Three Leading GOP Campaigns Condemn Coulter's Remarks

Less than a day after Ann Coulter called John Edwards a "faggot" at the Conservative Political Action Conference, the three leading Presidential candidates denounced Coulter for her insult:

Three of the leading Republican presidential candidates on Saturday denounced one of their party’s best-known conservative commentators for using an antigay epithet when discussing a Democratic presidential contender at a gathering of conservatives here.

The remarks by Ann Coulter, an author who regularly speaks at conservative events, were sharply denounced by the candidates, Senator John McCain of Arizona, Rudolph W. Giuliani of New York and Mitt Romney of Massachusetts. Their statements came after Democrats, gay rights groups and bloggers raised a storm of protest over the remarks. ...

Of the major Republican candidates, only Mr. McCain did not attend, but he denounced her remarks on Saturday morning. “The comments were wildly inappropriate,” said his spokesman, Brian Jones.

Mr. Giuliani said, “The comments were completely inappropriate and there should be no place for such name-calling in political debate.”

Kevin Madden, a spokesman for Mr. Romney, said: “It was an offensive remark. Governor Romney believes all people should be treated with dignity and respect.”

Coulter sent an e-mail to the Times claiming that "it was a joke," and that she wouldn't think of insulting gays by comparing them to John Edwards. It's a non-sequitur. We know she wanted to tell a joke, because that's what she does -- insult people through comedic name-calling. She probably meant "ragheads" as a joke last year, too. That's not the point -- and she knows it.

I had heard at CPAC from a couple of the campaigns to expect announcements about Coulter's remarks. Frankly, a failure to condemn this remark would have been problematic for any candidate who attended the conference, but it would have been the worst for Romney. He introduced her rather enthusiastically [see below], and she mentioned her inclination to support him during the same speech.

John Edwards has started using the video clip as a fundraising tool, and Howard Dean used the incident to bash Republicans more, but the real winner of this incident is ... John McCain. McCain didn't attend the conference and got excoriated by conservatives for this decision. He can point to the Coulter remark as an excuse for bypassing CPAC by calling it an extremist venue that he was correct to avoid. It's not true -- most of the CPAC attendees abhorred Coulter's remark when informed of it -- but he won't win their support now anyway, and it makes for a good ex post facto excuse.

UPDATE: Marcus in the comments questions whether Romney introduced Coulter enthusiastically, and Kathryn Jean Lopez questioned earlier today whether Romney introduced her at all. Good points both. Kathryn states, rather convincingly, that it's just proper manners to mention the following speaker, and that it's not an introduction in any formal sense. "A good thing" isn't all that enthusiastic, either, although it's certainly polite.

It's probably a better idea to focus more on Coulter's invitation from CPAC to speak there in the first place, rather than associate Coulter to a particular candidate because of CPAC's scheduling.

CPAC: The Wind-Down

CPAC continues to wind down, just before Tim Pawlenty takes the stage for his appearance at the conference. Exhibitors have started disassembling their booths, and the attendees have mostly left the exhibition hall. A couple of exceptions are Major Eric Egland and Muhammad Ali Hasan.

Major Egland has been walking the hallways to publicize his effort to get the American public to support the war, in both the Afghanistan and Iraq theaters (here with Mary Katharine Ham):

He's going to have a book published later this month, and will be attending the Eagle Summit on March 17th.

Muhammad Ali Hasan represents Muslims for America, which supports many (but not all) of the conservative agenda. They're backing Newt Gingrich for President, and may be the only organization to endorse both George Bush and Keith Ellison. He introduced himself to all of us and presented an intriguing enough platform that I though CQ readers might want to check it out.

Giuliani - What A Drag

The buzz here on the final day of CPAC doesn't have anything to do with policy, but with the dress code for Presidential candidates. Should they wear ties, or open-collar shirts with sport coats? Or, perhaps, a feather boa:

Rudy Giuliani's liberal stance on abortion, guns and gays wasn't his biggest problem yesterday as he addressed a conference of conservative activists - it was his having dressed in drag.

A whisper campaign targeting the front-running GOP White House contender's cross-dressing stunts at gala political dinners in New York and on "Saturday Night Live" was the hot topic among right-leaning activists.

"A lot of people are talking about it. It's not respectable. They use it as a way to highlight all of his other shortcomings," Las Vegas conservative Bruce Feher told The Post.

Giuliani, who addressed the key gathering yesterday, may top national GOP presidential polls, but conservatives already uneasy with Giuliani's positions on social issues were latching on to his gags as a drag queen.

If this is the worst problem Giuliani has with conservatives here at CPAC, then he can expect smooth sailing to the nomination. Dressing in drag is a comedic tradition that goes back to burlesque and probably further than that. Comedians like Milton Berle and the Monty Python troupe have made it a staple of humor over the last several decades, and I'd dare anyone attending costume parties to find one where not a single man cross-dressed for a laugh.

Critics complain that it doesn't look "presidential", but Rudy wasn't president at the time. He was Mayor, and his constituents didn't complain about it. No one can argue that it somehow made him less effective as Mayor, given his long track record of success in NYC.

Let's quit trying to find dirt in our own people and spend more time debating policy in an intelligent and mature fashion. Unless Giuliani starts taking meetings in drag, this is one of the sillier developments in a conference that has had more than its share of goofiness.

UPDATE: Perhaps we can get Mayor Giuliani to bid on e-Bay for one of Mary Katherine Ham's shoes. Jane has the scoop on this new fundraiser (for her and me).

CPAC, The Provocateur Watch

It remained rather quiet here until just a few moments ago, when Mike Stark showed up and tried to provoke an argument here on Bloggers Row. In case you didn't read about this on Hot Air, Stark showed up yesterday to get an autograph from Michelle Malkin and then started haranguing her about CPAC attendees not enlisting in the military. He videotaped the incident on his cell phone, and then Huffington Post for some reason gave him a forum to brag about his ohso-courageous intrusion on an event open to the public.

He brought his weak-assed crap to me and started going into his schtick. I stopped him and told him to go back to Huffington Post. He looked taken aback to be greeted with nothing more than tired disgust, and said, "I thought we were peers." Uh, no, Mike, we're not peers. You're a provocateur and a self-involved assault artist. Jeralyn Merritt, John Aravosis, James Boyce, and other real thinkers on the Left are my peers.

Stark slunk off after I refused to play his little game, probably to write something about how mean-spirited conservative bloggers can be, or maybe to plan his next performance-artist event. Anyone who finds this kind of mischief supportable has rocks in his head.

UPDATE: I was wrong about one point on this post -- Mike had someone else shooting the video, with a normal video camera. I got that point mixed up with another, unrelated incident. I regret the inaccuracy, which Mike's cameraman pointed out to me.

CPAC On A Saturday Morning

We're just getting underway here, but the energy level seems to have dialed down. We're about to head into some of the headlining events this morning, but the exhibition hall has barely awoken:

Blogger Row is pretty quiet, too. Some have already left, and the rest of us have spent most of the morning chatting over the events of yesterday. We're also working on strategies for the Victory Caucus and reviewing notes and photos for later posts. I've fixed my problems with my camera, so I will be posting more photos today and tomorrow from the entire conference.

