arnold' campaign John Carroll waged the past few weeks, the LA Times has demonstrated atrocious journalistic standards in its editorial section yesterday.

The story concerns General Jerry Boykin, the man in charge of finding al-Qaeda leaders and Saddam Hussein, and the man Rumsfeld just nominated as deputy undersecretary of Defense for intelligence. General Boykin is a fervent Christian who feels God is calling the US to fight against Satan, and who regularly shares this opinion with others, when asked to do so. For instance, according to William Arkin, the Times' military affairs analyst, Boykin has been quoted as follows:

In June of 2002, Jerry Boykin stepped to the pulpit at the First Baptist Church of Broken Arrow, Okla., and described a set of photographs he had taken of Mogadishu, Somalia, from an Army helicopter in 1993. The photographs were taken shortly after the disastrous "Blackhawk Down" mission had resulted in the death of 18 Americans. When Boykin came home and had them developed, he said, he noticed a strange dark mark over the city. He had an imagery interpreter trained by the military look at the mark. "This is not a blemish on your photograph," the interpreter told him, "This is real."

"Ladies and gentleman, this is your enemy," Boykin said to the congregation as he flashed his pictures on a screen. "It is the principalities of darkness It is a demonic presence in that city that God revealed to me as the enemy."

The editorial (which is linked) covers other similar quotes from Boykin, and about two-thirds of the way through the article, Arkin states:

But that's only part of the problem. Boykin is also in a senior Pentagon policymaking position, and it's a serious mistake to allow a man who believes in a Christian "jihad" to hold such a job.

Putting aside Arkin's opinion, to which he's entitled and for which he's paid, there seems to be an issue with quoting Boykin on believing in a Christian "jihad": he's never said that. He never said the word "jihad", so what are the quote marks supposed to be indicating? James Lileks has an intriguing guess, in the form of an imaginary dialogue between Arkin and his editor:

But he didn’t say that.

Exactly? Well,he meant, it though.

He meant it.

Yes, and that’s why I put it in quotes.

Quotes. Which are usually reserved for, you know, quotes.

Right, but I used them here to set the word apart. You know, show that it was a paraphrase.

By using the means we use to indicate direct transcriptions.

Well, sometimes, sure. But I meant them more as, you know, those air quotes you do with your fingers?

Yes, the official LA Times explanation is that they used quote marks precisely because it wasn't an exact quote. Arkin intended to highlight the concept. But now, I wonder how many of Arkin's quotes were exact, or just Arkin's paraphrase. For instance,

"It is the principalities of darkness. It is a demonic presence in that city that God revealed to me as the enemy."

could very well have been

"It's a murky region. There's an evilness in the area that my faith compels me to confront and overcome."

And, of course, the further question is: in how many other stories did Arkin apply this odd journalistic and grammatical standard? The Times should be prepared to produce transcripts supporting quotes in every one of Arkin's stories or retract them.

I first heard about this story yesterday on Hugh Hewitt's radio show, where he discussed this with Peter Beinart. Hewitt's focus was not on the quote -- I don't know if that was in question at the time -- but on how the Times had handled the entire story's publication, which had gone to NBC first for Wednesday night's news broadcast:

I interviewed Arkin today and discovered that he developed the story on his own initiative as a columnist for the Times, and he decided with the full knowledge and approval of editors at the Los Angeles Times to provide NBC News with the story so that NBC could run the story before the paper ran Arkin's op-ed and the front-page story. He stated that the idea was to get the story some pop by using the audio and video.

The Los Angeles Times thus gave away a scoop on a story that ended up on its front page. Why would it do that? It may have a precedent in the world of journalism, but to me it stinks. Didn't the Times engage in manipulation of the news to increase its impact on the audience? Or did the paper need cover for the story and gave it to NBC in order to generate that cover[?]

While synergy in media is nothing new, this clearly appears to be a case where both A and B apply: The Times manipulated the story so as to maximize its exposure, and it also allowed NBC to make the false claim that it had developed the story so as to deceive the Times' readership as to the origin of the reporting. It's embarrassing and shameful that a newspaper of such stature could create such staggering ethical crises as the Boykin and the groping stories have done. In order to maintain any credibility as both a media outlet and shaper of the political debate, the Times can have an (honest and open) editorial slant but still must be transparent in its processes, and setting out to deceive people in this manner completely destroys their credibility and the trust needed for them to function in either capacity.

We are in Jayson Blair territory here. Unless the Tribune Company makes immediate changes in management, the Times is forfeit as a reliable news source, and Angelenos should be outraged. They deserve to have a daily newspaper that reports fairly, quotes accurately, editorializes to improve the community as it sees, and discharges its public-service mission in a responsible, consistent, and fair manner. The events of the past three months have made it clear that John Carroll and his team are not the people to meet those objectives. Carroll and Arkin, and perhaps more, need to be removed immediately.

We could always rename it Wanker

Let's hear it for GM's marketing folks: their new name for the Buick Regal certainly has instant recognition, if nothing else:

General Motor's plans to rechristen the Canadian-built Buick Regal passenger car as the Buick LaCrosse have hit a snag: In Québécois youth culture, the word is slang for masturbation, among other things...Stew Low, a GM Canada spokesman, said in Quebec youth culture the word is a slang term "that means a couple of things, either to masturbate or 'I just got screwed,' or 'I just got taken.' "

I can't think of anything that would help sell cars better than to pick a name which either reflects that the owner has no (binary) social life, or is a complete tool just waiting to be taken. Here's a few more names GM may consider in coming months:

* Chevy Schlemiel
* Cadillac Bunko
* Pontiac Pudwhacker (Pee Wee Herman Select Model)

(via Cronaca)

Blogosphere Goes Once Around the Diamond

A bit of of reaction this morning to a curseless World Series ...

Over at OxBlog, David waxes biblical, invoking Lamentations (how appropriate!), while Josh simply asks why anyone will care ...

Jacob Levy over at the Volokh Conspiracy decides that discretion is the better part of rage ...

Strange Women Lying in Ponds expresses sympathy to Cubs fans, but doesn't seem 100% sincere ...

Denial-of-Service attack at Hosting Matters

Ever see what a denial-of-service attack looks like from the server side? Check out this graph of server traffic at Hosting Matters last night. (via Instapundit)

We're Sorry You Can't Comprehend Our Genius

The Malaysian government, after being scolded for the remaks of its Prime Minister at the OIC the day before, tries a little bit of damage control:

"I'm sorry that they have misunderstood the whole thing," Syed Hamid, the foreign minister, told The Associated Press. "The intention is not to create controversy. His intention is to show that if you ponder and sit down to think, you can be very powerful."

If that was his intention, then I suppose he failed miserably, considering this:

Mahathir said the world's "1.3 billion Muslims cannot be defeated by a few million Jews," but suggested the use of political and economic tactics, not violence, to achieve a "final victory."

Final victory, final solution, Jews running the world ... they didn't ponder or sit down to think, they're just channeling the Nazis.

"Please forget about anti-Semitism," Syed Hamid told reporters.

No, we wish you Muslims would forget about anti-Semitism and start taking care of your own messes.

All Curses Will Remain Valid until Further Notice

So much for living in the Age of Freakin' Reason ... both "cursed" teams manage to promote their long-term images by choking in game 7 of their respective series. The Red Sox actually deserve a lot of credit; they went back on the road down 3-2, and won the first game and came close to winning the second. The Cubs, on the other hand, were up 3 games to 1 with home-field advantage, and managed to lose three games in a row, including two in Wrigley Field.

[sigh] So instead of a World Series with the promise of real historical significance, which would have been true if either the Red Sox or Cubs had made it alone, we get the Marlins who won less than a decade ago, and New York for the fifth time in six years. Fabulous, simply fab-oo. I'll make sure I set the TiVo, with a priority level somewhere above the classic "Saved By The Bell" episodes where Screech's voice changes.

As the fans headed out of this ancient stadium toward the elevated subway tracks, their taunting chant echoed in the corridors: "19-18! 19-18! 19-18!"

The classiness of Yankees fans -- another reason to hate New York.

[double sigh]

This game's a classic .... so I'm going to bed

The Corporate Juggernauts tied the score up, we're going to extra innings, and Instapundit is still off line ... I'm watching the rest of the game in bed. G'night, y'all.

Major blogs off-line tonight

It looks like HostingMatters has crashed for some unknown reason, and some major blogs seem to be down with them. Instapundit is definitely one who is affected -- you can hit the backup site here, but so far the only post is from Glenn confirming that the servers are down. Power Line isn't responding, and neither is Little Green Footballs or Dissident Frogman. I hope the problem gets corrected soon, so I can continue to avoid commercials between innings. (Score so far: Red Sox 4, Overhyped-Babe-Curse Bronxies 2.)

If nothing else, take a look at James Lileks today, who's in fine curmudgeonly style. He's ranting about Kill Bill and rooting for Agent Smith.

Ortiz just went yard on David Wells' first pitch, so it's Red Sox 5, Crushing Monotony in Pinstripes 2.

Breaker, breaker ... any takers?

USC's Online Journalism Review has an interview with NY Times technology reporter John Markoff, written by Adam Clayton Powell. Markoff has been covering technology since the year after two guys named Steve came up with a computer named Apple, and he gives an interesting but somewhat bleak picture of the future:

I certainly can see that scenario, where all these new technologies may only be good enough to destroy all the old standards but not create something better to replace them with. I think that's certainly one scenario. The other possibility right now -- it sometimes seems we have a world full of bloggers and that blogging is the future of journalism, or at least that's what the bloggers argue, and to my mind, it's not clear yet whether blogging is anything more than CB radio.

And, you know, give it five or 10 years and see if any institutions emerge out of it. It's possible that in the end there may be some small subset of people who find a livelihood out of it and that the rest of the people will find that, you know, keeping their diaries online is not the most useful thing to with their time.

When I tell that to people … they get very angry with me. ... I also like to tell them, when they (ask) when I'm going to start a blog, and then, 'Oh, I already have a blog, it's www.nytimes.com, don't you read it?'

Not sure what he means, not the most useful thing to do with my time ... [sniff]. Markoff may be a bit pessimistic, but his vision of the possibilities is intriguing and certainly sounds believable. (via Romanesko)

Isn't this the ultimate goal of the nanny state?

