Game Day

I'm completely exhausted from my wonderful day at the nation's most storied college football stadium. After a cold and blustery day yesterday, Game Day turned out to give us beautiful weather, at least for most of the game: sunny, mid-50s, and light wind. The weather had kept us from touring the campus yesterday, but we got a chance to show the Admiral Emeritus the Golden Dome and other highlights today.

After a strange first quarter where Holy Cross appeared to be wearing the Irish football uniforms, allowing the 1-7 Syracuse Orange to gather a 3-0 lead, the Irish finally showed and wound up winning a critical victory for the BCS-enabling win. The Irish topped the Orangemen, 34-10.

Anyway, too tired to continue tonight. Thanks to CQ reader TJB for the kind gift of the tickets -- the FM, Admiral Emeritus, his wife, and myself enjoyed the day tremendously.

UPDATE: I really was so tired that I didn't realize I'd left off the last part of that last sentence ...

Iranians Admit Getting Blueprint For Nuclear Warhead

It looks like Iran had plans for the top of that new Shahab-3 rocket they have recently tested -- the one that can pitch a warhead over 1200 miles. According to the Guardian (UK), the Iranians now admit they received plans for a nuclear warhead from the AQ Khan network:

International suspicion of Iran's nuclear programme heightened yesterday when it was revealed that Tehran had obtained a blueprint showing how to build the core of a nuclear warhead.

Mohamed ElBaradei, head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, told diplomats that his inspectors had recently obtained documents from Tehran showing that the Iranians had been given various instructions on processing uranium hexafluoride gas and casting and enriching uranium. These had been obtained via the black market in nuclear technology headed by the disgraced Pakistani scientist, Abdul Qadeer Khan. ...

United Nations inspectors had long suspected that the Khan network had helped Iran, but this was the first time the Iranians had come clean on the issue. They told the inspectors they had not sought the information, but that the Khan network had supplied the documents anyway.

This claim stretched credulity among diplomats and nuclear experts, and reinforced their conviction that Tehran is determined to acquire the capacity and knowhow for nuclear weapons.

No, really -- we didn't want the bomb. It came automatically whenever anyone purchased their first 1,000 centrifuges! Only an idiot would believe that the Khan network just blithely handed out that kind of information unsolicited, and only the Iranians would believe the West to be precisely that stupid. Meanwhile, the Iranians showed their embarrassment at having been caught by the IAEA in another lie by announcing their intent to continue processing uranium.

Will this finally push the UNSC into action? Probably not. Mohammed elBaradei has the Iranians ready for such a referral, but so far has refused to set a date to forward it. Based on the frantic nature of the diplomacy this has set off -- the Guardian calls it precisely that -- it looks like the IAEA wants yet another excuse to do nothing, rather than fulfill its mission and pass it onto the Security Council, where they can do nothing about it for several months as well. Why not pass the buck? Because the IAEA and UNSC know that that the US and UK will not allow it to sit there forever, and that a failure at the UNSC to resolve the Iranian stalemate will reinforce the reality of the UNSC's impotence.

We need to push the IAEA for its referral. Quite obviously, its efforts have done little to resolve the Iranian push to arm themselves, and now with their new rockets, the Iranians can start peppering European targets as well as Israeli and American military assets in Southwest Asia. They have rapidly become an imminent threat in the region, and if the IAEA and the UNSC can't do anything about it, then we need to start pursuing other options.

Try To Forget The Two Bombers Who Showed Up Uninvited

Maybe Abu Musab al-Zarqawi has the capacity for embarrassment after all. When thousands of Jordanians erupted in anger at the slaughter of two families celebrating a wedding, it clearly showed that the terrorist mastermind had made a huge error in judgment. Yesterday, Zarqawi attempted to mitigate the PR disaster he created among Muslims by releasing a tape insisting that he never meant to target wedding celebrants, even as the mother of bride passed away from her severe injuries:

In the past, al-Zarqawi has defended Muslim civilian casualties in attacks by his suicide bombers in Iraq, saying they were justified because the attacks are part of a "jihad" against U.S. occupiers and their Iraqi allies. "God ordered us to attack the infidels by all means ... even if armed infidels and unintended victims — women and children — are killed together," he said in an audiotape released in May.

But he sounded more penitent in Friday's audio.

"People of Jordan, we did not undertake to blow up any wedding parties," he said. "For those Muslims who were killed, we ask God to show them mercy, for they were not targets. We did not and will not think for one moment to target them even if they were people of immorality and debauchery."

In the deadliest of the triple attacks, a bomber set off his explosives belt in the Radisson hotel, killing 30 people at a Jordanian-Palestinian wedding party in a ballroom. Both the bride's parents were among the dead, as was the father of the groom.

Zarqawi wants Muslims to believe that sending two "agents" into a ballroom obviously occupied by a wedding reception, positioning themselves to maximize the damage, and then exploding themselves to kill as many as possible amounts to some kind of unforeseen error. All he proves is that he isn't terribly bright or reliable when it comes to picking his targets. Nor would he care if the end result destabilized Jordan enough for King Abdullah to either flee or agree to ally with Zarqawi. Like most sociopathic monsters, he's only sorry to the degree that his crime backfired on him, and only apologizes to the extent that he's sorry that others cannot recognize his overall genius.

Muslims have finally started asking themselves why Zarqawi keeps blowing up civilians and other Muslims instead of Americans and Israelis. The reason? Americans and Israelis now shoot back, and the kill ratio mostly favors the West. The limited resources of the terrorists force them to slaughter the unarmed instead, and these tactics have started a backlash that won't stop as long as Zarqawi doesn't stop murdering them indiscriminately. Making a tape saying in essence, "Oops, sorry!", that insults their intelligence won't do anything but harden them against Zarqawi's bloodthirstiness.

Woodward Apologetics 101

The Washington Post, suddenly finding itself in much the same position as the New York Times in the Plame Flameout, goes on defense in today's editorial. Facing the scorn of other journalists for supposedly protecting a conservative rather than a liberal leaker, the Post defends Bob Woodward's actions and reminds journalists about the point of protecting sources:

The longtime Post reporter disclosed this week that, while conducting research for a book, he received information from an administration official about Ms. Plame before her identity was revealed by Robert D. Novak in a July 2003 column. That information was potentially relevant to Fitzgerald's investigation and to a news story that has been extensively covered in this and other papers. Mr. Woodward said he told one Post reporter at the time what he had learned but did not disclose the source. Mr. Woodward recently testified to the prosecutor, with the source's permission and after the source had spoken with Mr. Fitzgerald, but still (again according to his agreement) has not publicly identified the source. ...

[O]ver the years innumerable cases of official corruption and malfeasance have come to light thanks to sources being able to count on confidentiality. It's astonishing to see so many people -- especially in the journalism establishment -- forget that now. Many of those who condemn Mr. Woodward applauded when The Post recently revealed the existence of CIA prisons around the world, a story that relied on unnamed sources.

Is there a distinction to be made based on the motives of the leakers? If so, Mr. Woodward might have had to pass up his first big scoops three decades ago, because his Watergate source, Deep Throat -- recently revealed as FBI official W. Mark Felt -- was disgruntled at having been passed over for the post of FBI director.

I have made this point repeatedly over the months of the Plame Flameout: journalists only believe in protecting sources when leaks come from fellow liberals and/or serve to embarrass conservatives. Mark Felt provides the perfect example. The Post's editors remind people that Felt got passed over, but forgets to remind its readers that he failed to get the promotion because of his participation in the culture of corruption that J Edgar Hoover developed at the FBI. (Even Bill Sullivan, who denounced Hoover and started leaking just before Hoover's death, would never have been considered for that position.) Felt and the other toadies that surrounded Hoover had almost as much culpability in the FBI's excesses as Hoover, if not equal. And yet the liberals in journalistic circles quickly held him up as a national hero when he revealed himself as Woodward's source -- just to make a few bucks for himself before he dies.

All of which brings us back to Judy Miller and, ironically, Bob Woodward today. Miller found herself shunned not for protecting her source, but for protecting a source that provided a defense for a conservative administration. Now Woodward finds himself in the same position, and while the tenor of the criticism has muted somewhat, he faces the same basic backbiting as Miller. It doesn't matter whether the information leads to the truth, as it turns out -- journalists only care about undermining conservatives. Leakers and the journalists that protect them had better deliver that, or else it turns out that their peers will find themselves singularly uninterested in all the First Amendment arguments they make when sources leak damaging information on conservatives rather than fellow leftists.

How ironic that the Washington Post's editors took thirty years to discover this about their peers.

What Could Be More American Than A Vote?

Man, I take a vacation and the place falls apart.

I'm watching C-SPAN right now, looking at a procedural vote to allow a motion on withdrawing American troops from Iraq, as demanded by Rep. John Murtha yesterday. With two minutes left, it looks like the Democrats will successfully block the motion, keeping Congress from taking a vote and making the Democrats go on record about troop disposition. Instead of stupid suggestions about amendments to bills constituting no-confidence motions, the Democrats have been given a chance to vote on a real no-confidence motion. Unsurprisingly, they are running away like cowards.

In fact, time just ran out on the vote and the procedural motion may have just passed, but only just. It looks like they're holding the vote open a few more minutes ...

8:44 CT - It's been 203-203 for the last couple of minutes -- which would, I believe, equate to a motion failure.

8:52 - The House finally voted to continue to the actual point, despite the vote from every single Democrat to run away from it. If nothing else does it, this shows the Democrats as political cowards as well as military incompetents. Why should we trust the leadership of the military to a group of people who run away from merely taking a vote?

9:00 - Rep Lantos wants "serious debate", and he wants an interminable filibuster. That's ridiculous. Murtha has been screaming for withdrawal for eighteen months, and we held a national election on the issue.

9:05 - Hyde and Weldon speak at length about the honor of Jack Murtha. That might make for great comity in the House, but let's get a grip, OK? Jack Murtha has a great record of service, without a doubt. That doesn't make his demands honorable.

9:07 - Murtha gets up to speak and tells a great, self-deprecating story about Jimmy Carter and Tip O'Neill.

9:12 - "I didn't say anything about the President." Excuse me, but he did make the chickenhawk argument yesterday about the Vice President. Calling him a "good friend" doesn't cut it today, nor does his sudden discovery of the merits of civilian control of military policy.

9:16 - Intelligence was "wrong". Possibly and maybe probably. I'd say that until we see a regime change in Syria we won't know for sure. But if it was "wrong", it was wrong, not a Bush lie, especiallt since it preceded his administration.

9:24 - The First Mate comments that both sides sound like blowhards. She's right. She says that whether one agrees with going into Iraq or not and whether or not WMD was found isn't the point any longer. We need to complete the mission now that we started it; we cannot afford to leave it unfinished. Al-Qaeda is in Iraq now, unarguably. Withdrawing in the face of their fire is retreat. We will not be safer by leaving them there.

