Able Danger: Zaid's Rebuttal To The AP

Earlier this week, the AP reported on a series of issues that the DIA used as an excuse to revoke the clearances of Lt. Col. Anthony Shaffer, the liaison to the SOCOM program Able Danger and the first public witness to the program's identification of four 9/11 hijackers as al-Qaeda operatives more than a year before the terrorist attacks. Many of us saw the revocation as a transparent attempt to discredit LTC Shaffer before he has a chance to testify to Congress on the Able Danger program, and the failure of the DoD to allow it to share its information with the FBI as well as the 9/11 Commission's refusal to meet with any of the Able Danger team.

Now his attorney, Mark Zaid, has posted his comment on the matter at CQ. With his permission, I'm reposting here so that it gets the most exposure possible.

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I have read through many of the comments posted concerning LTC Anthony Shaffer and it is great to know that so many of you support him and his efforts and see through the DoD/DIA charade. As most may know, I am LTC Shaffer's attorney.

This is my first post on this blog and I want to use this opportunity to comment on something that I find to be very important, and that is the issue of LTC Shaffer's security clearance. The AP story that was issued Friday entitled "Pentagon revokes clearance of 'Able Danger' officer" was replete with many errors and unfortunate omissions that portrayed my client, who the reporter never interviewed, in a false light.

I would like to set the record straight so that everyone knows the situation. I set up the story so that a full and balanced portrait could be drawn. Of course I knew that unfavorable information would be reported, but so long as the substantive responses would be reported alongside we had no qualms about releasing the information. The information I submitted not only from LTC Shaffer to refute the allegations but also from independent third parties would show everyone how petty, pathetic and absurd the allegations were.

Unfortunately, the AP story was terrible. Despite having the documents in her possession the reporter made numerous errors and ignored crucial information. To say that I was disappointed is an understatement. Twice I got the AP to modify the story and yet still they just couldn't get it right, which is why I am submitting this post here.

Most of you already realized, even with the poor reporting of the AP story, how ridiculous the DIA allegations are. I have been handling security clearance cases for about a decade and I was dumbfounded by the lack of evidence the DIA had against LTC Shaffer and the depths to which DIA transversed to try and manufacture a case against him. Let me further support your conclusions.

First, the AP failed to understand the distinction between DIA and the Army. DIA is LTC Shaffer's civilian employer. The key allegations filed against him were while he served with the Army on active duty. LTC Shaffer is now a reserve Army officer. The Army took no punitive action against LTC Shaffer. Instead, with full knowledge of everything DIA was doing, the Army promoted him from Major to LTC in the midst of the security clearance revocation proceedings. This says everything. It was a slap right in DIA's face. Thus, it is his civilian, not military, security clearance that was revoked.

Second, the initial article noted: "Shaffer says he received a Bronze Star medal for work on a classified operation in Afghanistan in 2003. According to papers provided by Zaid, the military is now questioning whether he deserved it, including challenging whether at least one person who backed Shaffer's nomination for the medal had firsthand knowledge of his actions."

This was not the medal that DIA - again, not the military/Army - raised an issue about. LTC Shaffer was awarded the Bronze Star for his six month deployment in support of combat operations in Afghanistan during his July-Dec 2003 deployment for Operation ENDURING FREEDOM. He served as the DHS (Defense Humint Services) representative to the most sensitive, highly classified operational unit conduct operations in the CENTCOM Area of Responsibility. This Bronze Star award was provided outside of DIA’s Joint Reserve Unit award processing mechanism and presented to him while still in Afghanistan.

The award at issue was the Defense Meritorious Service Medal (DMSM) - and it had to do with his work on classified operations such as ABLE DANGER. Again, the Army/military is not questioning whether he deserved the DMSM - it was the DIA. The Army resolved this issue by promoting him. In fact, LTC Shaffer was wearing the medal at last week's Senate Judiciary hearing. The Army has never sought to take it back, and I doubt it ever will.

The key aspect here is that we provided the AP with a copy of Col Gerry York's statement to support LTC Shaffer's entitlement to the award. Col York was LTC Shaffer's military AND civilian rater and had full knowledge of LTC Shaffer's activities. His statement makes it clear that LTC Shaffer was entitled to the award and that the individuals who complained about the award had no idea what LTC Shaffer had been doing because they were not properly cleared to know. That is fundamentally important and goes far beyond simply noting that I, as the attorney, or LTC Shaffer, as the "victim", deny the allegations. Col York was a very senior, respected DIA official who as a third-party is completely independent. Yet he was not quoted at all by the AP.

Third, the story notes that "Shaffer says he showed his government credentials during two incidents in 1990, when he was drunk, and 1996, when he was pulled over by police. The military says he misused his credentials, but Shaffer says he was not told he should not have used them. He also said he has joined Alcoholics Anonymous and has been sober for 13 years."

In the 1990 incident Shaffer merely had the credentials on him when he got a "drunk in pubic" charge. He did not use the credentials for any purpose. In 1996 he was on official business with a DIA Counterintelligence Special Agent in the car when he was pulled over. He was explicitly told by the DIA Special Agent to show the credentials. That is a very important fact that was omitted. Moreover, there was no alcohol involved with the 1996 incident though at first glance the article may give that impression. Why the AA comments were included I do not know as they are completely irrelevant to the issue and was never raised by DIA.

Additionally, every allegation prior to 1995 was FULLY investigated by DSS (Defense Security Service) and found to be unsubstantiated or irrelevant and he was given his TS/SCI clearance, which he has had for years. I provided the AP with a statement from DSS Agent Ann Clark who conducted an earlier investigation and stated that these prior issues were favorably resolved for LTC Shaffer. After several versions of the article were published the AP at least added this fact though they attempted to minimize its impact.

Fourth, the story states that: "Falsely claiming $341.80 in mileage and tolls fees. He said he filed travel expenses based on what he was told by human resources staff"

It was $180 - not $341. The entire voucher that LTC Shaffer had submiited and was approved was $341. Tthe New Jersey (Ft. Dix) part, which is what was in contention, was only $180. It was to attend a military school and he was authorized to file for it. In fact, all such claims are deemed legitimate when filed by reg (so I am told) and it routinely happens that sometimes the reimbursements are judged to be inapplicable. Yet neither DIA or the Army has ever requested the funds back, which LTC Shaffer has offered to return.

Fifth, yes, LTC Shaffer took pens and pads from the American Embassy to use at school. However, it was nearly 30, not 20, years ago, in the 1978-79 timeframe - when he was 15 and 16 years old. And, again, this previously investigated and favorably adjudicated.

Sixth, the story quotes: "Going over his chain of command to do briefings. Shaffer said he was providing briefings to higher-ups on projects even his direct superiors did not know about, and he received superior review ratings for that time"

Major General Harding (a two star general) provided a written statement stating that he directed LTC Shaffer to brief him. He had specific permission and guidance from the commanding general of the organization to do exactly what he did. That statement categorically refutes the allegation. That LTC Shaffer's immediate superiors were annoyed the General had him go around them is not LTC Shaffer's problem.General Harding's letter was provided to the AP but completely ignored.

Seventh, the article asserts: "Showing irresponsibility with $2,012 in credit card debt. He said he paid off the debt"

This allegation is not even an issue any longer. DIA dropped it completely, which is clear from the documents I provided the AP but which was not noted until I requested a correction. Moreover, to just have this allegation hanging out there was irresponsible given the stated explanation.

LTC Shaffer was fighting in Afghanistan risking his life and gave his fiancee power of attorney to take care of his bills and she simply neglected to pay it. As soon as he found that out, he paid it. Plain and simple.

Eighth, the story states "Mark Zaid, Shaffer's attorney, said the Pentagon started looking into Shaffer's security clearance about the time in 2003 he met in Afghanistan with staff members of the bipartisan commission that studied the Sept. 11 attacks and told them about Able Danger. Zaid said he can't prove the Pentagon went after Shaffer because he's a whistleblower, but "all the timing associated with the clearance issue has been suspiciously coincidental."

This is perhaps a minor point, but I did not say that. I said DIA started looking into the allegations in late 2003 or early 2004 and then decided to take action against Shaffer only after he told DIA of his meeting with the 9/11 staff.

Finally, the story accurately states that "Shaffer, now a member of the Army Reserves, has been on administrative leave since March 2004. During the same time, he was promoted to lieutenant colonel on Oct. 1, 2004."

This is the key to the whole story and was lost in the shuffle. If any of the DIA allegations had merit, LTC Shaffer would still be Major Shaffer. So why is DIA taking the action it has?

I wish I had an answer to that question.

Thank you all again for the support you have shown LTC Shaffer.

Mark S. Zaid, Esq.

Bill Bennett's Bogus Journey

The blogosphere and talk radio have pulled apart the unfortunate two minutes of Bill Bennett's "Morning In America" broadcast in which he attempted a clumsy reductio ad absurdum argument involving a hypothesis about aborting all black babies. Most of the commentary has predictably been inflammatory, although Matthew Yglesias, Brad DeLong, Jeff Goldstein, and Dafydd ab Hugh all offer excellent analyses of Bennett's commentaries.

When one looks at the entire context of the remarks made by Bennett in discussing the Freakanomics argument that three decades of abortion lowered violent crime in America (an argument that suffers by the fact of the violent death of 43 million feti, wouldn't one think?), it should be obvious to reasonable people that Bennett neither argues for aborting black babies nor does he agree with the Leavitt and Dubner hypothesis. Anyone who spends time with Bennett, either listening to his radio show or reading his works, knows that Bennett is no racist.

However, he makes one mistake in his reductio ad absurdum argument that he should have avoided, one which gives fuel to the entire argument: he assumed that lowering the African-American population would result in a lower crime rate, without any other conditions being met. Here's Bennett's statement:

But I do know that it’s true that if you wanted to reduce crime, you could—if that were your sole purpose, you could abort every black baby in this country, and your crime rate would go down. That would be an impossible, ridiculous, and morally reprehensible thing to do, but your crime rate would go down.

Do we know that the crime rate would go down, any more than if we aborted every white baby in America? No, we do not, and that mistaken assumption creates the much smaller but legitimate criticism of Bennett's remarks. At the heart of that assertion, Bennett has to assume that all other things being equal, blacks are more likely to commit crime than non-blacks as part of their innate nature, and not as part of an environment.

First mistake: using blacks as an example. Had he said "poor", he would have been much closer to the mark. The poor do not have an innate compulsion to commit crime either, but the environment in which they enter the world creates more pressure towards criminal behavior. That does not hold true for "all black children" -- only for those born into that environment.

Jeff notes some interesting data from the Department of Justice on racial statistics on crime showing that for the past thirty years, showing that murderers tend to be black more than white, which would tend to support Bennett's assumption. But why? Looking at the breakdowns, white murders outnumber blacks in all but a handful of categories: gun, argument, felony, and drugs. It looks like absent drug prohibition, the numbers might tend to normalize somewhat, although probably not enough to reach equality.

Less convincing is Dafydd's argument supporting Bennett's assumption. Dafydd says this:

If half of all violent Asian criminals were to reform, turn over a new leaf, and become honest citizens, it would slightly lower the violent-crime rate of the United States; but if half of all violent black and Hispanic criminals were to cease committing crimes, it would drastically lower the national violent-crime rate.

But part of that argument's veracity comes from the fact that the Asian population accounts for 3.6% of US population as a whole, while blacks and Hispanics account for 24.8%. Dafydd's argument is obviously true, and just as obviously irrelevant. And Bennett still would have been better off choosing white babies as a way to lower crime, because they would account for roughly three-quarters of all births and could contribute much more to the lowering of the crime rate. In 2003, white births outnumbered black births 6-1.

I don't think that Bennett chose his example wisely, and he should expect some criticism for it. The White House stupidly injected itself into this nine-day wonder of a controversy, but at least they got the temper of their criticism correct; the remark was "inappropriate". If Bennett wants to talk about race and crime, then let him argue, as Jeff does, from real data and real issues, instead of playing around with it in the indirect manner Bennett does. Injecting it as a hypothetical for what would otherwise have been an excellent reductio ad absurdum refutation of Leavitt and Dubner amounts to a moment of uncharacteristic rhetorical folly for Bennett. That doesn't make him a closet racist; it just makes him mistaken.

UPDATE: Now, this is racism, but we won't hear that from the people screaming for Bennett's job.

UPDATE II and BUMP: We'll be discussing the Bill Bennett issue on the Northern Alliance Radio Network on AM 1280 The Patriot at 1 pm CT. Listen on the stream at the Patriot and call us at 651-289-4488 to join in the conversation. We're discussing Judy Miller right now.

Palestinian Elections Produce Murky Results

Local elections in the West Bank produced results quirky enough for both Fatah and Hamas to claim victories in the 104 municipalities polling yesterday. Even the media coverage seems confused, as the New York Times suggests that the results favor Hamas while the Washington Post argues the opposite. The difference between the two comes from the lack of representation for Hamas in many of the elections, while Fatah had candidates in all localities.

The Post's Scott Wilson takes the macro view:

The Palestinians' ruling Fatah movement won a majority on 51 municipal councils in elections held Thursday in 104 West Bank towns and villages, according to official results scheduled to be released Saturday that show the rival Hamas movement taking clear control of 13 councils.

Thursday's vote was the third round of municipal elections in the Palestinian territories. Voting in the Gaza Strip, where Israel recently ended its 38-year presence, was postponed to give election officials more time to prepare ballots.

In total, Fatah won 54 percent of the municipal seats, while Hamas, formally known as the Islamic Resistance Movement, won 26 percent. The remaining seats were won by several smaller secular parties and independent candidates, leaving 40 councils without a clear majority party. Fatah and Hamas could increase the number of councils in their control by forming coalitions with the smaller parties in the weeks ahead.

Wilson gets this correct as far as he goes, but it has to be somewhat disappointing for Fatah that it couldn't control a majority of the councils when Hamas didn't field candidates in a significant number of communities. Given that Fatah claims a voter turnout of around 85 percent, this appears to give Mahmoud Abbas a less-than-stirring boost of confidence going into the delayed parliamentary elections.

The New York Times takes the more nuanced view of the election, noting that Hamas does pretty well for an underrepresented party:

The elections, the third of four rounds of local votes, encompassed about 10 percent of the Palestinian population in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, with the largest cities still to vote.

Preliminary tallies show that the main Fatah faction of Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president, rebounded slightly from earlier rounds of voting, taking 54 percent. Hamas, which is considered a terrorist group by the United States, took about 26 percent, a strong showing in the West Bank, where it has been historically weaker than it has in Gaza.

Fatah appears to have won majority control of 61 of the 104 councils, while Hamas appears to have won 28 of them. Voter turnout was about 85 percent, according to the Palestinian Election Commission. ... Complicating the analysis, Hamas had candidates running in only 56 councils, meaning that it won half of the council races it entered.

That success rate of 50% outstrips that of Fatah, which presents a real problem for Abbas. If Hamas can launch itself as a national party, it could easily beat Fatah in a fair election -- a demonstration of the Palestinian desire for total war against Israel. Abbas will find himself out of power and living at the whim of a militant organization bent on genocide, hardly the kind of political "party" that engages its opposition with anything but bombs and bullets. Abbas will have to choose between corruption and tyranny, thanks to the Palestinian electorate which his organization has poisoned for decades with anti-Semitic and anti-Western propaganda.