I'll have more later. I'm looking forward to Tim Pawlenty and Newt Gingrich, and I'm trying to see if we can get Pawlenty here for an interview. Keep checking for updates!

NARN, The Travelin' Man Edition

The Northern Alliance Radio Network will be on the air today, with our six-hour-long broadcast schedule starting at 11 am CT. The first two hours features Power Line's John Hinderaker and Chad and Brian from Fraters Libertas. Mitch and I hit the airwaves for the second shift from 1-3 pm CT, and King Banaian and Michael Broadkorb have The Final Word from 3-5. If you're in the Twin Cities, you can hear us on AM 1280 The Patriot, or on the station's Internet stream if you're outside of the broadcast area.

I'm out of town at the CPAC conference, which I can also say about our governor, Tim Pawlenty. He'll be speaking at 2 pm ET, or 1 pm CT, when our show starts. Mitch will have to go it alone for the first hour, but I'll probably join him remotely for at least some of hour 2. I'll update everyone on CPAC, as well as other stories during the week.

Be sure to call and join the conversation today at 651-289-4488.

White House: Prosecutors Did Not Follow Priorities

The termination of seven US Attorneys resulted from a lack of performance to the priorities of the Bush administration and at least in one case was prompted by a complaint from a Republican Senator regarding that issue. Sources within the Department of Justice made clear that the political appointees fell out of favor when they did not meet the policy goals of the White House on immigrations and firearms, among other issues:

The White House approved the firings of seven U.S. attorneys late last year after senior Justice Department officials identified the prosecutors they believed were not doing enough to carry out President Bush's policies on immigration, firearms and other issues, White House and Justice Department officials said yesterday.

The list of prosecutors was assembled last fall, based largely on complaints from members of Congress, law enforcement officials and career Justice Department lawyers, administration officials said.

One of the complaints came from Sen. Pete V. Domenici (R-N.M.), who specifically raised concerns with the Justice Department last fall about the performance of then-U.S. Attorney David C. Iglesias of New Mexico, according to administration officials and Domenici's office.

Iglesias has alleged that two unnamed New Mexico lawmakers pressured him in October to speed up the indictments of Democrats before the elections. Domenici has declined to comment on that allegation.

Since the mass firings were carried out three months ago, Justice Department officials have consistently portrayed them as personnel decisions based on the prosecutors' "performance-related" problems. But, yesterday, officials acknowledged that the ousters were based primarily on the administration's unhappiness with the prosecutors' policy decisions and revealed the White House's role in the matter.

"At the end of the day, this was a decision to pick the prosecutors we felt would most effectively carry out the department's policies and priorities in the last two years," said Justice Department spokesman Brian Roehrkasse.

This makes more sense, and is perfectly legitimate. They are political appointees, and they serve at the pleasure of the President. If they are ignoring the administration's priorities, then these US Attorneys have to understand that they risk their further employment.

However, the White House once again has showed that it has some deficiencies in communication. It could have gotten ahead of this story by announcing their reasons for replacing these prosecutors in the beginning of the effort. The Bush team would have won some kudos if they stated openly (and honestly) that they wanted to pursue immigration cases more aggressively, and so had moved to replace US Attorneys who did not share their enthusiasm for this task.

The silence instead helped feed the notion that another kind of politics was in play. Rumors have arisen that the prosecutors fired would not play ball by investigating Democrats for allegations of corruption, with the clear implication that the purported charges had no merit. In the absence of communication from the White House, the sudden departure of almost 10% of the US Attorneys looked suspicious on some level, and that rumor gained strength. If in fact it were true, it would be a significant abuse of power.

We have less than two years left in this administration. It's probably too late to expect them to improve their communication skills, but the need still demonstrates itself.

MSM Coverage Of CPAC

CQ readers have had plenty of moment-by-moment coverage of the Conservative Political Action Conference, but how has CPAC played to the national media? With the exception of the convergence of Republican presidential hopefuls, it has mostly flown under the national radar. The New York Times, Washington Post, and Los Angeles Times mostly reported on the speeches from Rudy Giuliani and Mitt Romney, and the absence of John McCain.

The Gray Lady focuses almost entirely on the two GOP frontrunners, while using a picture of Sam Brownback:

Mitt Romney of Massachusetts and Rudolph W. Giuliani of New York are both Republican presidential candidates who have been voted into office by largely Democratic electorates. They both have a history of taking liberal positions on social issues. And both are viewed warily by conservative Republicans who are integral to the party’s presidential nominating process.

Mr. Romney, the former governor of Massachusetts, and Mr. Giuliani, the former mayor of New York, sought to address those challenges on Friday with speeches to conservative advocates gathered for an annual conference in Washington.

To a certain extent, they approached the task in similar ways: by presenting themselves as devotees of Ronald Reagan who had tamed Democratic excesses in their communities. Mr. Giuliani talked about cutting crime, welfare and taxes; Mr. Romney talked of cutting taxes and the size of government.

Yet they parted company on how they dealt with the more difficult question of their positions on social issues. Mr. Romney made no mention of his past support of abortion rights and gay rights, instead focusing on his current opposition to abortion and same-sex marriage. He portrayed himself as someone who stood at the barricades as his state sought to permit same-sex marriage and to remove restrictions from abortion and stem cell research.

The Post focuses more on the conservative activists attending the conference, calling them "glum" over the lack of a strong conservative presidential candidate:

Each year for more than three decades, a handful of icons of the American conservative movement have met for a friendly game of seven-card stud in a Washington hotel suite the night before the annual Conservative Political Action Conference, or CPAC.

This week, according to several participants, the mood around the poker table could hardly have been more glum.

"Nothing focuses the mind like an impending hanging," said longtime conservative fundraiser Richard A. Viguerie, paraphrasing the English essayist Samuel Johnson. "And Republicans feel an impending hanging with Hillary looming on the horizon."

The possibility of Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton as president was bad enough. Even worse is the absence of a Republican candidate to rally around.

The movement's leaders "are all pretty much agreed that there is no clear conservative choice," said the game's host, David A. Keene, chairman of the American Conservative Union. "Or even an unclear conservative choice."

The LA Times follows its Big Apple namesake, but manages to be the only national outlet that reported on the most controversial moment of the day:

The day's most controversial speaker proved to be conservative pundit Ann Coulter, who at the end of her speech — which followed Romney's — used a slur to refer to Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards.

Coulter said she had intended to comment on the former senator from North Carolina, "but it turns out you have to go into rehab if you use the word 'faggot,' so I … can't really talk about Edwards."

I'm not seeing much gloom here at CPAC, despite the mainstream media's reporting on the subject. I didn't watch the Vigurie speech, but it hasn't matched the mood here in the exhibition center. Attendees seem enthusiastic and engaged -- perhaps a little too much so. It's been almost a convention-like atmosphere with a lot of focus on the candidates and not enough on the specific issues of conservative thought, as though control of the event has slipped from the fingers of the organizers.

How so? The Romney campiagn has obviously organized a response from their youth support. We have seen a plethora of teenagers and young adults wearing Mitt Romney gear and acting as barkers in the main passageways. They have tried to harangue people into voting Mitt on the straw poll here at CPAC, and when Mitt made his appearance here, they formed a large and loud entourage, complete with organized cheers. Sam Brownback's campaign has tried to do something similar with their followers, and yesterday afternoon the two contingents ran into each other on Bloggers Row and started conducting a shout-off.