9:25 - Rep Bill Young agrees with the FM. "Who do we negotiate with? Saddam Hussein? al-Zarqawi?"

10:12 - Sam Johnson wrapped up the debate well, and the best part came when he asked for an additional three minutes to complete his remarks. The Speaker asked for any objections, and several Democrats hooted out "Objection!" However, when the Speaker asked for whomever objected to stand up for his objection -- not one of them would stand up to Sam Johnson.

If that doesn't paint the Democrats and their lack of moral courage accurately, I'd like to see a better example.

10:16 - When the initial vote got called, not one "Aye" voice could be heard. Now I notice, after a demand for a recorded vote, that three people found their missing voice, two of them Democrats. It's going out on a lopsided No vote.

10:22 - CQ reader Jim O'Toole would like to know the identity of the Congressmen who objected to Johnson's request for an additional three minutes. Anyone have any idea? Also checking my e-mail, I see that John at Drumwaster is also liveblogging the debate.

10:31 - I would be remiss if I failed to mention the great coverage from Michael and Joe at The Moderate Voice on this issue. Think centrism is easy? Ha! But these two make it look like it is.

10:35 - 403-3, the idea of immediate withdrawal gets hooted down. In another Profile in Courage, six Democrats voted "present".

What a joke. The Republicans made the right move -- instead of debating the issue through the media, they took the Democratic demands and introduced it as a resolution for debate where rhetoric actually counts, and where both sides get equal time. In the Democratic world, that equates to something vaguely unfair. They tried to hide behind a procedural block, and when that didn't work, they screamed and hollered in support of the idea of withdrawal -- and then promptly voted against it when it counted.

No honor and no shame have the Democrats in these times, to their everlasting discredit. So much for no-confidence votes. None will stand for one even when handed the opportunity on a silver platter.

NAACP Leader Switches Parties

Doug at Considerettes notes an interesting political story that should shake up South Florida politics, especially for those who want to toss race cards around during election season. Scott Maxwell at the Orlando Sentinel reports that the head of the NAACP for Florida's Orange County has responded to GOP outreach efforts by changing his party affiliation to Republican:

"I've thought about this for two years," [Derrick] Wallace said Tuesday afternoon, just a few hours after returning from the elections office. "This is not a decision I made yesterday."

It is, however, a decision that rang out like a shot among political circles.

Republican Party leader Lew Oliver described himself as "extraordinarily pleased," while Democratic leader Tim Shea said he was disappointed.

Wallace, a construction-company exec, was candid about the fact that his business life was a big part of his decision to change.

"It's purely a business decision. Ninety percent of those I do business with are Republicans," he said. "Opportunities that have come to my firm have been brought by Republicans."

To that, Shea responded: "I'm a little confused. Are we talking about the National Association for the Advancement of Construction Professionals -- or Colored People?"

Wallace elaborated that his "business" line of thought also referred to the NAACP. Behind many of the power desks in this town sit Republicans. And he said he wants his organization to be part of that structure. Just as importantly, he said, he didn't want people to immediately brand -- or dismiss -- NAACP concerns as synonymous with those of liberal Democrats. "I want this branch to be respected," he said.

This, of course, is the Big Nightmare for the Democrats. Wallace's pragmatism might foreshadow a general move on the part of African-Americans to take advantage of the courtship offered by the GOP to gain more influence in electoral politics. They have come as far as possible through the strategy of monolithic bloc-voting, and now they have to look at a wider strategy that will gain them more influence. Their failure to move the agenda for five years of knee-jerk opposition to Republicans shows the limits of their current leadership and approach.

Expect to see more moderates like Derrick Walker rise through the ranks. Wallace, in return, should expect to take some pretty vicious criticism in the short run, as does Michael Steele and every other minority conservative/moderate who fails to toe the party line.

LaShawn Barber also covered this yesterday.

Air America Settles Lawsuit

Air America has managed to get one scandal behind it even as it continues battling through other legal problems. The liberal radio netlet has settled its $1.5 million lawsuit with Multicultural Radio, who sued AAR for unpaid leased air time in two of the largest markets in the US in its initial launch period:

Air America Radio has reached agreement on terms that would settle a lawsuit brought by Multicultural Radio Broadcasting, according to representatives from both companies. The terms of the settlement were undisclosed, and a formal agreement had yet to be signed.

The settlement would terminate a lawsuit filed with the New York Supreme Court in May, in which Multicultural was seeking more than $1.5 million in damages from the liberal radio network. The complaint said that Multicultural aimed to recover debts that were amassed by Air America soon after its launch in April 2004, and the cost of attempting to recover those debts in a 19-month legal battle.

An attorney representing Multicultural, Randy Mastro of Gibson, Dunn and Crutcher, said yesterday, "The client is very satisfied with the terms."

This may almost literally come a day late and a dollar short for the struggling left-wing enterprise. The lawsuit exposed several strange transactions in ownership of AAR which now have the belated attention of authorities in New York. The series of scandals, which have received excellent coverage by the New York Sun's David Lombino and an unprecedented, bulldog effort by bloggers Michelle Malkin and Brian Maloney, show that the operation not only has almost no operating income but has changed hands in name only to avoid paying its debts, primarily but not exclusively to Multicultural Radio.

Somehow, AAR came up with the money for its payoff to Multicultural. After months of selling itself like a non-profit (which it isn't) to its listeners with "memberships" that promise bumper stickers for $50 donations and canvas bookbags for $150 donations, perhaps they found enough suckers to scratch up the cash. It will be interesting to find out if that sourced the cash or AAR found another sugar daddy to get it out of the hot water into which they had stumbled. I wouldn't be surprised to see that coming next from Michelle and Brian.

Senior French Aide To Annan Confesses Saddam Bribery

The London Telegraph reports this morning that a senior French diplomat has confessed to accepting money from Saddam Hussein in exchange for his access to and influence with UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan. The former UN ambassador for France claims that the allocations given to him through Tariq Aziz came in recognition of his "work for the Iraqi people", but nonetheless acknowledges its illegality:

One of France's most distinguished diplomats has confessed to an investigating judge that he accepted oil allocations from Saddam Hussein, it emerged yesterday.

Jean-Bernard Mérimée is thought to be the first senior figure to admit his role in the oil-for-food scandal, a United Nations humanitarian aid scheme hijacked by Saddam to buy influence.

The Frenchman, who holds the title "ambassador for life", told authorities that he regretted taking payments amounting to $156,000 (then worth about £108,000) in 2002.

The money was used to renovate a holiday home he owned in southern Morocco. At the time, Mr Mérimée was a special adviser to Kofi Annan, the UN secretary general.

This provides one of the most direct links between the corruption in the Oil-For-Food program and the Secretary himself. His own aide -- someone outside the OFF structure -- took bribes and kickbacks during a period when M. Mérimée held a unique position that could assist Iraq in pushing the UN delicately on any number of issues. It shows that Saddam Hussein not only had corrupted the UN to the point where he could use the humanitarian aid program as his own personal ATM (low-end estimates show at least $1.5 billion going into his pockets), but with Mérimée on the payroll, influencing the direction of the UN itself.

Why didn't this make the American media today? The last we heard of M. Mérimée, the French had detained him briefly for questioning on OFF. Now that he's confessed, a large piece of the twelve-year Iraqi quagmire at the UN is now clear. It sheds light not just on the corruption at Turtle Bay but a major reason for twelve years of inaction on Iraq's consistent defiance of UN resolutions, and the UN's curious lack of effort in enforcing them. It would explain why the US and UK alone on the Security Council finally had to take action to hold Saddam accountable for his intransigence.

And yet the Washington Post, New York Times, Los Angeles Times, and every other outlet seems to have missed this story, according to this Google search.

After the details do emerge, we will want a full reckoning from Annan on his administration of the UN. Perhaps we might actually get his resignation, the only honorable way out for the massively incompetent Secretary-General who has led the UN to its worst period of disgrace. Given his track record, though, it will take the General Assembly to kick him out -- and given their track record, they will uphold their dishonorable reputation as a den of thieves instead.

Tories To Jump The Gun?

Despite having reached an agreement with Jack Layton and the NDP to wait for November 28th to attempt a no-confidence motion, Conservatives may try to push the Martin government out next week if Liberals try to pass any tax-relief legislation through the Commons:

The electoral gamesmanship on Parliament Hill has taken yet another turn, with Conservative Deputy Leader Peter MacKay hinting his party could try to bring down the minority Liberals a week earlier than previously anticipated. ...

Conservative Leader Stephen Harper made it clear Wednesday he was setting his sights on Nov. 28 as the date to bring down the government, sparking an election campaign that would run through Christmas.

On Thursday, however, Liberal House leader Tony Valeri signalled that he could call for votes next week on a series of motions to implement tax cuts and other measures arising from Finance Minister Ralph Goodale's recent mini-budget.

Layton wants Martin to agree to elections in January rather than force him from office, while Harper wants to call an election specifically on the issue of corruption. Calling an election on a tax cut seems rather strange for the Tories, but what they fear is that the Liberals will prorogue Parliament after passing a couple of tax cuts, bailing out before any of the scheduled Opposition Days can be used to introduce traditional no-confidence motions. That option may extend the Liberal executive, but if the Gomery conclusion due on February 1 has any more bad news for Martin, his political career will not survive it anyway.

Harper needs to make sure he has the kind of cards he needs to make a non-confidence attempt work if he tries it next week. Layton's adverse reaction to this suggestion -- he told the Tories to re-read their agreement -- makes it appear otherwise. The Tories cannot afford to lose another one of these attempts.

Democrats Keep Shifting Towards Surrender

Rep. John Murtha pushed the national argument on the Iraq War further towards the International ANSWER/MoveOn agenda this afternoon by demanding an immediate start of an American retreat from Iraq, declaring that American soldiers do not have the capability to defeat terrorists. He based his conclusion not on the facts on the ground, but apparently his experience in Viet Nam, which he tossed around like a West Point degree all afternoon long:

One of Congress' most hawkish and influential Democrats called Thursday for an immediate U.S. withdrawal from Iraq, sparking bitter and personal salvos from both sides in a growing Capitol Hill uproar over President Bush's war policies.

"It's time to bring them home," said Rep. John Murtha (news, bio, voting record), a decorated Vietnam combat veteran, choking back tears during remarks to reporters. "Our military has accomplished its mission and done its duty."

The comments by the Pennsylvania lawmaker, who has spent three decades in the House, hold particular weight because he is close to many military commanders and has enormous credibility with his colleagues on defense issues. He voted for the war in 2002, and remains the top Democrat on the House Appropriations defense subcommittee.

"Our troops have become the primary target of the insurgency. They are united against U.S. forces and we have become a catalyst for violence," he said. "The war in Iraq is not going as advertised. It is a flawed policy wrapped in illusion."