The irony of Yasser Arafat's partner in terrorism slowly getting hoist on his own petard would be delicious if it weren't for the terrible consequences it will cause. Nevertheless, it remains true that the Hamas appears to have the true sense of the Palestinian people -- they want all-out war, and they have no idea how close they are to getting their wish.

UPDATE: Hamas won't challenge the election results, although they criticize Fatah's analysis of their meaning. Meanwhile, Brant at SWLiP wonders when the Pali Party has finally hit Last Call.

What's That Bulge Under The Burqa, They Wondered

Security forces in Afghanistan arrested a Taliban commander wanted in the string of bombings that unsuccessfully attempted to derail elections in the newly liberated and democratic nation. Gafar attempted to hide in plain sight from the American and Afghani soldiers who rooted him out:

U.S. and Afghan forces arrested a Taliban commander suspected in bomb attacks against coalition forces during a raid on central Afghanistan home, where he tried to conceal his identity by dressing as a woman, police said Saturday.

The commander, known as Gafar, was arrested Wednesday in Andar district of Ghazni province, southwest of the capital, Kabul.

A U.S. military statement said he was a "key enemy commander" behind attacks on Afghan and U.S. forces in the province carried out with homemade bombs, rockets and small-caliber handguns. ...

During the raid, the suspect tried to conceal his identity by dressing as a woman with a veil and sitting with other women in the house, Sarjang said.

A moment of gender equality from the Taliban! Will wonders never cease? One has to wonder what his former followers must think about Gafar's choice of subterfuge, and of its efficacy. For a group as fanatical about keeping women covered up from prying male eyes, they won't be pleased with its implications. Gafar has now made it a requirement for security forces to check under the veils of Afghani women to do a Y-chromosome check.

US forces now have Gafar for questioning. Perhaps they can soften him up by playing old Poison records and having him watch Some Like It Hot until he cracks.

NOTE: I was going to suggest To Wong Foo, Thanks For Everything, Julie Newmar, but I think that might be a specific violation of the Geneva Convention.

Another Terrorist Attack On Bali?

It appears that Islamists have chosen the popular resort destination of Bali once again as a target for terrorist attacks. A series of explosions have left at least eight people dead, including tourists, in the Indonesian area:

Bombs exploded almost simultaneously Saturday in two tourist areas of the Indonesian resort island of Bali, killing at least eight people and wounding 13 others, police and hospital officials said.

The victims included foreign tourists.

The blasts at Jimbaran beach and a bustling outdoor shopping center in downtown Kuta "were clearly the work of terrorists," police Maj. Gen. Ansyaad Mbai, a top Indonesian anti-terrorism official, told The Associated Press.

Other reports quote higher casualty figures, but none provide solid links yet. I will update as this becomes clearer. It also may not yet be over -- some of these reports imply more than two attacks.

It has the earmarks of al-Qaeda operations, which usually pinpoint the primary economic infrastructure of a target. In the US, that meant NYC and the World Trade Center, an objective that they tried twice to destroy. The original Bali attacks in October 2002 resulted in the deaths of over 200 people, mainly Australian tourists. The mastermind behind the Jemaah Islamiyah group responsible for the first Bali bombings only received 30 months behind bars for his part in 202 murders, although the operational leader had already gotten a death sentence.

Once again, we see that the Islamofascists have bravely taken on unarmed civilians, including women and children, in order to further their political and religious goals -- and that Muslims will once again suffer the brunt of the consequences of their actions, as Bali will lose even more of its luster as a tourist resort. Maybe this will get Indonesia to take people like Abu Bakar Bashir more seriously.

UPDATE: The BBC reports three bombs now, with nine dead.

So Who Was Miller Protecting?

The more that I think about the denouement of Judith Miller's three-month stay in prison, the less sense it makes. It didn't sound right to me last night when word leaked that I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby had given her a personal assurance that she could name him as her source, even though he had repeatedly waived any confidentiality agreement before she went to jail. Now, having read some of the comments by her attorney Bob Bennett, it makes no sense at all.

Power Line notes that Bennett blames Libby for not speaking up sooner and letting Miller off the hook:

Miller's lawyer Bob Bennett is way out of line as he makes the rounds of the talk shows suggesting that Scooter Libby should have called Judith Miller earlier to personally assure her that she had his permission to testify. For example, he told Wolf Blitzer:

Mr. Libby knew where Judy was. He had her phone number. They knew each other. There was no secret where she was. So I find it amazing that somebody would suggest that Judy would unnecessarily spend 85 days in jail.

I find amazing that Bennett would say something this ridiculous. As CNN has reported, Libby's lawyer (Joseph Tate) told Miller's original lawyer (Floyd Abrams) a year ago that she could testify as to Libby's conversation with Miller. And Libby himself testified twice before the grand jury about his conversation with Miller. Thus, Libby would have had no reason to contact Miller's attorney again. As Tate told CNN, Libby assumed that Miller was protecting another source, as she very likely was.

I think Power Line has this right. The agreement between her and Fitzgerald sets this up perfectly. She agreed only to testify to narrow questioning, presumably about only Libby. That allows her to get out of the grand jury without talking about whoever else knew about Plame or whatever Fitzgerald thinks she has. Fitzgerald went along with it, which seems doubly odd to me, and perhaps indicates that he doesn't have much of a case after all. He may want to wrap this up and head back to his Chicago investigation.

So in the end, what did her three months in prison accomplish? Fitzgerald already had Libby's testimony, and Miller already had a few waivers from Scooter to testify as well. If Fitzgerald allowed Miller to walk without having other sources explored, then why bother to imprison her in the first place? It looks like Miller protected a source that never had much to fear from Fitzgerald all along.

UPDATE: The Gray Lady can't figure it out either. Adam Liptak writes in the New York Times that all Miller got was the same deal other witnesses got from Fitzgerald without having to spend a night in jail:

Two developments drove the decision of Judith Miller, the New York Times reporter jailed for refusing to testify about conversations with a confidential source, to appear before a grand jury in Washington yesterday in exchange for her freedom, she and her lawyers said yesterday.

One was a long phone call with the source. The other was a deal with the special prosecutor in the case.

But three recent letters from people involved in the case debate whether a similar deal may have been available for some time and raise questions about why Ms. Miller decided to testify now.

In fact, Libby wanted Miller to testify, according to Liptak, because he thought Miller's testimony would help him with Fitzgerald. Her refusal to accept his earlier waivers took him by surprise. Libby finally contacted Miller directly to urge her to testify. Nor did Miller win any special favors from Fitzgerald in keeping the focus of his questions narrow. Glenn Kessler at the Washington Post got essentially the same deal without bunking at the hoosegow.

So now even her own newspaper can't figure out why she served the last three months in jail. Didn't Liptak just think to ask her -- or is this gobbledygook her reply?

Pork -- It's What Eats Your Lunch

One of the benefits of the Not One Dime For Porkers campaign applies to the politicians and not to the electorate whose money disappears into these waste-laden programs. Sometimes, when politicians dig into half-baked pork, they find it quite damaging to their political health. Take Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, for example. After making arrangements for a series of federal grants to a Nevada church, Reid now may suffer a bit of indigestion from the fraudulent use of the money:

The money that led to the indictment this week of two Las Vegas pastors and the wife of one of them came from federal grants arranged by Sen. Harry Reid in September 2001, a Reid spokeswoman said Wednesday.

Moving to distance Reid from a possible scandal, aide Tessa Hafen said the senator sought the money on behalf of a nonprofit social services agency and not for the churches or persons who have been accused of mishandling the money.
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"The money was administered by the Department of Justice, and it went to the agency in Nevada (Alliance Collegiums Association of Nevada)," Hafen said.

The Rev. Willie Davis, the longtime pastor of Second Baptist Church, and his wife, Emma, were indicted Tuesday on fraud charges with an associate minister, the Rev. McTheron Jones.

They are accused of spending $330,000 from federal grants on themselves although the money was intended for halfway houses for prison inmates in Southern Nevada.

What was Reid doing giving federal money to churches in the first place? Won't his ACLU allies have a fit over that kind of line-crossing between church and state? I expect that they will want to start a campaign in Nevada noting that Harry Reid represents the front line of the "new theocracy" that threatens America. For my part, I'm pleased to see that Democrats have sympathy for faith-based initiatives, even if they only have sympathy for those which benefit Democrats and crooked clerics instead of the poor and needy.

Putting that aside, this episode demonstrates that pork can be dangerous. Politicians would be wise to avoid it in the future, and allow the taxpayers to bring home their bacon where they know best how to handle it.

'Several' RCMP Investigations Ongoing In Canadian Government

Newsbeat1 notes an interesting admission by a minister in the Candian governennt, run now by the Liberals, at least until scandal finally overtakes them. Scott Brison, the Minister of Public Works, appeared rattled enough during yesterday's Q&A period to admit that the RCMP has 'several' investigations into government malfeasance active at once in attempting to explain why the Mounties took dozens of boxes of materials out of his office this week:

Mr. Jason Kenney (Calgary Southeast, CPC): Mr. Speaker, yesterday, in response to a question from me about the apparent seizure of documents from the Department of Public Works, the minister said, “I am informed that last week the RCMP contacted Public Works [which] provided an invoice to the RCMP...”.

Is it the position of the minister that the invoice ran over 100 boxes long? Is it not true and will he not confirm that over 100 boxes of information were taken from the offices of his department by the RCMP related to the sponsorship inquiry?

Hon. Scott Brison (Minister of Public Works and Government Services, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, yesterday that hon. member said on the floor of the House of Commons that in fact the information that was voluntarily provided by Public Works to the RCMP in full cooperation with the ongoing investigations of the RCMP was in fact withheld from the Gomery inquiry.

He was wrong. In fact, that information had been provided to the Gomery inquiry on at least two occasions previously. In fact, over 28 million pages of documents have been provided by the Government of Canada to the Gomery commission.

That hon. member should rise and apologize to the House.

Mr. Jason Kenney (Calgary Southeast, CPC): Mr. Speaker, is that not interesting? The minister will not deny that he claimed yesterday that an invoice was seized when in fact, by all appearances, over 100 boxes of evidence were taken from the offices of his department.

We are not going to accept the transparent diversions of the minister. We would like a straight answer. Were over 100 boxes of information seized by the RCMP from his department and were those boxes of information relevant to the sponsorship inquiry, yes or no?

Hon. Scott Brison (Minister of Public Works and Government Services, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, the fact is that there are several ongoing RCMP investigations and Public Works has cooperated fully with the RCMP.

Beyond that—

Some hon. members: Oh, oh.

Note that Brison never answered the question on whether the boxes had anything to do with the Sponsorship Programme or the Gomery inquiry. But in avoiding it, Brison makes it clear that the federal police have a number of probes active in Ottawa and in politics, and that the Public Works group may be central to more than one of them. What else has the Martin government been doing?

That may also be back on Canadian voters' minds. According to the G&M, new polling has begun to reflect what the Tories' private polling had already suggested was a beneficial summer break for the Conservatives. After taking an unexpected beating in the late spring while voters gave the Liberal Party a temporary pass on Adscam, Conservative numbers have once again bounced back. Not only have they cut the national Liberal lead in half since then, but they have also cut Martin's vital Ontario lead in half as well.

One other scandal appears on its way to the forefront of Canadian politics, only this scandal will damage the national pride more than the national pocketbook. CTV reports that the Canadian military and its procurement chain has fallen into such disrepair that it might take decades to correct -- decades during which the nation will have to rely on its southern ally for protection of its sovereignty:

The budget for the Canadian Forces needs to be doubled to about $30 billion a year if Canada is to secure the country and its sovereignty, says a new report by the Senate Defence Committee.

"At some point, the elastic snaps. And we think we're at that point right now," Sen. Colin Kenny, the chair of the committee, told a news conference Thursday.

"We are seeing so many things degrading simultaneously that they may not recover."

Canada only spends $15 billion per year on its defense, and the pennypinching has reduced what used to be a small but effective force into a collapsing, underpowered shell. It now takes 15 years to get new materiel through the production line and into the hands of its troops, a cycle that guarantees that the Canadian forces will find itself at a disadvantage on almost any battlefield in the world. For a country of its size, the national standing force of 62,000 would hardly even be of much assistance during a natural disaster on a Katrina scale, let alone a military attack by a foreign power.

It does call into question Paul Martin's decision to forego the American missile defense offer. With an army bravely operating under these conditions imposed by its government, Canada could use all the protection it can get.

More of these stories have begun to surface now that the autumn political season has reopened. Perhaps more Canadians will rethink their former allegiance to the Liberals, if the Tories can figure out a way to take advantage of the political opening they provide.

Able Danger: Strip Tease

Col. Tony Shaffer has had his security clearances revoked by the DoD and have officially notified his attorney of the circumstances surrounding the revocation. Although it does not technically affect his membership in the Army reserve, the action effectively ends the career of the former DIA liaison to the Able Danger project. Shaffer cannot pursue his specialties within the Army or DoD without security clearances.

So what led to the revocation of Shaffer's clearance -- his whistleblowing to Congress or his interviews with the press on Able Danger? No, that would look too direct. The Pentagon gave this list of incidents to Mark Zaid, Shaffer's attorney, who then released it to the press:

Shaffer says he received a Bronze Star medal for work on a classified operation in Afghanistan in 2003. According to papers provided by Zaid, the military is now questioning whether he deserved it, including challenging whether at least one person who backed Shaffer's nomination for the medal had firsthand knowledge of his actions.

Shaffer says he showed his government credentials during two incidents in 1990, when he was drunk, and 1996, when he was pulled over by police. The military says he misused his credentials, but Shaffer says he was not told he should not have used them. He also said he has joined Alcoholics Anonymous and has been sober for 13 years.

As for the pens and other office supplies taken, he blamed that on "youthful indiscretions" more than 20 years ago.

According to the paperwork, the alleged infractions against Shaffer also include:

• Falsely claiming $341.80 in mileage and tolls fees. He said he filed travel expenses based on what he was told by human resources staff.

• Obtaining $67.79 in personal cell phone charges. He said the amount was a legitimate expense accrued so he could forward calls.

• Going over his chain of command to do briefings. Shaffer said he was providing briefings to higher-ups on projects even his direct superiors did not know about, and he received superior review ratings for that time.

• Showing irresponsibility with $2,012 in credit card debt. He said he paid off the debt.

Stealing pens? Getting drunk sixteen years ago? Twenty-year-old incidents, all of which should have been reviewed and considered long ago by the DoD when selecting Shaffer for his various cleared positions, do not suddenly rise to a crisis level that requires his clearances to get revoked. This list looks like a transparent attempt to rationalize stripping Shaffer of his career. In fact, this list insults the intelligence to such a degree that it almost appears as if the DoD wanted everyone to know that its actions against Shaffer are meant to be vindictive.

Why not just revoke his clearances for blowing the whistle on Able Danger and the 9/11 Commission's ignorance? If the Pentagon did that, they would unwittingly endorse everything that Shaffer claims. One can only break rules about classification if the data released accurately reflects the classified data. A cleared NASA scientist cannot lose his access by claiming to the press that the moon is made of green cheese, but if he turned out to be correct, NASA would find other ways to discredit him -- perhaps by claiming that he or she stole pens from the office. In 1985.