It looks like the jig is up for an ex-patriate German just trying to make ends meet on a German disability pension in Florida:

Maybe it is the image of a German pensioner, deeply tanned and dipping his toes in the surf on Miami Beach, while retired people here trudge windswept streets in dismal German burgs.

Or maybe it is the notion of a housekeeper, paid for by the German government, to keep the fellow's apartment tidy. Whatever the reason, the curious case of Rolf John, a 64-year-old former banker who is living a sun-dappled retirement in Florida on $2,200 a month in German welfare checks, has driven people here batty.

Germany currently pays over $6 million a year in pensions and benefits to just over a thousand German citizens living abroad in 88 countries. Rolf John's monthly benefits include:

* $1,023 for rent
* $854 as a "living allowance"
* $170 for a housekeeper

A housekeeper? "I have a cleaning woman, sure," he said. "But I'm 90 percent disabled." He said he needed her not only to clean his place, but to do the laundry and drive him to doctor's appointments.

When the German Parliament votes Friday on a sweeping package of tax cuts and welfare reforms, it is not a stretch to say it will be responding, at least in part, to the anger aroused by people like John.

While his case is extreme - and the German Health and Welfare Ministry has since said it will stop paying his benefits if he does not return to his home country - it is not unique. Stories of welfare recipients who own yachts and luxury cars are a staple of the German news media.

Schröder is expected to win the vote on Friday, after lobbying for months to persuade leftist members of his government that Germany must finally take a scalpel to its cradle-to-grave welfare system, which can make being unemployed more lucrative than working.

Germany is at least ahead of France in discovering that the cradle-to-grave welfare system amounts to nothing more than a huge Ponzi scheme, one that worked well when younger workers far outnumbered pensioners, but teeters on the edge of disaster now that European populations have grown older and started to shrink. Germany also appears to be less straitjacketed than France by all-powerful unions that create almost insurmountable obstacles to economic reform.

But the best part of the story is this last last word from Rolf John:

John has not given up his battle. He said he had written a letter of protest to Schröder and was waiting for a reply. In the meantime, he has no intention of pulling up stakes from South Florida.

"I've lived here for 25 years," John said in softly accented English. "I have a lot of friends here. My homeland is the United States."

He wants the Germans to pay him his money, even though he won't come back to Germany! You gotta love that ...

Finally, the truth comes out ...

... it was all Steve's fault. Bad blogger! Bad, bad blogger!

Pizza Hut offers lower-fat menu items

"Honey, why don't we eat out tonight?"

"Sure, but you know I'm on a diet... I know -- how about Pizza Hut?"

"That's a great idea, honey! That's why I love Pizza Hut, because I'm so concerned with my health!"

Leaks, and the leaking leakers who leak them ...

Man, I had a tough time trying to decide whether this White House leak qualified as Current Affairs or Humor:

Concerned about the appearance of disarray and feuding within his administration as well as growing resistance to his policies in Iraq, President Bush - living up to his recent declaration that he is in charge - told his top officials to "stop the leaks" to the media, or else.

News of Bush's order leaked almost immediately.

I feel bad for Bush, I really do. I can just imagine the scene in the Oval Office this evening: Bush has his staff gathered around him in the Oval Office, chewing them out for allowing this last leak to occur, and soon as he turns his back to face one person, all the others grab notepads and scribble furiously until he turns around again. Every modern President has had to deal with leaks, and of course every modern President has used leaks to their advantage, too ... it's just that kind of job. Probably one of the reasons Presidents come into office looking like the picture of youth and vitality, and go out looking like they're two steps away from residential care.

QandO has a good suggestion for handling the issue. Jon feels that Bush needs to lay down the law:

"I want to make something perfectly clear. You are a part of this administration because I feel you can be a strong part of a strong team. If I am mistaken...if you cannot be a part of this team, I want your resignation on my desk this afternoon. Then, extend that same order to your staff. If you cannot get your staff to be a part of this team, then I expect your resignation on my desk this afternoon, along with the names of staff-members who refuse to be a part of the team. If you continue to be a part of this administration and I find you leaking stories or working against this team, I will personally hold a press conference to announce why you are being fired, and why you are a failure. I will not be kind."

It sounds great, and I'll keep watching the papers to see when he takes Jon's advice and tells this to his staff. (We should know right away, right?) By the way, QandO is a well-written blog -- spend some time there.

$5000 and France's Sympathy

The Dissident Frogman, an excellent bilingual blog, has an outstanding post about what's happening in Iraq, and how little of this gets out via the traditional, "independent" media:

At the risk of repeating myself, I heard almost daily on France-Info's broadcast: "Yet another US casualty in Iraq."

The Coalition is wiping out Saddam's SS and the Al-Qaeda skuzzballs by the hundreds.

I never heard : "Yet another hundred of SS and terrorist skuzzballs eliminated in Iraq."

The Coalition has completed 13,000 reconstruction projects, including 1,500 schools as of October the first -- and I'll assume this number includes the 330 that were rebuilt by the 101st Airborne with Saddam's money -- and "the teachers earn from 12 to 25 times their former salaries."

I never heard: "Yet another school rebuilt and reopened in Iraq."

There are 240 hospitals and more than 1200 clinics open, a pharmaceutical distribution that has gone from nothing to 700 tons in May and a current total of 12,000 tons - even though the supposedly "essential", "humane" and "brave" subsidy-eating NGOs prefered to bravely take off. 22 millions of vaccination doses where nonetheless administered to the children of Iraq.

I never heard: "Yet another hospital opened in Iraq."

Read the entire post, and add Dissident Frogman to your blogroll.

Kofi Annan Blathers On

The UN Secretary General tells the West to address the grievances of Muslims:

"We must unite our efforts to address the extremism that is, alas, on the rise, not only in Islam but among many faiths," said Annan, who withdrew from the summit after the Iraq (news - web sites) issue was taken back to the UN Security Council.

He said Western governments must match their rhetoric of respect for human freedom with action to promote development, including a fair world trading system.

Okay ... we should therefore try a dialogue with this Muslim leader:

Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad on Thursday told a summit of Islamic leaders that "Jews rule the world by proxy" and the world's 1.3 billion Muslims should unite, using nonviolent means for a "final victory." ...

The prime minister, who has turned his country into the world's 17th-ranked trading nation during his 22 years in power, said Jews "invented socialism, communism, human rights and democracy" to avoid persecution and gain control of the most powerful countries.

Mahathir added that "1.3 billion Muslims cannot be defeated by a few million Jews," but he suggested using political and economic tactics instead of violence. ...

The leaders gave Mahathir a standing ovation afterward.

Does anyone still remember the last time in history that a world leader blamed Jews for all their problems and promised them "final victory"? Did negotiation with that world leader save lives, or did it cost the world 50 million people dead? Didn't we say "never again"?? Is Kofi Annan bucking for the Neville Chamberlain Sleepwalker Award?

UPDATE: Read this post about the Maylaysian PM at Power Line, too.

Yahoo! News - U.N. Unanimously Adopts Iraq Resolution

In case anyone is confused, this is what a stunning diplomatic victory looks like. Notice that this was a unanimous vote recognizing the legitimacy of the Coalition in Iraq, with no requirement to stick to a specific timetable for withdrawal, only for the Iraqi Governing Council to have a plan ready by December 15:

The United States and Britain never wavered in their assessment that sovereignty can't be relinquished until Iraq drafts a new constitution and holds elections.

They agreed, however, to include new provisions urging the U.S.-led Coalition Provisional Authority "to return governing responsibilities and authorities to the people of Iraq as soon as practicable" and calling on the Iraqi Governing Council to provide the Security Council with a timetable for drafting a new constitution and holding elections by Dec. 15.

In the end, there were no nays and no abstentions, not even from Syria, who must have figured that bucking the US so soon after the Gaza bombing would be a bad idea.

This represents an overwhelming victory for the Bush administration and will enhance its prestige both abroad and at home; it pulls the rug out from under those candidates who still talk about how "unilateral" Bush's foreign policy is. Not only did Bush go to the UN repeatedly -- something Clinton never did for any of his Balkans adventures -- but in the end he forced them to ratify the result of American-British policy, and unanimously at that. It is an utter defeat for Germany and France, whose pre-war strategy of setting themselves up as rival diplomatic power is in tatters, thanks to Bush's adept alliance with Putin. Most of all, it is a victory for the Iraqi people, whom the UN had cynically consigned as chattel to one of the world's worst dictators.

The Responsibility Gap

The Washington Post excoriates Democrats for their irresponsibility regarding the rebuilding of Iraq and their intransigence in supporting proper funding:

But political pressure doesn't excuse irresponsibility, and what's emerging in the Democratic Party is a gaping responsibility gap...On the wrong side is the rest of the Democratic field. Sens. John F. Kerry (Mass.) and John Edwards (N.C.) say they won't vote for the funding because Mr. Bush hasn't come up with enough of a long-term plan or done enough to get allies on board. This righteous position may make them, or their voters, feel better, but the security of U.S. troops and the long-term interests of both Iraq and the United States still depend on improving Iraqi daily life.

The candidates do not seem to realize that the rebuilding of Iraq is crucial to the overall effort to eliminate terrorism, and that trying to do it on the cheap will only make things worse. We cannot walk away from Iraq now regardless of whether people think the war was a good idea or not. That these nominees ignore this makes me nervous that, faced with terrorist attacks, they would fall back to the old pattern of bluster and retreat that brought us 9/11.

However, at least they've managed to have a position:

Most astonishing is the response from retired Gen. Wesley K. Clark, whose position is that he's taking no position on the grounds that he's running for president, not Congress.

Rebuilding Iraq is, for the time being, the highest-priority national security and foreign policy issue and likely will remain so past the election, and General Clark has no position on what we're supposed to do about it? As the Post asks -- This is leadership? Why is he running for President, anyway?

That's okay, he can inspect home-schooling parents

It's decisions like this that make an even bigger joke of scare stories like the one from CBS News that argues that home-schooling is dangerous because there is no government oversight:

At the same time that Donald Leonard Keys was being investigated on suspicion of having an illegal sexual relationship with a 16-year-old Woodbury boy, he was granted a renewal of his social worker's license.

The renewal was approved by the Minnesota Board of Social Work despite knowledge that the 58-year-old St. Paul man had convictions for attempted sodomy with a child in 1971 and for fraud, for bilking an elderly man in Hennepin County in 1996.

But it's okay, really, he's had a criminal background check .... he's licensed ...