That doesn't say "glum" to me.

All three reports mention the rousing response Romney got for his speech yesterday, and I can tell you he left a lot of people impressed. He improved quite a bit from his NRI appearance in January. However, all three missed the fact that Romney and Brownback organized their followers to get that response, and Giuliani -- who got unfavorably compared to Romney on the basis of audience response -- had no such organization here at all. It seems like a bit of lazy reporting on the part of all three newspapers to not have presented that context.

There's no gloom here except from a few of the ideological purists, and some of the enthusiasm is canned. The majors missed both parts of the story.

Coulter Said What? (Bumped)

Ann Coulter is speaking at the moment, and drawing a huge crowd -- with longer lines than those for the Rudy Giuliani. She's definitely one of the stars here at CPAC, and I listened to the audio stream for a bit while she opened her speech. I had to take a phone call, though, and I missed a critical, and infuriating, throw-away line. Michelle Malkin reports (from two chairs down):

"I'd say something about John Edwards, but if you use the word 'faggot', you have to go to rehab."

Yeah, that's just what CPAC needs -- an association with homophobia. Nice work, Ann.

At some point, Republicans will need to get over their issues with homosexuality. Regardless of whether one believes it to be a choice or a hardwired response, it has little impact on anyone but the gay or lesbian person. We can argue that homosexuality doesn't require legal protection, but not when we have our front-line activists referring to them as "faggots" or worse. That indicates a disturbing level of animosity rather than a true desire to allow people the same rights and protections regardless of their lifestyles.

Ann Coulter can be an entertaining and incisive wit. Unfortunately, she can also be a loose cannon, and CPAC might want to consider that the next time around.

UPDATE: Sean Hackbarth has the audio.

UPDATE II and BUMP: Fascinating discussion in the comments. Since this is likely going to remain a hot topic today, let me add a few more thoughts in response to the points raised.

First, criticizing Coulter's use of the word "faggot" is not a suppression of free speech; it is an exercise of free speech. We're not advocating her arrest for using the word. We're just saying it was stupid, unnecessary, and hateful. This is no different than Melissa McEwan calling Christians "Christofascist Godbags" and Amanda Marcotte's incendiary hate speech about Catholics. We howled about that when John Edwards hired them; why do we defend Coulter's appearance at CPAC?

Also, if CPAC continues to invite Coulter to these events, then unfortunately, these little rhetorical bombs reflect on conservatives. We just spent most of the week criticizing John McCain for not meeting the conservative base at CPAC. If Coulter said this in an interview on her own, it would not have reflected on CPAC or conservatives but on herself. Yesterday, though, she used our platform for that little nugget of vileness -- and some in the audience cheered her for it. Conclusions can reasonably be drawn from that.

I had to laugh when someone noted the use of the word "fag" and "faggot" in Fast Times at Ridgemont High and the song "Money For Nothing". Yes, they're there, but we're not supposed to think highly of the people that use them. In the song, the "voice" is a whiny, shallow man (a physical laborer, for a bit of class warfare from Dire Straits) who thinks that musicians do nothing all day long. It's a critique, not a celebration, of that voice, from a musician obviously tired of hearing those comments from naysayers. In Fast Times, it's used for a realistic view of how teenage boys ridicule anything different. In fact, both of these comparisons show one of the problems with Coulter: she's juvenile. She's arguing at the level of a thirteen-year-old.

A few commenters compared "faggot" to the N-word, saying that gays use it as a term of endearment and then get hypocritically offended when straights use it to describe them. I'm not familiar with that level of usage, but let's say it's true. If Ann Coulter got up and desceribed Barack Obama as a "n----r" as part of a joke at an event like CPAC, would you think that reflected well on conservatives? Uh, no.

Bottom line: Coulter's remark was indefensible. She had the right to say it, but that doesn't make her right for saying it, and she deserves every bit of criticism she's getting.

UPDATE III: The Dire Straits song is actually titled "Money for Nothing", not "I Want My MTV". Thanks to the CQ commenters who pointed this out in the comments; I've corrected it above.

Romney Interview

Governor Mitt Romney just paid a visit to Blogger Row, and a number of the CPAC bloggers got a chance to interview him on the fly. I've podcasted our portion of the interview, and you'll hear NZ Bear and Philip Klein from The American Spectator on this segment.

Mitt comes across very well in person -- warm, funny, informed, and engaging. You'll catch some of that in this podcast, I think. I wanted to ask him if he would insist on a repeal of McCain-Feingold -- he came out in opposition to it in his speech -- but he had to move on before I could get the question out.

One more note ... the Brownback crowd shows a lot of enthusiasm for their candidate, and that's great. However, his followers tried drowning him out with Brownback cheers when he was talking to some of the bloggers. These campaigns need to dial down the confrontation and allow people to speak. We'll get enough mindless noise during the primaries.

CPAC: Mitt Romney

Mitt Romney is speaking now to the CPAC conference. I'm going to appear on Kevin McCullough's radio show in a few minutes and unable to watch all fo his remarks, thanks to a seriously delayed schedule for the speakers. He's talking about the necessity of conservatism, and how this country needs it more than ever. So far, it's an entertaining and engaging speech, and it's getting a similar reaction as Giuliani's in the hall. That's somewhat less surprising, since the Romney campaign has really pushed to get its activists all over the hall. If one had to guess the frontrunners in this race based on signage and stickers, Romney and Brownback would outstrip all others.

Like Giuliani, he's talking about his application of conservative fiscal values in one of liberalism's laboratories. He just committed to holding non-defense discretionary spending to current levels after inflation, minus 1%. He says that will save $300 billion to the bottom line and actually reduce the size of government.

Brownback, Part II

Sam Brownback paid a visit to Blogger Row after his speech in the hall. NZ Bear and I interviewed him, with his sizable Brownies trailing behind him. It's noisy, and NZ had to tell them to keep the cheering down at one point, but he sounded better in this interview than I think he did in his speech. Take a listen to the podcast for yourself.

UPDATE: CPAC named NZ Bear its Blogger of the Year! A great decision about a great blogger.

CPAC: Sam Brownback

Sam Brownback is just coming to the stage now, after we have just fixed our connectivity issues. Serendipity or coincidence? You make the call. I'll live-blog it either way ...

2:01 - Brownback pays homage to Ronald Reagan and Barry Goldwater. Reagan spoke at CPAC on twelve occasions, and he will get a lot of references today.

2:02 - Now he's honoring people like Phyllis Schlafly, who are appearing at this year's CPAC.

2:03 - "I'm taking the yellow brick road to the White House." Er, that's kind of strange, isn't it? Yes, I know he's from Kansas ...

2:04 - First topic is the war on terror, which he says is a misnomer. He says we have to name our enemies -- the extremists who want to impose totalitarianism on the West.

2:06 - Kind of a strained transition to immigration and border enforcement. "A fence is not sufficient" -- we have to do more. We need an instant verification system on Social Security numbers.

2:07 - He's talking about the tax code now; "This should be taken behind the barn and killed with a dull axe." The tax system is burdening the economy. He's endorsing the flat tax now, saying that the entrenched interests have defended the existing system. Why not give Americans a choice between both -- allowing a market approach to taxation policy?