Why now? It looks like the Pentagon will not avoid dealing with the Senate hearings on Able Danger and wants to get out in front of the whistleblowers in order to minimize the political fallout. By discrediting the witnesses in petty ways, it makes them look like kooks before the American public gets a chance to see and hear their testimony.

The Pentagon needs to quit playing games and get the first five witnesses on the stand. We need to hear directly from them exactly what they found, when they knew it, who blocked them from cooperating with law-enforcement staff inside the US, and why exactly did the program get cancelled.

Private Property Rights Making Comeback From Extinction?

Over the past thirty years, private property rights have steadily retreated in the face of an unprecedented hunt by environmentalists and grasping government agencies. Starting with the Nixon-era Endangered Species Act and reaching its nadir in the recent Kelo Supreme Court decision, owners of property have found their rights to hold and develop their property as they see fit increasingly restricted. Now, however, with the public outrage over Kelo still reverberating through political circles, Congress may finally push back on behalf of private property rights. On a mostly party-line vote, the House approved important restrictions on the application of the Endangered Species Act that requires the government to reimburse owners for the loss of any commercial value to their property under ESA enforcement, and not just only if all commercial value is lost:

The House passed legislation yesterday that could greatly expand private-property rights under the Endangered Species Act, the 1973 law that is credited with helping keep the bald eagle from extinction but that has also provoked bitter opposition.

By a vote of 229 to 193, lawmakers approved a revision of the act, perhaps the nation's most powerful environmental law. The law has led to battles over species such as the Northern spotted owl, the snail darter and the red-legged frog. ...

The bill would require the government to compensate property owners if measures to protect species thwart development plans. It would also give political appointees the power to make some scientific determinations and stop "critical habitat" designations, which limit development.

The changes were pushed through by House Resources Committee Chairman Richard W. Pombo (R). The California rancher contends that the current rules unduly burden landowners and lead to costly lawsuits while doing too little to save plants and animals.

Many Democrats and moderate Republicans said Pombo's bill would eliminate important protections for species and lead to large government handouts to property owners. A White House statement yesterday supported the bill. But it noted that payments to property owners could have a "significant" impact on the budget.

The bill will only lead to "large government handouts" if the ESA continues to get abused to pursue no-growth strategies instead of its intended purpose of actually balancing the needs of nature and man. Far too often, environmentalists have used the Act as a back door to stop activities of which they disapprove politically, regardless of the consequences or the animals involved. A farmer in Central California had to stop farming on his very expensive land in the 80s because enviromentalists found an endangered rat on his land, the kangaroo rat, and farming could have killed it off.

One of the frequent casualties of such application of this and other efforts by environmentalists are oil refineries. America has not built an oil refinery in thirty years, mostly due to the opposition by environmental groups to the use of fossil fuels. However, instead of dealing with refineries in that manner, they hijack environmental laws to make the process of building a refinery so long and so expensive that the oil companies simply give up. The effect of such abuse only becomes apparent when we face crises like Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, where our existing capacity takes a temporary hit and has to shut down down -- and we have no backup facilities to meet our demand.

The cost of this abuse gets entirely borne by the property owner. The new bill transfers that cost to all taxpayers, appropriately so since the federal government confiscates a profitable use of the properties in question, right now without any compensation. It will show people exactly how much this radical environmentalism actually costs our economy, bringing the damage into the light. Perhaps it will make people a lot less enthusiastic about ESA and the abuses it allows if they find out that they will have to foot the bill to keep rats alive in Central California.

AIPAC Central Figure Pleas Out, Will Testify

The central figure in the AIPAC espionage scandal has accepted a plea bargain and will testify against the operatives that passed classified intelligence to Israel, according to the Washington Post and the New York Times today. Lawrence Franklin has all but signed the paperwork, his attorney said, and the Post's sources confirm his agreement to testify against his co-conspirators:

A Defense Department analyst charged with passing government secrets to two employees of an influential pro-Israel lobbying group plans to plead guilty at a hearing next week, court officials announced yesterday.

Lawrence A. Franklin, 58, will enter his plea in U.S. District Court in Alexandria on Wednesday, the court said. Sources familiar with the case said Franklin is expected to plead guilty to conspiracy and possibly to other counts. He also is planning to resume his cooperation with prosecutors, they said. ...

If Franklin enters a plea, it will be a major development in a long-running investigation into whether classified U.S. information was provided to the Israeli government. The two employees of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, or AIPAC, have also been charged, and Franklin could be a key witness against them. The two AIPAC employees were fired after their alleged contact with Franklin.

Originally, Franklin cooperated with the FBI in its investigation into AIPAC, but then discovered that he could get charged with associated crimes as well, and lawyered up. He hired a big-gun attorney, Plato Cacheris, who rarely gets involved just to make arrangements for his clients to serve time. The NY Times points out that the type of activity for which Franklin will plead guilty -- especially conspiracy to transmit classified information to a foreign government -- rarely results in a suspended sentence.

Will Cacheris get Franklin completely off the hook? Hopefully not. Anyone who reveals classified intelligence information to spies, regardless of the nationality of the agents involved or for whom they work, should do some real time behind bars. On the other hand, the government appears to feel that the former AIPAC operatives, Steven Rosen and Keith Weisman, have more importance as targets of prosecution than Franklin. Why? They want to ensure that the spies have no more opportunity to find another dupe to give them the material they want, especially on Iran during this sensitive period when we negotiate the next step with the EU-3.

Espionage is espionage. If Israel spies on us and gets caught, too bad; their agents don't get a free pass at our classified data unless our elected officials approve it. Weisman and Rosen may soon join Jonathan Pollard in belatedly recognizing that fact of American life, and like Pollard, they will likely have many years to reflect on that fact.

Quick Notes

A couple of quick notes before I go to bed and get a little shut-eye...

John Hinderaker sent me an e-mail earlier tonight that Sean Hannity quoted my Daily Standard article on the Chuck Schumer/DSCC scandal on his radio show tonight. Glad to hear it! ...

Don't forget to keep voting at Patrick Ruffini's straw poll for the 2008 presidential election. So far, we've had 351 voters come from this site, and 40% have gone for Rudy Giuliani. I've been pretty dismissive of Giuliani's chances, although I admire him greatly. Perhaps this shows that Rudy might really represent the rank-and-file of the GOP. ...

The Anchoress has been blogging up a storm recently -- be sure to keep up with her excellent output!

Now The Real Swearing Begins

John Roberts won confirmation to the Supreme Court as Chief Justice on a strong but hardly unanimous vote in the Senate, 78-22. Half of the Senate Democrats voted against his confirmation, including the arguable front-runner for the 2008, Hillary Clinton; half of them voted to confirm him, including most of the red-state Democrats like Robert Byrd (WV), Bill Nelson (FL), Ben Nelson (NE), and Kent Conrad (ND). The politics finally ended when Roberts went to the White House to take the oath of office in time for his first official day on the job next Monday.

However, that only starts the swearing, as both sides prepare for a nastier battle the second time around:

"The pivotal appointment is the next one," said Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), who opposed Roberts. "The comparison obviously is with O'Connor," she said, in contrast to the reliably conservative Rehnquist. Asked how much she feared that Bush will name someone more conservative than Roberts, she replied: "Very. On a scale of one to 10? Eight and a half."

Republicans said the next nominee should be held to no higher standard than was Roberts, suggesting that the new chief justice has blazed a path others can follow. "Every single judicial nominee deserves to be considered on his or her own merits and not juxtaposed with their predecessors or horse-traded for ideological reasons," said Sen. Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.). ...

"If it's an ideologue such as a Janice Rogers Brown or an Owen," said Sen. Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.), mentioning another once-filibustered judge, "I think there's a good chance that we would move to block it on the floor" with unending debate.

Numerous Republicans have said an effort to filibuster a Supreme Court nominee chosen by a twice-elected president would be foolhardy. If necessary, some said, Republicans would revive their plan to change Senate rules and bar judicial filibusters.

While the O'Connor seat presents a bigger target for the Democrats, it still has its drawbacks as a line in the sand on judicial confirmations. Some Democrats might find themselves foolish enough, or partisan enough, to initiate a filibuster fight over a Priscilla Owen or Janice Rogers Brown appointment to replace O'Connor. We know 22 of them will oppose almost anyone appointed by George Bush, but some of the other 22 have elections to face next year, and cannot afford to make themselves look like obstructionists in states that have supported Bush twice.

But one factor that the Democrats have to keep in mind is that George Bush has three more years in office, and the GOP is likely to retain control of the Senate for all three. The Democrats have to defend more seats in the 2006 election and have more red-state incumbents than the GOP have blue-state incumbents. Why is that important?

John Paul Stevens.

O'Connor may have sometimes provided a swing vote, but overall the best Democrats can say about O'Connor is that she didn't turn out to be as conservative as they feared in 1981. She mostly represents the GOP's home turf. They will make a hue and cry about maintaining her moderation on the court, but they cannot afford to lose the filibuster over O'Connor.

John Paul Stevens, on the other hand, is 85 years old and not getting any younger at all. Stevens provides one of the most reliable of the liberal votes on the Court these days, and they have to have all the weapons available in case he retires or passes away. He remains in good health at the moment, but the chances of him staying that way for another three years aren't high enough for the Democrats to throw away the leverage they need to protect his seat if it comes up for replacement during a Bush term, regardless of the reason.

The Democrats will threaten a filibuster, and some of them may get insane enough to try one. However, unlike the lower-court filibusters, the GOP will not hesitate to pull out the Byrd option this time, and the Democrats will not risk everything to split the difference between a Janice Rogers Brown and an Antonio Gonzalez. That's why Bush needs to act boldly to name a solid conservative to replace O'Connor now.

Expect an announcement tomorrow, during prime time. Bush already has his pick, and he will want to force the coverage to come over a weekend. By eight-thirty tomorrow evening (ET), I think we will know who Bush has lined up for O'Connor's spot on the bench.

Judy Miller Scoots From Jail

Judith Miller, the New York Times reporter who went to jail rather than reveal her source only to endure the scorn of her colleagues for supposedly not reporting critically enough on the Iraq War, has now left prison and named Scooter Libby as her source on the Plame case. Miller spent three months in jail before finally calling Dick Cheney's longtime aide to verify that he had waived their confidentiality agreement:

After nearly three months behind bars, New York Times reporter Judith Miller was released Thursday after agreeing to testify in the investigation into the disclosure of the identity of a covert CIA officer.

Miller left the federal detention center in Alexandria, Va., after reaching an agreement with Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald. She will appear before a grand jury investigating the case Friday morning.

"My source has now voluntarily and personally released me from my promise of confidentiality regarding our conversations," Miller said in a statement.

The Times, which supported her contention that her source should be protected, reported late Thursday that her source was Vice President
Dick Cheney's chief of staff, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby.

This will probably disappoint those who anticipated that Miller went to prison to protect Karl Rove. It may not mean all that much, anyway, since we don't know what Lewis told Miller. Miller never wrote anything for publication about Valerie Plame, which made her arrest on contempt charges so provocative. It probably will turn out that Miller passed the information to Robert Novak or to some other people in the media.

The grand jury expires on October 28th, so we may finally see some answers from Fitzgerald and his lengthy investigation. Perhaps we'll also discover why someone who didn't write about Valerie Plame wound up doing prison time protecting Lewis Libby.

Will Paul Martin And Autumn Leaves Begin To Fall?

The Globe & Mail reports that Tory polling shows the Liberal lead eroding once again, and with the NDP pulling out of the temporary alliance that kept the Martin government in power last May, autumn might see more than just leaves fall. The NDP fired the first shot yesterday, as Ed Broadbent scolded the Liberals for reneging on electoral reform and indicating that it didn't need to wait for the full Gomery report to come out next year to act:

Talk of a snap fall election is creeping into the political chatter on Parliament Hill as the NDP strikes a harder tone toward the Liberals and the Conservatives say their internal polling has them within four percentage points of the Liberals.

Veteran NDP MP Ed Broadbent accused the Liberals during Question Period yesterday of backing down on a promise to launch consultations this fall on electoral reform.

"Is this not another extraordinary example of the cynicism and empty rhetoric of the government that the people of Canada want removed?" he said.

Outside the House, NDP MP Joe Comartin said the public could support an election after the first Gomery report into what happened with the sponsorship program is released Nov. 1, but before the second Gomery report with recommendations comes out Feb. 1.

The NDP split with the Grits comes at a good time for the Conservatives. According to the G&M's inside sources, the private polling done by the Tories show them only trailing the Liberals 33%-29% coming out of the summer doldrums. With the NDP taking the aggressive position on a possible no-confidence motion, they could avoid some of the political heat for causing new elections and force the issue back onto corruption and competence.

The timing gets problematic, however. Any snap election will have to have its campaign through Christmas, with the earliest day for actual voting Boxing Day. It's not exactly what most Canadians have in mind for a national holiday, nor will a Christmas campaign hold much appeal to the electorate either. A move for a no-confidence resolution would realistically create a January election, when the weather reaches its nadir. After that, the initiation of an election would almost certainly have to wait until March, when the second and final Gomery report would be right around the corner.

If the NDP wants it badly enough, we could see a Christmas election, and the NDP might take the political heat for triggering it just to distance itself from Paul Martin. Don't expect the Tories to roll the dice like that for themselves with such a precarious political position to protect.

Color The WaPo Editorial Board ... Skeptical

The indictment of Tom DeLay by DA Ronnie Earle has split the blogosphere into predictable battle lines, with liberal bloggers celebrating the indictment and conservatives, such as myself, pointing out the long history of partisanship that Earle has displayed in his pursuit of DeLay. Lost in the shuffle, for the most part, is the indictment itself. Apart from the arguable partisanship, the argument for a criminal indictment on the basis of the kinds of transactions alleged appears very weak, as even the Washington Post acknowledges:

Nonetheless, at least on the evidence presented so far, the indictment of Mr. DeLay by a state prosecutor in Texas gives us pause. The charge concerns the activities of Texans for a Republican Majority (TRMPAC), a political action committee created by Mr. DeLay and his aides to orchestrate the GOP's takeover of the Texas legislature in 2002. The issue is whether Mr. DeLay and his political aides illegally used the group to evade the state's ban on corporate contributions to candidates. The indictment alleges that TRMPAC took $155,000 in corporate contributions and then sent a check for $190,000 to the national Republican Party's "soft money" arm. The national committee then wrote $190,000 in checks from its noncorporate accounts to seven Texas candidates. Perhaps most damning, TRMPAC dictated the precise amount and recipients of those donations.

This was an obvious end run around the corporate contribution rule. The more difficult question is whether it was an illegal end run -- or, to be more precise, one so blatantly illegal that it amounts to a criminal felony rather than a civil violation. For Mr. DeLay to be convicted, prosecutors will have to show not only that he took part in the dodge but also that he knew it amounted to a violation of state law -- rather than the kind of clever money-trade that election lawyers engineer all the time.