I listened to Murtha extensively on CNN this afternoon as Wolf Blitzer interviewed him, and the AP left out some of Murtha's more idiotic commentary. He kept bringing up Abu Ghraib as if it were the most critical juncture in the Iraq War and kept insisting that it doubled the casualty rate. He repeatedly told Blitzer that the military could not beat the terrorists, a lovely message to send to the 150,000 men and women currently deployed to Iraq, as well as the Zarqawi network and their recruiters. In fact, for most of the interview Murtha could hardly complete a sentence, he became so hysterical.

After the White House disputed his assertions -- mostly rehashed arguments we've now heard for almost all three years of this effort, disregarding the actual fact that our military has allowed the Iraqis to develop a democracy and hold two successful and remarkably peaceful elections -- Murtha got viciously personal, pulling out the chickenhawk argument:

Underscoring the rising emotions of the war debate, Murtha uncharacteristically responded to Vice President Dick Cheney's comments this week that Democrats were spouting "one of the most dishonest and reprehensible charges" about the Bush administration's use of intelligence before the war.

"I like guys who've never been there that criticize us who've been there," said Murtha, a former Marine. "I like that. I like guys who got five deferments and never been there and send people to war, and then don't like to hear suggestions about what needs to be done."

When will Democrats get through their head that our military comes under civilian control? This isn't Starship Troopers, where only veterans make decisions on war and peace, and most Americans wouldn't want to live in that kind of society. All due respect to Murtha's Viet Nam service, but being an enlisted man in Viet Nam doesn't make him the reincarnation of von Clausewitz, either. Dick Cheney has served as a Secretary of Defense and has his own expertise on military matters, even if Murtha doesn't want to admit it.

Cutting and running is surrender, no matter who proposes it. I don't care if Murtha has a chest full of medals -- telling the national media that American troops can't handle Islamofascist terrorists and must be withdrawn from their range of action is cowardice. As I recall, Marshal Petain managed to prostrate himself right quickly before the Nazis despite his status as a WWI hero, too. Besides, where exactly will Murtha draw that line -- New York City? Logan Airport?

Now, of course, the Democrats have the political cover to say that they disagree with Murtha, but they have a more reasonable proposal for a fixed timeline for surrender than Murtha's -- and the media will treat them like "centrists". Blitzer put on that show with John Kerry later tonight, where the erstwhile presidential candidate came up with his latest formulation of an Iraq policy after trying out at least a half-dozen during his failed presidential bid last year. The Democrats, no longer satisfied with being the Party of No have now become the Party of Panic, all while the Iraqis continue to (a) build up their security forces, (b) establish their democratic structures, and (c) more fully engage the Sunni in the political process than ever before.

The Iraqis have more courage in their (purple) finger than Murtha has in his entire hysterical body. Shame on him, and shame on his party.

Hitting The Road

The time has come to roll, ladies and gentlemen! The second annual pilgrimage to the Golden Dome is on its way. We will leave the house in a few minutes to start heading towards South Bend and our weekend at Notre Dame. Blogging will be light today, but this time our hotel has Internet access -- so I will be able to do some blogging over the next few days. Many thanks to those who offered better route options than trans-urban Chicago ... we'll try Joliet instead and see how we do.

Shake down the thunder!

UPDATE, 4:58 - Made it to Michigan City after about nine hours on the road, including an hour outside of Rockford for lunch. We're a bit stiff and it took us about an hour to get the energy to unpack and get settled, but now we're thinking about finding a bite to eat. The internet access here is excellent but hardwired, so I'll go out and buy a long cat-5 cable so I can run the computer from the bed.

This is the first time I've taken a long road trip with XM satellite radio. I liked it, although I have to use the FM link to get it to play on my car stereo, and passing trucks with heavy communications equipment often interfere with the transmission. I listened to CNN and Fox, so I kept up with a couple of news stories all day. I'll have a few things to write about the hysterical John Murtha later on tonight. Right now, I'm going to catch up with e-mail and comments and then get some grub while we wait for the Admiral Emeritus to arrive.

Haven't Heard About Abramoff In A While?

If the name Jack Abramoff hasn't come up in quite a while, it shouldn't surprise anyone. After having had a turn as the favorite Democratic bogeyman on Republican corruption, the issue inexplicably slid off the radar as the Democrats instead talked more generically about the "culture of corruption." Now we know why -- it turns out that Abramoff took much more of an equal-opportunity approach to spreading the wealth on Capitol Hill than Democrats initially let on:

Nearly three dozen members of Congress, including leaders from both parties, pressed the government to block a Louisiana Indian tribe from opening a casino while the lawmakers collected large donations from rival tribes and their lobbyist, Jack Abramoff.

Many intervened with letters to Interior Secretary Gale Norton within days of receiving money from tribes represented by Abramoff or using the lobbyist's restaurant for fundraising, an Associated Press review of campaign records, IRS records and congressional correspondence found.

Want to hear some familiar names? These lawmakers may have some 'splainin' to do:

House Speaker Dennis Hastert, an Illinois Republican, held a fundraiser at Abramoff's Signatures restaurant in Washington on June 3, 2003, that collected at least $21,500 for his Keep Our Majority political action committee from the lobbyist's firm and tribal clients.

Seven days later, Hastert wrote Norton urging her to reject the Jena tribe of Choctaw Indians' request for a new casino. ...

Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid sent a letter to Norton on March 5, 2002 ... The next day, the Coushattas issued a $5,000 check to Reid's tax-exempt political group, the Searchlight Leadership Fund. A second Abramoff tribe sent another $5,000 to Reid's group. Reid ultimately received more than $66,000 in Abramoff-related donations between 2001 and 2004. ...

Sen. Trent Lott, R-Miss., the former Senate GOP leader, wrote Norton on March 1, 2002, to "seriously urge" she reject the Jena casino. Lott received $10,000 in donations from Abramoff tribes just before the letter and $55,000 soon after. Lott's office said he sent the letter because his state's Choctaw tribe and a casino company were concerned about losing business.

Then-Sen. John Breaux (news, bio, voting record), D-La., wrote Norton on March 1, 2002. Five days later the Coushattas sent $1,000 to his campaign and $10,000 to his library fund, tribal records show.

Sen. Thad Cochran, R-Miss., wrote Norton on June 14, 2001, one of the first such letters. Cochran's political committee got $6,000 from Abramoff tribes in the weeks before the letter, and another $71,000 in the three years after.

Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-La., who was engaged in a tight re-election race in 2002, sent her letter March 6, 2002. That same day, the Coushattas sent $2,000 to her campaign and she received $5,000 more by the end of that month. By year's end, the total had grown to at least $24,000.

The money involved totals to over $800,000, far more than the cash output involved in the Keating 5 savings-and-loan scandal in the 80s. Unlike the Keating scandal, where John McCain was the only Republican involved in the cash-for-influence scandal, Abramoff made sure that he worked both parties in depth to maximize his ability to influence the bureaucracy at Interior.

The next time a Democrat talks about the culture of corruption, ask him or her when Harry Reid will step down from his leadership role in the Senate. The culture unfortunately pervades DC politics without regard to the R or D after the name; it relies on human nature and greed, one of our least partisan and most unfortunate impulses. Talking about it as a partisan issue may well be the rankest and most foolish demagoguery found in our political debate.

Louis Freeh: Let's Get Hearings On Able Danger

The former head of the FBI writes a recap of the Able Danger story that serves as a good entrée for those who may have missed all or part of the issue. Louis Freeh, who served as head of the agency for most of the Clinton administration, wants better explanations made public from the 9/11 Commission -- a group that he correctly describes as bureaucrats somewhat besotted by their fanciful treatment by the media:

It was interesting to hear from the 9/11 Commission again on Tuesday. This self-perpetuating and privately funded group of lobbyists and lawyers has recently opined on hurricanes, nuclear weapons, the Baltimore Harbor Tunnel and even the New York subway system. Now it offers yet another "report card" on the progress of the FBI and CIA in the war against terrorism, along with its "back-seat" take and some further unsolicited narrative about how things ought to be on the "front lines."

Yet this is also a good time for the country to make some assessments of the 9/11 Commission itself. Recent revelations from the military intelligence operation code-named "Able Danger" have cast light on a missed opportunity that could have potentially prevented 9/11. Specifically, Able Danger concluded in February 2000 that military experts had identified Mohamed Atta by name (and maybe photograph) as an al Qaeda agent operating in the U.S. Subsequently, military officers assigned to Able Danger were prevented from sharing this critical information with FBI agents, even though appointments had been made to do so. Why?

There are other questions that need answers. Was Able Danger intelligence provided to the 9/11 Commission prior to the finalization of its report, and, if so, why was it not explored? In sum, what did the 9/11 commissioners and their staff know about Able Danger and when did they know it?

That used to be the primary question of Able Danger, but now that we have seen what the DIA has done to the primary whistleblower, the questions have to run deeper than the incompetence of the Omission Commission. The Defense Intelligence Agency stripped Lt. Colonel Tony Shaffer of his clearances over a series of old and bogus charges relating to the use of pens and pads of paper from more than twenty years ago. That effectively ended his career in civilian intelligence work, although it doesn't affect his status in the Army Reserve. The DIA's attack on Shaffer on transparently stupid and baseless points of trivia shows that Able Danger has more than just the bureaucrats of the Commission worried. Why?

Freeh calls for the resumption of public hearings on the Able Danger program and its identification of terrorist cells by Congress as soon as possible. That probably means late January at the earliest if the Judiciary Committee takes the case as it promised earlier. We need to press Arlen Specter and Pat Leahy to fight the DIA and issue subpoenas if necessary. One man has already sacrificed his career for this effort, and that sacrifice should not pass unrewarded.

Bush Takes The High Road With Senate GOP Caucus

George Bush has decided to look at the Warner Amendment in much the way I first analyzed the situation, hailing the overall process that eliminated any call for a timetable to withdraw from Iraq. Speaking from Kyoto on his tour of Asia, Bush expressed his satisfaction with the defeat of the competing Democratic amendment that demanded a withdrawal schedule and told the press that the Warner approach sounded reasonable:

President Bush said yesterday that it was "a positive step" for the Senate to defeat a Democrat-led effort to establish a timetable for withdrawing troops from Iraq.

"The Senate, in a bipartisan fashion, rejected an amendment that would have taken our troops out of Iraq before the mission was complete," Mr. Bush said during a press conference in Kyoto with Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi. "To me, that was a positive step by the United States Senate."

Mr. Bush rejected a reporter's suggestion that he was embarrassed by the Senate's subsequent approval of a watered-down measure that requires the White House to give lawmakers regular progress reports on Iraq.

"That's to be expected," the president said of the measure, an amendment to the Senate version of a defense spending bill. "They expect us to keep them abreast of a plan that is going to work."