2:09 - No one is paying much attention to Brownback's speech here in the hall.

2:11 - He's also talking about using the BRAC process for unlocking the partisan gridlock on other issues, but that implements a completely different system for Congress. They could adopt new parliamentary rules if they want, but it's unlikely they'll agree to do it across the board.

2:13 - "Cellulosic" ethanol - moving beyond corn to grass, although he took care to say he didn't mean marijuana. He may have just lost the all-important hemp activists within the GOP.

2:17 - He wants to declare war on cancer as part of his fight for life. He spoke movingly about his recent adoption of a little girl whose biological parents made the choice for life. He says that biological life starts at conception, and that should be obvious on a scientific basis.

2:18 - He will appoint judges that will overturn Roe and not create gay marriage.

2:21 - "Faith is a good thing ... separation of church and state does not require the removal of church from public view." He invokes William Wilberforce, who used his faith to argue for the end of slavery in the British Empire.

2:25 - Wrapping up; he says in answer to "why us, why now?", "Because ... it is your destiny." In my mind, it instantly recalled Darth Vader trying to convince Luke to switch to the Dark Side.

Overall, not exactly a riveting speech, although it hit all of Brownback's strong points. Romney will come up in about 20 minutes, if they catch up.

CPAC: Giuliani Speaks

Rudy Giuliani is speaking now at the CPAC conference, and he is drawing huge crowds -- not only in the Regency Ballroom where he is appearing, but also around every monitor in the exhibition hall. He's keeping the CPAC attendees riveted, and the place is otherwise as quiet as I've seen it since my early morning arrival.

George Will introduced him to the CPAC audience by noting that only three Presidents have served as mayors previous to their national election: Andrew Johnson, Grover Cleveland, and Calvin Coolidge, the latter being the last President with whom Will completely agreed. Will noted that the mayoralty of New York City carries specific challenges, calling it "liberalism's laboratory" and a center for "learned dependency". He spoke about Giuliani's conservative instincts -- such as when he declared fatherhood the best social program, or raising taxes a "dumb, stupid, idiotic, and moronic idea". Will assured the CPAC activists that Giuliani's conservatism is the same flavor as Lady Thatcher's, and that pugnacity is his political philosophy.

Rudy spoke afterwards, and he hit some familiar themes. He started by talking about the non-binding resolutions on the war, which he acknowledged Congress had every right of debating. However, Giuliani used this to show the general bankruptcy of leadership in American politics. America does not elect people to Congress to be commentators, but to make decisions. Let George Will do commentary, he said, as Will knows what he's doing. Congress should make decisions and live with the consequences, not abdicate their responsibilities or use the process of legislation to make meaningless, useless gestures.

Giuliani returned often to the theme of leadership. He talked about how Ronald Reagan defied public opinion to do the right thing so often, and becoming a great President in the process. He staged Pershings in Europe even though he got roundly excoriated for it. He refused to sign a bad deal at Rekjavik, and people claimed he would bring the end of the world.

He also alluded to his differences with CPAC activists. Giuliani said that he understands that we will have some differences, but told people to beware making your 80% ally a 20% enemy. He joked that he might have just described some marriages. Giuliani urged CPAC to focus on areas of agreement and to determine who will most effectively carry those points of agreement to the White House.

Afterwards, he spoke at length on national security. He says that the Democrats want to go back to the way we handled national security in the 1990s, allowing the US to remain paralyzed waiting for international approval. He drew great applause with this line: "We don't have to be ashamed of acting in our own interests."

Rudy ends by invoking Ronald Reagan a final time, saying we need peace through strength. He's getting a huge ovation as he leaves the stage, and it was a stirring speech, no doubt -- and no surprise.

If you want a clue as to his impact here at CPAC, I'll give you this description. Mitt Romney has turned out a fabulous response, with scores of young people acting as barkers for Mitt in the hallways. Campaign activists have prowled the hallways both days. Exhibitors have tried buttonholing passers-by to make their own special pleas. Everyone of these people gathered around television monitors, enraptured until the final word.

Very impressive, and tough to follow. Mitt Romney will be on at 2:45 pm ET today, and he'd better be bringing his A-game.

CPAC - Blogger's Row Visits

Normally, I'd be posting about visits here on Bloggers' Row as they occur, but they have been so overwhelming that it's been almost impossible to get the opportunity to actually write blogs. So far today, we've spoken with Newt Gingrich and Duncan Hunter, as well as news reporters from various networks.

Newt came through first, and he drew quite a crowd -- the biggest entourage outside of Michelle Malkin. He spent about 20 minutes speaking with us on the same issues we covered in my earlier interview on CQ Radio. He looks very relaxed and confident, and with the number of people insisting on having their picture taken with him, it's not hard to understand why. When he announces late in the year, the other candidates had better be prepared for a bleed-away of a portion of their support.

Duncan Hunter, who has already announced the official opening stages of his campaign, spent less time here in Bloggers Row. He has a tight schedule today, but emphasized his three-part basic message: strong national defense, enforceable borders, and a two-way street on trade. Hunter wants to hold China to task on trade "cheating", which he says Fed chair William Bernanke verified recently. I asked him if his tough talk on trade extends to NAFTA and CAFTA, but he demurred on specifics. I'm curious how the anti-free-trade talk will fly here at CPAC, where fiscal conservatives tend to think along the lines of globalization.

NZ Bear has more on Hunter's speech earlier.

Otherwise, it's been a zoo here at CPAC. We have so many visitors that we have trouble blogging -- but it's a blast. I even took a ride on a NASCAR simulator, and I'm sad to report that I will not get my NASCAR credentials any time soon. (I could get some for Demolition Derby, though.) The simulator was provided by OOIDA, a transportation-industry group hoping to get more exposure for their concerns on security and licensing.

Clinton White House Suppressed Hillary's Senior Thesis

The Hillary Clinton campaign will have a few more questions to answer about her husband's tenure in office after MS-NBC reported this morning that his administration demanded the suppression of her senior thesis at Wellesley:

"I got a call from someone at the White House — I don't remember who — shortly after the inauguration, saying the Clintons had decided not to release her thesis," professor Alan H. Schechter told MSNBC.com.

"I said, 'Why? It's a good thesis.' I got some mumbo jumbo about how they were beginning to work on health care and she had criticized Sen. Moynihan in the thesis, and didn't want to alienate him.'"

In fact, the thesis from 1969 contains not a negative word about Daniel Patrick Moynihan, the Democratic senator from New York, and Schechter allows that the real source of fear must have been the subject of the academic paper: Chicago radical organizer Saul Alinsky.

Schechter, a Clinton supporter who has contributed money to her campaigns, said that hiding the thesis, which got an "A" grade, was one of many "quite naive" decisions by the Clintons in those early days — he also lists making gays in the military the first priority, and trying to do too much with her health care plan. But liberals, he said — and he counts himself among them — tend to overreach instead of taking the incremental approach.

After the call from the White House, Wellesley's president, Nannerl Overholser Keohane, consulted with lawyers and closed access to any thesis written by a U.S. president or first lady, a rule affecting only Hillary D. Rodham's thesis. Keohane moved on later that year to be president of Duke University, and now is a visiting professor at Princeton, where she teaches political philosophy, leadership and feminist theory. An Arkansan who was eight years ahead of Hillary Rodham at Wellesley, Keohane is a regular contributor to Democratic candidates and to a congressional PAC that gives exclusively to Democrats, including Hillary Clinton.