As I pointed out yesterday, the Democrats used the exact same manuever in the same election cycle. The Texas Democratic Party sent $175,000 to the DNC and got $195,000 in return in three pairs of matching transactions between June 2001 and October 2002, all pairs occurring on the same date:

The only problem is that similar transactions are conducted by both parties in many states, including Texas. In fact, on October 31, 2002, the Texas Democratic Party sent the Democratic National Committee (DNC) $75,000, and on the same day, the DNC sent the Texas Democratic Party $75,000. On July 19, 2001, the Texas Democratic Party sent the DNC $50,000 and, again on the same day, the DNC sent the Texas Democratic Party $60,000. On June 8, 2001, the Texas Democratic Party sent the DNC $50,000. That very same day, the DNC sent the Texas Democratic Party $60,000.

If what Earle alleges that DeLay did amounts to money-laundering -- which Earle charged the other conspirators with committing, but not DeLay -- then why not the Democrats as well? If in fact both violate Texas law, then both groups should face prosecution. Did Earle present that to the grand jury, or did he just limit it to DeLay and the GOP? Earle's use of this case as a stump speech for Democratic Party fundraising this past May indicates that he had little motivation for equal application of the law -- which gives the understandable impression that Earle acted out of political malice and not a desire to see justice done.

Again, if DeLay broke the law, then he needs to face trial for it and answer for his actions, no question. If he conspired to launder money through a series of illegal transactions, then he should not only lose his leadership post but should get booted from Congress altogether. But like the Washington Post, I remain deeply skeptical about a criminal complaint concerning what appears to be a manuever used openly by both political parties and only one of them being held accountable for it -- by an activist for the other party.

I also agree with the Post about one other issue. We need to decide whether Tom DeLay should continue to represent the GOP in a leadership position even if this indictment gets tossed out, as it likely will as soon as a judge reviews it, but not for the hypocritical "ethics" charges that the Democrats keep tossing at DeLay, such as travel-expense irregularities that they more than casually commit themselves. We need to recapture the mantle of fiscal responsibility and smaller government, and DeLay appears to have swung over to the Drunken Sailor wing of the GOP establishment. His ludicrous statement earlier this month that the House had trimmed all the fat off the government budget at first sounded like an attempt at irony, but instead it demonstrated that the one-time firebrand for limited government had grown addicted to pork.

We need to ensure that those who lead the GOP understand that we elected them to cut the pork, not just shift it around to benefit Republicans. They seem to have forgotten that it's not their money -- it's ours. We only want it spent on items of national importance, and the rest of it should come back to us. If Tom DeLay can't find any waste in a federal budget that now eats up 20% of our gross domestic product, then he's obviously the wrong man to lead the party.

Pataki Nixes Controversial Freedom Center At Ground Zero

Governor George Pataki, buoyed by a late alliance with Hillary Clinton on the issue of the memorial, has ordered the removal of the controversial International Freedom Center from Ground Zero. The 9/11 memorial site had generated a storm of heated debate about the appropriate manner or remembrance for the thousands of dead from the worst foreign attack on American soil, and some had grave concerns that the IFC would amount to little more than a rationalization of the terrorists' actions. In response, the IFC has declared itself defunct, refusing any other site as inappropritae:

Governor Pataki pulled the plug yesterday on the International Freedom Center, the museum planned for ground zero that aimed to weave the events of September 11 into a historical movement toward freedom around the globe.

The governor asked the state agency in charge of the site, the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation, to work with the freedom center to locate other potential sites outside of its previously designated home in the World Trade Center site's "memorial quadrant."

But freedom center officials abruptly terminated their project after learning of the governor's decision.

"We do not believe there is a viable alternative place for the IFC at the World Trade Center site," read the freedom center's statement. "We consider our work, therefore, to have been brought to an end."

The decision by Pataki makes sense, both objectively and politically. What he specifically ordered was to ensure that the IFC did not sit in the same quadrant as where the Twin Towers stood. He understands, at least now, that the gaping hole where the Towers once stood, mightily dominating Manhattan's skyline, should remain exclusively devoted to telling the stories of 9/11: the tragedy, the heroism, and the terrible effect of al-Qaeda terrorism.

The IFC could easily find a home elsewhere, but its backers have decided to act petulantly and disband. It calls their mission into question even further than Debra Burlingame and other critics have done in the past. Pataki did not ban the IFC from the entire 9/11 memorial site, after all, merely from the site of the Towers themselves. If the IFC feels that its message holds value as a component of the 9/11 memorial, the relocation should make little difference to its function. However, their reaction makes clear that they intended the IFC not just to present an alternative viewpoint espousing a why-do-they-hate-us exploration, but that they wanted to ensure that their approach supplanted the memorials that would directly recall the barbarity of the acts themselves.

If not, then why disband?

Has Schroeder Seen The Light Yet?

German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder may have changed his mind about a grand coalition between his SDP and the party that barely supplanted its plurality position in the last election, Angela Merkel's Christian Democrat/CSU alliance. Previously dismissive of any arrangement for power sharing between the two top votegetters in the last election, Schroeder has apparently agreed to consider a lesser post than Chancellor in a belatd recognition of the reality of the vote count:

Emerging from the talks, the chancellor said he was confident the two parties could work together in government. "I believe we can - we will - succeed in bringing together a stable coalition that will last for four years and bring Germany further down the path of reform," he said. Mrs Merkel described the talks as serious and constructive. She said she was "pleasantly surprised" by Mr Schröder's willingness to discuss "serious themes".

Schroeder yesterday told the press that "personnel issues" should get addressed later in the process when asked about the Chancellory, but the talks clearly indicate that Schroeder recognizes no other way for the SPD to remain in power. The CDU/CSU will never allow Schroeder to remain at the head of government after having won the most seats in the Bundestag, albeit by a razor-thin margin. His personal unpopularity alone would make such a move political suicide. Besides, the CDU/CSU did not go through all the effort needed to win a plurality just to see the executive remain in the hands of the center-left.

If these talks result in a grand coalition, as Germans hope it will, it probably won't last long. The differences between the parties seem rather wide, and the unexpectedly mediocre showing by the CDU/CSU has given Schroeder a new lease on political life and on his enormous ego. We can expect him to cause problems no matter where he lands in the new government, making life unpleasant for Angela Merkel or whoever else ascends to the Chancellory in his place.

Not One Dime For Porkers: A Convergence

I have been watching the Porkbusters campaign championed by Instapundit, NZ Bear, Michelle Malkin, and others with a wistful sense of admiration and regret. Normally I would love to dive into the federal budget and find the pork, but due to work obligations, family issues, and other investigations I'm pursuing at the moment on the blog, I simply don't have the time. Those who have worked hard to make this effort have done a tremendous job in identifying billions of dollars in federal spending on foolishness and waste.

My good friend Mark Tapscott of the Heritage Foundation called me today and asked me why I had not yet blogged about Porkbusters. I told him that without having much to contribute that I didn't want to distract from the effort made by other bloggers. He suggested that I could assist the program by expanding the Not One Dime More effort to Porkbusters ... which I think is an excellent idea.

Not One Dime More targeted the National Republican Senatorial Committee for the failure of GOP leadership to get George Bush's judicial nominees confirmed or even in process. Now we want to target both parties' Congressional election commitees, the NRCC and the DCCC, by withholding funds while the parties act to protect their pork. For those representatives who refuse to pare the pork, we need to cut off their political oxygen until they turn blue and their campaign chests grow cold. Tell your Congressperson that while they protect the pork we discover, while they continue to vote for budgets with these useless and wasteful projects when the funding could defray the hurricane relief efforts, we will send Not One Dime to their efforts to re-elect their incumbents.

Voting for outdoor art museums as part of a transportation bill? Not One Dime More for Porkers.

Supporting baseball lessons from a foundation set up by a wealthy former baseball player? Cal Ripken might be a great guy, but the government needs its $3 million for higher purposes. Not One Dime More for Porkers.

Unwilling to rethink priorities and excusing it by demanding that federal money get spent on the 'burbs as well as the big cities? Not One Dime More for Porkers.

If I can clear some research time, I promise to find more myself. In the meantime, I'll help out by linking back to races we can target for withholding campaign funds until the pols get the message. We mean to end the pork wagon now.

Movie Review: Serenity

The distribution partners for the new film Serenity, the sequel to the short-lived television series Firefly, have decided to embrace the blogosphere in order to promote its movie. They asked bloggers to set up pre-release screenings across America (or to attend previously scheduled screenings) for free as long as the bloggers agreed to write about the film on their blogs. They did not demand or even suggest that the blog reviews be positive or encouraging, just to write something.

One might assume that Universal might have taken this approach for one of two reasons. The first motive that occurred to me was that the studio did not have confidence that Serenity would score with traditional critics and wanted to bypass them, which would indicate a poor effort. The other option was that the studio didn't have confidence that a sci-fi film based on a failed TV series qould find an audience in the fall season, and they wanted to get some buzz going so that a good film would not fall off the radar screen for moviegoers.

I'm happy to report that, based on the film itself, Universal must have had the second motive in mind. I never saw more than five minutes of Firefly, so I have no idea how this fits in with the series. I can tell you that this may be one of the better sci-fi films I've seen in the theaters in a long time. It has some flaws, but they remain minor and do not interfere with a movie that does not take itself too seriously but also does not kneecap itself by insulting its audience with dumb gag lines, either.

It takes a while to understand all the plot elements -- perhaps because I was unfamiliar with the series -- but the story coalesces around the sister, River, of the doctor, Simon, who rescues her froma secret facility that has programmed her for some heavy-duty purpose. A government operative (played with monstrous humanity by Chiwetel Ejiofor) sets out to get her back, which puts him on the trail of the ship Serenity. Mal decides that he must protect her, a decision that he will come to regret, but one that may also unlock a way to finally prevail against his enemies.

I won't tell you more than that; for the purposes of this review, it isn't necessary to give anything away. Very little of what follows is illogical or unbelievable, but most of it will surprise viewers. The film unpredictably navigates an incredibly complex universe, almost never allows viewers to rely on a pure good/pure evil paradigm, and puts its main characters on the line like no movie will risk in an age of focus-group testing and reliance on sequels.

Its characters do not rely on speeches and noble slogans (much), and most of them have their own sense of gallows humor that come from their own unique identity. The laughs the movie gets come honestly from realistic dialogue, from having the characters on the screen say what the audience is thinking, but avoids the "I like you, Solly, I kill you last" kind of goofiness.

In fact, the only major complaint I have with the film is its rating. The film has far too much horrific violence for a PG-13 rating. I thought it must have been an R, and only after the film ended did I discover its MPAA rating. Some of the futurespeak got on my nerves as well, but that gets less troublesome as the movie goes along.

My recommendation: Sci-fi fans will love this film. It reminds me of the best of the classics, where the purpose of all the hardware and the costumes is to remind us of our humanity and how easily it can be lost. It's good enough that many who do not normally enjoy sci-fi might find this one an exception to the rule. Don't bring the kids, though.

Back to the marketing. Power Line arranged this showing, and over 150 people came out to see it. Between then and now, John has heard from other studios that would like to have blogger pre-release screenings for their films as well. It makes a lot of sense; for a low cost, a movie that may not have a built-in audience could get some Internet momentum going for its launch. That might not mean much for an expected blockbuster, but we may see this model used more and more for the midlevel releases or those films that might develop a cult following.

Bloggers who love films may have hit upon a way to combine their passions. I say, as long as we get no pressure to praise a movie, pass the popcorn and bring on the feature film!

UPDATE: John at Power Line says that he has offers to do more of these pre-release screenings. Great! I hope I can make it to all of them. He also gives his review, although he has a number of caveats that might tend to undermine his credibility just a tad on sci-fi action films.

And yes, I did have to pay for the popcorn ...

DeLay Indicted By Partisan DA

A Travis County, Texas grand jury indicted House Majority Leader Tom DeLay on a single charge of conspiracy to violate state campaign-finance laws earlier today, a long-awaited result of a years-long investigation by Travis County DA Ronnie Earle. The indictment will force DeLay to step down from his leadership position until either a trial or a dismissal. Roy Blunt will take over most of his responsibilities temporarily, with some falling to David Dreier and Eric Cantor:

The indictment accuses DeLay of criminally conspiring to inject illegal corporate contributions into 2002 state elections that helped the Republican Party reorder the congressional map in Texas and cement its control of the House of Representatives in Washington.

The four-page indictment alleged for the first time that DeLay himself participated in a conspiracy with others to funnel corporate money into the 2002 state election "with the intent that a felony be committed."

In the indictment, DeLay is accused of conspiring with two associates: John D. Colyandro, the former executive director of a political action committee in Texas that was formed by DeLay, and James W. Ellis, the head of DeLay's national political committee. Colyandro and Ellis had previously been charged in an indictment that did not name DeLay.

DeLay helped organize the Texas election fundraising effort at the core of today's indictment, Texans for a Republican Majority Political Action Committee, known as TRMPAC. The committee itself was indicted on Sept. 8 for accepting illegal corporate funds. Eight corporations and an industry lobbying group have also been indicted during the 34-month probe.

The indictment charges that DeLay entered "into an agreement" with Colyandro and Ellis to circumvent the state's ban on corporate contributions by arranging for the donations to be sent first to an arm of the Republican National Committee in Washington, and then back to Republican candidates in Texas named on a written list prepared in Texas.

The conspiracy charge against DeLay carries a potential penalty of six months to two years in state prison and a fine of up to $100,000. DeLay, unlike the two others named in the indictment Wednesday, was not charged with money-laundering, an offense that can bring a 10-year prison term.

Ronnie Earle has tried to derail DeLay for years, and he has conducted himself in a most partisan fashion in doing it. Rather than investigate these charges in a clearheaded, direct, and nonpartisan manner, Earle has made no bones about his personal and political vendetta. He has openly used this investigation as a Democratic Party fundraising device, charging up Democratic rallies such as one last May that raised over $100,000, featuring Earle on the stump talking about the case and DeLay. According to the American Bar Association Canon of Ethics, Earle has violated DR7-107(A) as well as (B)(1). He also has clearly violated EC8-8, which states that lawyers who serve as public officers "should not engage in activities in which his personal or professional interests are or foreseeably may be in conflict with his official duties."

That has nothing to do with any question of whether DeLay violated the law, of course, but it has plenty to do with whether Earle presented a balanced and honest case to the Travis County grand jury. I suspect that his political ambitions come before his desire to see that justice is done in Travis County, and just like his ill-starred indictment against the diminutive Kay Bailey Hutchinson for battery, it will probably get a quick dismissal from the first judge to review it. Besides, as the American Spectator points out, the activity that garnered Earle's attention hardly qualifies as unique:

At stake in 2002 was control of the Texas legislature, which was to redraw congressional district lines. Corporate contributions to legislative candidates are illegal in Texas. The DeLay aides stand accused of violating that prohibition, along with eight companies like Sears Roebuck that provided the funds. The corporate money, however, never went to the candidates. Instead, it went to a much larger fund for state elections controlled by the Republican National Committee in Washington. That committee made contributions to Texas legislative candidates, constituting what Earle now charges is "money laundering."