Demosophia: Mr. Moore's Neighborhood

I avoided commenting on the latest foolishness spewing forth from Michael Moore during an appearance on CNN's Crossfire, with Robert Novak and Julian Epstein, who sounds as if he couldn't suck up enough to the pseudodocumentarian.

EPSTEIN: And, in your book -- I love you. I think you say a lot of useful, important things that need to be said to shake the system up.

Yeah, well. Anyway, Moore said in the course of the interview:

MOORE: I'd like to ask the question whether September 11 was a terrorist attack, or was it a military attack? We call it a terrorist attack. We keep calling it a terrorist attack.

But it sure has the markings of a military attack. And I'd like to know whose military was involved in this precision, perfectly planned operation. I'm sorry, but my common sense has never allowed me to believe since that day that you can learn how to fly a plane at 500 miles per hour. And you know, when you go up 500 miles an hour, if you're off by this much, you're in the Potomac. You don't hit a five-store building like that.

You don't learn how to do that at some rinky-dink flight training school in Florida on a little video game with PacMan buttons. I'm sorry. I just don't buy that.

The folks over at Demosophia take apart the idea that the attack on the WTC was so complicated only a military pilot could possibly have done the trick, and they do a fine job. They do leave out the fact that pilots of all stripes (including at rinky-dink flight schools) routinely target structures that are so narrow they're only a few feet wider than the wingspan of the aircraft. They're called runways. Just another example of how Michael Moore poisons the environment. (via Roger Simon)

Rounding up the usual suspects

The Palestinian Authority began rounding up the usual suspects in the wake of the Gaza Strip bombing that killed 3 Americans and critically wounded a fourth:

Palestinian police started rounding up suspects in a dragnet expected to last through the night, security sources said.

The action followed word that Arafat had reappointed a law and order general, Gazi el-Jabali, to command Palestinian police forces -- a man he had previously fired from the job.

The US position is that the bombing specifically targeted Americans, according to CNN:

In Washington, State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said that "in the absence of information" on who did it, "the assumption one has to make, given the nature of the attack," is that Palestinians targeted Americans.

That would tend to implicate the PA itself, given that the PA was responsible for the security arrangements and the route of the caravan. How else could the bomber have done this:

According to the State Department, a roadside bomb was triggered immediately after the Palestinian police cars in the convoy passed by, hitting the U.S. vehicle. An Associated Press correspondent at the scene reported seeing a gray wire leading from the bomb crater to a small concrete building nearby. He said an on/off switch was attached to the wire.

That means that whoever triggered the bomb had to have known the cars belonged to the Americans (who else would get a PA escort that Palestinians would want to attack?), as well as knowing the route well ahead of time, and presumably the timing of the caravan. All of this points to an inside job, and if it's an inside job, that means Arafat. Arafat has been implicated in the deaths of two American diplomats in the 70s, but the US has put that aside in an attempt to use Arafat's leverage to quell Palestinian terror tactics and get broad-based support for a multitude of peace initiatives. If nothing else, we should finally understand the futility of negotiating with life-long terrorists, and work to remove Arafat and his organization from the equation. Arafat has to pay for this.

CBS News: The Dark Side

CBS has run a truly egregious hit piece on home schooling, which is also posted to their web site:

"I think there's so little supervision that they really are not protecting those kids," Marcia Herman-Giddens, of the North Carolina Child Advocacy Institute.

Herman-Giddens is on the state task force that reviewed the Warren case. The conclusion: home school laws "allow persons who maltreat children to maintain social isolation in order for the abuse and neglect to remain undetected."

Let's see ... because of the three or four cases of child abuse (including murder and suicide) of home-schooled kids they found, this is supposedly an evil trend, a conspiracy of child abusers to keep their victims from being noticed. Where is any mention of the hundreds of thousands of abuse cases that occur with children taught in public schools? Or, perhaps, a litany of children assaulted, molested, and murdered in public schools, sometimes by the teachers and administrators? Are there any statistical analyses comparing risks of both systems? I'd settle for risks associated with just the public schools, at least for context. The report estimates that 50,000 kids in North Carolina are home-schooled, and only mentions one case.

Unlike teachers, in 38 states and the District of Columbia, parents need virtually no qualifications to home school. Not one state requires criminal background checks to see if parents have abuse convictions.

No state requires parents to undergo criminal background checks because the children are already in their custody. Children don't start home schooling until they're close to public-school age, so there are four or five years where the child is out of the system regardless of whether they later become home-schooled or not. Didn't anyone at CBS think about that before writing this article? Or is CBS subtly suggesting that parents must be licensed to have children at all?

What stories like this are intended to do is to stir up enough righteous anger -- the children are in danger!! we must do something!! -- to enable legislators to pass new laws restricting the rights of parents to make decisions for their children. The entire tone of this two-part article is that children who are home-schooled are being kept from background-checked, government-certified experts who know more and care more about what's best for the child than the benighted, backwoods parents. It's all about extending the government-enforced union monopoly, with CBS scaring up bogeymen to keep the public frightened enough to knuckle under. Hell, they even threw Andrea Yates into the equation, even though only two of her children were school age, and her psychosis had nothing to do with home-schooling her children.

Outlawing home schooling will not eliminate child abuse, nor will forcing home-schooling parents to submit to background investigations. (After that, they'll require stay-at-home moms to register as day-care providers.) Based on the prevalence of abusive and dangerous environments in public schools, I'd wager that home-schooled children are actually far, far safer than their peers stuck in the education monopoly.

Thanks to Steve at Meaningful Media for his post on the subject, and if you're as irritated by this as I am, his post links to protest sites., such as ThinkPink, who posts her own letter to CBS.

Another take on my post on name-calling

OxBlog has an essay which, unbeknownst to Oxblog, expands on my post yesterday about name-calling and elevating political discourse:

Are people really so sure of themselves that they simply cannot acknowledge that anyone who disagrees could be intelligent? Have they no humility whatsoever? Of course we all think we're right -- if we didn't think we were right, we'd change our opinions until we did. Maybe I'm just naive, but it really does amaze me when people claim that everyone who disagrees with them (on topics where general opinion is relatively divided -- I'm not talking about largely uncontroversial opinions like "slavery is wrong") is either malevolent, stupid, or both.

This attitude exists in a lot more places than in the blogosphere, although Josh Chafetz understandably focuses on that area of debate. I mentioned talk radio in yesterday's post, of course, but it wouldn't exist in the blogosphere or on talk radio if it wasn't completely pervasive in general society. Watch most political TV, and you get bombarded by panels of unruly talking heads, all of whom try to score points by screaming epithets at each other rather than debating in an orderly and intelligent manner. Tight time frames and overburdened agendas drive this, and a skillful moderator could eliminate much of the problem, but the producers of these shows seem to aim for this chaotic cacophony (if you'll pardon the alliteration!). Why? Because we buy it.

And why do we buy into this noise, this emotional and childish dissonance? Because I suspect we all would prefer to think of ourselves as warriors of the faith, whatever the faith may be. It's so much more dramatic to cast all your opponents as evil incarnate, and so much more desirable, because we then can contrast ourselves as the pinnacle of goodness and light. And if your opponent is evil incarnate, well then, what's a little sarcasm and disdain in a holy war? And instead of listening to each other, re-evaluating our positions as new data or concepts come to our attention, we shout at each other and grab onto our opinions as if they were tribal affiliations. It's small wonder that we see fewer calls for compromise and negotiation and instead dig for dirt with which to smear our opponents and their champions.

In fact, I see blogs as part of the solution. I always find it easier to tune my message when I write rather than when I speak, and I usually find it easier to read opposing opinions, even ones I find distasteful, than listening to them in real time. With features like TrackBack and commenting, we have the ability to build a more intelligent and productive discourse, and no one has to listen to Bill O'Reilly or Chris Matthews barking at people, or their guests barking back. Maybe we could actually convince people of the merits of our positions, or at least find places in which we can mostly agree.

So, please. A little civility. A little respect. A little elevation of the discourse. It won't hurt, I promise.

It may hurt -- descending from Defender of the Faith to Active, Informed Citizen may bruise the ego a bit -- but if we're going to ever fix the problem, it will be worth it.

Captain's Quarters Undergoing Minor Renovations

I'll be making some tweaks tonight -- the three-column format doesn't quite work for me, so I'll be playing around with some other options ... let me know what you think!

I Owe Ed Asner a Partial Apology

This demonstrates a problem with blogging -- when a source turns out to be incorrect, you wind up having to apologize to people you'd rather not. If you scroll to the bottom of Kevin McCullough's partial retraction, you'll see that Ed Asner was not expressing admiration for Stalin and was in fact quite open about putting him on the same plane as Hitler:

"Well, you know something, they've played Hitler, nobody has ever really touched Stalin, it just occurred to me. It's not because I am a liberal or anything like that. Stalin is one big damn mystery, I wonder why nobody has tried it? Many people, you know, speak of the fact that he killed more people than Hitler – why does nobody touch him? It's strange. So, and he was about my size, my height – with a wig I probably could do it."

In fact, in his way he asked the same question that the Reason article attempted to answer: why doesn't Hollywood cover Communist atrocities the same as Nazi atrocities? So for reposting McCullough's careless (in the extreme) errors, I apologize, Mr. Asner.

Note, though, that McCullough stands by his reporting of Ed Asner's comments about Sean Hannity and Rush Limbaugh.

Day by Day - 'Covering' the election

Chris Muir makes another pithy but pointed statement on newspaper 'coverage' in recent elections.

Gee, I wonder what he may mean by that? Perhaps we should ask Jill Stewart ...

More on the Gaza bombing

Via Oxblog, more on the bombing from Haaretz:

The blast went off around 10:15 A.M. Wednesday as a three-car U.S. diplomatic convoy drove near a gas station on the outskirts of the town of Beit Lahiya in the northern Gaza Strip, along the main north-south road.

Both the militant Islamic Jihad and Hamas movements denied responsibility for the attack.

Witnesses at the scene said a silver Cherokee jeep used by American diplomats was completely destroyed by the blast. Parts of the vehicle were strewn in a 30-meter radius around a crater created by the explosion.

If Islamic Jihad and Hamas are denying responsibility, what about the al-Aksa Martyrs Brigade, a division of Yasser Arafat's al-Fatah faction? They've been known to plant bombs as well. My guess is that, unlike other attacks in the area, no one will be in a rush to claim this one as their own. As Oxblog states:

An attack on a nation's diplomats is an act of war, and a government which refuses to crack down on terrorists is complicit in that act.