On one hand, trying to determine someone's political views by reading a thesis written four decades earlier is silly. Ronald Reagan was an FDR Democrat until middle age, as were several Republican politicians. Hillary herself flirted with the College Republicans at one time in her career. People grow out of some nonsense, especially during their college years, when they have a lot of pressure to try out some of the sillier political positions on the spectrum.

However, the thesis isn't really the story. What's news is the Clinton effort to hide the thesis, proving once again that the coverup is worse than the crime. The Clintons had no problem extorting Wellesley into hiding Hillary's thesis, which makes one wonder what else the Clintons managed to bury during their two terms in the White House.

Hillary apologists have at times tried to distance themselves from the actions of Bill during the 1990s. This shows that the abuses of the Clinton years weren't limited to the man from Hope.

An Infusion Of Backbone At State?

The administration has had to fight for its policies on the war for the last several months, if not longer, a task that got tougher after the announcement of the surge in Baghdad and Anbar. The Republicans in the Senate, and to a lesser extent in the House, have had to battle the Democrats on a series of efforts to cripple the surge and defund the war, with varying degrees of unity. On that score, the White House seems determined to make itself clear on its direction:

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has tapped Eliot A. Cohen, a prominent writer on national security strategy and an outspoken critic of the administration's postwar occupation of Iraq, as her counselor, State Department officials said yesterday.

Cohen would replace Philip D. Zelikow, a longtime Rice associate who left the administration earlier this year to return to teaching history at the University of Virginia. Despite Cohen's sometimes caustic views on administration policies, officials said he has impressed both Rice and President Bush with his writings, especially "Supreme Command," a study of the relationship between civilian commanders in chief and their military leaders.

In hiring Cohen, a professor at the John Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies whose son served a tour of duty as an Army officer in Iraq, Rice has lured a leading figure of the neoconservative movement as her policies toward North Korea and Iran draw fierce attack from the Republican Party's right wing. Cohen has connections in that circle and deep roots in the military establishment, and he is likely to concentrate initially on Iraq and Afghanistan and on reshaping the State Department to better handle post-conflict environments.

The press will likely focus on the dissenting opinions of the new counselor over the past two years. He has at times called the White House "incompetent", using "cockamamie schemes" in rebuilding Iraq. As one of the more influential neoconservative thinkers, he has been a gadfly from the right for an administration beset by gadflies in all directions.

Cohen's hiring may mark a shift at State. Rice has received condemnation from the administration's base for her work on the crises in North Korea and Iran, especially the former. Former Rice supporters worry that she has drifted into the Colin Powell/Brett Scowcroft mode of realpolitik rather than emphasize a strong response to nuclear proliferators and terror-supporting states.

Cohen scolded the White House for an unrealistic approach to certain foreign-policy goals, and worse, for allowing itself to fall into a policy cocoon that punishes dissent. His hiring shows that the administration has listened to his criticism and wants to fix the problem. His arrival could signal a strengthening at State after a season of flirting with appeasement.

Profiles In Political Courage?

It's not often I disagree with my friend John Podhoretz at The Corner, but today's post on John McCain and CPAC struck me as rather odd. In response to a post by Kathryn Jean Lopez that scolded McCain for skipping both NRI and CPAC, John said that McCain was right to stay away:

If I were a McCain adviser, there's no way I would recommend he attend CPAC. The stakes are simply too high. It's a total sandbagging opportunity for people who want to derail him. The last thing he needs is a headline like "Conservatives boo McCain," and you know people attending CPAC know it and would love nothing more than to provide that headline. Anything less than a performance that wowed his enemies on the Right would only do him injury.

I understand John's analysis, but all this does is confirm that McCain has no business running for the Republican nomination. McCain has gone out of his way to stress his conservative credentials, especially on hot-button topics such as abortion and the war. If that's true, then what does he have to fear from a conference of conservatives predisposed to his positions? In fact, if he claims to represent conservatives, why should he fear speaking in front of a group of them?

We debated this quite a bit on Blogger's Corner yesterday (which is somewhat misnamed, since we occupy a row and not a corner, but that's another story).Someone made the point that the eventual nominee needs the people in this conference to act as foot soldiers in the general election. What does it say to those foot soldiers if that nominee is too afraid to face them because he might get booed -- a slim possibility in any case? How does that nominee inspire loyalty in those he explicitly spurned out of the gate?

If McCain wanted to win the nomination as a straightforward Rockefeller Republican, his snub would make sense. It makes none if he wants to convince us that he's more conservative than Rudy Giuliani and Mitt Romney, two men with spottier records than his but two men who had the intestinal fortitude to appear before conservatives to make their case. John is usually spot-on in his analysis, but he's off the mark here.

UPDATE: Another blogger here at the BC reminds me that Arlen Specter showed up here yesterday and gave a speech, and no one booed him -- and the conservatives have more reasons to boo Specter than McCain.

Pressed, Pakistan Comes Up With A Taliban Chief

A little pressure from the United States seems to have refocused Pakistan on their end of the war. Within days of the highest-level visit by the US in a long time, Pervez Musharraf's security forces captured a major Taliban figure -- in a city where Pakistan had insisted that al-Qaeda and the Taliban had no organization:

The former Taliban defense minister was arrested in Pakistan on Monday, the day of Vice President Dick Cheney’s visit, two government officials said Thursday. He is the most important Taliban member to be captured since the American-led invasion of Afghanistan in 2001.

The man, Mullah Obaidullah, was a senior leader of the Afghan insurgency, which has battled American and NATO forces with increasing intensity over the last year.

He is one of the inner core around Mullah Muhammad Omar, the Taliban leader. The leadership is believed to operate from the relative safety of Quetta, Pakistan, where Mullah Obaidullah was arrested.

It was not clear whether he was picked up before, during or after Mr. Cheney’s visit. But the timing may be significant because Mr. Cheney’s mission was intended to press Pakistan to do more to crack down on members of the Taliban and Al Qaeda who use Pakistan as a sanctuary.

Quetta sits near the Afghan border in Balochistan province. Pakistan had insisted that no significant Taliban operations existed in the border city prior to this arrest, but the sudden capture of a member of Mullah Omar's inner circle makes that harder to swallow.

Obaidullah had used a recent Reuters interview to brag about the capabilities of the Taliban army. He claimed that his forces could stand up to any foreign army, but in the same interview indicated that his new strategy would be to avoid direct confrontation with NATO and opt for suicide bombings on civilians instead. He was close enough to Omar to have that kind of insight. A Taliban spokesman captured in 2005 confirmed that Obaidullah was one of only a handful to have personal access to Mullah Omar, and is one of the four men thought to form the Quetta Council at the highest levels of the Taliban.

This makes the expected spring offensive a tough call for the Taliban. Obaidullah has to have had a large role in planning the military operations, such as they are, and his capture means that a significant security breach has to be assumed. They have probably arrayed their forces and logistics to conduct the opening operations. They either have to hope that Obaidullah can keep his mouth shut, or they will have to pull back their offensive operations and return to the drawing board.