The only problem is that similar transactions are conducted by both parties in many states, including Texas. In fact, on October 31, 2002, the Texas Democratic Party sent the Democratic National Committee (DNC) $75,000, and on the same day, the DNC sent the Texas Democratic Party $75,000. On July 19, 2001, the Texas Democratic Party sent the DNC $50,000 and, again on the same day, the DNC sent the Texas Democratic Party $60,000. On June 8, 2001, the Texas Democratic Party sent the DNC $50,000. That very same day, the DNC sent the Texas Democratic Party $60,000.

EARLE'S LAST FORAY INTO politicized prosecution in 1993 turned into a huge embarrassment when he went after Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-TX), who was then Texas Treasurer. Earle made a series of trumped-up charges, including that the demure Hutchison had physically assaulted an employee. Earle dropped the case during the trial.

Michelle Malkin has plenty of links at her site, but make sure to read the e-mail she received from former DoJ official Barbara Comstock, especially this:

Neither the RNC nor RNSEC constitute a political party under Texas election law. They are considered PACs, just as the DNC is.

Corporations in Texas could have legally made contributions to the RNC or RNSEC during the period in question under Texas election law.

There was no violation of the Texas Election Code. There was no conspiracy. The underlying transaction was legal. Had corporations sent money directly to the RNC or RNSEC, the transaction would be legal. How could anyone conspire to do indirectly what could legally have been done directly?

If DeLay broke the law and conspired to break the law, then he should face trial and a jury, just like anyone else. However, anyone else facing this Javert-like partisan would immediately get a judge's attention and a skeptical review of the underlying charges. Regardless of the profession of a defendant, District Attorneys represent all of the People -- including the defendants -- and are supposed to ensure fairness of process, not just cheerlead for indictments. Those who fail to live up to that standard expose themselves as political hacks, and political hacks might start off getting headlines but they usually wind up receiving blistering remonstrations from judges who suffer such wastes of time poorly.

Don't be surprised to find this indictment quashed within a few weeks.

UPDATE: The Commissar has a broad collection of links from across the blogospheric spectrum, well worth checking out.

It Takes A Thief ...

In my Weekly Standard column today, I note the lack of media interest in the scandal that Hugh Hewitt dubbed "Chuckaquiddick". Senator Chuck Schumer runs the DSCC, which we found out last week had fraudulently obtained the credit report of Maryland Lt. Gov. Michael Steele -- and had kept it quiet for over two months. I write that what this scandal needs is Congressional hearings, chaired by an expert on data privacy:

Where would we find experts on data privacy in Congress to hold this hearing? For starters, we would need senators and congressmen like--well, like Chuck Schumer. Schumer, after all, co-authored and sponsored the Schumer-Nelson ID Theft Prevention Bill, introduced in April of this year to discourage the kind of actions that Barge and Weiner took on Schumer's behalf. At the time, Schumer himself said the following, a prescient warning about how someone's personal information could be abused:

[O]ur comprehensive measure focuses on making sure that your personal information isn't surfing the Internet without your permission and that companies handling your Social Security number and other sensitive information should come under the watchful eye of the Federal Trade Commission immediately.

Who knew that within weeks of uttering this statement, his staff at the DSCC would have provided such a compelling example of the problem? Once again, Senator Chuck Schumer was ahead of the curve.

Inspired by a tip from CQ reader Donald Morrissey (no relation), I use questions that Schumer posed to Choicepoint VP Don McGuffey during his appearance at the Senate Banking Committee to imagine a Schumer vs Schumer showdown in Congress. In fact, I see that Mark Kennedy anticipated one of my questions by demanding to know whether the DSCC has acquired his credit report as well (via Fraters Libertas).

UPDATE, IN THE GREAT MINDS THINK ALIKE CATEGORY: Michelle Malkin's latest column addresses the DSCC scandal as well:

Law enforcement officials are taking this criminal intrusion into private records deadly seriously. But left-wing partisans are nowhere to be found. Steele's staff tells me that longtime crusader against identity theft Sen. Schumer, who denies having any knowledge of the scheme, has still issued no apology for the abuse of Steele's personal data. And there has been no outcry from the ACLU, the champions of clean campaigns, or any major national newspaper editorial board.

(Protecting privacy only seems to matter to liberals when it comes to 14-year-old girls seeking abortions behind their parents' backs, illegal aliens seeking sanctuary from the police, and registered sex offenders objecting to community registration requirements.)

Michelle gets to the heart of an issue like no one else. Be sure to read the whole thing.

A Battle Only Postponed

ersailWhen fourteen Senators gathered to congratulate themselves on hijacking the leadership of the upper chamber on judicial confirmations last spring, they proclaimed that they had, in Robert Byrd's words, "saved the Republic" by avoiding a rule change on filibusters -- a parliamentary manuever for which Byrd himself changed rules on four separate occasions. Despite the opportunity to get the matter resolved by the full Senate while working on lower-level judicial appointments, the Gang of 14 instead imposed the Memorandum of Understanding on both sides, with the seven GOP Senators essentially ceding some legitimacy to filibustering judicial nominees on ideological bases.

That will now come back to haunt them, as the Democrats get ready to crank up another filibuster regardless, it seems, of who the President nominates to replace Sandra Day O'Connor. As I predicted, the vaunted MoU turned out to be nothing more than a Versailles Treaty, a simple postponement of war rather than any kind of resolution:

The roster of those threatening a filibuster includes liberal and moderate Democrats, supporters and opponents of John G. Roberts Jr., Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean, and at least one of the seven Democratic senators who were part of the bipartisan "Gang of 14."

Democrats have splintered almost evenly over Roberts's nomination as chief justice, leading to frustration among party activists who think their elected leaders did not put up a serious fight against him. Pollsters have told party leaders that a show of opposition against Bush's next nominee could be crucial to restoring enthusiasm among the rank and file on the left.

In an interview, Dean said Democratic unity is essential in the upcoming battle and that the party "absolutely" should be prepared to filibuster -- holding unlimited debate and preventing an up-or-down vote -- Bush's next high court nominee, if he taps someone they find unacceptably ideological. ...

The possibility of a filibuster comes only a few months after an agreement that supposedly eliminated such threats. The Gang of 14 agreement barred filibusters against judicial nominees except under "extraordinary circumstances." The compromise also blocked Republican threats to change Senate rules to bar the use of filibusters to block judicial nominations, a step considered so drastic it became known as the "nuclear option."

Owen and Brown were cleared for confirmation to the appellate courts as part of that agreement, and Republicans said then that Democratic acquiescence in their confirmation meant the opposition party could not use ideology to bar future Bush nominees. But Democrats rejected that interpretation and said this week that Owen, Brown and several others believed to be under consideration by the president face a likely filibuster if nominated to the high court.

The Democrats obviously didn't learn any lessons from the Roberts confirmation battle, a debacle that they imposed upon themselves. Despite the warnings from some of their leadership to keep their heads, the Democrats instead went on the attack against Roberts only to find themselves outclassed and outgunned by the brilliance of the nominee. They got away with filibustering Roberts the first time around due to the media's lack of interest in appellate court nominations, but that will not hold true of Supreme Court confirmations -- and they found that out, painfully, with Roberts.

Almost anyone Bush nominates will probably face a filibuster at this point. The money on the Left now demands it, and Dean's signal shows that some Democrats feel they cannot win an election without obstructionism, the last two electoral cycles notwithstanding. The GOP needs to give them what they want and let the Kennedy-Schumer-Biden triumvirate of ineptitude loose once again on prime-time TV. The President needs to nominate someone with the same kind of skill at drawing out the innate foolishness of the Democrats on the Judiciary Committee as Roberts -- which is why I hope he will nominate Janice Rogers Brown, a brilliant legal scholar possessing a keen judicial temperament.

Now the Seven Republican Dwarves of the Gang of 14 will see the folly in compromising with the Democrats. They now have to make up their minds about whether to support Bush's nominees to the Supreme Court or to protect a filibuster that has been abused by the Democrats to overturn the results of two elections in terms of controlling judicial nominees. They could have resolved this four months ago, with the stakes less than today and with a lower level of media attention. Now they find themselves only a year away from an important election cycle, where the voters will surely remember whether they supported a Supreme Court pick rather than an obscure appellate nomination.

The time for the Byrd option has arrived. This time, let's get it done quickly and firmly, so that we can minimize the risk of wavering. I put off the Not One Dime campaign to give the MoU a chance to succeed, but this shows that the issue of the Constitutional prerogative for the presidential power to nominate jurists has never been resolved. We'll be watching those seven GOP Senators and the GOP leadership before we give a single dime to the NRSC.

DNC Supports Race Baiting, Paper Of Record Misses It Entirely (Update)

When Charlie Rangel called George Bush "our Bull Connor", I didn't pay much attention to the comment. Rangel, after all, often issues ridiculous and deplorable statements, and the notion that anyone can compare the firehose-directing, dog-siccing racist of Birmingham with the President who has put African-Americans into such jobs as Secretary of State -- twice -- shows more than just a little disconnect from reality. It demonstrates a full-blown schizophrenia and paranoia that Rangel all too often vents in his scratchy voice.

A paranoid Rangel doesn't amount to news. Having the DNC back him up, as the New York Sun reports, is another matter entirely (subscription may be required):

The Democratic National Committee yesterday refused to distance itself from Rep. Charles Rangel's comparison of President Bush to an infamous Southern segregationist, Theophilus "Bull" Connor, remarks the Republican National Committee identified as "hate speech" and urged the DNC to repudiate. ...

The DNC chairman, Howard Dean, appeared yesterday at a campaign stop on the Upper West Side with the Democrats' mayoral nominee, Fernando Ferrer, who has supported Mr. Rangel's remarks.

Asked at the campaign appearance by The New York Sun to respond to Mr. Rangel's statement and the RNC's requests, Dr. Dean said: "I think the chairman of the RNC ought to be embarrassed for what his party has done to America the last five years. ... It ought to be Mehlman that's apologizing to the people of New York City." Dr. Dean made no reference to Mr. Rangel's statements.

George Bush's low approval ratings should give the Democrats the perfect opening to reclaim their status as a majority party. However, they have found themselves mired in a deeper funk than the GOP despite Bush's recent woes. This shows why; the people cannot put any trust into the knee-jerk hysteria that has gripped the Democratic Party. Fringe pols like Rangel used to play a useful role in keeping the International ANSWER/MoveOn conspiratorial weenies in harness while the party establishment would scold such behavior and present a more responsible image.

Now, however, the people in charge of the party have bought into the personal attacks, the conspiracy theories, and the outright insanity that the hothouses of the radical Left produce. Only an idiot could defend the notion that George Bush equals Bull Connor in any sense, only a nut would risk his own political reputation to try it, and only Howard Dean would be dumb enough to take the entire DNC with him.

Even more egregiously, the DNC claims it speaks for African-Americans as a group in supporting Rangel's contentions. I suspect that African-Americans who remember what people like Connor actually did to them and their families understand the difference between George Bush and Bull Connor. They may not agree with the President's policies, but they don't see Bush directing firehoses and siccing dogs on them when they congregate for demonstrations. They won't recall seeing black men and women as key aides to Bull Connor's regime in 1963, either. In other words, most African-Americans will see this statement and its support by Howard Dean for what it is: a baseless personal attack that not only makes the Democrats look like kooks, but demeans and diminishes the real terror that Bull Connor and people like him caused during the struggle for civil rights.

Do you suppose the DNC has tired of Howard Dean yet, or will it take a debacle in 2006 for them to ask him to MoveOn?

UPDATE: I noticed that the NY Times had a piece mentioning race as a factor in the Ferrer-Bloomberg contest for mayor. The Gray Lady gives a long analysis of the so-called "coded language" of comparing Ferrer's policies to those of David Dinkins, the last liberal New York mayor -- but mentions nothing about Ferrer's support of Rangel's "Bull Connor" comments:

A supporter of Fernando Ferrer accused one of Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg's allies of using "coded, fear-mongering language" by linking Mr. Ferrer to former Mayor David N. Dinkins, raising a racial element in the mayoral race as the two candidates battle for the support of black voters.

Responding to a comment in The New York Times on Tuesday by a Staten Island congressman, Vito Fossella, that a Ferrer victory would mean going "right back to the antagonistic years under David Dinkins," Representatives Jerrold L. Nadler of Manhattan and Gregory W. Meeks of Queens released statements accusing him of using Mr. Dinkins, the city's only black mayor, to pit voters against one another.

"The Bloomberg campaign and Representative Fossella ought to know better than to inject this kind of coded, fear-mongering language into what ought to be a thoughtful debate about our city's future," Mr. Meeks said.

"For the Republicans to fall back on tired, divisive scare-mongering the way Representative Fossella did is to show that they will do anything, including sowing seeds of divisiveness, in order to retain control of City Hall."

So comparing the policies of Ferrer to Dinkins somehow equates to "divisiveness", while comparing the actions and personal motives of George Bush to Bull Connor equates to reality? The Democrats have lost their minds, and the New York Times keeps proving they never had theirs to lose at all.

UPDATE II: Michael Barone of US News and World Report e-mails:

There's one additional point that you might want to make in connection with the Democratic National Committee's comparison of George W. Bush with Bull Connor.

That is this: at the time of the police dogs and firehose incidents, CONNOR WAS A MEMBER OF THE DEMOCRATIC NATIONAL COMMITTEE. He was the single Democratic National Committeeman from Alabama.

Some Democrats like to pretend that all Democrats were for the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and all Republicans were against it. Just the opposite of the truth. Support for the Act was bipartisan, with Republicans like Senator Jacob Javits and Congressman William McCulloch taking the lead along with Democrats like Senator
Hubert Humphrey and Congressman Emanuel Celler. Most of the votes against were cast by Democrats. A larger percentage of Republican members than of Democratic members voted for the Civil Rights Act.

When Johnny Met Cindy

Ever in search of ways to endear himself to the national media, John McCain met with so-called "Peace Mom" Cindy Sheehan, who returned the favor by calling McCain a "warmonger":

Peace mom Cindy Sheehan didn't change her opposition to the war in Iraq after meeting Tuesday with one of its supporters, Sen. John McCain, a Vietnam veteran whom she called "a warmonger." ...

"He is a warmonger, and I'm not," Sheehan said after meeting with McCain. "I believe this war is not keeping America safer."...

Sheehan and McCain had met once before, shortly after the funeral of her son. Sheehan said Tuesday that McCain told her then that her son's death was "like his buddies in Vietnam" and that he feared their deaths were "for nothing." McCain, however, denied he made such a statement.

McCain later told reporters that he had been misled into believing that her delegation included some of his Arizona constituents. Otherwise, McCain claims he wouldn't have met with her at all.

Does anyone believe that? McCain's entire career shows him as a rank opportunist, and with his recent moves to establish himself for a run at the 2008 Presidential nomination, he figured he could score a twofer: he could embarrass George Bush and make himself a media darling by getting some friendly face time with Sheehan. Instead, she winds up, predictably, talking about him in shrill tones while he mumbles some excuse about thinking that he would meet an Arizona representative among her staff. In the end, he proved Bush's wisdom in declining a second meeting with the poster woman for the radical Left.