This is the rationale offered for removing the Taliban from Afghanistan, after all; a government that hides terrorists after attacking Americans will be targeted in the war on terror. Will the Bush administration apply this policy to Arafat and the Palestinian Authority? Or Syria, for that matter, which openly hosts Hamas? But to do that would risk losing the goodwill and sympathy of Palestinians after this terrible crime:

Later in the day, American security officials investigating the bomb attack left the scene abruptly after Palestinian youths threw stones and rocks at them. The investigators were taking pictures of the bloodied, twisted remains of the van when half a dozen kids threw stones and rocks at them as about 200 Palestinians looked on.

Uh, never mind.

Woman Gets Jail In Assault On Boy, 4 (washingtonpost.com)

Who wants to keep tabs on this woman's baby for the next 18 years?

A woman who chased a 4-year-old boy through a McDonald's restaurant in Montgomery County, pinned him in a headlock and screamed obscenities as she smeared his face with hot french fries was sentenced yesterday to four days in jail and ordered to attend anger management and parenting classes.

Milikia Hayes, 18, of Gaithersburg was nearly nine months pregnant with her first child when the incident took place in May. The boy, whom Hayes did not know, accidentally smeared ice cream on her clothing at a McDonald's in Germantown, authorities said.

She should be getting lots of follow-up visits from Children's Services as well.

UN Security Council Caves

There is no other way to describe this but as a diplomatic victory for the Bush administration:

France, Russia and Germany on Tuesday dropped their demands that the United States grant the United Nations a central role in Iraq's reconstruction and yield power to a provisional Iraqi government in the coming months. The move constituted a major retreat by the Security Council's chief antiwar advocates, and signaled their renewed willingness to consider the merits of a U.S. resolution aimed at conferring greater international legitimacy on its military occupation of Iraq.

If passed, the new Security Council resolution would effectively reject the obstructionism of Kofi Annan and the French. Jacques Chirac seems to have gotten the message that France, if the US ceased negotiating, would be revealed as a pretender to real power.

The Bush administration refused to incorporate the French, Russian and German demands for a timetable for the transfer of power in a revised text presented to the council last night -- and indicated the United States would soon call their bluff ... The administration arrived at this point with an intensive diplomatic campaign. It was designed, in the words of a senior U.S. official, to neutralize the resolution's chief critic, France, by accommodating suggestions from Russia and Germany that were "more practical, more realistic and easier to take into account."

By signing onto the new but substantially identical resolution, France gets to pretend it still matters, and Bush gets to pretend that's important. The Bush administration finally started playing hardball by threatening to bypass the UN on all future issues regarding Iraq. If we hadn't had to give some domestic cover to Tony Blair, we would have been better off doing just that from the very start.

Gaza blast kills 3 Americans

Breaking news: a bomb attack in the Gaza Strip has killed at least 3 American officials who were apparently touring to monitor progress on the peace process.

[Saeb] Erakat offered his condolences and condemned the attack.

"These people were here to help us," Erakat insisted, saying an attack on what he described as U.S. monitors was not in the interest of the Palestinian people. "I don't think this was a deliberate attack against the Americans."

Obviously, some of the "Palestinian people" felt it was in their interest to attack Americans. Would that be the Hamas-led "Palestinian people"? The Islamic Jihad "Palestinian people"? Or the al-Fatah "Palestinian people" who report to Yasser Arafat and blow people up as a sideline?

"We offer to have an immediate, joint Palestinian-American investigation committee to investigate the matter," Erakat said.

Perhaps we should have a US delegation meet up with Erekat and Arafat. I nominate the 4th Infantry Division, with an introduction by a contingent of F-18s.

Jill Stewart's Rebuttal to John Carroll

Jill Stewart has penned an extensive and detailed rebuttal to John Carroll's "explanation" of the groping stories at the LA Times and how they were nothing more than good journalism. (John Carroll's editorial had been listed in a featured position at the top of the Times' web site for several days; today is the first day it's gone.) Stewart writes:

Carroll claims that the groping story was published as soon as it was done. In fact, in journalism, a story is done when the boss says turn it in. Carroll himself saw to it that the story was strung out until the last. That is why some staffers continue to insist to me that the story was sufficiently nailed and should have run two weeks beforehand.

One of Carroll's major gripes with Stewart -- whom he never bothered to name -- was that she claimed he held the story back on purpose. Stewart then details how this was held back, and later in the story her source asks her

Some people here insist that we couldn't run the first attack piece on Schwarzenegger any sooner than five days before the election because the groping claims took so long to verify. How were those groping claims of all those women at the end checked out in a few hours and pushed into the paper by next morning?

How indeed? Or, if all these stories were in the process of being checked, why did they run the initial story without them?

"The mainstream press critics like those published on Romenesko are asleep as to what has happened here. They are defending the L.A. Times in every way. There should be no defense by media critics of what happened here. One woman did not sleep for two nights after a Times reporter showed up at her door, with the thinnest evidence, demanding to know if her child was Arnold's love child. It never panned out, it was untrue. Why has the L.A. Times become a tabloid, knocking relentlessly on people's doors for tabloid gossip? And would John Carroll have run a front page Love Child story if it had been true? Could we sink any lower?"

Read the entire article; it's very illuminating. And according to the LA Times' own journalistic standards, it's dead-on accurate, because Jill Stewart has two anonymous sources for the story. (via Andrew Sullivan)

Minneapolis officers accused of assaulting suspect

On the day that Rodney King gets back in the news, this story makes me more than a tad bit nervous. The Minneapolis Police Department is taking great pains to handle this by the book and to make sure everyone sees that. Either they are very confident that these charges won't hold up, or something serious really did happen and CYA mode is kicking into high gear.

Can't we all just ... get lost?

Guess who's back in the klink again: Rodney King. He should have been using that well-deserved settlement (I can watch videotape, but juries seem to have a problem with it) on some psychological help. I'd be happy if his name never popped up again in the news. I suspect he'd be happier, too.

Name-calling as political discourse

Speaking of Amygdala, I noticed that he has posted (way down the left column) Farber's First Fundamental of Blogging:

If your idea of making an insightful point is to make fun of people's names, or refer to them by rilly clever labels such as "The Big Me" or "The Shrub," chances are high that I'm not reading your blog.

On the way home from work this afternoon, I listened to The Patriot, the conservative talk-radio outlet here in the Twin Cities. At my drive-time, Michael Medved is on the air, and I have enjoyed Medved from when he wrote The Golden Turkey Awards back in the 70s. It's out of print now, but it's hilarious. Anyway, unlike some of the other hosts on the Patriot, such as the screechy and utterly reactionary Michael Savage, Medved is thoughtful to his callers and encourages those who disagree with him to give him a call. In other words, he's pleasant, and manages to disagree without being disagreeable.

Today, however, I listened while Medved discussed his reservations about Wesley Clark, and in the course of this discussion called him Weasely Clark. Now, I think Clark is a dangerous egomaniac who can't be relied upon to stick to a position on anything: his whole campaign seems to be, "I'm a general and you're not. Elect me." But I really cannot understand why talk radio hosts can't resist the temptation to refer to people with silly epithets based on their names, just like we all endured in primary school, for crying out loud! The fact that Medved did this, and then went into a lengthy defense of this practice as political discourse severely impacted the respect I had previously had for him.

So, I am very disappointed, and I'm left wondering why neither side can argue and debate like adults. (And if you're tempted to write this off as a right-wing phenomenom, let's all recall the Schwarzengroper picket signs and column references last week, mm'kay? Or pithy little references to Bush as Shrub the past three years.) Let's get something straight: Calling me Eddie Spaghetti is not political discourse -- it's rude and it's pointless. It's a waste of my oxygen, and I resent anyone who wastes valuable rainforest resources on it. You don't like Wesley Clark? Join the club. Tell me why. If you can't tell me why, calling him Weasely tells me a hell of a lot more about you than it does Clark. And if you're making your living or your avocation as a radio show host or as a blogger, your credibility is all you've got, pal.

Medved's show will never excite me again, and his books will never get me as enthused as they did before. His vigorous defense of childishness as political discourse tells me he is not to be taken seriously. It's not that we disagree on much; it's just that I'd rather spend my time on people who don't insult my intelligence. And I'd rather start getting the childishness out of political debate than support those who want to sell it to us in spades.

The Blogging Iceberg

Here's an interesting article on blogs, and the blogging bloggers who blog them. I saw this yesterday at Amygdala but didn't get a chance to post on the article. Like Amygdala, I am in the 1% demographic, although I just started there. Not to rub it in or anything.

Perseus Development Corp. estimates that there are 4.12 million blogs out here in the blogosphere, but 2.72 million have been abandoned, either temporarily or permanently. Over a million of these were one-day wonders. (Guess I've surpassed that threshold; I believe this is my 140th post.) There's lots of interesting data here for bloggers who like a bit of navel-gazing.

We're Winning, part 37b

The AP reports that the coalition has captured another senior terrorist in Iraq, this time from Ansar al-Islam, which is tied to al-Qaeda:

The arrest of Aso Hawleri, also known as Asad Muhammad Hasan, late last week in the northern city of Mosul has not been announced. Larry Di Rita, chief spokesman for Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, told reporters, "I'm not in a position to confirm" Hawleri's capture.

Hawleri was taken by soldiers of the 101st Airborne Division, said a defense official, who discussed the matter on condition of anonymity.

The officials said Hawleri is thought to be the third-ranking official in Ansar al-Islam, most of whose fighters were believed to have fled their stronghold in northern Iraq before U.S. forces invaded in March. U.S. and Kurdish forces destroyed the group's main base in the early weeks of the war.

Ansar al-Islam claimed responsibility for the car bombing in Mosul that killed several reporters in Mosul during the war, and has been suspected of participating in the attacks in and around Baghdad since the end of the invasion, if not outright leading them. This is a major coup for the 101st Airborne.

Pawlenty to Tie Drivers Licenses to School Performance

Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty has proposed making underage drivers licenses dependent on school attendance. Pawlenty describes the link between truancy and criminal behavior and says:

"I have no hesitation linking expectations around school attendance and the privilege of driving," Pawlenty said. "We need to make sure we have the horse before the cart."