He added that he viewed the measure as "consistent with our strategy, and look forward to continue to work with the Congress."

Even Democratic strategists viewed the Democratic push for date-specific timetables as a huge strategic error. Bill Sammons quotes Michael O'Hanlon at the Brookings Institute describing it as a "major mistake ... Democrats would run too high a risk of conceding defeat ..." Congress could certainly ask the Pentagon to explain their overall formulation for success and replacement of American troops on the front lines with battle-ready Iraqis. The Democrats, O'Hanlon says (and I agree), overplayed their hand and continue to do so by demanding what amounts to a surrender date -- making themselves the Party of Appeasement when they could have set themselves up as something a bit more responsible.

Bush's statement gives the Senate some political cover from the conservative rage that swept across the New Media the last two days, a phenomenon with which he has recent and painful experience himself. Bush and his team should realize that they have all the tools necessary to rebuild support for the rebuilding of Iraq and the defeat of al-Qaeda terrorists there. Just as their counteroffensive against the Democrat's transparent smear campaign of "Bush lied!" has worked because of the personal engagement of Bush and VP Dick Cheney, who delivered a rhetorical masterpiece suggesting that Democrats might be suffering from a type of political Alzheimer's Syndrome, the administration needs to have a personally engaged, consistent, and profound public-relations effort to explain and defend the war. They have allowed the Democrats far too much room and time to define the war on their own terms, and the public -- lacking any real effort from the White House to define it correctly -- have absorbed it. The GOP in the Senate want the White House more engaged in the process, not because they don't know the status of the engagement, but because the American public doesn't know it. Hundreds of paper reports by Donald Rumsfeld won't fix that.

Bush made a smart move in taking the high road, signaling to the GOP that he understands the problem. The GOP should return the favor by dropping the Warner Amendment in conference. I look forward to the new offensive by the Bush administration in the theater of American public relations -- where this war will truly be won or lost. If Bush and his staff finally understand that, the foolishness of the Warner Amendment will have had some value in the end.

Jay Rockefeller And The Run Of Logan's Writ

My new Daily Standard column comes out today, and I wrote about the stunning admission from ranking Senate Intelligence Committee Democrat Jay Rockefeller that he discussed American terror-war strategy with terrorist sponsor Bashar Assad. While the column does not call for a charge of treason, it does ask how Rockefeller can possibly avoid an indictment for a violation of the Logan Act:

If Rockefeller discussed war plans with Assad while the United States had begun military operations against global terrorist organizations, which Assad has been known to fund, surely it is a major breach of the senator's duties? The Logan Act, a piece of rarely enforced legislation, may be pertinent[.]

I wrote this article before reading Bill Bennett's column in National Review. I would go farther than Bennett suggests; at the least, I think the full Senate should consider expulsion just on the basis of his admission. In going to a known supporter of our enemies in a time of armed conflict and admittedly advising Assad on our approach, he could not help but to give Assad and our enemies valuable insight into our war footing. Stupidity, in this case, is not a defense.

Liberals Tanking In New Polling

On the cusp of a no-confidence motion, the Liberal Party faces an increasingly hostile political environment, a new poll by SES research indicates. The Liberals have lost ground across the entire nation, both in total and within each region, with most of the gains going to the NDP (via Newsbeat1). They now lead the Conservatives by only a six-point margin, down by half in three weeks (Oct 27 poll in parentheses):

Liberal: 34% (40%)
CPC: 28% (28%)
NDP: 20% (15%)
BQ: 14% (12%)

Even in the east, where the Liberals enjoyed a majority three weeks ago, their numbers have slipped dramatically:

Liberal: 43% (57%)
CPC: 35% (26%)
NDP: 17% (14%)
BQ: N/A (N/A)

Looks like an excellent time to hold an election, if these numbers and trends continue to hold up.

US Exports Its Southern Border Solution To Gaza

The Palestinians and the Israelis reached an agreement on the control of the Gaza border with Egypt yesterday, thanks to American pressure on both parties -- on Israelis to capitulate, and on Palestinians to not laugh with merriment over the final arrangements:

Israel and the Palestinians settled Tuesday on the final details of a border agreement for Gaza that gives the Palestinians almost unfettered control of their border with Egypt.

In the works for weeks, the U.S.-mediated agreement followed marathon negotiations Monday night that included Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. Rice delayed a planned trip to Asia to ensure the two sides signed the deal, U.S. Embassy spokesman Stewart Tuttle said. She had said she would not leave without an accord. ...

European Union representatives on the ground will monitor compliance, as will a joint Israeli-Palestinian-European control room, according to the agreement. Goods coming into Gaza from its revamped border terminal at Rafah will be monitored by sophisticated X-ray equipment.

In a critically important step for future Palestinian trade, the deal also allows the Palestinians to begin building a Gaza seaport.

So without forcing the Palestinians to even start disarming the terrorist squads in their midst that continue to attack Israel -- which was supposed to be a precondition for any further Israeli concessions -- Rice and the rest of the nations involved have forced the Israelis to give up a crucial security checkpoint that kept at least some of the heavier weapons out of terrorist hands. It also helped to keep al-Qaeda from infiltrating Gaza. Now, however, all Israel can do is look over the PA's shoulder at an X-ray machine in Rafah.

I guess this means that Palestinians can become more productive, to the extent that they can quit digging tunnels at their southern border to move weapons from Egypt. And, since they now get their own seaport unmolested by Israeli security checkpoints, they can once again await those humanitarian shipments on board the Karine A, confident that they will reach their intended targets.

Man, no wonder Rice had to work so hard to get the Palestinians to take this deal. Even Mahmoud Abbas had to ask himself about a secret "catch" in the language. I'd ask where the notion of this hole-filled southern border comes from, but having lived extensively in Southern California and Arizona, unfortunately I already know.

Alito Application Causes Twitters Instead Of Tidal Waves

To the assumable frustration of partisan interests intent on blocking his confirmation to the Supreme Court, the discovery of a cover letter on an application to Ed Meese for a job as his deputy has not done the damage Samuel Alito's opponents hoped it would:

Seeking to tamp down a political uproar over a 1985 document in which he denounced racial quotas and said the Constitution did not protect the right to abortion, Judge Samuel A. Alito Jr. told senators on Tuesday that the sentiments were simply the views of "an advocate seeking a job."

The document, an application for a promotion within the Reagan administration, could complicate Judge Alito's nomination for the Supreme Court, opening him up to questions during his confirmation hearings about his personal views on the politically sensitive issues of abortion and civil rights. Other nominees have been able to dodge such questions, but both Republicans and Democrats said Tuesday that Judge Alito might be unable to do so.

PFAW has already begun cranking up its war machinery by creating new advertising campaigns against Alito using the letter, which explicitly stated his opposition to abortion and the Roe decision. Democratic Senators have started commenting on it, but Alito's quick response and personal contacts with them on the Hill appears to have mitigated the issue. Even Dianne Feinstein and Ted Kennedy acknowledged that his response -- the letter was written 20 years ago for a political job and he has a track record of fifteen years in the judiciary since then -- keeps him well on track for consideration.

The other problem for PFAW is timing. This came out in the middle of the dogfight on the "Bush lied!" meme that has sucked up most of the media oxygen on politics. The Senate vote yesterday on the Warner amendment took up the rest of it, and now the Woodward revelation on the Plame unscandal will probably overshadow Alito all the way to the confirmation hearings.

PFAW will still spend its money, of course; otherwise, it could hardly go out begging for more and use Samuel Alito as its bogeyman to fill the coffers. The momentum for confirmation continues undisturbed, though, and the Left's hysterical shotgun-style attacks on the Bush administration ironically threatens to make the Supreme Court confirmation the second-tier event it always should have been.

Internet Dodges Dictators One More Time

American management of the Internet dodged another challenge at a UN-sponsored summit on information systems. The attendees voted to continue American oversight through ICANN of the Internet, avoiding a protracted legal and political battle over freedom of speech and a number of other issues:

Negotiators from more than 100 countries agreed late Tuesday to leave the United States in charge of the Internet's addressing system, averting a U.S.-EU showdown at this week's U.N. technology summit.

U.S. officials said early Wednesday that instead of transferring management of the system to an international body such as the United Nations, an international forum would be created to address concerns. The forum, however, would have no binding authority.

U.S. Assistant Secretary of Commerce Michael Gallagher said the deal means the United States will leave day-to-day management to the private sector, through a quasi-independent organization called the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, or ICANN.

It would be difficult to imagine a more costly setback to the cause of freedom than to allow the UN or a similary forum to gain control of the servers that run the Internet. Too many governments around the world would use that power to stifle dissent among their own people. The Internet, to the extent that the oppressed have access to it at all, provides the eye to the world that freedom fighters need to remain motivated to keep up the struggle and the contacts which can make the struggle successful.

The American laissez-faire attitude towards content creates many problems regarding spam and p0rn, but it also guarantees the broadest latitude for political speech and debate. Given the UN's rather strange ideas about committee assignments, it doesn't take much imagination to picture an "independent" international committee in charge of the Internet headed by China and including such free-speech lovers as Saudi Arabia, Zimbabwe, Brazil, Libya, and Cuba outweighing the US on critical access decisions.

The Internet is not the Panama Canal. We created it, and we should continue to run it. Any President who agreed to give it away should plan on keeping his or her bags packed and ready at the exit of the White House.

Administration Official Told Bob Woodward About Plame's CIA Role Before Leak: Post

Tomorrow's Washington Post has a stunning new development in the Valerie Plame story, one that could unravel most of the investigation conducted by Patrick Fitzgerald. The paper reveals that its most celebrated reporter, Bob Woodward, learned of Valerie Plame and her employment at the agency from an unnamed administration official a month before Robert Novak revealed it in his column -- and it wasn't Karl Rove or Scooter Libby:

Washington Post Assistant Managing Editor Bob Woodward testified under oath Monday in the CIA leak case that a senior administration official told him about CIA operative Valerie Plame and her position at the agency nearly a month before her identity was disclosed.

In a more than two-hour deposition, Woodward told Special Counsel Patrick J. Fitzgerald that the official casually told him in mid-June 2003 that Plame worked as a CIA analyst on weapons of mass destruction, and that he did not believe the information to be classified or sensitive, according to a statement Woodward released yesterday.

Fitzgerald interviewed Woodward about the previously undisclosed conversation after the official alerted the prosecutor to it on Nov. 3 -- one week after Vice President Cheney's chief of staff, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, was indicted in the investigation.

So much for the covert status of Valerie Plame. Even the CIA didn't think she worked under cover -- a rather obvious conclusion, given that she went to work rather openly at the Langley facility. Someone will need to remind me why we've spent two years on this investigation, because at the moment it looks like a gigantic waste of time and money. Fitzgerald had two years and came up with nothing more than a perjury and obstruction indictment against one person on a case in which no crime has been proven to be committed. Now it looks like in those two years, it never occurred to Fitzgerald to check with other journalists to see if they had heard of Plame and her association with the CIA.