If CQ readers want to see how badly this worked out for John McCain, by the way, read through the print editions of the Washington Post and New York Times. Neither one of them carried a word about this meeting, despite the meeting taking place well before deadline. This AP report appears on the web editions of both newspapers as a wire-service story, which means that McCain's office waited a long time before talking about this meeting to reporters. How ... convenient.

Arkin Denies What Pentagon Already Admits

A number of people e-mailed me today about the blog entry at the Washington Post by William Arkin regarding Able Danger and the nature of the material it developed. Arkin claims that Able Danger never found any connection to Mohammed Atta, never amounted to an intelligence operation, and got shut down for spying on American citizens. Arkin, a defense analyst, writes:

The Pentagon is hiding something. But it’s not what Weldon thinks.

First, to debunk the myths:

# As best as I can determine, having spent tens of hours talking to military sources involved with the issue, intelligence analysts did not identify anyone prior to 9/11, Mohammed Atta included, as a suspect in any upcoming terrorist attack.

# It is not even clear that a "Mohammed Atta" was identified, let alone that it is the same Atta who died on 9/11.

# No military lawyers prevented intelligence sleuths from passing useful information to the FBI.

# Able Danger itself was not an intelligence program.

As a representative of U.S. Special Operations Command said at a special Pentagon briefing arranged on September 1, Able Danger "was merely the name attributed to a 15-month planning effort" to begin building a war on terrorism.

Arkin makes careful use of language here. No one associated with Able Danger says they deduced that Atta and the other three al-Qaeda operatives had an attack planned. Nor have they specified that "military lawyers" blocked them from sharing the information from the FBI. In fact, the entire thrust of their assertions has been that the military command in conjunction with the civilian legal staff at the DoD blocked the meetings.

Besides, Arkin appears to write this about four weeks too late. On September 1, the same Washington Post at which Arkin writes this reported that the Pentagon itself found three additional witnesses to the identification of not only Mohammed Atta as a potential AQ operative but the other lead 9/11 hijackers as well. It came as a stunning reversal after a week of denials from the Department of Defense:

Pentagon officials said Thursday they have found three more people who recall an intelligence chart that identified Sept. 11 mastermind Mohamed Atta as a terrorist one year before the attacks on New York and Washington. But they have been unable to find the chart or other evidence that it existed.

Last month, two military officers, Army Lt. Col. Anthony Shaffer and Navy Capt. Scott Philpott, went public with claims that a secret unit code-named Able Danger used data mining _ searching large amounts of data for patterns _ to identify Atta in 2000. Shaffer has said three other Sept. 11 hijackers also were identified. ...

They said they interviewed at least 80 people over a three-week period and found three, besides Philpott and Shaffer, who said they remember seeing a chart that either mentioned Atta by name as an al-Qaida operative or showed his photograph. Four of the five recalled a chart with a pre-9/11 photo of Atta; the other person recalled only a reference to his name.

The intelligence officials said they consider the five people to be credible but their recollections are still unverified.

Moreover, Senator Specter and the staff at the Judiciary Committee has interviewed these witnesses in closed session and finds their recollections "credible". If these credible witnesses testify that the program found nothing of the sort, why would the Pentagon stop them from testifying at all? And if they told that to Specter and he found them credible, why would Specter insist on holding the hearings anyway?

Arkin could be correct in that the program got shut down for collecting data on US citizens. We know that Condoleezza Rice and Defense Secretary William Perry got ID'd for connections to Red China, for instance. Speculation has it that the China probe killed the program as it got too close to politically well-connected people close to the Clinton administration -- but so far, speculation is all we have on that.

It's important to remember that Arkin has a reputation for playing fast and loose with the facts and the quotes, as this incident from 2003 (when I first began blogging) amply demonstrates. In his haste to smear General Jerry Boykin for his outspoken Christianity while having a policymaking role at the Pentagon for the war on terror, he glibly used quote marks to suggest that Boykin endorsed a Christian "jihad" -- when in fact Boykin had never said any such thing. Arkin, if I recall correctly, refused to release the transcripts of the recordings he supposedly used for his Boykin quotes and wound up forcing the Los Angeles Times to issue a retraction for running his opinion piece.

I'm interested in reading the thoughts of credible military observers and analysts on Able Danger. William Arkin doesn't really qualify.

UPDATE: Hugh Hewitt wrote about Arkin at the time for the Weekly Standard:

The answer is best found in Arkin's own speech to an audience at the U.S. Naval War College on September 25, 2002. In this lengthy and vitriolic attack on the Bush administration, Arkin admitted to feeling "cynical about the fact that we are going to war to enhance the economic interests of the Enron class," and declared that "the war against terrorism is overstated." Arkin believed, in fact, that the war "is not the core United States national security interest today." He rhetorically asked the audience: "Aren't I just another leftist, self-hating American?" and condemned the administration for taking "enormous liberties with American freedoms."

"The war against terrorism," he said, "if it is a war at all, is not World War II or the Cold War, and it is grasping at empty patriotism to claim that it is." He warned of "our tendency to fall back upon secrecy and government control." And he concluded by warning that our foreign policy "convey[s] the wrong message, which is that we have no values, that we are for sale"[.]

The entire essay is well worth a read to get a better understanding of the agenda that William Arkin brings to the table.

UPDATE II: Where are my manners? Mark at Decision '08 brought this to my attention first, and AJ Strata has his doubts about Arkin as well. Juliette at Baldilocks has some interesting thoughts as well (hell, as always).

UPDATE III: Mac, an Able Danger skeptic, has some knowledge of Arkin and tends to think Arkin may be closer to the truth than Shaffer and Philpott.

The New, Improved Ruffini Straw Poll!

Patrick Ruffini has a new straw poll for blog readers to cast their votes for their Presidential preferences in the 2008 race. We had a lot of fun tracking the results from Patrick's last poll, which could display results by referring blog. CQ readers surprised me by selecting Rudy Giuliani in August, 40%-25% over George Allen, at the time my undisclosed choice in the poll. Patrick now has a way to use Technorati tags to give even further breakdowns in the results.

None of this is scientific, of course, but it's a lot of fun. Give it a whirl, using the above link, and we'll see where CQ readers fall this time.

Roberts -- In With A Whimper

The massive effort to derail the John Roberts nomination will end, in the words of TS Eliot, not with a bang but a whimper on Thursday. The New York Times reports that debate opened in the full Senate yesterday and that the Democrats did not attempt to fight cloture, allowing Bill Frist and the GOP to schedule the vote for 11:30 AM on the 29th, as predicted last week:

There were no surprises as the floor deliberations on Judge Roberts began, and Republicans and Democrats alike agreed that a vote should come no later than Thursday. Lawmakers restated their reasoning on the nomination and emphasized the import and unique opportunity of voting on the lifetime appointment of a chief justice. ...

With Republicans solidly backing Judge Roberts and Democrats divided, he has easily surpassed the threshold for confirmation. And Senator Harry Reid of Nevada, the Democratic leader, on Monday eliminated the prospect that Democrats might seek to stall the vote through any procedural effort, saying they would be ready to vote by Thursday.

The Democrats may have finally discovered that the longer they fought against Roberts, the more ridiculous and partisan they appeared. Reid made a comment that the Judiciary Committee had done the "heavy lifting" on the confirmation, meaning that he didn't see any need to prolong the debate or delay Roberts' ascension to the Supreme Court. Roberts will probably only get about a third of the Democratic votes in the Senate -- at best, he will only have 75 for his confirmation -- but that more than guarantees that grandstanding stunts will flop rather spectacularly if attempted.

The Democrats will instead lick their wounds and attempt to show that they can be reasonable in an effort to influence the White House to select a moderate to replace Sandra Day O'Connor. Bush hinted strongly yesterday that he wanted a woman to take her seat on the bench, and he has several candidates from which to choose -- but probably none of which will thrill Reid or his caucus one bit. Two of the most-mentioned names got their current bench assignments this summer thanks to a shabby compromise that temporarily transferred de facto power over nominations to a superminority of fourteen Senators, Priscilla Owen and Janice Rogers Brown, and a third (Edith Hollan Jones) promising just as much opposition over her long track record of conservative opinions.

The White House should not be fooled into thinking that the Democrats have any political capital left. They put on a circus for the nation to see in Roberts' hearings before the Judiciary Committee and got outed for the inept, inarticulate boobery that most of them keep behind the scenes, and for good reason. While Pat Leahy may have recovered some respect for his tough but informed questioning, the rest of the Democrats got so badly outplayed by Roberts in both class and legal erudition that the nation could be excused from wondering how this collection of political hacks wound up on a Judiciary Commitee in the first place. None of them, save perhaps Leahy, showed any kind of depth as legal scholars, and at least two of them (Biden and Schumer) spent most of their time whining that they didn't have enough time because Roberts kept answering their questions. One, Ted Kennedy, sounded so incoherent and disconnected from the proceedings -- and appeared so ill -- that viewers hoped the committee had an EMT team standing by in case Ted needed to return to the sanitarium.

This doesn't add up to leverage or political capital; it adds up to a Siegfried Line circa 1945. All it takes is the will to punch through it, and it will completely collapse. Janice Rogers Brown will provide the legal scholarship, the poise, and the verbal deftness to swiftly dispatch the pretenders on the Judiciary Committee, and again the nation will see the injustice of the Democratic demagogues that kept her prior nomination bottled up for four years, just as they did with Roberts for almost two.

Spanish Verdicts Contradict 9/11 Commission But Disappoint Prosecutors

I wrote yesterday before the Spanish trial judges announced their decision on their only 9/11 trial that the verdict had the possibility of demonstrating the invalidity of the conclusions reached by the 9/11 Commission. The Spanish court did just that, convicting two of the three major figures before the court with belonging to the 9/11 conspiracy -- but then confused the issue by letting them off the hook for the actual deaths that conspiracy caused. The Washington Post tried to make sense of the verdicts reached:

A Spanish court on Monday convicted and sentenced a Syrian-born man to 27 years in prison for conspiring with al Qaeda and the hijackers who carried out the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks in the United States.

Imad Eddin Barakat Yarkas, alias Abu Dahdah, was one of 18 found guilty among 24 defendants on charges of cooperating with al Qaeda. ...

Prosecutors presented evidence that Yarkas and Driss Chebli, a Moroccan, coordinated a key meeting in Spain with the lead Sept. 11 hijacker two months before the attacks.

Chebli received a six-year prison sentence on a charge of collaborating with a terrorist organization. Ghasoub Abrash Ghayoun, a Syrian who videotaped the World Trade Center and other key landmarks in the United States, was acquitted. He insisted he shot the footage as a tourist.

Tayssir Alouni, a journalist with the Arabic-language television network al-Jazeera, was sentenced to seven years in prison. Prosecutors used an interview that Alouni conducted in 2001 with Osama bin Laden as evidence that he had a link to al Qaeda.

If the overwhelming number of convictions belied the 9/11 Commission's findings that Mohammed Atta and Ramzi Binalshibh received no material assistance from anyone else in Spain during the odd interlude in Madrid two months before the attacks, the sentencing appeared strangely disconnected from the crimes they conspired to commit. Yarkas got twenty-seven years for conspiracy to commit terrorism, even though his conspiracy ultimately met success with the deaths of 3,000 people, the worst such attacks in history. The Spanish court ruled that although prosecutors had proven his role in the 9/11 planning, he had not taken material part in the attacks themselves. Thanks to this ruling, Yarkas will likely survive to walk out of prison a free man within the next decade.

Even more odd, the court only gave Chebli a six-year sentence for performing more or less the same role as Yarkas. The six-year sentence guarantees that Chebli will emerge from prison within a couple of years, free to coordinate more attacks on Western targets. Both men will make a number of new contacts in prison to allow al-Qaeda to hatch new plots and find new "holy warriors". Why the twenty-one year disparity between the sentences? Why didn't the Spanish court recognize that those who conspire to commit murderous acts that prove successful become accessories before the fact to each murder committed -- and sentence them properly for it?

As Dafydd at Big Lizards notes, this puts the sanctimonious closing argument from the Spanish prosecutor in the light it deserves:

In clear reference to the United States, the lead prosecutor, Pedro Rubira, called in his closing arguments this summer for "an exemplary sentence which shows that neither wars nor detention camps are necessary in the fight against Islamic terrorism."

Rubira didn't get an exemplary sentence; he got instead a ridiculously light sentence for his efforts, proving that the idea of using civilian courts to answer acts of war provides only an illusion of security. He wound up proving the wisdom of the Bush administration's policy, not deflating it. The Spanish took four years to settle the question of 24 detainees from the 9/11 attacks, and will likely take two more to do the same with the terrorists captured from the 2003 Madrid bombings. In the meantime, the Spaniards wait for the next terrorist attack so that they can arrest a few more people and take another four years to figure out what to do with them -- and the ultimate result will be that since the detainees didn't commit suicide, they cannot be held responsible for the murders.

Brilliant. They have the al-Qaeda martyrs right where they want them now! Dafydd wonders whether the Democrats will still want to argue for the law-enforcement approach in next year's elections:

Yep, the Spaniards certainly showed us how to do things. I wonder if the Democrats in Washington D.C. will point with admiration in November 2006 to this less-than-spectacular result of the antiterrorism policies they advocate...?

They'll abandon that strategy about the same time they quit demanding 9/11 Commission-type panels to investigate the response to Hurricane Katrina. Some people cannot admit failure even when it stands out so obviously, as it does in both cases.

Zarqawi Losing More Aides

Iraqi terror mastermind Abu Musab al-Zarqawi lost another key aide this weekend with the death of Abu Azzam, the US confirmed last night. Abu Azzam died in an American raid on a Haditha safehouse:

A man believed to be al Qaeda's No. 2 operative in Iraq has been killed, a U.S. Defense Department official confirmed to CNN.

Abu Azzam was a "significant" figure in the al Qaeda network in Iraq, the official said. ...

Just last week, U.S. and Iraqi officials announced that two men described as top al Qaeda leaders in the northern city of Mosul were captured during a September 5 raid.

One of those captured in that raid was said to be responsible for supervising and directing the day-to-day operations of the group, and was responsible for numerous attacks against Iraqi security and coalition forces. Officials hailed the capture as a blow to al Qaeda's operation in northern Iraq.

A senior leader of the terrorist group was killed in a September 17 raid on a terrorist safehouse in the western city of Haditha, officials added.

The intelligence keeps getting better and better, and the noose grows ever tighter. Zarqawi may replace these positions as fast as we capture or kill the incumbents, but each time that happens he has to use people with less skill and experience as replacements. That means more mistakes, less communication with external units, both of which forces the terrorists to simplify strategy and tactics to remain successful on their missions.

Even capturing or killing Zarqawi will not end the insurgency. Another fanatic will rise to take his place. However, the continual losses by the nutcases and their increasing desperation will turn off the flow of recruits into the network. We have already seen that with the "drafting" of either unwitting or unwilling people to carry the suicide bombs in Iraq, and now we can add a new atrocity: killing schoolteachers. Terrorists murdered six teachers in Muwalha, south of Baghdad, by herding them into a room and shooting all of them.

They want to keep the children of Iraq ignorant and ill led, all the more to recruit them later on. Ignorance is their stock in trade, after all, just as with any other bigots and racists. This demonstrates the "plan" that the foreign terrorists have for the future of Iraq: a blighted, ignorant mass under the thumb of an autocratic caliphate that will cough up its children for suicide missions because they have no hope of any better life. The Iraqis have better plans for their children, and they know that the Americans do as well.