"Students need to understand the importance of education and that there are consequences if they don't take it seriously," Pawlenty said in a statement. "Chronic absenteeism is one step away from crime and we need to do everything we can to stop it."

Right now, the only consequences of truancy are borne by the parents; if the truancy becomes chronic, the parents can be taken to court to correct the situation. Truancy undoubtably underlies a significant part of teen crime, and the failure of the system to provide any significant consequences to the teens themselves doesn't do much to reduce the problem. Schools can flunk them, but with the social promotion policies of today's schools, there isn't much threat to that. Pawlenty proposes to eliminate this practice as well. Reaction came swiftly:

Declaring it "government by gimmick" Rep. Mindy Greiling of Roseville said the Legislature had considered and rejected similar proposals in the past.

"We've had bills in the Legislature that ran into a buzz saw of logistics," said Greiling, the ranking DFLer on the Education Finance Committee.

One problem with Pawlenty's proposal is that students can legally drop out of high school at age 16 with or without parental approval, although Pawlenty says that he will require a special waiver for underage drivers who are not in school. Presumably these waivers would not be granted for underage drivers who are not in school for anything other than hardship or home-schooling reasons.

Overall, Pawlenty's proposal holds some promise. No one has a "right" to a driver's license, and if students aren't fulfilling their responsibilities, the state should take a dim view of putting those kids on the road anyway. I'd also like to see a proposal for a graduated license for underage drivers, allowing them to start driving only during daylight hours and without any other underage people in the car, adding priveleges like expanded driving hours as they accumulate experience and demonstrate responsible driving. Too many kids get on the road and get hurt, killed, and do likewise to others on the road, not because they're bad people but because they're inexperienced and overconfident in their invincibility.

Pledge to be Reviewed by Supreme Court

The Volokh Conspiracy has an excellent series of posts on this subject, starting (or ending, I suppose) with this one.

I hadn't heard that Justice Scalia had recused himself, but considering his ill-advised commentary, it's probably for the best. It's not the content of the commentary that is a problem; he shouldn't have been commenting on the case at all, since it was always likely to be reviewed by the Supreme Court. It was a rare example of bad judgment on his part.

A Hope for France?

I'm not shy in sharing my views on France, but this article in Reason gives hope that change may be coming in the person of Sabine Herold, a 22-year-old Opposition leader in Paris:

Herold, the 22-year-old leader of Liberté, J’ecris Ton Nom (Freedom, I Write Your Name), has in the last few months emerged as the massively popular and highly photogenic leader of -- zut! -- a burgeoning pro-market, pro-American counterculture in France. Earning comparisons to Joan of Arc, Brigitte Bardot (!), and Margaret Thatcher in the panting British press, she represents something French politics hasn’t seen in years: a public figure eager to take on the country’s endlessly striking unions.

Herold's youth, passion, and eloquence earned her enough of a following that she was able to draw 80,000 to a protest against union strikes early this summer in Paris. I've read about her before, mostly through Merde in France and the Dissident Frogman, and her influence is starting to affect the government in positive, libertarian directions, as the article details. Make sure you read the whole thing. (via Power Line)

What did the coach put in their Gatorade?

Let's see ... you're a football player at a major football college, and you've just been humiliated on national TV by an unranked team. What's your first instinct when you come across a rival fan? If it's decking the guy while the cameras are rolling, either you've taken a wee bit too much Testosterone or you're on the SpongeBob Squarepants academic track.

I report, y'all decide.

Study surprise: Low-carb dieters eat more, lose weight

It took the medical/dietary establishment about 30 years to check this out, but it seems that they may have been wrong all along:

Now, a small but carefully controlled study offers a strong hint that maybe Atkins was right: People on low-carb, high-fat diets actually can eat more.

While I do not think that the Atkins plan is all it's cracked up to be -- any diet that severely limits fruits isn't going to be terribly healthy -- the philosophy is very sound. I lost a lot of weight and kept it off by eliminating "unneeded" carbs from by diet, as well as eating less and exercising regularly. It's a life change, though, not a "diet" in the popular sense; I won't be eating pizzas and burgers and fries except on very rare occasions for the rest of my life.

Over the course of the study, they consumed an extra 25,000 calories. That should have added up to about seven pounds. But for some reason, it did not.

"There does indeed seem to be something about a low-carb diet that says you can eat more calories and lose a similar amount of weight," Greene said.

Here's what you need to do: instead of buying "low fat" foods, look for high carbs and calories. Anything where sugar is the first ingredient should be eliminated right away, and that includes corn syrup, which is what is used most of the time. Use common sense, and get some regular aerobic exercise, and the weight will eventually come off.

The President's End Run

The Washington Post reports that President Bush will start bypassing the national, traditional media and start focusing on regional and non-traditional media in order to get his message out more clearly and with less editorial filtering. Power Line links the story in its essay on the decision and its possible impact. Read the entire essay; it's excellent, although I disagree with it in one respect:

And he and other administration officials should criticize Democratic jounalists and news outlets by name. The Democratic news media have overplayed their hand, and everyone knows how biased they are. (I'll link to a recent Gallup poll on this issue later in the day.) Why should hacks like Dana Milbank get a free pass to attack the administration on behalf of the Democrats, in the guise of objective journalism?

I'll have to disagree with Hindrocket on taking such a confrontational strategy. Bush and the senior members of his administration speak volumes when they go to Brit Hume, or to Hugh Hewitt, instead of Time, Newsweek, et al. There's no need to get so directly confrontational with the rest; it risks getting the Spiro Agnew treatment, which hurts their cause whether they're correct or not. Rising above the petty fingerpointing will enhance Bush's prestige. Scott McClellan can handle the "why" questions when they occur.

Someone finally bothered to ask the Iraqis

With all of the debate about how long we should be staying in Iraq, and the UN demanding that we leave so that the Iraqis can take care of themselves, Gallup cut out the middlemen and just asked the Iraqis what they want. A novel approach, to be sure, but one that the UN apparently never bothered to try.

The Gallup poll found that 71 percent of the capital city's residents felt U.S. troops should not leave in the next few months. Just 26 percent felt the troops should leave that soon.

Bear in mind that Baghdad is part of the Sunni Triangle, where you could expect to find significant hostility to the US presence that eliminated the Sunni minority's hold on power (to the extent it was Sunni-based, anyway). Gallup's polling did not include areas outside the Sunni Triangle, where you would expect approval for the US occupation to be higher, because it's keeping the Baathists from reclaiming power.

These numbers indicate what the Bush administration has been saying all along -- that the rebuilding of Iraq, while dangerous and slow, is succeeding, and if we stay the course, we can expect an independent and democratic Iraq to be an enthusiastic ally of the United States. The worst possible move to make at this point is to hand over the whole thing to the cut-and-run UN, who brought us such debacles as Rwanda and the Congo.

Unofficial diplomacy reaches agreement -- but who will implement it?

Negotiators from outside the governments of both Israel and the Palestinian Authority reached a peace agreement, but one with no weight whatsoever as Israel strongly denounced the effort:

Coming at a time when Middle East peace prospects are at a low ebb, the 50-page draft agreement was reached during the weekend in Jordan by the two delegations, which include current Parliament members and former cabinet members from both sides.

But the proposal has no official blessing, and the Israeli government immediately denounced it, calling it irresponsible freelance diplomacy.

"The public rejected these same political figures," Limor Livnat, Israel's education minister, said of the Israeli delegation, led by left-wing politicians. "In no democratic country would this be acceptable." The Palestinian Authority did not immediately comment, though the Palestinian team included senior political figures with close ties to Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat.

Put into terms that we might relate to, it would be the equivalent George McGovern and Hubert Humphrey going to Hanoi in December 1972 and negotiating a peace agreement with the Viet Cong. Not that either of those men would have done that, mind you; they knew better than to interfere with American foreign policy in that manner. (Too bad Jimmy Carter never figured it out.) This may or may not be a starting point for future official negotiations, but the fact is that the democratically elected leadership of Israel should represent Israel exclusively. The Swiss Foreign Ministry should know better than to sponsor events such as these. Would the Swiss find it amusing if we negotiated on Swiss issues with a bunch of politicians they had voted out of office?

The Soviet Republic of Texas (washingtonpost.com)

The Washington Post rails against the latest redistricting plan in Texas, but misses an important point. The current district plan was not implemented by the Texas Legislature but was imposed as a temporary plan by a federal court. Districting is a function of the Legislature and not the courts and it was entirely appropriate for Texas to redistrict, even if it was oustide the census cycle.

That being said, the Post has a point about the results of the plan, and ultra-partisan districting plans in general:

YOU MIGHT THINK America's rigged system of congressional elections couldn't get much worse. Self-serving redistricting schemes nationwide already have left an overwhelming number of seats in the House of Representatives so uncompetitive that election results are practically as preordained as in the old Soviet Union. In the last election, for example, 98 percent of incumbents were reelected, and the average winning candidate got more than 70 percent of the vote. More candidates ran without any major-party opposition than won by a margin of less than 20 percent ... The pernicious effect of partisan redistricting in general is the weakening of the center with the creation of "safe" seats for both parties -- which encourages the election of people considerably to the left or right of the state's political center of gravity.

This is the same problem faced by Californians, and look at what's happened there. The Governator has suggested using a non-partisan panel, appointed at random from a pool of people nominated by legislators of both parties, to come up with a districting plan that respects community boundaries and gives people a true say in elections. If California can successfully implement such a plan, perhaps Texas will consider it as well.

Like Father, Like Son

Osama's son plays an increasignly important role in al-Qaeda, according to today's Washington Post, and is being protected by Iran:

Saad bin Laden, one of Osama bin Laden's oldest sons, has emerged in recent months as part of the upper echelon of the al Qaeda network, a small group of leaders that is managing the terrorist organization from Iran, according to U.S., European and Arab officials.

The younger bin Laden speaks English and is computer literate, two rare qualities among al-Qaeda, and so his influence is even more pervasive than his family name would indicate. Saudi Arabia wants him extradited from Iran, but negotiations have gone nowhere:

Similarly, Saudi Arabia, which in recent years has tried to thaw relations with its larger and more powerful neighbor across the Persian Gulf, is trying, unsuccessfully, to persuade Iran to extradite Saad bin Laden and others suspected in the Riyadh bombing. Saudi officials estimate there are as many as 400 al Qaeda members there.