Having Obaidullah in custody has significantly improved the situation in Afghanistan. If we can keep the pressure on the Pakistanis to continue rolling up the Taliban, the spring offensive may turn into a retreat before the first jihadi has a chance to blow himself up.

Porking Up The War Bill

I have questioned the use of supplemental appropriations to fund the Iraq war and the general war on terror for quite some time. That approach opens the funding process to even more shenanigans as the bills move through Congress, and it leaves the effort exposed to attacks from the anti-war Democrats, especially now that John Murtha controls defense spending in the House. The Democrats may have retreated on the latter issue for the moment, but Representatives have not lost their taste for pork:

As House Democrats wrangle over details of a $100 billion war spending bill -- including whether restrictions should be placed on troops sent to Iraq -- some members want to add significant money for agricultural relief, Hurricane Katrina reconstruction and other nonmilitary projects.

Rep. Collin C. Peterson (D-Minn.), who chairs the Agriculture Committee, said yesterday that rural states hit hard by floods, droughts and snowstorms in the past two years need $4 billion in emergency farm relief. And attaching the request to the war bill is the best way to insure they get it, he said.

Members from Gulf states want funds for improving levees in areas devastated by Katrina. And lawmakers from across the country say their states need federal help to cover deficits in a children's health insurance program.

As of yesterday, Rep. David R. Obey (D-Wis.), who chairs the House Appropriations Committee, had agreed to add about $3 billion to the war bill to help close military bases and relocate troops as part of the Base Realignment and Closure process. And he approved an additional $750 million for the State Children's Health Insurance Program, a joint federal and state program that provides health care for six million poor children.

Obey has not agreed to the farm-relief request, according to Democratic aides familiar with the discussions. But Peterson made it clear that conservative Democrats and some Republicans from farming communities would be inclined to support the war bill if it included disaster aid. "A lot of these guys are farm guys," Peterson said. "Disaster relief is important to them."

The Democrats apparently have turned quite cynical about their anti-war passions. If they can't stop the war -- and the Republicans have made it clear that they will not allow it -- then they'll hijack the funding bills in order to get their pet projects funded.

No one can explain why they need to get supplemental funding for these requests anyway. They just finished putting together the spending bills for the budget. Why not include these requests in the normal budget? After all, Hurricane Katrina hit over a year ago, and the Democrats campaigned on the real and perceived shortcomings of the federal response. The BRAC commission issued its report last year. None of these involve unforeseen issues, as should be the case in supplemental legislation.

I seem to recall campaign promises made by Democratic Party leaders that they would "drain the swamp" and start conducting earmark reform once they held the reins in the House. These amendments to the supplemental are worse than the normal pork one sees on spending bills, primarily because of their cost. At a time when the Democrats are puling over the expanding national debt, they're trying to conduct end-arounds to stick $3 billion in farm subsidies and another $750 million in covering an already dysfunctional health-insurance program that can't meet the budget it already has.

It's all the more egregious that House Democrats have hijacked a spending bill intended on supporting our troops in the field in order to bolster their own petty ambitions. They have done so not for any emergent need, but because the spending they want to pass will not stand on its own during a competitive budget process, and they know it. The Democrats had a chance to show that they could reform the budget system in the House, and instead they have demonstrated that they have more interested in making it cash out for themselves.

A Message To Putin

The US has sent a message back to Vladiimir Putin after his eruption at Poland and the Czech Republic for considering the installation of American missile-defense infrastructure. After the Russian president's threat to start aiming medium-tange missiles at eastern Europe, the Missile Defense Agency answered by adding the Caucasus as another desired site for their system:

The director of the U.S. Missile Defense Agency said Thursday that Washington wants to base an anti-missile radar in the Caucasus, a move that could provoke a further rift with Russia.

Lt. Gen. Henry A. Obering declined to specify which country the long-range radar could be installed in, but noted that "it would be very useful for the anti-missile system."

Speaking on a stop at NATO headquarters in Brussels, he said "we would like to place a radar in ... the Caucasus."

The United States has said the planned defenses would not be aimed at Russia, and are intended to defend against missile attacks from countries such as Iran.

It's hard to view that as anything less than a message to Putin, and the substance of that message is that we will not be cowed by the Kremlin.

It's not as if the Russians share our security concerns anyway. Their deputy Foreign Minister told the press that "In the modern world, security is indivisible." Funny, but they didn't seem to think that when they agreed to supply Iran with nuclear power and when they stuffed billions of dollars into Saddam's pockets. They made security divisible over the last few years, especially in Southwest Asia.

That left us with a security gap regarding Iran, who now tests missiles that have enough range to hit our allies in the Middle East as well as potentially those in eastern Europe, with the Shahab-3. They could add nuclear warheads to those missiles in six months, and we need to find a way to stop them. Since the Russians have made it much easier for them to develop the fissile material necessary for the nukes, we have to focus some of our effort on defense rather than prevention.

Why the Caucasus? It would give a more complete encirclement of Iran with the MDS. As Putin undoubtedly sees, it would also make a better shield from Russian missiles if the need arose, and given his recent moves in Belarus, Ukraine, and internally to Russia, he's making the case that it will. The message reminds Putin that the borders of his new empire are a great deal smaller than those of the Soviets, if he chooses to take Russia down that path again.

Huckabee Interview Set For Tonight (Bumped)

Show starts at 10 pm ET!

I've completed my interview with Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee, one of the presidential contenders in the GOP that has not garnered as much attention. It's not for lack of intelligence and commitment, as listeners will hear on tonight's show. Huckabee makes the case for a principled conservative, answers some of his critics, and insists that the Republican Party should nominate a Republican for President.

Be sure to check out Mike Huckabee's website for more information on his campaign.

In the second half of the show, I'll be joined by NZ Bear to discuss CPAC and the Victory Caucus. We'll also be taking your calls at 646-652-4889. Remember, the show airs live at 10 pm ET, and podcasts within minutes of its end.

CPAC Interview: Bill Simon, Rudy, & The Judges

Bill Simon paid a visit to Blogger's Row here at CPAC in his new role as missionary for the Rudy Giuliani campaign. Simon once ran for governor in California, losing to Gray Davis, which helped set the stage for the historic case of buyer's remorse that resulted in Davis' recall and the election of Arnold Schwarzenegger. He struck me as a warm and friendly person who has focused on his new mission to win the nomination for Giuliani.

I had not been aware of his professional connection between Simon and Giuliani, but the two worked together in the US Attorney's office in New York 22 years ago. I asked him what he learned about Rudy in the time the two worked together, and he said that he found teamwork, leadership, and accountability. Simon found Rudy to be a loyal but tough leader in the civil and criminal casework that his office handled.

Given the conservative skepticism towards Rudy, I asked Simon what he felt might make conservatives most comfortable with Giuliani. He spoke about Rudy's commitment to fiscal discipline and focus on freedom. In the years that Giuliani ran New York City, crime went down and people began to feel as though the Big Apple could be a livable city. Social issues will come in second to security and leadership, Simon believes.

I asked Simon about the recent issue with judges. The Politico posted an article on Rudy's track record on judicial nominations, and reported that Giuliani appointed more Democrats than Republicans to the bench as Mayor. Hower, Simon called this misleading. The mayor does not have a free hand in judicial appointments in New York City. An independent panel gives the mayor a choice of three candidates for each open seat, and the mayor has to select from those three. Rudy did not choose the candidates; he had to select one of three locked-in choices.