Woodward also testified that he never discussed Plame with Libby or Karl Rove. That answers the question that would have come up, which is whether the two officials may have heard Plame's status from Woodward instead of other government officials. It doesn't exactly excuplate either, especially Libby of perjury and obstruction, but it does make the indictment look even more foolish if the CIA itself outed Plame to Woodward, one of the most famous journalists in America. Woodward's story shows that the leak did not come from some back-door effort to punish Wilson or his wife for their efforts to discredit Bush and the war effort.

The Left will have to go back to the drawing board, and I suspect that Fitzgerald will eventually withdraw the indictment.

UPDATE: Corrected for the rather egregious error of assigning the official to the CIA, which the story does not do. The other point, which I missed in my first presentation of the story, is that Woodward doesn't believe that the leak was malicious at all. According to Woodward, the administration didn't even think Plame was covert at all -- which eliminates the mens rea needed for the crime Fitzgerald's investigation meant to uncover.

Not One Dime Adopts Its First Candidate

The National Republican Senatorial Committee wants to discourage conservative Republicans from having an option to the liberal Lincoln Chaffee, who has not only helped form the Gang of 14 which arrogated power from the majority on judicial nominations but also has attacked the Iraq War and George Bush for waging it. Even among RINOs, Linc Chaffee stands out as the extreme edge of a big-tent approach. Now, for some reason, the NRSC wants Rhode Islanders to stick with a Senator that more often than not betrays the GOP, going so far as to actively campaign against a conservative with the temerity to challenge Chaffee in the primary:

Liberal Republican Sen. Lincoln Chafee refused to support President Bush in the last election, opposed the GOP tax cuts and was the only Republican to vote against the use of military force in Iraq, a war he has likened to Vietnam.

So why, a year before the election, is the GOP embracing Chafee and spending close to $200,000 on television ads aimed at undercutting his conservative rival in the Republican primary, Cranston Mayor Stephen Laffey?

Like him or not, Republicans consider Chafee their best chance to win in heavily Democratic Rhode Island.

Brian Nick, spokesman for the National Republican Senatorial Committee, said it is "ridiculous" that Laffey is running against "the only Republican that can keep the seat in the Senate." The committee is financing the ads and urging Laffey to abandon the race.

This explains exactly why I started the Not One Dime campaign in the first place. I let it sit for a while until we saw whether the NRSC had listened to our objections and waited until after the primaries to commit funds to the most objectionable of the current GOP caucus. Not only have they not done that, but now they want to spend the money they collect from conservatives to attack other conservatives who will offer a real choice to Rhode Islanders. In fact, the NRSC plans to spend $200,000 attacking Laffey in the primary after wooing him to run for statewide office earlier. Talk about gratitude! Ladies and gentlemen, that's what the NRSC thinks is a good use of your donations -- spending six figures of it against fellow Republicans, especially one that might actually support the Republican agenda.

For his part, Chaffee smugly tells the AP that he and the White House have a "non-aggression pact" -- which allows him to betray Bush and the GOP on almost all critical points of policy. Chaffee even flirted with pulling a Jim Jeffords at one point over his dissatisfaction over the GOP's refusal to embrace its inner Nelson Rockefeller, but the party wooed him back, albeit in name only.

For that reason, I have decided to give Mayor Stephen Laffey the NOD -- by making him the first endorsement for the Not One Dime campaign. We need to get funding to Laffey in order to make sure he stays in the primary against Chaffee. If you donated to the NRSC in the past, take that amount and put it into the hands of Laffey this year and next. For Rhode Islanders, we need to see some volunteer effort to get help to Laffey before the NRSC and the RNC chase the mayor off.

Let's start sending the message now to the NRSC -- Not One Dime for the re-election of those who won't support the GOP at all, except to put an R by their name.

On Second Thought ...

I've been giving the matter of the Warner amendment considerable thought this afternoon, after reading a number of CQ commenters at lunch and listening to Hugh Hewitt in the way home. While I still think that the idea of getting Bush out in front on the war has its merits, one part of this has me convinced now that it was the wrong way to go about it.

They waited until Bush left the country to do it.

Now that, frankly, I missed when I first started writing this morning. If the Senate GOP wanted to send a message to the White House, the leadership should have had the courtesy to wait until the current occupant was home. Bush left for an important trip to China, where he especially needs to appear to be in charge of events back home. The GOP move could have waited for Bush to return, when they could have discussed the political ramifications with him. Right now, it just shows tremendous disrespect to do it while he's away.

This still underscores how poorly this administration has communicated our victories in the war. Rumsfeld grumbled today that he has sent the Senate hundreds of updates in reports that he suspects no one has read. That's not the point. The American people aren't reading these reports -- they're waiting for their President to talk to them directly about the war, on a regular basis.

How many nationwide addresses has Bush given from the Oval Office on the war? How many stump speeches has he given in towns, schools, and mall openings to talk directly to the people? These efforts aren't a distraction from war; they're a vital part of the war itself, and it's time that the administration finally figure that out. Without the American people on board, this effort will collapse, and that support doesn't stay up by sending progress reports to Senate staffers in DC. We have long warned the White House that they need to get better as mass communication on this issue, and they have only just started responding, and only to the extent that Bush's personal integrity got called into question.

Overall, though, Hugh is right. Passing this amendment while Bush travels outside of the country on an important foreign-policy tour amounts to little more than a sucker punch instead of the wake-up call that I believe the GOP caucus sincerely meant it to be.

Senate GOP Plays Smart Tactics, Not Surrender (Updated)

Several CQ readers point out this article in today's New York Times, angry at what appears to be yet another Republican surrender to the Democrats on the national stage. The GOP has introduced a measure that will require the White House to publicly lay out a victory in Iraq and some sort of plan for the phased withdrawal of troops afterwards:

In a sign of increasing unease among Congressional Republicans over the war in Iraq, the Senate is to consider on Tuesday a Republican proposal that calls for Iraqi forces to take the lead next year in securing the nation and for the Bush administration to lay out its strategy for ending the war. ...

The proposal on the Iraq war, from Senator Bill Frist, the majority leader, and Senator John W. Warner, Republican of Virginia, chairman of the Armed Services Committee, would require the administration to provide extensive new quarterly reports to Congress on subjects like progress in bringing in other countries to help stabilize Iraq. The other appeals related to Iraq are nonbinding and express the position of the Senate.

The plan stops short of a competing Democratic proposal that moves toward establishing dates for a phased withdrawal of troops from Iraq. But it is built upon the Democratic approach and makes it clear that senators of both parties are increasingly eager for Iraqis to take control of their country in coming months and open the door to removing American troops.

The Senate will debate two different bills. This measure comes in response to a Democratic proposal that would set a specific timetable for troop withdrawals, a bad idea that doesn't take into account Iraqi troop strength or on-the-ground status of the insurgency and native forces. Republicans want to stay ahead of the Democrats in war management, and this keeps the GOP in the lead.

It isn't unreasonable to have Congress call for some accounting from the White House on the status of Iraq, given the 150,000 troops currently deployed on a police mission there. It doesn't have to be a net negative for Bush to come to the Senate to present his side of the story; as the events this past week have shown, the President can use that kind of platform to correct many distortions of his record and the state of the effort in Iraq. Given the frustration many in the GOP feel with the White House in communicating all the good that our intervention has created, it sounds like a very good idea indeed, one that might be cast as a long-overdue bullhorn.

The second part of the GOP effort, however, does seem more like surrender:

The Senate is also scheduled to vote Tuesday on a compromise, announced Monday night, that would allow terror detainees some access to federal courts. The Senate had voted last week to prohibit those being held from challenging their detentions in federal court, despite a Supreme Court ruling to the contrary.

Senator Lindsey Graham, the South Carolina Republican who is the author of the initial plan, said Monday that he had negotiated a compromise that would allow detainees at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, to challenge their designation as enemy combatants in federal courts and also allow automatic appeals of any convictions handed down by the military where detainees receive prison terms of 10 years or more or a death sentence.

It depends on the manner of the capture of these detainees as to whether they should have access to federal court and how much jurisdiction those courts should be given. Those captured in open battle against American troops, such as in Iraq and Afghanistan, should have none. We do not want to treat battlefield captures as arrests, and have defense attorneys issuing subpoenas to American soldiers for courtroom testimony. Terrorists captured under these circumstances should either be shot on capture -- as provided by the Geneva accords -- or handled strictly within the military.

I can see a point in making a distinction for those caught by the CIA and FBI, however. Those do not qualify as enemy combatants in the manner of the detainees described above, and really fall into the category of espionage/sabotage agents, which traditionally have had their cases heard in civilian courts. If the Lindsay Graham measure allows for strict secrecy on agents and methods, and only allows access to the appellate system for its public review and not fact-finding, then it could be an acceptable compromise.

I would hesitate in reading either as a capitulation in any circumstance. The former looks like an excellent tactical play on behalf of the White House by the Republican caucus, while the latter -- in light of the Supreme Court ruling which it hopes to replace -- may be the best retrieval possible of a bad situation.

UPDATE: CQ readers strongly disagree with me, as does Hugh Hewitt and most of the conservative blogosphere on this point. Well, I've been wrong before and I'll be wrong again, but bear with me for a moment on this.

I will grant everyone that in this hyperpartisan atmosphere, any attempt to find a middle ground looks like surrender, and very well might be surrender. However, I think when readers check out the entire NYT article, John Warner's assurance that the Republican version of this bill will set no timetables for withdrawal marks an important difference. It respects the executive's prerogrative to run the war, but also preserves the people's prerogative to have the executive report on its progress on a regular basis. In this case, with the Iraqi government talking about the withdrawal of American troops next year, it doesn't sound unreasonable for the White House to consult Congress in such a manner.

Many of us have felt a huge amount of dissatisfaction with the communication from the White House on the great work our men and women in Iraq do on a daily basis. This would give an excellent forum for the Bush administration to highlight all of that as well as to continually drive home the goals for the Iraq phase of the war on terror, which they have generally only done when they could no longer avoid doing so for political reasons.

I am no great fan of the Senate GOP leadership, but when faced with an increasingly skeptical public, a more or less silent White House, and the Democratic initiative to force a timetable from Bush, this might be the best of a bad situation. At least, as I wrote above, it doesn't have to be a net negative.

I urge people to read through the excellent comments disagreeing with me from the CQ community. If nothing else, it proves that Captain's Quarters is no echo chamber. Be sure to check out Hugh's post for contact information if you want to protest the Republican action in the Senate.