"Those people are in Iran and somebody must be helping them. The question is who?" Prince Bandar bin Sultan, the Saudi ambassador, told the San Francisco Chronicle last month. "This is the problem with Iran. The people who we can deal with can't deliver, they can't lead eight ducks across the street. And the guys who can deliver, they're not interested."

You have got to be kidding me ...

I'm not even going to try to introduce this. I'll just let this speak for itself. (Caution: May be disturbing to some readers.)

Have a nice night, folks. Sweet dreams. Heh heh heh.

Return of the Road Map

I don't know if I agree that the Middle East Road Map is the evil clone of this historical document -- the argument can be made -- but at least this is pretty darned funny, and well-written, too.

Gun Control Fails Miserably in Great Britain

Good luck on reading anything about this in the New York or LA Times, but Strange Women Lying in Ponds (a cool Monty Python reference, for those who don't know) picked up on a story in the Guardian which details the effects of banning all handguns:

Handgun crime has soared past levels last seen before the Dunblane massacre of 1996 and the ban on ownership of handguns introduced the year after Thomas Hamilton, an amateur shooting enthusiast, shot dead 16 schoolchildren, their teacher and himself in the Perthshire town. It was hoped the measure would reduce the number of handguns available to criminals. Now handgun crime is at its highest since 1993.

SWLIP reacts:

Let's see, when Britain passed the handgun ban, many pro-gun ownership types predicted that Britain would eventually see a rise in violent gun crimes as guns became readily available on the black market for criminals, and as criminals lost their fear of an otherwise disarmed populace. The Left called us crazy.

Well, how in the world can this happen if guns are banned? This is the lead from the Guardian story:

Few people paid much attention when, late last month, Shabir Hussain and his friend Mohammed Shabir were jailed for 11 years at Birmingham Crown Court. Working with rudimentary tools in the basements of their homes, the pair had set themselves up as armourers to the local underworld, converting blank firing pistols into lethal weapons.

They produced more than 170 guns and sold them to gangs from Bristol to Manchester.

...

As well as being converted from air guns and blank firing weapons, handguns are being imported from eastern Europe and beyond. A good quality semi-automatic handgun can be bought on the streets of London for as little as £200.

When you criminalize guns, only the criminals will have guns, and they will use them with impunity against a disarmed and demoralized populace. Thankfully, that experiment was conducted elsewhere, but I doubt if the political class here will learn any lessons from this. The answer is to heavily penalize the use of firearms in crime (adding 10 years to sentencing would be a start), and to enforce the gun regulation we already have instead of adding onto it.

Israeli raid on Syria alters a 30-year-old 'proxy game' in the Mideast

I found an interesting article on the decades-long proxy game between Israel and Syria, and how Israel is looking to change the rules, with the first gambit being the attack on the terrorist training camp last week:

No matter how much violence raged around it, the Israeli-Syrian border has been quiet since the armistice following the 1973 Arab-Israeli war. If the bitter foes wanted to fight, they squared off on the battlefield called Lebanon, or deployed various proxy forces.

The attack a week ago Sunday on what the Israelis said was a Palestinian terrorist training camp changed that formula, perhaps forever.

This article gives a much clearer explanation of what the attack means to both Israel and Syria and what Israel hopes to gain from the escalation:

The Syrians say they give no logistical support to the Palestinian groups, but cannot expel Palestinians who have lived legally here for decades. If expelling them is the price demanded to head off further attacks, however, it might be one the government pays.

"Maybe they will volunteer, maybe not," said Haitham al-Fahoum, an independent Palestinian official, said of the leaders of Hamas and Islamic Jihad. "But I am sure they will leave if America puts pressure on Syria."

Syria needs to understand the new diplomatic realities of supporting (literally hosting) terrorists, such as Hamas and Islamic Jihad. It means that the US will no longer reflexively restrain Israel from acting to secure itself from attack. Prior to 9/11, the US would never have stood for an Israeli attack on terrorist camps in Syria, but those days are, thankfully, over.

Dean's 'Urban Legend'

I recall when this happened, and how the Dean campaign tried backing away from it at warp speed. Quite frankly, I just considered it to be a typical reaction from the no-war-for-any-reason set, and in that context it makes perfect sense:

"Questioned about the deaths of Saddam's sons, Odai and Qusai, in Iraq, Dean dismissed suggestions that it was a victory for the Bush administration. `It's a victory for the Iraqi people . . . but it doesn't have any effect on whether we should or shouldn't have had a war,' Dean said. `I think in general the ends do not justify the means.' "

Nevertheless, when challenged on this, Dean has gone on the attack rather than explain what he meant, or more likely, that he forgot he said it because he shot his mouth off without thinking about it at the time:

"I never said that. I never said that," the man from Vermont insisted. "McCain claimed I said that on television. We called the station and said we never said that. This is the problem with LexisNexis. It's great, but it circulates urban legends and creates them and I had never said that. . . ."

What was the "that"? Dean angrily denied being "soft on the death of Uday and Qusay. That was something McCain said, and it got quoted in my story and I've been a victim of it ever since. McCain said I said it. We talked and called the station and said we never said any such thing."

The problem for Dean is that he did say it, and blaming McCain makes him look a bit ... well, paranoid. Safire never actually says this, but implies it through a comparison with Richard Nixon. He pegs Dean thusly:

But it is not Dean's way to explain "what I meant was . . ." His eagerness to expunge from the record his snap judgment about the killing of Saddam's sons — to claim falsely "I never said any such thing," to suggest it is a McCain concoction, an "urban legend" — tells us that he is a man who treats a toothache by biting down on it hard.

By repeatedly denying the words ever came out of his mouth — thereby imputing inaccuracy to the A.P. reporter and blatant dishonesty to McCain — he compounds the original blunder that all too tellingly revealed his mindset.

Ouch.

Ed Asner: Historical Idiot

I don't know what's more disturbing about this story on Ed Asner: his predilection for mass-murdering tyrants, or his swollen ego regarding Rush Limbaugh, or just his entire, pathetic schtick ever since he started taking himself seriously after Lou Grant was canceled.

I first read this story at Andrew Sullivan's site this morning, and it's been picked up by Instapundit (who discussed it in his MS-NBC column, too), but here's the original story, from Kevin McCullough at WorldNetDaily:

"Mr. Asner, I do have a question ... if you had the chance to play the biographical story of a historical figure you respected most [emphasis mine] over your lifetime, who would it be?"

"I think Joe Stalin was a guy that was hugely misunderstood," said Asner. "And to this day, I don't think I have ever seen an adequate job done of telling the story of Joe Stalin, so I guess my answer would have to be Joe Stalin."

Andrew Sullivan just takes enough time to note this ridiculous statement, but Glenn Reynolds really takes him and his ilk to task:

Andrew Sullivan notes that actor Ed Asner recently defended Stalin as “hugely misunderstood.” Stalin? Who murdered tens of millions in pursuit - and defense - of absolute power? If Stalin is misunderstood, it’s because too many people like Ed Asner think that there’s something good to say about him.

Reynolds talks of the willingness of academia to gloss over Communist atrocities, quoting John Earl Haynes and Harvey Klehr from their new book, In Denial: Historians, Communism & Espionage:

“Defense of Nazi mass murder is not acceptable in the scholarly world, and shouldn’t be. But another species of historical revisionism, one that is equally repugnant, is practiced with impunity in the academy. The number of apologists for the former Soviet Union and its mass murders dwarfs the handful of aberrant pro-Nazi academics in America. Sympathy for the Communist project and distaste for attacking it are today fully accepted in American higher education.”

Read all of Glenn's article, and especially read the linked articles to Reason and The New Republic. But that's not all the weirdness that occurs in McCullough's story:

Mike Gallagher approached Asner at a recent cocktail party promoting the new film "Elf" in which Asner stars as Santa Claus. As Gallagher introduced himself, Asner asked his profession. When Gallagher replied "radio talk-show host," Asner replied, "I love going toe-to-toe with you guys.''

''I know,'' Gallagher replied. ''I've heard you on Sean Hannity's show.''

''Hannity's next, you know,'' Asner responded.

''Huh?'' said Gallagher.

''Hannity's next,'' said Asner. ''We're going after him just like we went after Limbaugh. And you saw what happened to Rush this week, right?''

I can attest to these news reports because I was there. Standing not more than 10 feet from where the conversation was happening.

So is Asner admitting to some sort of conspiracy to Limbaugh's character assassination? Or is he just so full of himself that he has to make everyone feel like he's all-powerful, despite his not being associated with anything remotely successful in about two decades? Whatever the answer, you can bet that I will not be taking my granddaughter to see "Elf", his new movie, nor will I ever watch anything with Ed Asner in it again. If anyone thinks this is too strong, let me ask you this: would you go see a Schwarzenegger movie if it turned out that he really was a big fan of Hitler? Because I sure as hell would not.

Saudi Arabia to Hold First Elections

In a move that indicates the US is beginning to make a major impact on the Arab world, Saudi Arabia announced its first ever free elections:

Saudi Arabia, an absolute monarchy, announced Monday it would hold its first elections to vote for municipal councils, seen as the first concrete political reform in the Gulf Arab state. ... Since the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on the United States -- in which 15 of the 19 hijackers were Saudis -- Riyadh has come under intense pressure by key ally Washington to implement social and political reform in the kingdom which is the cradle of Islam and the world's largest oil exporter. ... "The council of ministers decided to widen participation of citizens in running local affairs through elections by activating municipal councils, with half the members of each council being elected," the state news agency SPA said.

It's not just the election, either; public expression seems to be loosening up as well:

"Our happiness will be complete when there are 100 percent elections," said 38-year-old Saudi citizen Sultan Abdul-Aziz. ... Mohammed al-Harfy, a columnist in al-Watan daily, said he hoped the decision was not a unique move to appease reform calls. "I think this is a positive step because many people in our society have been calling for comprehensive elections, including municipal," he told Reuters. "But this is not enough. We hope these elections are a beginning and would lead to elections in the Shura Council, in universities and the right to form syndicates," he added.

The Top 10 Most Dangerous Jobs in America

No, this is not a David Letterman list, but it's really the most hazardous jobs in America, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The top 10 most dangerous jobs are:

10. Truck drivers
9. Construction workers
8. Farm occupations
7. Electrical "power installers" (as opposed to workers?)
6. Roofers
5. Drivers - Sales Workers (incl. pizza delivery, vending machine workers)
4. Structural metal workers
3. Pilots and navigators
2. Fishers

And the most dangerous job in America is ...