Courage!, Say The Cowards

Just when we thought the anchorman model for news broadcasts had died out, leave it to al-Qaeda to bring it back on the Internet. The Washington Post reports this morning that al-Qaeda has begun its own news program, bypassing such outlets as al-Jazeera and al-Arabiya, which edited its copy in the past, and going out directly to the world on an Internet stream:

An Internet video newscast called the Voice of the Caliphate was broadcast for the first time on Monday, purporting to be a production of al Qaeda and featuring an anchorman who wore a black ski mask and an ammunition belt.

The anchorman, who said the report would appear once a week, presented news about the Gaza Strip and Iraq and expressed happiness about recent hurricanes in the United States. A copy of the Koran, the Muslim holy book, was placed by his right hand and a rifle affixed to a tripod was pointed at the camera.

The origins of the broadcast could not be immediately verified. If the program was indeed an al Qaeda production, it would mark a change in how the group uses the Internet to spread its messages and propaganda. Direct dissemination would avoid editing or censorship by television networks, many of which usually air only excerpts of the group's statements and avoid showing gruesome images of killings.

Its first broadcast focused on news from Iraq, repeating the pledge made by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi to make war on Iraqi Shi'ites, the "great victory" of the Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, and a claim that Zarqawi's network had fired chemical-weapon missiles at an American compound in Baghdad. It even featured a commercial for an English-language movie called "Total Jihad", which unfortunately does not star Sylvester Stallone but appears to be a recruitment video for English-speaking Muslims. The maiden broadcast finishes with delight over the destruction wrought by Hurricance Katrina on New Orleans, to which the Islamofascists refer as the "city of homosexuals".

It does not say whether the anchorman with the bandolero and the ski mask had a quirky yet memorable signoff for his viewers.

All this really does is provide a clear channel for AQ to broadcast its propaganda, rather than just deliver the videos to al-Jazeera and wait for them to rebroadcast it. AQ must have tired of having their copy whittled down by the editing process and decided to go direct, especially since their production values have never been particularly high in the past anyway. The choice limits the audience for their videos to those who know where and when to look for them, whereas AJ and other Arab networks would typically play the edited clips over and over again.

One drawback for the West is that this will allow AQ's entire message to get out on the Internet. If these videos contain coded instructions, law enforcement agencies won't have the ability to cut them out prior to broadcast -- a probable reason for the change in tactics. The Internet always gave AQ a clear distribution channel for that kind of broadcast, though. Coded messages have appeared on Usenet boards for years, and websites and blogs have also performed that function for at least as long.

If AQ gets a bit too wrapped up in its celebrity, on the other hand, it may make a mistake and give away information that will tip the authorities to their plans and their whereabouts. In that case, we look forward to the eventual and abrupt cancellation of the Al-Qaeda Evening News and its sister show, 60 Martyrs.

Scandals Shall Come, Moral Relativism Shall Follow?

One of the more blog-conscious members of the mainstream media comes from the Philadelphia Inquirer. Frank Wilson, the book editor of the Inquirer, has not only encouraged bloggers in general (and myself in particular), he now has his own blog -- Books, Inq. Frank loves books, but he also has a deep and abiding Catholic faith and writes provocatively and passionately about it.

Today, Frank reviews the issue that has faced the Catholic Church over the past decade and more, sexual abuse, in light of a new grand jury report on the crimes and abuses from the Philadelphia diocese. He writes that the report makes the Starr Report on Bill Clinton and Monica Lewinsky "seem wholesome by comparison". But what disturbs Frank more than the crimes committed by the priests is the excusing of sin by the Church as mental disorders, waiving any spiritual responsibility for these crimes from both the priests who committed them and the Church hierarchy that ignored them:

In Saturday's Inquirer, Cardinal Rigali was quoted as saying that "in every single case reported to Archdiocesan officials, action was taken based on the best medical attention available." What about sin, your Eminence? I realize that, for many, it's an archaic term, but I believe it is still used in Catholic moral theology. Even if one admits that the moral failings of the priests in question were to some extent mitigated by a measure of psychiatric disorder -- and I think it's a stretch myself -- those moral shortcomings remain both obvious and grievous. ...

Why, confronted with acts the Church designates as sinful -- rape, corruption of innocents, abuse of authority, to say nothing of blasphemy -- did they evince no moral response? I go to confession and tell the priest I'm having an affair and I'll be told to repent and clean up my act, not see a shrink. Bishops and priests seem ready enough to bloviate about sin to the laity, but when it comes to their wayward colleagues -- oh, they need treatment. What the priests cited in the grand jury report needed was arrest, prosecution and conviction. Moreover, even if Archdiocesan officials had a hard time discerning the moral dimension of the problem, what about their plain duty as citizens? When you know that a felony has been committed, padres, you're supposed to report it.

I know for a fact that this betrayal runs deeper for many members of the faithful than the acts themselves. Most people understand that criminals retain primary responsibility for their crimes, and the sinner for his sins. Those who enable such acts must take responsibility for their acts of commission and omission as well. Where we have an issue is when the Church that teaches us this makes excuses for their own, and hides behind the psychobabble and moral relativism against which they inveigh in every other possible situation. That betrayal of their own doctrines appears hypocritical and oddly convenient, and strips the hierarchy of its moral standing to identify sin and demand repentance, both of its members and of society in general.

Read all of Frank's post, and be sure to blogroll Frank and keep him on your spiritual reading list.

Broussard's Holy Grail Moment

Jefferson Parish President Aaron Broussard has apparently decided that the best defense is to be really offensive. Tim Russert and Meet the Press invited Broussard back on the NBC show yesterday to get an update on the status of its recovery from Hurricane Katrina. Russert also wanted to get Broussard's explanation for his earlier contention that the federal government allowed an associate's mother to drown rather than rescue her from a nursing home when it turned out that she had drowned a week earlier -- and that Broussard had lied about what his associate told him.

Russert played his words back to him:

Mr. Broussard: Sir, they were told, like me, every single day, "The cavalry is coming." On the federal level, "The cavalry is coming. The cavalry's coming. The cavalry's coming." The guy who runs this building I'm in, emergency management, he's responsible for everything. His mother was trapped in St. Bernard Nursing Home and every day she called him and said, "Are you coming, son? Is somebody coming?" And he said, "Yeah, Mama. Somebody's coming to get you. Somebody's coming to get you on Tuesday." "Somebody's coming to get you on Wednesday." "Somebody's coming to get you on Thursday." "Somebody's coming to get you on Friday." And she drowned Friday night. She drowned Friday night.

After complaining several times that Russert took him back to a "sad place" by replaying that clip and expressing surprise about seeing it, Russert got to the point:

Mr. Russert: ...that our viewers see that again because MSNBC and other blog organizations have looked into the facts behind your comments and these are the conclusions, and I'll read it for you and our viewers. It says: "An emotional moment and a misunderstanding. Since the broadcast of [Meet the Press] interview...a number of bloggers have questioned the validity of Broussard's story. Subsequent reporting identified the man whom Broussard was referring to...as Thomas Rodrigue, the Jefferson Parish emergency services director. ...Rodrigue acknowledged that his 92-year-old mother and more than 30 other people died in the St. Rita nursing home. They had not been evacuated and the flood waters overtook the residence. ... When told of the sequence of phone calls that Broussard described, Rodrigue said `No, no, that's not true. ...I contacted the nursing home two days before the storm [on Saturday, Aug. 27th] and again on [Sunday] the 28th. ...At the same time I talked to the nursing home I had also talked to the emergency manager...to encourage that nursing home to evacuate...' Rodrigue says he never made any calls after Monday, the day he figures his mother died... Officials believe the residents of St. Rita's died on Monday, the 29th, not on Friday, Sept. 2, as Broussard has suggested."

In other words, Rodrigue said that Broussard lied about what Rodrigue had told him. Rather than just admit he got the sequence wrong, and that Rodrigue had never called the federal government to rescue his mother, Broussard instead attacked the federal government again:

Mr. Broussard: ... Listen, sir, somebody wants to nitpick a man's tragic loss of a mother because she was abandoned in a nursing home? Are you kidding? What kind of sick mind, what kind of black-hearted people want to nitpick a man's mother's death? They just buried Eva last week. I was there at the wake. Are you kidding me? That wasn't a box of Cheerios they buried last week. That was a man's mother whose story, if it is entirely broadcast, will be the epitome of abandonment. It will be the saddest tale you ever heard, a man who was responsible for safekeeping of a half a million people, mother's died in the next parish because she was abandoned there and he can't get to her and he tried to get to her through EOC. He tried to get through the sheriff's office. He tries every way he can to get there. Somebody wants to debate those things? My God, what sick-minded person wants to do that? ...

Mr. Russert: Mr. Broussard, the people who are questioning your comments are saying that you accused the federal government and the bureaucracy of murder, specifically calling on the secretary of Homeland Security and using this as an example to denounce the federal government. And what they're saying is, in fact, it was the local government that did not evacuate Eva Rodrigue on Friday or on Saturday. ... And, in fact, the owners of the nursing home, Salvador and Mable Mangano, have been indicted with 34 counts of negligent homicide by the Louisiana state attorney general. So it was the owners of the nursing home and the local government that are responsible for the lack of evacuation and not the federal government. Is that fair?

Mr. Broussard: Sir, with everything I said on Meet the Press, the last punctuation of my statements were the story that I was going to tell in about maybe two sentences. It just got emotional for me, sir. Talk about the context of everything I said. Were we abandoned by the federal government? Absolutely we were. Were there more people that abandoned us? Make the list. The list can go on for miles. That's for history to document. That's what Congress does best, burn witches. Let Congress do their hearings. Let them find the witches. Let them burn them. The media burns witches better than anybody. Let the media go find the witches and burn them. But as I stood on the ground, sir, for day after day after day after day, nobody came here, sir. Nobody came. The federal government didn't come. The Red Cross didn't come. I'll give you a list of people that didn't come here, sir, and I was here.

Burn the witches. It's an unfortunate reminder of what people do when they don't want to take responsibility for their own failings. Broussard's comments about "black-hearted" people second-guessing his accusations sound pretty damnable when one considers that had we taken him at his word, the nursing home owners who neglected to arrange for the evacuation of their patients would now be off scot-free. Public officials such as Broussard exist to get the facts out, not run around spewing urban legends and getting hysterical on national TV.

One could excuse it in the first instance, especially if his staff got the story wrong as he implies in a portion of his response, but this appearance is now three weeks past the emergency. He has had time to get his facts straight and to act responsibly. Broussard just proved once again that Louisiana has to take some responsibility for the disaster just in the competence of the people they elected to office in their local and state government.

For a great explanation of how burning witches allows idiots to make themselves feel good while doing nothing to solve real problems, one could do worse than the classic skit from Monty Python and the Holy Grail.

UPDATE: Aaron, not Allen. (h/t: several CQ readers)

Poland's Conservatives Sweep Into Power

For the first time since joining the EU, the Polish Left has collapsed, with Polish conservatives winning a sweeping victory in parliamentary elections yesterday. The former leading political party, the Democratic Left Alliance that descended from the former Communists that ran Poland during the Soviet era, dropped from 41% in the previous election to 11% yesterday, not even qualifying as the official opposition:

Voters in Poland's parliamentary elections shunned the nation's scandal-prone government of ex-communists to embrace two center-right parties that have promised tax cuts and clean government, partial results showed Monday.

The conservative Law and Justice Party had nearly 27 percent of vote in Sunday's parliamentary election with 60 percent of ballots counted. The free-market Civic Platform had 24.

The two parties, made up of former activists in the Solidarity movement, say they will form a coalition enabling them to claim more than 270 seats in parliament's 460-member lower house.

This comes as good news for the US, and bad news for the autocracy of Belarus. The new Polish government wants to implement free-market reforms that will address its crisis in unemployment, which sits at almost 18%, and will lower taxes in order to jump-start its economy. It will also purge old Soviet-era Communists from its government with the idea that people working from market-based principles will allow the government to work that much quicker to solve these problems.

The new regime also will likely strongly support the US on foreign policy. They have declared themselves open to negotiating an extension on the Polish commitment for their troops in Iraq, while the previous government had quietly informed us that they intended to leave in December when their initial agreement ended. They will also keep the pressure on in Belarus, pushing for democratization in what has been called Europe's last dictatorship.

One has to wonder what the EU will make of the new Polish government. They will have to deal with Warsaw's new commitment to tax cuts and free-market economics at a time when its central states (France and Germany) both turn away from such painful but necessary adjustments. While they may welcome Polish prosperity, the EU nations may have a lot of explaining to do if the Poles successfully transform their economy with their free-market approach. Brussels might have to take a hard look at whether the nanny-state can sustain itself for much longer, or whether Western Europe faces an economic calamity from the Ponzi schemes that comprise their social systems.

Spanish 9/11 Trial Nears Its End

Spanish authorities expect a verdict soon in their prosecution of three alleged 9/11 conspirators, in a case that has received scant attention in the American media -- and even less from the 9/11 Commission report. Twenty-four defendants will find out whether a panel of Spanish judges will rule that they gave material support to Mohammed Atta and Ramzi Binalshibh in the run-up to the 9/11 attacks:

Three men accused of helping to plot the Sept. 11 attacks waited to learn their fate Monday as Europe's biggest trial of alleged al-Qaida members neared its finale. ...

Binalshibh is alleged to have met in the Tarragona region of northeast Spain in July 2001 with Mohamed Atta, believed to be one of the suicide pilots, for a last-minute planning session.

The lead suspect in the Spanish trial, alleged al-Qaida cell leader Imad Yarkas, 42, a Syrian-born Spaniard, is accused of having set up that meeting along with another suspect, Moroccan Driss Chebli, 33. Both denied knowing Binalshibh or Atta or having anything to do with the terror attacks. ...

The third suspect facing specific Sept. 11 charges is Ghasoub al-Abrash Ghalyoun, another Syrian-born Spaniard, who was indicted over detailed video footage he shot of the World Trade Center and other landmarks during a trip to several American cities in 1997.

This may come as news to many Americans, who have not seen or heard much about the Spanish proceedings. The Washington Post covered the start of the trial in April in some detail, when they presented details of the case that never made it into the 9/11 Commission's final report. The Commission insisted that Atta and Binalshibh never met with anyone else while Atta traveled to Spain, and only relegate Yarkas and Ghalyoun to footnotes, mostly on page 530 of their final report. In those footnotes, the Commission wrote:

Although U.S. authorities have not uncovered evidence that anyone met with Atta or Binalshibh in Spain in July 2001, Spanish investigators contend that members of the Spanish al Qaeda cell were involved in the July meeting and were connected to the 9/11 attacks. ... Although we cannot rule out the possibility that other facts will come to light as the Spanish case progresses to trial,we have not found evidence that individuals in Spain participated in the July meeting or in the 9/11 plot.

And one other for Yarkas on page 499:

Notwithstanding persistent press reports to the contrary, there is no convincing evidence that the Spanish al Qaeda cell, led by Imad Barkat Yarkas and al Qaeda European financier Mohammed Galeb Kalaje Zouaydi, provided any funding to support the 9/11 attacks or the Hamburg participants.