Germans Also Return To The Seventies

When competing coalitions join together in a parliamentary system to form an executive, they necessarily jettison parts of the two platforms in order to form a single policy plan that can get support from most of the members of all factions. Usually this means getting rid of the more innovative notions and sticking with less controversial ideas. Unfortunately, the new German government led by Angela Merkel wants to provide the exception that tests the rule. As the London Times reports, the Germans now will attempt to spend their way out of a deficit by taxing their way to economic growth -- a daring plan, given its remarkable failure every time it's been tried in the past:

Germany in the past three years has been the world’s most depressed economy, with the weakest growth in economic activity and consumption. The coalition partners — representing, as they do, the opposite ends of the political spectrum — found it hard to find common ground on most issues, but on one point they could emphatically and enthusiastically agree: the way to stimulate an economy suffering from mass unemployment and stagnant consumption is to increase tax. ...

Accordingly, the new German Government has decided to impose one of the biggest tax increases in postwar history and to target the extra taxes on the weakest and most sensitive parts of the economy: consumption, which will suffer a three percentage point increase in VAT, and housing, which will lose tax incentives for first-time buyers. In addition, to fend off accusations that the new consumption taxes will bear unfairly on poorer consumers, the Government will hit the rich as well, increasing the top rate of income tax from 42 per cent to 45 per cent.

It seems that Angela Merkel’s idea of a compromise between the Christian Democrats, whose most unpopular idea was the VAT increase, and the Social Democrats, who were berated for demanding higher income tax, was to combine the most unpopular measures from both parties’ manifestos, while dropping all the rest.

Welcome to the German version of the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act of 1931. For those of you whose only idea of Smoot-Hawley is a comedy schtick by Ben Stein in Ferris Bueller's Day Off, it actually did exactly what Stein describes in the movie. It took a sad song and made it tragic by creating unnecessary barriers to imports, helping to deepen the global Great Depression. The protectionist instinct threw gasoline on the fire of a depression then, and the socialist instinct of the Germans will do much the same in Europe now.

When last seen, this strategy started an economic crisis across Asia that almost killed the Pacific Rim market. Japan, which had been seen as a juggernaut moving implacably towards global economic leadership surpassing even its American mentor, kneecapped itself by doing exactly what Merkel proposes in almost identical circumstances. Given France's state of affairs, the new German policy appears almost assured of sinking the EU in a similar fashion.

American economic planning had better not count on significant investment from European sources over the next few years. The only ones we're likely to see will be those who come across the Atlantic in balloons, hoping to escape the Brussels Wall of economic stupidity.

The Jimmy Carter Of France

Jacques Chirac finally addressed the French people about the riots that have extended into their 19th evening. Looking wan and tired, Chirac gave a speech with a familiar ring to it, at least among those Americans who have not blocked the memory of the Jimmy Carter era like the trauma that it was:

President Jacques Chirac, addressing his country for the first time since unrest broke out, said that he had asked Parliament to extend a national state of emergency to February and that he would set up a program that would provide jobs and training for 50,000 youths by 2007.

The president, stressing respect for the law and the need to recognize the diversity of French society, acknowledged that the past two weeks had been proof of a "profound malaise" in the country, calling it a "crisis of identity."

That, of course, recalls the infamous "malaise" speech by Carter, when he told Americans that we would have to learn to get by with less, and that mandatory energy rationing would be the New Patriotic Way. Like Carter, Chirac has taken a real problem and used it to cover for a more serious problem -- and the solution Chirac proposes will make the situation even worse than before.

Even if one accepts that the uprising in France has little to do with Islamists and mostly concerns the massive unemployment in the immigrant community, the Chirac government offers little more than a Band-Aid for a solution. Instead of setting the economic conditions that will create real jobs, Chirac proposes a domestic Peace Corps -- a civil service that might pay minimum wage and add in food stamps and housing assistance. France also plans on offering job training, and says it will have 50,000 "youths" in such training by 2007.

Fifty thousand youths, out of a total immigrant population of 5 million people, in an economy that already has double-digit unemployment: no wonder malaise has struck France. The government they elected cannot even do math.

How does Chirac and his cohorts figure on paying for this new civil corps and training program? They will pull even more resources out of the private sector, which will decrease the working capital that might allow some critically-needed job creation. Chirac will only wind up extending their addiction to government intervention in their lives, in order to offer a benefit that even if all plans go on schedule will only service one percent of the population. In the meantime, the crushing weight of the French social model will get larger and make an economic recovery even more remote for the nation.

When Carter gave his "malaise" speech to Americans, we recognized that his time had passed and we needed a new direction in the White House -- and we weren't even watching a nationwide riot burning into its third week. If history gives any guidance, the French will mostly either agree with Chirac or object that his solutions are not socialistic enough to solve the problem. France appears completely lost, even apart from the radical Islamism that seeks its destruction.

Liberals Still Playing Monty Hall

In a stunning display of sheer cynicism, the Liberals have now decided to offer a budget bill with a number of tax cuts in order to dare the three opposition parties to torpedo it for their no-confidence motion. Martin, who last avoided a no-confidence loss by coughing up $5 billion for NDP programs last spring, all of a sudden has more cash to spare for Canadians as long as they keep him in power:

The federal government unveiled $39-billion in tax cuts and spending Monday in a mini-budget whose life expectancy could be measured in days as opposition parties threaten to force an election within a week.

The document, released by Finance Minister Ralph Goodale, also includes a heavy emphasis on reducing Canadians' anxiety about their economic future by investing billions in post-secondary education and work training programs while making cuts to corporate taxes. ...

"It's about people living fulfilling lives, the kinds of retirements we can expect to enjoy and the opportunities our children will have."

That will be how the Liberals will want this to be seen. However, everyone who has followed the recent career of perhaps the slipperiest politician ever born will see it as a bit of a political bomb for the tri-party coalition. The Liberals have no love of tax cuts, but they don't inten on seeing them through anyway. These proposals merely act as an election issue for the time after the Tory/BQ/NDP no-confidence motion topples the government.

The coalition can either introduce their own no-confidence motion or vote down the budget, which has universal recognition as a confidence measure. In either case, the tax cuts disappear and must get reintroduced after the election. The Liberals can then argue that they had a plan to reduce taxes while maintaining government services -- but the Tories blew it by rushing into an election. However, what Martin really wants is for the business interests which align with the Conservatives will pressure them into accepting the budget and postponing any push against Martin's government.

Martin's Monty Hall impersonation got pretty good this spring when he showed Jack Layton as a mercenary for hire when a $5 billion health-care outlay bought the NDP for Martin, or at least leased them for a critical few weeks. Now, not even showing how he intends to pay for that boondoggle, Martin coughs up $30 billion in tax relief for the other side of the political spectrum. While Martin tries to make the need for political parties non-existent, his constituents get whiplash watching him do whatever he needs to keep his feeble grasp on power.

Now that's a deal that even Monty Hall would decline.

Game On Again

Just when the anti-Alito forces began to cast their nets elsewhere in hope of landing an issue, it looks like abortion may come back to the center of the debate. The Washington Times reports that Alito's application to join the Reagan administration explicitly states an opposition to abortion and Roe v Wade, creating the opening Democrats need to open that line of questioning at his confirmation hearing:

Judge Samuel A. Alito Jr., President Bush's Supreme Court nominee, wrote that "the Constitution does not protect a right to an abortion" in a 1985 document obtained by The Washington Times.

"I personally believe very strongly" in this legal position, Mr. Alito wrote on his application to become deputy assistant to Attorney General Edwin I. Meese III.

The document, which is likely to inflame liberals who oppose Judge Alito's nomination to the Supreme Court, is among many that the White House will release today from the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library.

In direct, unambiguous language, the young career lawyer who served as assistant to Solicitor General Rex E. Lee, demonstrated his conservative bona fides as he sought to become a political appointee in the Reagan administration.

Republicans quickly pointed out that this was a political point of view, not a judicial opinion or even a scholarly effort on Alito's part. The document meant to assure Edwin Meese that the Reagan administration's policies matched up with his beliefs, making him a better candidate for the position of deputy assistant to Meese. Translating that to an overturning of Roe will take some argument, especially since Alito passed on opportunities to narrow abortion rights on three of four opportunities as a jurist.

Still, Alito wrote it and will need to speak to it when the hearings begin. This will delight the "liberal coalition" described by the New York Times, a collection of every Democratic special-interest group possible, as they will not have to work hard to generate some controversy and some contributions for their coffers:

A coalition of liberal groups is preparing a national television advertising campaign against the Supreme Court nomination of Judge Samuel A. Alito Jr. that seeks to move the debate over his selection beyond abortion rights and focus instead on subjects like police searches and employment discrimination, several leaders of the coalition said. ...

In addition to the [Alliance for Justice], a liberal legal group that focuses on judicial nominations, the coalition includes the abortion rights groups Naral Pro-Choice America and Planned Parenthood, as well as People for the American Way, the A.F.L.-C.I.O., the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People and the Sierra Club.

Last week, the alliance released results of a poll that highlighted elements of the judge's record unrelated to abortion that the liberal groups say could have greater resonance with moderate voters.

Among the issues raised by the poll was Judge Alito's support as a lawyer in the Reagan administration for an employer's right to fire someone who had AIDS. Another issue was a judicial opinion he wrote supporting a police strip-search of a suspected drug dealer's female companion and her 10-year-old daughter. Others included his votes as a judge against employment discrimination suits and an opinion overturning part of the Family and Medical Leave Act.

Most of these have already been out as arguments against Alito, and have already been clearly answered as decisions to respect stare decisis -- which is what these groups want from Alito when it suits them (Roe being the main example). The rest look like straw-grasping, and with this new document coming to light, expect them to fall off the radar screen altogether. The abortion game is afoot once more, Watson.

Why Isn't This Man Smiling?

Perhaps because he watched last night as his beloved Cleveland Browns took a pasting from the Pittsburgh Steelers on national TV, 34-21, in a game that never even looked close, and certainly not as close as the final score indicates. Instead of facing the Steelers' daunting and nearly-unbeaten QB, Big Ben Roethlisberger, they got beat by Charlie Batch and Turnover Tommy Maddox. Instead of facing the powerful running-back duo of Willie Parker and Jerome Bettis, the Browns faced Duce Staley, just coming back from a long-term injury, and Verron Haynes.

The result of the second- and third-string Steelers against the browns' first squad? 159 yards rushing, 382 overall yards in offense, and no turnovers -- although Maddox came close twice.

I suppose Hugh watched Rome instead last night -- it was a great episode, too. I think I'd take the 13th over the Browns, too, even with the points, especially if Pullo's healthy and Vorenus is under center.