1. Timber cutters!

Man Attacks Stain in Trousers...Destroys Apartment

Or, you could say he was really washing with gas!

What would Winston do?

Today's Strib features a column by Isaac Cheifetz titled "What would Winston do?" It doesn't give any answers to that specific question but instead talks about a little-discussed side of Winston Churchill: the accomplished manager. I found it interesting, since Churchill is one of my favorite historical figures, and I believe his life and philosophy are so applicable to today's global issues. Afterwards, check out the post that pointed me to it at Power Line.

Coleman straddles the fence

Sen. Norm Coleman tries to eat his cake and have it too on the issue of school vouchers. He proposes putting a school voucher plan in place for Washington DC schoolchildren, but tries to claim he's not considering any application to any other state, including Minnesota:

"I'm not going to push for vouchers for Minnesota kids," Coleman said in an interview. "I'm not going to push for a national program. But I will certainly support the local mayor in his effort to provide greater opportunity for his kids."

Well, why not? I understand that DC schools are especially poor performers, but there are certainly schools like that in Minnesota, too, and elsewhere. Are those schoolchildren any less trapped by the educational monopoly? Why are DC schoolchildren special cases? I suspect it has a lot less to do with geography than with mollifying Education Minnesota, the state NEA outfit, who weighs in thusly:

Judy Schaubach, president of Education Minnesota, the teachers union, said that instead of supporting vouchers, Congress should be "funding the things we know that work," such as lower class sizes, well-qualified teachers and reading programs.

Of the voucher plan, she said: "The purpose for doing it is allegedly to help these kids, but there's just no evidence that that's how it's going to work. So it's disappointing that somehow that rhetoric is resonating with the senator. . . . When public money is spent in this way, it does have an impact. I mean, there are limited dollars available."

"Limited dollars" is a much-used and essentially meaningless phrase. Of course dollars are limited -- they are, after all, a finite measurement. But voucher plans do not take away money that is paid for students who remain in the system; they redirect only those monies that would be paid for the students who leave the system. In most plans, they don't even redirect all of that money, usually more like half, so actually the public school makes a profit on every child who opts out. Not only that, but it certainly allows class sizes to shrink, which is one of the top priorities of the NEA and Education Minnesota.

This is not about "limited dollars" anyway; it's about making sure the government enforces the education monopoloy that continually promotes mediocrity and protects union jobs. School vouchers would inject much-needed competition into education but would eliminate the tenure and job security that is Issue #1 with the NEA. Coleman's safety dance around this gets ridiculous later in the article:

Despite his support for the proposal, Coleman said he dislikes even using the word "voucher." "In my state it's a pretty divisive word," he told his colleagues...Calling it "the deadly v-word," Coleman said then that Republicans needed "to get away from the voucher word."

This is just political-correctness nonsense. "Voucher" is a perfectly acceptable and descriptive word -- there is nothing inherently evil or negative about it. Are we going to have to change words every few years in everything we do to keep the PC police happy?

Norm Coleman is not covering himself in glory these days. Stop flirting with Education Minnesota, Senator: They do not support you and will campaign hard against you in 2008, regardless of whether you fight vouchers with every ounce of your being. They are part of the problem. Start concentrating on solutions.

Fisking the Whistleblower

Colleen Rowley, the FBI agent who blew the whistle on the bureau's lack of follow-up before 9/11 -- mostly due to political correctness concerns -- wrote a tedious and silly op-ed in Sunday's Star Tribune. James Lileks, who has a regular column and feature in the Strib (the Back Fence), fisks the hell out of Rowley. Rowley's article is another of those vague, unsupported complaints about how dissent is being stifled in John Ashcroft's America that seem to find themselves on the pages of major newspapers on almost a weekly basis. It would be delicious satire if these idiots actually had a sense of humor. (via Instapundit)

A breath of fresh air from the Democratic Leadership Council

For those who may not know, the DLC is the centrist Democrat group that promoted Bill Clinton as a potential party leader as early as 1988. Now they're trying to keep California Democrats from going off the rails by giving them a major reality check. After acknowledging the right-wing origins of the recall, it tells them

[I]t's clear the success of the recall effort was no mere right-wing conspiracy. Californians are deeply frustrated by what they perceive as a political establishment -- in both parties -- that's not listening to their concerns, acting on their needs, or paying much attention to anyone who does not belong to a bedrock partisan constituency group.

Then they warn some of the radical elements of the party against following through on threats made on Election Night:

There's already talk of Democrats going to the mattresses, denying cooperation to the Governor-elect, or even launching petitions to immediately recall the recall winner. That would be a big mistake. They should instead hold him to his vague promises, and hold him strictly accountable for his performance. Governors have to make choices, and the most important choice Schwarzenegger will face is whether to govern the only way he can succeed -- from the center -- or curry favor with the right wing and fail.

They wind up making the same point I made earlier today (obviously before I did, but I just read this) about re-enfranchising moderates through an open primary, and even provide a link to another essay on their site which expands on their arguments. (via No Left Turns)

Why We Went to War

William Kristol and Robert Kagan have written a lengthy, detailed article covering the reason for the Iraq war in-depth. Kristol and Kagan take us back through the history of the UN inspections and Saddam's weapons programs, including statements by the Clinton administration, the UN, and Saddam:

Here is what was known by 1998 based on Iraq's own admissions:

* That in the years immediately prior to the first Gulf War, Iraq produced at least 3.9 tons of VX, a deadly nerve gas, and acquired 805 tons of precursor ingredients for the production of more VX.

* That Iraq had produced or imported some 4,000 tons of ingredients to produce other types of poison gas.

* That Iraq had produced 8,500 liters of anthrax.

* That Iraq had produced 500 bombs fitted with parachutes for the purpose of delivering poison gas or germ payloads.

* That Iraq had produced 550 artillery shells filled with mustard gas.

* That Iraq had produced or imported 107,500 casings for chemical weapons.

* That Iraq had produced at least 157 aerial bombs filled with germ agents.

* That Iraq had produced 25 missile warheads containing germ agents (anthrax, aflatoxin, and botulinum).

Again, this list of weapons of mass destruction is not what the Iraqi government was suspected of producing. (That would be a longer list, including an Iraqi nuclear program that the German intelligence service had concluded in 2001 might produce a bomb within three years.) It was what the Iraqis admitted producing. And it is this list of weapons--not any CIA analysis under either the Clinton or Bush administrations--that has been at the heart of the Iraq crisis.

For in all the years after those admissions, the Iraqi government never explained, or even tried to explain, to anyone's satisfaction, including most recently, that of Hans Blix, what had become of the huge quantities of deadly weapons it had produced. The Iraqi government repeatedly insisted that most of the weapons had been "secretly" destroyed. When asked to produce credible evidence of the destruction--the location of destruction sites, fragments of destroyed weapons, some documentation of the destruction, anything at all--the Iraqis refused.

In 1998, Clinton said, in part:

It is obvious that there is an attempt here, based on the whole history of this operation since 1991, to protect whatever remains of his capacity to produce weapons of mass destruction, the missiles to deliver them, and the feed stocks necessary to produce them. The UNSCOM inspectors believe that Iraq still has stockpiles of chemical and biological munitions, a small force of Scud-type missiles, and the capacity to restart quickly its production program and build many, many more weapons. . . .

Now, let's imagine the future. What if he fails to comply and we fail to act, or we take some ambiguous third route, which gives him yet more opportunities to develop this program of weapons of mass destruction and continue to press for the release of the sanctions and continue to ignore the solemn commitments that he made? Well, he will conclude that the international community has lost its will. He will then conclude that he can go right on and do more to rebuild an arsenal of devastating destruction.

And some day, some way, I guarantee you he'll use the arsenal. . . . In the next century, the community of nations may see more and more of the very kind of threat Iraq poses now--a rogue state with weapons of mass destruction, ready to use them or provide them to terrorists, drug traffickers, or organized criminals who travel the world among us unnoticed.

If we fail to respond today, Saddam, and all those who would follow in his footsteps, will be emboldened tomorrow by the knowledge that they can act with impunity, even in the face of a clear message from the United Nations Security Council, and clear evidence of a weapons of mass destruction program.

However, as the article continues, the Clinton administration wound up taking no action at the time, because any attempt at enforcing the existing truce and UN resolutions "was averted by a lame compromise worked out by U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan. But within a few months, Saddam was again obstructing U.N. inspectors, driving a deeper wedge into the U.N. Security Council and attempting to put a final end to the inspections process. He succeeded."

In 1998, Clinton sent missiles into Iraq as punishment for Saddam's intransigence, and also to destroy what the UN and US believed to be a WMD production facility. But for four years afterwards, there were no follow-up inspections, no action whatsoever except additional UN resolutions for Saddam to ignore and Franco-Russian attempts to remove or undermine the sanctions on Iraq. Although both Clinton and Bush believed Saddam to be a priority threat, nothing much changed until 9/11, mostly due to a paralyzed UN Security Council. After Afghanistan, the next military issue was obviously Iraq. In order to keep pressure on Saddam, a huge amount of military resources were pinned down in the Persian Gulf, which limited our ability to respond elsewhere and also acted as a provocation to the region. However, in the four years in between, Saddam had been left to his own devices:

The only means of learning Iraqi activities during those years were intelligence, satellite photography, electronic eavesdropping, and human sources. The last of these was in short supply. And, as we now know, the ability to determine the extent of Saddam's programs only by so-called technical means was severely limited. American and foreign intelligence services pieced together what little information they could, but they were trying to illuminate a dark cave with a Bic lighter. Without a vast inspection team on the ground, operating unfettered and over a long period of time, it was clear that the great unanswered questions regarding Iraq--what happened to the old stockpiles of weapons and what new programs Saddam was working on--could never be answered.

Read the entire article. It is the best recap I have yet seen, and it takes the reader through the apposite points of the Kay report, putting them in historical and strategic context. This is the argument that should have been consistently communicated from the Bush administration, but if nothing else, they can look to Kristol and Kagan to pull their collective butt out of the fryer.

First Mate back on board

The First Mate is home from the hospital, with four fresh prescriptions to fill and a tired smile on her face. She's looking and feeling much better, but I'm going to stay home from work tomorrow to keep an eye on her.