CPAC Live Blog: Dick Cheney

I'm at CPAC's final event of the night to watch Dick Cheney address the CPAC conference.

7:45 PM ET - Thanking the people who introduced him. He also acknowledged the people he met on his last trip, mentioning Bagram specifically, and encouraging all of us to remember and honor them. The conference's chair has a daughter who just finished a tour in Iraq.

7:47 - "I'm probably the last non-candidate you'll see this weekend." Good laugh. Too bad John McCain didn't say it.

7:51 - Reviewing the economy in the context of what has happened in the last six years. GDP has risen over 16%, an amount equal or greater than the entire economy of Canada. This shows the fallacy of economics as a zero-sum game. This has come from the tax breaks that allowed the economy to thrive.

7:53 - Revenues have risen by $520 billion in the last two years, the greatest two-year period in history.

7:55 - Earmark control is a key indicator for fiscal seriousness in Congress. So also is the permanent adoption of the Bush tax cuts. "No nation has taxed their way to prosperity." Cheney implies to the CPAC conference that Bush will veto any tax increases. Of course, they don't have to increase the taxes -- merely avoid prolonging the Bush tax cuts.

7:58 - Energy policy next. Cheney says that we need to diversify our energy production, including opening up domestic sources of oil, such as ANWR.

8:00 - Judges and security are the two keys for the next two years, Cheney says. We have defeated all terrorist attempts to strike the United States, but that doesn't mean it won't happen again if we don't remain vigilant.

8:02 - We'll be on the offensive against the Taliban this spring, Cheney promises. They want to beat the Taliban to the punch, and for good reason. He also notes that the Senate voted to confirm David Petraeus, and then tried to cut off the troops he said he needed to conduct an offensive in Iraq. Cheney says that every message we send has multiple audiences, and we cannot allow our enemies to believe they can outlast us.

8:06 - "If you support a war on terror, then it only makes sense to support sending troops where the terrorists are." He also had a good line about how the strategic disaster that will accompany a retreat from Iraq is an "inconvenient truth".

8:07 - Wrapping up the speech by thanking the activists of CPAC in making a better nation and a better world.

8:09 - Michael Steele followed Dick Cheney to the podium, and he cracked off the best line of the evenng: "In the words of Joe Biden, isn't he articulate?"

CONCLUSION: Michael Steele again impresses in a short appearance at the dais. He did forget to introduce the clergyman who was to offer grace, but otherwise he was completely charming. The GOP really should have made him their national chairman; they missed an opportunity there.

CPAC, The Silly Season

So far, we've spent most of our morning getting to know one another and prepping for some of the more anticipated events scheduled for later. I've been sitting between Jane and Mary Katherine Ham while I've prepped for my interview with Mike Huckabee, which means I'm having way too much fun. However, we're not the only ones getting silly. So far, we've seen someone in a dolphin costume handing out anti-Mitt literature, someone else handing out Mitt flip-flops, and a line of men about a mile deep to see Michelle Malkin.

I'm hoping to get pictures of the lighter moments, and I'll post them back here when I do.

Bullish On The Iraqis

I have a new essay up at American.com, a project of the American Enterprise Institute, about the new agreement on oil revenue in Iraq. The agreement opens the door to eventual reconciliation and a success for the US in the Middle East:

With most of American politics focused on the troop surge and partisan maneuverings over its implementation, another story has gotten lost: The Iraqis themselves have made important progress in a basic economic issue that has fueled the sectarian divide. ...

Over the past three years, the politicians were unable to settle on an equitable and secure revenue-sharing plan that still allowed the Kurds and the Shi’ites to manage their own resources. But now things have changed. The Kurds, who had held out the longest, agreed to share their oil revenues on a basis that had already won support from the Shi’ites and the Sunnis. Two days later, the Iraqi cabinet approved the deal, and the Iraqi Parliament will likely vote it into law.

Does this address the fundamental differences that have produced dissent and Sunni insecurity in the past? It appears to. It takes the collection of oil revenues out of the hands of regional governments and invests it into the central government. The Sunnis may not control the central government any longer, but they have more representation in Baghdad than in Basra or Kirkuk. They also won central government oversight over oil contracts, ensuring that oil revenues could not be hidden or controlled by the regions. This turned out to be one of the major stumbling blocks, with the Kurds insistent that Baghdad not be allowed to force contracts on the regions or require approval from national bureaucrats. Instead, the parties agreed to give the national government the power to “prevent” contracts from being executed, a bit of wordsmithing that allowed the Kurds to acquiesce.

I've written about this a few times over the last week, but American.com allowed me to pull all my thoughts together into one place. Be sure to read it all.

Jim DeMint Visits Blogger Row

Senator Jim DeMint stopped by Blogger Row, in part to speak to his support for Mitt Romney for the GOP nomination. DeMint spoke for just a few minutes, but made the case that the federal government needs a strong CEO to straighten out the chaos and confusion of the bureaucracy. He likes what Mitt did in Massachussetts to find creative solutions that can gather bipartisan support, and feels that talent would be put to good use in the White House.

He covered a few other issues as well. I asked him to comment on the administration's apparent reversal on negotiating with Iran and Syria on Iraq's security. He responded that he had not heard of any reversal, but that he didn't see a problem in attending a conference which included both nations and still excluded direct negotiation with Iran. After all, he said, we deal with a lot of bad players at the UN, too.

DeMint also talked about tax reform, telling us that the "courage" may not exist for meaningful tax reform, but he remains hopeful. He's open to the national sales tax plan if it replaces the current income-tax system, especially since it will make collections easier and more transparent.

He also committed to a filibuster on the proposal to allow unions to organize on the basis of check cards rather than secret ballots. "We will not allow that one to pass," he assured the bloggers.

Live On Blogger's Row

I've managed to make it to CPAC's Blogger Row, sponsored by Townhall, and it's looking pretty sweet. We're at one end of the exhibition hall, and we get a great view of the people passing through the hall. CPAC has set us up with a closed-circuit television for watching some of the events down here, rather than hiking up to the conference rooms.

I've met the blogger behind See Jane Mom, a delightful Southern mom with a great sense of humor. Robert Bluey, who's blogging at Heritage, just arrived, and we have a few others starting to trickle into the area. I've alreay heard that Mitt Romney will be meeting with us later this morning for a chat.

I'm hoping to post a few pictures later, but at the moment, the camera won't transfer pictures to the computer. I'm going to work on that, and start making plans on which events I will attend. They're going to overlap quite a bit, and I want to leave enough space for blogging. More later ...

Democrats Have To Double Down On Dollar Bill

Normally, committee assignments get approved by voice vote with no opposition. The political parties have plenty of incentives to allow themselves to police their own, and confrontation will breed more confrontation later. However, the Republicans have decided to risk it in order to force individual Democrats in the House to cast a vote approving the assignment of William Jefferson to the Homeland Security Committee, despite an ongoing corruption probe:

House Republicans plan to force a floor vote on the appointment of Rep. William J. Jefferson (D-La.), who is the subject of a federal bribery investigation, to a seat on the Homeland Security Committee.