Norman Podhoretz Article At OpinionJournal

The Norman Podhoretz article that appears to have inspired the GOP to finally fight back against the ridiculous and intellectually dishonest "Bush lied!" Democrat campaign now appears at the Wall Street Journal's free opinion site, OpinionJournal.com. Podhoretz takes the main thrust of a counterargument that has rumbled around the blogosphere in simpler forms and uses the data to stage a devastating rhetorical rebuttal to those Democrats who used the same intelligence in 1998 and 2002 to make themselves look tough.

Podhoretz begins:

Among the many distortions, misrepresentations and outright falsifications that have emerged from the debate over Iraq, one in particular stands out above all others. This is the charge that George W. Bush misled us into an immoral or unnecessary war in Iraq by telling a series of lies that have now been definitively exposed.

What makes this charge so special is the amazing success it has enjoyed in getting itself established as a self-evident truth even though it has been refuted and discredited over and over again by evidence and argument alike. In this it resembles nothing so much as those animated cartoon characters who, after being flattened, blown up or pushed over a cliff, always spring back to life with their bodies perfectly intact. Perhaps, like those cartoon characters, this allegation simply cannot be killed off, no matter what.

Nevertheless, I want to take one more shot at exposing it for the lie that it itself really is. Although doing so will require going over ground that I and many others have covered before, I hope that revisiting this well-trodden terrain may also serve to refresh memories that have grown dim, to clarify thoughts that have grown confused, and to revive outrage that has grown commensurately dulled.

As long as the "Bush lied!" meme stayed on the fringes of the political scene, among the ANSWER and MoveOn crowd that never met a conspiracy it didn't like, the GOP felt comfortable in ignoring it. After all, the last election saw this argument played as a major part of John Kerry's platform, and it not only failed to win the White House, it cost them four seats in the Senate as well.

Unfortunately for the Democrats, their leadership spent the last year drinking the leftover stolen-election Kool-Aid from 2000. They believe that Kerry really won the election last November. The conspiracy theory that the GOP somehow stole Ohio by manipulating precincts under heavy Democratic control leads them to think that their 2004 strategy actually worked -- and all they need to do is act like they really, really believe it for the American electorate to start believing it, too.

It's that irrationality that leads to the debacles of yesterday's appearance by Jay Rockefeller on Fox News. Not only does his assertions that he has no responsibility for his vote supporting the war sound idiotic at best, but he has no answer for his own words in the run-up to the October 2002 authorization vote which sounded much more hysterical about the Saddam threat than anything coming out of the White House. It also provides an opportunity for Rockefeller to create his own news by admitting that he shared government information on war plans with Bashar Assad.

Read all of Podhoretz' excellent and energetic rebuttal.

France To Extend Emergency Powers Amid Continued Rioting

France went through yet another night of rioting, pressing on towards three weeks worth of violence, without question coming from its heavily Muslim immigrant areas. While the world press largely downplays the uprising as a "youth" rally, the French government will ask for a three-month extension of government by fiat as a result of their inability to end the revolt:

The French cabinet is to ask parliament to extend a state of emergency aimed at tackling unrest in impoverished suburbs by three months.

The laws, which allow local councils to impose curfews and ban gatherings, were introduced last Wednesday for 12 days.

Parliament is expected to approve an extension of the laws, which officials say have helped curb the rioting. There were scattered incidents overnight.

So far, it seems that the curfews have kept the bandwagoneers off the streets, as well as any citizens that might oppose the hardcore, organized effort to force France into creating official autonomous no-go zones. While the French police have long treated these neighborhoods as such, the Muslims want official status so that they can introduce sharia law in the center of Europe.

With the Chirac government looking like a deer in the headlights, the French have to ask themselves what they have gained so far from the emergency powers and loss of assembly rights they have already granted to Chirac. He's barely been seen since the crisis first arose; where is his leadership? Has Nicolas Sarkozy and Dominique de Villepin simply bypassed him in favor of a split executive? French ennui at the highest levels of society demonstrates a decadence that gives a strong impression of impending collapse. If the French leadership cannot bring itself to care about a direct challenge to its authority, can another Vichy be far behind?

Addendum: Jack Kelly isn't fooled by the "poor youths" meme, either:

As Theodore Dalrymple noted in a prescient article in the City Journal three years ago ("The Barbarians at the Gates of Paris"), those whom the media choose to describe as "French youths" have cell phones, cars, boom boxes, gold chains around their necks. "They enjoy a far higher standard of living than they would in the countries of their parents' or grandparents' origin, even if they labored there 14 hours a day." ...

The elephant isn't really there, the media assure us. "The violence in France has not taken on religious overtones," said The New York Times. "Islamic ideology and leaders play no role in the disturbances," said The Washington Post.

But the "disaffected youth" shout "Allahu Akbar" as they toss Molotov cocktails into churches and synagogues. They talk of turning Paris into "Baghdad on the Seine."

They certainly aren't shouting, "Vive la France!" and declaring their love for France as they burn hundreds of cars every night.

Canadians Will Get A Christmas Campaign

Events have moved quickly this weekend in Ottawa. The Conservatives and Bloc Quebecois finally reached an agreement with the NDP to force elections out of Paul Martin and the Liberals by demanding a January 20th poll. The Liberals, apparently believing that the three parties were bluffing about putting up a no-confidence vote that would create an unpopular holiday-season election, refused to come to that agreement -- and the Tory/NDP/BQ coalition have shown their hand:

The Liberals rejected an ultimatum posed by the opposition parties Sunday that would either see the Prime Minister agree to an election call in January or face a non-confidence motion that could topple his government next week.

Liberal House Leader Tony Valeri told reporters Sunday evening in Toronto the government would not agree to call an election in January. ... Mr. Valeri challenged the opposition parties to put forth a non-confidence motion if they no longer had faith in the government, in accordance with parliamentary procedure.

Conservative Leader Stephen Harper met with reporters Sunday after a two-and-a-half hour meeting with NDP Leader Jack Layton and Gilles Duceppe of the Bloc Québécois.

"If the government wants to avoid a Christmas election, this [plan] will give them the opportunity," he said, adding that if the Liberals failed to agree, the Conservatives would force an election in the next two weeks.

According to John MacDonald at Newsbeat1, expect the no-confidence vote to come on Thursday. Canadians can also expect that the reason given for the collapse of Parliamentary support for Paul Martin and the Liberals will be the corruption of the Sponsorship Programme -- and that they will make sure that Canadians understand that the Christmas campaign came giftwrapped by the same Liberals that stole the Christmas money.

Jay's Bogus Journey?

A number of CQ readers caught something significant that I missed earlier in the quote from Jay Rockefeller. In trying to attack George Bush and fend off Chris Wallace, Rockefeller tells Wallace that he went out to Arab leaders to conduct his own foreign policy:

SEN. ROCKEFELLER: No. The – I mean, this question is asked a thousand times and I'll be happy to answer it a thousand times. I took a trip by myself in January of 2002 to Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Syria, and I told each of the heads of state that it was my view that George Bush had already made up his mind to go to war against Iraq – that that was a predetermined set course which had taken shape shortly after 9/11.

Now, what the hell was Rockefeller doing revealing his analysis of American foreign policy and the direction of war strategy to Bashar Assad??

If this is true, Rockefeller should get ejected from the Senate and possibly stand trial for treason. In 2002, we were at war against Islamofascist terrorists, and Syria has long been listed by the US State Department as a terrorist-supporting state. What Rockefeller admitted was conspiring with the enemy during a state of war -- and he should be held accountable, especially considering his admission of the act on national television.

UPDATE: One of the readers that pointed out this passage to me, Mark H., notes that Rockefeller's conversation with Bashar Assad may have given Saddam Hussein 14 months to collude on the transfer of WMD to Syria, rather than the 6 we assumed he got when Bush wasted five months trying to get the UN to enforce its own resolutions. Another reader, Jay Tea from Wizbang!, suggests a prosecution under the Logan Act.

The Second Annual Notre Dame Pilgrimage

With the Fighting Irish playing like national contenders again in the first season of the Charlie Weis era, the timing couldn't be better for the First Mate and I to make our second trip to see Touchdown Jesus, the Golden Dome, and the Notre Dame football team play on their home field. Last year, we made our way to our very first visit to South Bend by car, and we took 3 hours getting through the center of Chicago. Thanks to my brilliant navigation, I turned an eight-hour trip into a twelve-hour grueling marathon.

This year, I received tickets to the Syracuse game for next Saturday from loyal (and generous!) CQ reader TJ B. Thanks to his generosity, I will be able to invite my father, the Admiral Emeritus, along for the trip, although he and his wife will fly in from SoCal rather than drive. I decided to drive it again this year, but instead of listening to Mapquest and taking the urban route again, I've purchased a mapping program to re-do the route for better efficiency. Chicagoans should feel free to check this out and let me know in the comments if this improves my route, or if I'm just as insane as last year.

I figure that instead of taking 90 all the way through Chicago (and into Gary), I'd take 294 down to 80 and bypass most of the metro area around the Windy City. Then I'll take the 80 East out to the 94 to Michigan City, where I will be staying during the weekend. I figure it will only cost me an extra 20 miles, but it should save me that bumper-to-bumper traffic that got us stuck the last time.

We'll be leaving early on Thursday morning, and this time my hotel has Internet access, so I will be taking the camera and updating CQ readers about all of the campus activities to which we can gain access.

Shake down the thunder!

The Counter-Offensive Turns Into A Team Sport

The pushback against the ridiculous "Bush lied!" campaign taken up by Democrats in 2005 after they lost an entire electoral cycle on it in 2004 has broadened out past the White House to even the President's fair-weather friends in the GOP. Glenn Reynolds points to this exchange on Face The Nation, the CBS entry on the Sunday morning talking-head shows. Bob Schieffer tried to twist Bush's words into a complaint about criticism of war policy, and John McCain would not allow him to get away with it:

SCHIEFFER: President Bush accused his critics of rewriting history last week.

Sen. McCAIN: Yeah.

SCHIEFFER: And in--he said in doing so, the criticisms they were making of his war policy was endangering our troops in Iraq. Do you believe it is unpatriotic to criticize the Iraq policy?

Sen. McCAIN: No, I think it's a very legitimate aspect of American life to criticize and to disagree and to debate. But I want to say I think it's a lie to say that the president lied to the American people. I sat on the Robb-Silverman Commission. I saw many, many analysts that came before that committee. I asked every one of them--I said, `Did--were you ever pressured politically or any other way to change your analysis of the situation as you saw?' Every one of them said no.

Having McCain on national television backing up George Bush on his counterattack against this tired allegation signals that even the man who loves to have the press love him has his limits. When McCain slaps down Schieffer on FTN, McCain watchers sit up and take notice. Normally, the Arizona "maverick" uses his national-media time to pump himself, not protect Bush or promote his party's agenda. Even more rare is the attack on members of the Senate; after all, Harry Reid, Ted Kennedy, and Jay Rockefeller are among those promoting the "Bush lied!" theme that Democrats want to keep on life support.