Big grins!

Arnold Uber Alles

Here's a funny recollection of the last days of Arnold's campaign, from the October 30 issue of the Weekly Standard:

IT SEEMS LIKE ONLY YESTERDAY that I was jetting around California with Arnold Schwarzenegger, enjoying one-on-one access, eating Arnold's food, laughing at Arnold's jokes, choking on Arnold's cigar smoke. In fact, it was a year ago, when Arnold was campaigning for his ballot initiative promoting after-school activities. Back then, he was running a modest little jobs program for former Pete Wilson aides. Now, five days before the 2003 recall election, at the kickoff of his home-stretch bus tour at the San Diego Convention Center, it's apparent that Schwarzenegger has gone Hollywood. There are so many staffers on the ground that it's hard to know who to suck up to.

It's long but entertaining, sort of like the recall election.

Islamic states to welcome new Iraq

More good news, this time from an unlikely source: Islamic states to welcome new Iraq. I had thought they would try to exclude the Iraqi Governing Council, but it appears that the Organization of the Islamic Conference is about to take a more pragmatic view:

The status of Iraq since Saddam Hussein was toppled six months ago had led to disagreement in the OIC, with summit host Malaysia contending that no Iraqi government should be seated with the country under U.S. occupation, and the powerful Arab bloc saying that the Governing Council is transitional and legitimate enough, for now.

The Arab view prevailed, and Iraq will be represented by Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari, a Kurd, and by Ayad Alawi, current holder of the council’s rotating leadership. Delegates said that a resolution would likely welcome the Governing Council but be balanced with calls for Iraq’s return to full independence and sovereignty and control over its own oil. The resolution “is more of a welcome and acknowledgment of the Governing Council and considering it as a step in the right direction,” said Musa Braiza, a senior official from Jordan. “I am not aware of any opposition.”

Of course, no OIC meeting could be complete without a denunciation of Israel, although in this case there is certainly some cause for bruised feelings, no matter the provocation to Israel:

A resolution condemning Israel for launching an airstrike in Syria — the first such attack in three decades — was also expected, Syrian officials said. Israel has claimed that the attack targeted a training camp used by Palestinian militants. Syria insists the camp closed years ago.

If it was closed, it certainly was well-stocked for a site that hadn't been used in years ...

The Least Bad Option

Even the New York Times is starting to get it, although Thomas Friedman is normally fairly sane on foreign policy anyway. Friedman argues against letting the UN dictate the timetable for Iraqi sovereignty as thoroughly impractical:

Would the U.S. handing power to an interim Iraqi government really stop the attacks on U.S. forces, Iraqi police, the U.N. and Iraq's interim leaders? I doubt it. These attackers don't want Iraqis to rule themselves, these attackers want to rule Iraqis. Why do you think the attackers never identify themselves or their politics? Because they are largely diehard Baathists who want to restore the old order they dominated and will kill anyone in the way. Will the U.N., which has basically left Iraq, not flee again when its officials get attacked again — which will happen even after Iraqis have sovereignty? Could the Iraqi Governing Council agree now on who should lead an interim government? Will the Europeans really pony up troops and billions of dollars for Iraq, if the U.S. hands the keys to an Iraqi interim government? Will the U.S. public want to stay involved then, as is needed?

Until we are sure these questions can be answered, without Iraq spinning out of control, I'd stick with the status quo as the least bad option — in part because genuine sovereignty means running your own affairs and the U.S. has already done more to build that at the grass roots than most people realize.

Friedman then goes on to outline some of the successes in Iraq that we don't hear from mainstream media, including and especially his own paper. In the case of Iraq, the blogosphere is way ahead of the mainstream media, and at some point the mainstream media is going to have to answer for it.

The Post gets it

The Washington Post proves that it is the leading voice in American politics in a well-written, thoughtful analysis of the Iraq front of the war on terror.

The debate over intervention was fraught precisely because many people understood that Saddam Hussein was not an imminent danger. We argued nonetheless that the real risk lay in allowing him to defy repeated U.N. disarmament orders, including Resolution 1441, the "final opportunity" approved by unanimous Security Council vote.

As noted endlessly in the blogosphere, and acknowledged in the Post's editorial in a more passive way, the Bush administration never argued that Saddam represented an "imminent" threat. In fact, in Bush's State of the Union speech earlier this year, and in the speech he delivered to the UN, he argued that the United States and the civilized world could not afford to wait until the threat was imminent. That was the whole "preemption" controversy. Preemption doesn't apply to imminent threats. Preemption is the policy to remove threats before they become imminent.

Though it pokes holes in U.S. intelligence and our assumptions, Mr. Kay's report contains much to substantiate this reasoning. Saddam Hussein, the report claims, never abandoned his intention to produce biological, chemical and nuclear arms -- and he was aggressively defying Resolution 1441. He also was successfully deceiving U.N. inspectors. They failed to discover multiple programs for developing illegal long-range missiles as well as a clandestine network of biological laboratories, among other things. From a legal standpoint, the report shows that Iraq should have been subject to the "serious consequences" specified by Resolution 1441 in the event of noncompliance. More important, it strongly suggests that in the absence of intervention Iraq eventually would have shaken off the U.N. inspectors and sanctions, allowing Saddam Hussein to follow through on his intentions. He would have been able to renew his attempt to dominate the region and its oil supplies, while deterring the United States with the threat of missiles topped with biological warheads. In acting to enforce the U.N. resolution, the United States eliminated a real, if not "imminent," threat, while ensuring that future Security Council ultimatums carry some weight.

In the 1930s, before we had a United Nations, the League of Nations attempted to fill the same role, which was to discourage the use of force and to resolve international disputes through diplomacy. However, it refused to enforce any of its resolutions. When Italy invaded Ethiopia, and later when Japan invaded China, the League passed resolution after resolution demanding the withdrawal of invading forces, but refused to act on any of these resolutions. Because the League consisted mainly of Western democracies, Mussolini and Hitler became convinced that the Western democratic model was decadent and would not survive against Fascism or Communism, and certainly would not fight to save themselves. Franco's coup in Spain, assisted by both Mussolini and Hitler, assured them of this.

The danger of the UN is that a lack of action is worse than not having the organization at all. Had we allowed Saddam to outlast the now-discredited "inspection" process and re-arm, it would have encouraged other despots in the region and elsewhere to do the exact same thing. Worse, it would have underscored the notion that Western democracies can be bullied into submission, which would have exponentially increased our risk of terrorist attack for any number of crackpot causes. History teaches us that peace can only be achieved through strength and vigilance, not appeasement and retreat. We've tried that and it cost the world almost 50 million dead in the middle of the last century.

Read the rest of the editorial; it's balanced, contains very fair criticisms of the Bush administration, and some good suggestions for moving forward.

Longer Ambulance Ride Could Save Lives

If you are at risk of a heart attack, make sure you read this article -- and then make sure you know which of your local hospitals perform primary angioplasties.

[H]eart attack treatment has undergone a quiet revolution, one that ambulance services and small hospitals have largely ignored. Many heart specialists now agree that the clot-dissolving drugs are passe, or should be, and large hospitals have generally stopped using them. Instead, the best treatment is an emergency procedure called a primary angioplasty.

Even more reliably than clot drugs, it can stop a heart attack cold if done within the first two or three hours. But it is available only at major hospitals with top-tier cardiac centers.

So the little community hospital is no longer the ideal place to treat a heart attack, especially if it occurs within driving distance of an angioplasty center, as the vast majority do.

Nevertheless, specialists estimate that only about a third of heart attacks in the United States are treated with primary angioplasty. Most end up at hospitals that can't do them, and they aren't transferred to places that can.

Make sure you read the whole thing, and make sure your family members read it too.

PETA: People Empty of Tact and Aptitude

I'm surprised it took PETA this long to take a life-threatening tragedy and crassly use it for their own purposes.

The group People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals held a rally Saturday outside the Mirage hotel-casino to urge entertainers Siegfried & Roy to retire their felines after Roy Horn was nearly killed by a tiger during a performance.

Carrying signs reading, "The Strip Is No Place for Tigers" and "Big Cats Big Danger," about two dozen demonstrators gathered near the entrance to the resort's large Siegfried & Roy marquee.

It's understood that PETA opposes animals in entertainment, or in almost any other contact with humans, so it's not surprising that they want Siegfried & Roy to eliminate the tigers from their act. In fact, I believe they've protested the act several times previously. But since it's pretty clear that the act will be off the stage for a long period of time (if not permanently), this stinks of opportunism ... just another way to get themselves some cheap headlines.

The group also held placards displaying well-wishing messages for Horn, who remained hospitalized in critical condition Saturday.

Oh, yeah, I'm sure he feels the love.

A Winning Strategy in a Fractured State: Unite and Conquer

Steve Lopez, in today's LA Times, nails the recall election in another funny column:

Conservatives eagerly abandoned sacred covenants and joined moderates — and even some liberals, for God's sake — in voting for a serial groper who smoked dope, skipped elections and was a poster boy for Hollywood's gun violence and mayhem.

Who would've thunk it?

Lopez not only notes that, but actually understands what this means for the California electorate:

We're politically polarized beyond caricature, undermining any useful problem-solving, and great hordes of people need to be locked in their rooms.

But as far as anyone can tell so far, Arnold appears to be somewhere in the middle — a fiscal conservative and social moderate. If so, that would put him more in touch with California than Gray Davis, who pumped helium into the state budget, or any of the knuckle-draggers the GOP keeps sending into the game.

And given the way the state Legislature behaves, with raving lunatics on both fringes, it might be altogether fitting to watch lawmakers get their knuckles rapped by the star of "Kindergarten Cop."

The benefit of the recall is not so much to remove a man who was almost universally known to be a complete incompetent (a rent-an-incompetent, at that), but to allow the political center of the electorate to claim control of politics. Thanks to gerrymandering and a number of dirty campaigns, so vividly demonstrated in this last election, the political class is completely polarized, as Lopez states. The primaries inevitably raise up the most stubborn party-line candidates. If, when they get to Sacramento, they try compromise and negotiation, they find that they can't survive the next primary season.

Bypassing the political class and tossing out Gray Davis was the point of the recall, not electing Arnold, who I still think was a poor choice as Governor (but probably the best of the people who ran). Next up should be a ballot initiative creating open primaries so that the political center can ensure that they are represented in the general elections. Let the overhaul begin.