However, the Post reported that the Spaniards thought the evidence against Yarkas looked pretty good, including a conversation caught on a wiretap that informed Yarkas that the caller had "entered the field of aviation", "classes were going well," and that "the throat of the bird has been slit." This conversation took place two weeks before 9/11, but the Commission only mentions it in the footnote to dismiss it as irrelevant.

Spanish authorities also contend that Yarkas passed a phony passport to Binalshibh while in Spain, a contention that once again raises the spectre of Atta's true travel schedule. The position of the Commission and the timeline of the report depends on the conclusion that Atta never traveled under an assumed identity; it is how the Commission ruled out the trip to Prague in April 2001 that Czech intelligence still insists took place, with a meeting between Atta and a member of Iraqi intelligence.

The Spanish also have on trial a man named Dress Chebli, who allegedly assisted Yarkas in setting up the meeting. Chebli never gets any mention by the 9/11 Commission despite being part of the same indictment.

The report from the Spanish judges should be released today. We will soon see how much it differs from that of the 9/11 Commission, and also see how the media reports it.

Hamas: Oops. Our Bad.

The BBC reports that Hamas has cried "Uncle!" in its first-ever outright war against Israel after two days of one-sided fighting. Hamas now says it will refrain from launching rockets out of Gaza after watching the IDF pound Gaza in an unprecedented show of force, with the Israelis no longer handcuffed by the standards of occupation:

The Palestinian militant organisation Hamas has announced an end to rocket attacks on Israel from the Gaza Strip.

At least 30 rockets have been fired at Israel in recent days, following Israel's withdrawal from Gaza earlier this month.

In response to the rockets, Israel resumed its policy of targeting militant leaders in air strikes.

On Sunday, an Israeli missile strike killed two Islamic Jihad militants, including a top commander.

At a cabinet meeting, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon ordered "unrestricted" strikes against Palestinian militants. ... Overnight on Saturday, Israeli forces launched air strikes against alleged weapon storage sites, and a school linked to the militant group Hamas. At least 19 people were reported injured in the strikes.

The Israeli army said it arrested more than 200 militants in West Bank, including activists from Hamas and Islamic Jihad. It also test-fired artillery rounds into northern Gaza.

If one tried to construct the most foolish strategy possible on the part of Hamas and the Palestinians, it would have been to use Gaza as an attack site immediately after the withdrawal of the occupation. Hamas just found out that not only does that constitute an act of war, it also makes Hamas at best partisans, not covered under the Geneva Convention. The Israelis have no responsibility to treat them as POWs once captured, but as spies -- unless Mahmoud Abbas wants to claim them as the Palestinian Army, which would then make the West Bank a legitimate theater of war as well as Gaza.

On the plus side for Hamas, the operation has given them an opportunity to look for new leadership, since Israel captured theirs during the operations in the last two days. Perhaps that will improve their strategic thinking, but somehow I rather doubt it.

GunScam - The Next Canadian Scandal

The Winnipeg Sun reports that the Conservatives in Canada await more than just one report next winter that could alter the trajectory of Canadian politics. While Judge Gomery writes his report on the Sponsorship Programme, the auditor general has quietly performed her investigation into the controversial gun registry that the Liberal Party imposed on its citizens, and the results could produce some uncomfortable moments of its own for the Grits and the Martin government:

Critics of the gun registry are eagerly awaiting Auditor General Sheila Fraser's "Canadian Firearms Program" audit which is scheduled to be released in February -- if we're not in the midst of a federal election campaign.

Fraser isn't doing interviews about the audit, which has been underway for months.

The last time her office attempted to look into gun registry spending was 2002 and the results were explosive. In fact, her team was forced to abandon its attempts to follow the spending on the gun registry because of the absence of records.

"The information on cost recovery provided to the government changed as the program developed," Fraser wrote at the time.

Originally expected to be self-financing by 1999-2000, Fraser and her auditors discovered the target for the firearms program to break even was pushed to 2013 -- an assumption that the program collect $419 million in fees in 2002-03 and about $828 million by 2007-08.

Canadians can expect the Conservatives to attack the gun registry on two bases: its cost overruns and its ineffectiveness. Like most gun-control programs, it has done little to remove weapons from the hands of criminals, making the overall effect of the registry more onerous on law-abiding gun owners. It also cost much more than the Liberals acknowledged at the initiation of the program; the registry has drained finances from other law-enforcement efforts.

Some Conservatives will say that this was the entire point of the Gun Registry all along. The RCMP, which administers the Gun Registry, has the only law-enforcement portfolio to independently investigate the Canadian executive. In the Canadian political system, the executive comes from Parliament and does not have checks or balances as the American executive does in Congress and the judiciary. The only such check comes in a no-confidence motion, which a majority party can easily squelch, or in the national law-enforcement agency of the RCMP. However, burdened by an underfunded mandate in the Gun Registry and the loss of high-ranking professionals over the last few years, the RCMP no longer has the resources nor the clout to exercise that check on executive power.

What happened as a result? Some would point to Adscam, which put a lot of money into the pockets of Liberal Party backers as well as the Party itself.

Conservatives hope that Adscam and the Gun Registry audit will provide a one-two punch that will inspire a no-confidence motion in the Commons to launch new elections. If so, they had better hope that the electorate has a longer attention span that they did with the initial Gomery revelations, which only provided a window of a few weeks this past spring where the Tories could have grabbed control of the government.

Frist's Smoke And Fire

Stephen Bainbridge and Power Line have done excellent work in examining the charges of insider trading that have prompted an investigation of Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist. That should surprise no one, of course; Stephen and Paul Mirengoff have outstanding legal minds and a wealth of knowledge on the regulations surrounding stock trading.

However, both Stephen and Paul miss two aspects of this story. The first involves a separate legal question in my original post, but not referenced in either of their responses. The AP reported separately from the Washington Post that Bill Frist knew that he owned the HCA stock despite the trust supposedly being blind. His trustees informed him by letter that they had purchased a significant amount of the stock two weeks before he told people that he had no idea what kind of assets he had in that portfolio:

Frist, asked in a television interview in January 2003 whether he should sell his HCA stock, responded: "Well, I think really for our viewers it should be understood that I put this into a blind trust. So as far as I know, I own no HCA stock"

Frist, referring to his trust and those of his family, also said in the interview, "I have no control. It is illegal right now for me to know what the composition of those trusts are. So I have no idea."

Documents filed with the Senate showed that just two weeks before those comments, the trustee of the senator's trust, M. Kirk Scobey Jr., wrote to Frist that HCA stock was contributed to the trust. It was valued at $15,000 and $50,000.

The documents filed by the trustees of Frist's blind trusts were obtained by The Associated Press on Friday.

Frist's defenders claim that the Senator never saw the letter, but that seems rather lame as an excuse. A blind trust should not have its trustees communicating about the components of the portfolio under any circumstances; the need for the blind trust is to ensure that the owner does not take actions that benefit his own finances. If Frist had truly set up the trust as blind, why did the trustees send updates about purchases and sales? What would be the point of the blind trust with that kind of communication going on, whether or not Frist ever personally read the letters? The only assumption one can reasonable reach is that Frist's trustees had orders to keep him informed of the transactions.

That brings us to the other aspect that Paul and Stephen miss: the political aspects. In January, he told his constituents that he had no clue whether he owned HCA stock. If the AP documents prove authentic, he had set up his trust to keep him informed of the components of his portfolio. That means he lied about the blind trust. That may not rise to a violation of the law, but it certainly amounts to a violation of the trust that Frist needs between himself and the voters. Under those circumstances, Frist doesn't belong as a party leader in the Senate, and perhaps his constituents might want to rethink his representation of him there in any capacity.

As I posted earlier, we need to ensure that those documents are authentic. If they are -- which is what I said earlier -- then Frist needs to step down as Senate Majority Leader, regardless of whether he engaged in insider trading. Lying about the blind trust will give us enough headaches, and given Frist's generally lackluster performance in his leadership role anyway, he isn't worth the political capital that the GOP will have to spend defending him.

Hadley Denies Weldon's Claims In An Able Danger Sideshow

Rep. Curt Weldon's credibility may have taken a minor hit in yesterday's Washington Post with a rather passive denial from National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley that Weldon gave Hadley a chart showing Mohammed Atta as a member of al-Qaeda either before or after 9/11. Weldon claimed in his book that he gave Hadley a copy of a chart two weeks after the attacks, produced in 2000 by the Able Danger team showing the Atta connection and explaining the data-mining project to Hadley. According to the Post, Hadley gave this response yesterday:

But a spokesman for Hadley, who has previously declined to comment on Weldon's claims, said yesterday that a search of National Security Council files produced no such documents identifying Atta and that Hadley was not given such a chart by Weldon.

"Mr. Hadley does not recall any chart bearing the name or photo of Mohamed Atta," said the spokesman, Frederick L. Jones II. "NSC staff reviewed the files of Mr. Hadley as well as of all NSC personnel" who might have received such a chart.

"That search has turned up no chart," he said.

Hadley does recall seeing a chart used as an example of "link analysis" -- the technique used by the Able Danger program -- as a counterterrorism tool, but is not sure whether it happened during a Sept. 25, 2001, meeting with Weldon or at another session, Jones said.

First, notice the rather weak wording in the denial. Hadley does not recall seeing any such chart, and the chart doesn't exist in their files. In fact, the Pentagon used this same kind of language initially when pressed for a response after the public revelation of Able Danger. It allows for a non-specific denial which can later fit into further corroboration of Weldon's claims as well as Hadley's. It says very little, other than Hadley doesn't recall it.

Now, one can argue that if an NSA saw such a chart, it should be highly memorable. However, in the first few weeks after 9/11, many theories and hypotheses floated through DC and the media, and it could be that Hadley saw any number of charts and reports with similar kinds of connections. It also could be that Hadley knew about Able Danger (or found out about it later), couldn't discuss it then and had the chart shredded. Using "I don't recall" leaves all sorts of possibilities open without tying one to any specific outcome.

What we do know is that the Pentagon admits it has five witnesses who do specifically recall seeing Mohammed Atta identified as a potential AQ operative well before the 9/11 attacks, as well as three of his fellow hijackers. Four of the five recall his picture being on the chart. Whether Hadley recalls the incident that Weldon describes is a side issue at this point. We need to hear from the Able Danger team themselves to see whether they will testify to that identification, how those connections worked, and why the Pentagon would not allow them to coordinate with the FBI to target Atta prior to the attacks.

Why, Some Of His Best Friends Are Terrorists

Mayors in any country tend towards the colorful and radical. They usually cannot sustain their political base for any higher office, but their antics entertain enough of the locals to ensure re-election to citywide office. We have politicians such as Marion Berry in the United States. In London, the British have the ongoing spectacle of Red Ken Livingstone. Today the Washington Times reports that Red Ken has given a nuanced look at the humanity of terrorists, reminding us that they are people too, after all:

Acts of terrorism are sometimes justified, London Mayor Ken Livingstone said last week. There is often no other way to fight oppression than using "the assassin's bullet or the assassin's bomb," he added.

Speaking at a London press conference on Thursday, Mr. Livingstone -- called "Red Ken" for his outspoken and often controversial political views -- said he has known terrorists he viewed as "courageous and principled."

Asked by UPI whether he supports the British government's plans for new anti-terrorist legislation, announced last week, Mr. Livingstone said he is concerned that the proposed offense of "glorifying terrorism" is very hard to define.

"It is very easy for politicians in the West to make these random denunciations of terrorist attacks, but then I have known terrorists that I viewed as courageous and principled," he said.

He then used as an example a German Jew during the Hitler years whose job with the German Communists was to blow up Nazi Party headquarters. After the fall of the Nazis, this man supposedly had to flee the Communists and came to the UK instead and remained active in Socialist politics. Unfortunately, that doesn't fit anyone's definition of terrorism. Bombing a government facility is an act of sedition, but not terrorism, and sedition against the Nazi dictatorship hardly requires a defense. Terrorism involves terrorizing a civilian population in order to force political change, which in turn requires the targeting of civilians, not government facilities or military personnel.

His second example, that of fighting the Uzbek autocracy, not only has the same flaw but also only got included to cover up his use of the term "terrorist" for Jews fighting against the Nazis and the Holocaust. The Nazis referred to the Jews as "terrorists" as well. It shows a particular bent for Livingstone to use an example of a Jewish member of the German Underground as a moral equivalent of the Muslim terrorists that the new anti-terror laws in Britain target and which Livingstone meant to criticize.

Coming so soon after Muslim terrorists bombed the Tube and killed dozens of Brits, one wonders how much longer Londoners will find Red Ken all that colorful and instead start viewing him with embarrassment and disgust.

Palestinians Discover Self-Delusion Not Contagious

The Palestinians acted surprised when Israel responded to the launching of dozens of Katyusha rockets at their cities by bombing Gaza and arresting hundreds of Hamas terrorists, an act that the Palestinian Authority refuses to contemplate. As the Israeli response to the Palestinian provocation became clear, the PA proved its disconnection from reality by warning that the cease-fire might not hold if Israel didn't stop its retaliation:

Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has ordered "unrestricted" military strikes against Palestinian militants after rocket attacks from Gaza.

Overnight Israeli aircraft launched a series of air raids, injuring several people, and arrested more than 200 suspected militants in the West Bank.

Israel has also taken the unprecedented step of posting artillery pieces on the border with Gaza, and practice-firing.

Palestinians warned the moves could force a ceasefire to collapse.

As I wrote yesterday, the Israeli withdrawal from Gaza brought an entirely new set of circumstances to the use of military force. The abandonment of the settlements and the removal of Israeli troops took away the excuse of a 'legitimate fight against an unjust occupation' that the UN allowed the murderers and terrorists of Hamas and Islamic Jihad to spew for killing women and children in pizzerias and buses. It makes such rocket attacks open acts of war, for which the government nominally in control of the territory must take responsibility.

That means that the Israelis have every right to respond to an attack on their country when presented with such a casus belli, and they have done so. The Palestinians appealed to the US, which has all too often yanked a diplomatic leash on Israel, but not this time. The BBC reports that the American response, translated from Diplomatese, says, "Don't expect us to pull your bacon from the fire this time." The EU and UN, useless as ever, appealed to "both sides" for "restraint", instead of forcing the Palestinians to take responsibility for security in Gaza. Had the Palestinians not fired 40 rockets at Israeli cities, then this reponse would not have happened.

Israel also captured the leader of Hamas in their West Bank raids yesterday, Hassan Yousef, and announced that they would once again resume targeting the leaders of terrorist groups for military attack. In return, Hamas demonstrated its own self-delusion by warning Israel that it would once again start attacking within "the Zionist entity", a threat which seems empty when the rockets have already fallen within Israel.

Hamas and Islamic Jihad couldn't live in unoccupied Palestinian territory for two weeks without launching such attacks, and the PA couldn't or wouldn't prevent them from doing so. They provoked an appropriately major military response from Israel and now want to hide behind the tired rhetoric and failed excuses of the past. All they have done is prove Ariel Sharon's political brilliance.