Speaking of Rockefeller, he doesn't need McCain's help in looking like an idiot or a liar. As Power Line noted today, Rockefeller unwittingly shows the idiocy of the meme and of Senators trying to push it in an interview with Fox's Chris Wallace:

WALLACE: Senator Rockefeller, the President says that Democratic critics, like you, looked at pre-war intelligence and came to the same conclusion that he did. In fact, looking back at the speech that you gave in October of 2002 in which you authorized the use of force, you went further than the President ever did. Let's watch. SEN. ROCKEFELLER (October 10, 2002): "I do believe that Iraq poses an imminent threat, but I also believe that after September 11th, that question is increasingly outdated."

WALLACE: Now, the President never said that Saddam Hussein was an imminent threat. As you saw, you did say that. If anyone hyped the intelligence, isn't it Jay Rockefeller?

SEN. ROCKEFELLER: No. The – I mean, this question is asked a thousand times and I'll be happy to answer it a thousand times. I took a trip by myself in January of 2002 to Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Syria, and I told each of the heads of state that it was my view that George Bush had already made up his mind to go to war against Iraq – that that was a predetermined set course which had taken shape shortly after 9/11. Now, the intelligence that they had and the intelligence that we had were probably different. We didn't get the Presidential Daily Briefs. We got only a finished product, a finished product, a consensual view of the intelligence community, which does not allow for agencies like in the case of the aluminum tubes, the Department of Energy said these aren't thick enough to handle nuclear power. They left that out and went ahead with they have aluminum tubes and they're going to develop nuclear power.

WALLACE: Senator, you're quite right. You didn't get the Presidential Daily Brief or the Senior Executive Intelligence Brief. You got the National Intelligence Estimate. But the Silberman Commission, a Presidential commission that looked into this, did get copies of those briefs, and they say that they were, if anything, even more alarmist, even less nuanced than the intelligence you saw, and yet you, not the President, said that Saddam Hussein was an imminent threat. ...

SEN. ROCKEFELLER: Chris, there's always the same conversation. You know it was not the Congress that sent 135,000 or 150,000 troops.

WALLACE: But you voted, sir, and aren't you responsible for your vote?

SEN. ROCKEFELLER: No.

WALLACE: You're not?

SEN. ROCKEFELLER: No. I'm responsible for my vote, but I'd appreciate it if you'd get serious about this subject, with all due respect. We authorized him to continue working with the United Nations, and then if that failed, authorized him to use force to enforce the sanctions. We did not send 150,000 troops or 135,000 troops. It was his decision made probably two days after 9/11 that he was going to invade Iraq. That we did not have a part of, and, yes, we had bad intelligence, and when we learned about it, I went down to the floor and said I would never have voted for this thing.

WALLACE: My only point sir, and I am trying to be serious about it, is as I understand Phase Two, the question is based on the intelligence you had, what were the statements you made? You had the National Intelligence Estimate which expressed doubts about Saddam's nuclear program, and yet you said he had a nuclear program. The President did the same thing.

This is the conundrum in which the Democrats have stuck themselves. They want to put all of the rhetoric on Bush on determining that Iraq presented a long-term threat to the US. Bush carefully avoided using the term "imminent"; indeed, he argued against waiting for threats to become imminent, post-9/11, as that would put Americans in danger of surprise attacks just as we had experienced. Saddam's development of portable WMD would have found terrorist hands eventually, which is why Bush proposed military action before the threat reached that stage. Rockefeller instead used the "imminent" term and now wants to shove it off onto George Bush.

At the time, the Democrats did not want to give the Republicans an edge on national security, with the first national elections since 9/11 coming in four weeks. Democrats wanted to look tough and use tough rhetoric. Only after the election (where they lost the Senate) did they start ankle-biting their vote -- even after George Bush allowed the UN to restart the useless UNSCOM weapons inspections and waited five months to take the military action that Congress authorized.

How empty are the Democrats of ideas and long-term plans for national security? Three years later, they're still lying about their own statements on national TV to smear George Bush -- even though he can't run for election again! Rockefeller shows how lame this meme has become. It should embarrass every Democrat in the country and start a demand for new party leadership. Unfortunately, it won't, but it may finally convince the rational moderates that the Democrats have led the party over a cliff.

Shelby Cleared By Ethics Committee

The National Journal reports today that Senator Richard Shelby will be cleared of charges that he leaked classified material, bringing an end to a 15-month investigation. The leak concerned a translation of an Arabic-language intercept that preceded 9/11:

The Senate Ethics Committee informed Sen. Richard Shelby, R-Ala., late on Friday that after a 15-month inquiry into allegations that he had leaked sensitive national security information to the news media, that it had insufficient evidence that he had done anything wrong, and would not pursue the matter further, National Journal has learned.

The Senate Ethics Committee inquiry commenced as a result of a referral from the Department of Justice to the committee on July 20, 2004, in which the department said that there existed what sources described as "credible and specific information" that Shelby might have leaked classified information to the press, and then possibly made false statements to federal investigators to conceal what he had done.

What had attracted the interest of the FBI were news reports in 2002 revealing that on the eve of the September 11, 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, the National Security Agency had intercepted two Arabic-language messages suggesting that such attacks might soon commence. The messages that were overheard said: "The match is about to begin," and "Tomorrow is zero hour." But they were not translated until the day after the attacks, on September 12, 2001.

The FBI determined that Shelby had been the most likely source for a CNN report on the messages, a leak which the intelligence services felt could have damaged their intercept assets. Rather than pursue a criminal investigation, however, the Department of Justice turned the probe over to the Ethics Committee in the late summer of 2004. The case had long been overshadowed by the Plame investigation, but Republicans felt that the Shelby case represented another potential political shoe-drop in a season of leaks and investigations.

Instead, Shelby got cleared of both the leak charge and a separate accusation that he lied to FBI investigators when they initially looked into the leak. That gets Shelby completely off the hook and the GOP caucus in the Senate clear of any further restraint in pursuing other leak cases -- such as the leak of CIA operations for terrorist holding facilities and an air operation earlier this year.

After the Fitzmas fizzle, Democrats will face yet another disappointment in their season of litigation. I wonder how insane this loss will make them.

French Riots Continue Despite Ban On Assemblies

Despite a heavy police presence, the suspension of the right to assemble, and a curfew for nighttime hours, the French still found a way to riot overnight. While the major event police feared did not materialize, the show of force did not deter the rioters from torching hundreds more cars:

Violence has continued in deprived city areas of France with a tally of at least 374 cars burnt out and 212 arrests despite an official ban on public meetings in an attempt to curb riots that have rocked the nation.

In a 17th night of disturbances two police officers were injured Sunday, with one hospitalized after being hit by a metal object in the Paris suburb of La Courneuve.

Incidents involving the burning of cars also spread overnight to several towns in neighbouring Belgium. ...

Police said the situation in racially-mixed suburbs throughout France had been calmer than on previous nights. But cars were reported set alight in Lyon, Toulouse and St. Etienne.

The headline for the Agence France Presse story? "Paris clampdown amid uneasy calm in French cities." Having 374 cars torched and a couple of hundred people rounded up and taken to jail only sounds "calm" to the French, I would gather -- and probably not at all to one of the 374 car owners who will take the bus to work tomorrow.

The cars don't tell the whole story, either. The BBC reports that rioters also burnt down a nursery school. In a more dangerous mode, some rioters pushed a burning car against an "old people's home", in BBC parlance, causing a panic that could have killed more than a few of them itself, even without a building fire. Fortunately, it appears that no one got seriously hurt.

The American media finally noticed that the story has continued, however. The Washington Post offered its first reporting in days on the subject, using the Lyon attack at the city center as its hook. Molly Moore finally broke the silence, at least obliquely, on the "M" word:

No incidents of violence were reported inside Paris, though unrest continued Saturday in 163 cities and towns across France, according to police. On Saturday night, the 17th night of the rioting, a policeman was injured in a Paris suburb when he was hit by a metal ball thrown from an apartment building.

In the southern town of Carpentras in the Provence region, youths burned a school Saturday night. On Friday night, a motor-scooter rider threw two gasoline bombs at a mosque during prayers, causing minor damage. Police said it was unclear whether the attack was linked to the other violence around the country. Many of the youths involved in the rioting are Muslim.

One wonders how that last sentence managed to sneak its way past the editors at the Post. The New York Times manages two articles on the story it stopped reporting days earlier. The first, by Craig Smith, focuses on police success in keeping the riots out of Paris without mentioning the 163 cities and towns where it continued or the 374 cars that went up in flames. Instead, Smith reports that the violence "held steady at a reduced level" and that the low level of deaths came from -- get ready -- gun control:

Many French attribute the low level of injuries to the tight gun control laws here. The most serious incident involving gunfire was a series of shotgun blasts fired at police officers from a distance. Ten officers were hit, but only two were hospitalized, and their injuries were not life-threatening.

Perhaps if the citizens of France could arm themselves, Islamist riots wouldn't last seventeen days and show no evidence of abating. The second article, an analysis by Marc Landler, offers a facile look at the riots by reminding readers that torching cars is practically a national pastime for the socialist-oppressed French, who commit this arson an amazing 80 times a day even without rioting.

Meanwhile, the LA Times also wakes from its slumber on France, not to report on the continuing violence but to offer its analysis after ignoring the situation. The LAT does what it does best when reporting on riots -- it blames the police:

For years, the officers said, the police had warned that France's immigrant-dominated slums were on the verge of exploding, a slow-motion riot about to fast-forward. Culture clashes and economic woes had created a lost generation of mostly Muslim youths seething with hostility toward the state. Wrong-headed ideology had caused governments to pull back from low-income housing projects, or cites, allowing parallel societies ruled by criminal and extremist networks to flourish, officers said.

And several veterans agree with critics who say that France's rigid, paramilitary policing culture aggravated tensions between youths and officers. Even before the riots, an average of 3,500 cars a month were burned nationwide. ...

On the other hand, critics say flaws in French policing were among the fuses for the explosion. The French police excel at intelligence, investigations and crowd control, say academic experts and European and U.S. investigators. But in a hierarchical system, intelligence tends to flow up the chain of command, not to other officers in the field. And experts say police here are weaker at basic beat-cop patrolling, an area vital to the dramatic reduction of crime and unrest in U.S. cities in the last decade.

It's difficult to take this analysis seriously, when Sebastian Rotella includes this whopper:

The overall violence has declined markedly from its peak, but it continued this weekend, mainly in provincial regions.

Provincial? Lyon and Toulouse are provincial? I suspect they might object to that characterization. Rotella has not seen the wire services, apparently, since Wednesday.

Maybe we were better off when the American media didn't report
on this story. Except for Molly Moore at the Post, they've been uniformly terrible at getting the story straight.