The decision to put Jefferson on the panel was made by Speaker Nancy Pelosi (Calif.), and House Democrats endorsed the move at a private meeting Tuesday night, but his appointment must be confirmed by a vote on the House floor. Such an action would normally be a formality, but Republicans said yesterday that they would pursue a rarely used maneuver to force a recorded vote on the matter. ...

A spokesman for Pelosi said she opted to place Jefferson on Homeland Security because the panel oversees the Federal Emergency Management Agency. Jefferson had been a vocal critic of FEMA's performance during Hurricane Katrina, which affected thousands of his constituents.

But his appointment must be formally approved by the House, and Republicans said they would take the rare step of challenging the vote and requiring members to record their votes so Democrats will be forced to go on the record in their support of Jefferson.

Such appointments usually are ratified on the House floor by unanimous consent.

It's a good call in this case. The FBI found over $90,000 in cash sitting in Jefferson's freezer, the alleged result of a bribe from an official of another country. Denny Hastert and Nancy Pelosi defended Jefferson against a subsequent FBI raid on Jefferson's Capitol Hill offices, and the backlash was enough to get them both to eventually back away from Jefferson.

Pelosi says that Jefferson's district deserves to have representation on the Katrina subcommittee. That may well be true, but unfortunately his district elected a corrupt politician who cannot be trusted with the assignment. Jefferson proved that during Katrina, when he shanghaied National Guard rescue personnel to help him clean out his house in the middle of the storm. Instead of saving lives, Jefferson had them saving sofas -- hardly an endorsement of his good judgment on the cleanup efforts.

Peter King says he fails to see how Democrats can cast a vote in the open for Jefferson. We'll see. If Pelosi continues to play the Katrina card, she may pull it off, but she leaves the Democrats open for attacks on the "culture of corruption" strategy they used in 2006.

Monday-Morning Quarterbacking on North Korean HEU

In 2002, the US discovered evidence that North Korea bought at least 20 uranium centrifuges from Pakistan, through the AQ Khan network, even though Pyonyang had agreed not to pursue nuclear weapons. The US accused North Korea of reneging on the Agreed Framework, as it determined that the Kim regime would use the purchases to develop their own program for highly-enriched uranium (HEU). Kim's government rejected the charges, and the US suspended oil shipments to the energy-poor North. Less than a year later, Pyongyang admitted that they have been working on plutonium-based weapons for years and refused to negotiate an end to that program, a decision that resulted in last year's nuclear test and an arsenal estimated at between six to fifteen nuclear weapons.

Now, new intelligence shows that the Kim regime may not have done much with the centrifuges they bought from Pakistan, and the New York Times and Senate Democrats are outraged over what they see as another intelligence failure:

For nearly five years, though, the Bush administration, based on intelligence estimates, has accused North Korea of also pursuing a secret, parallel path to a bomb, using enriched uranium. That accusation, first leveled in the fall of 2002, resulted in the rupture of an already tense relationship: The United States cut off oil supplies, and the North Koreans responded by throwing out international inspectors, building up their plutonium arsenal and, ultimately, producing that first plutonium bomb.

But now, American intelligence officials are publicly softening their position, admitting to doubts about how much progress the uranium enrichment program has actually made. The result has been new questions about the Bush administration’s decision to confront North Korea in 2002.

“The question now is whether we would be in the position of having to get the North Koreans to give up a sizable arsenal if this had been handled differently,” a senior administration official said this week. ...

“The administration appears to have made a very costly decision that has resulted in a fourfold increase in the nuclear weapons of North Korea,” Senator [Jack] Reed said in an interview on Wednesday. “If that was based in part on mixing up North Korea’s ambitions with their accomplishments, it’s important.”

Context remains important here, which both Reed and the Times fail to consider. Intelligence is not an exact science, and conclusions have to be drawn on spotty evidence at times. The United States cannot allow itself the luxury of academic analysis paralysis; we have to prepare to meet danger before it becomes an unassailable fact, and that is especially true with nuclear proliferation.

No one disputes the fact that North Korea clandestinely bought 20 uranium centrifuges from Pakistan. That broke their part of the Agreed Framework, a violation that the US could not just ignore. After all, there are no other uses for uranium centrifuges than to enrich uranium, a process which the Kim regime supposedly had eschewed as part of the 1994 treaty. It seems a fairly reasonable conclusion that Kim didn't spend his hard currency on the centrifuges just to put them in a museum, but to enrich uranium.

When confronted on this, Kim refused to acknowledge it. That left the US a couple of choices. One, we could continue to operate our side of the agreement and supply them with oil while we attempted to get them to acknowledge that they were pursuing HEU. The other was to cut them off and force them back to the table.

The Times gets another point dreadfully wrong. The way that David Sanger and William Broad tell the story, Kim didn't start developing plutonium weapons until after we stopped shipping oil after the centrifuge purchase. That's ludicrous. North Korea doesn't have the expertise to develop plutonium weapons in less than four years. They had been working on the plutonium program ever since the Agreed Framework in 1994 left a huge hole where verification should have been. They had been cheating all along, and apparently wanted to see if they could add HEU to the plutonium program, and got caught.

Apparently no one has considered the possibility that the reason Kim doesn't have an HEU program is because the US publicly called them out on their efforts. Had we jollied them along in 2002, they may have been farther along than Iran in building centrifuges. In any case, this outrage over a reasonable and prudent policy decision based on the intelligence and evidence in hand in 2002 is nothing more than another non-event, twisted for partisan ends.

Move Over, Omar

The Taliban have a new commander and a new public face for their terrorism. Mullah Dadullah has become the new rock star of the jihad in Waziristan, and his emergence could portend an especially tough spring for Afghanistan and its NATO defenders:

If Osama bin Laden likes being in the global spotlight, he's likely a bit depressed in his hideout these days. The leader of the al-Qaida terrorist organization hasn't made an appearance on the evening news for quite some time. What's more, the Taliban no longer need bin Laden as a figurehead. Western intelligence agencies warn that the Taliban now have "their own star" in their struggle against Western soldiers and the Afghan government of President Hamid Karzai. The new nightmare from the Hindu Kush Mountains is called Mullah Dadullah. He sports a pitch black beard, always wears a military jacket and these days, he is omnipresent in the media. ...

Western intelligence agencies believe the Taliban have used the winter to thoroughly tighten their organizational structure. Some Taliban commanders are even reporting that Taliban leader Mullah Omar -- who disappeared from the scene entirely for years -- is once again writing letters to his supporters, congratulating successful commanders and the parents of suicide bombers and reminding militants of their "Islamic duties" via audio recordings. For years, one-eyed Omar had disappeared without a trace -- likely afraid of being tracked down by the CIA.

But Mullah Omar seems to be feeling more secure these days -- as does Mullah Dadullah, who only recently outlined his vision for the coming months. Behaving almost like any normal politician, he invited al-Jazeera journalists to visit him in the mountains. His words were alarming despite being full of rhetoric and propaganda. Dadullah said he commands 6,000 men who have volunteered for suicide attacks, and that their offensive is "imminent." He added that some of his men are already set off on their mission, which he described as a "bloodbath for the occupiers." This week's symbolic attack on US Vice President Dick Cheney is reason to fear that Dadullah is issuing more than just empty threats.

The Taliban have taken comfort in the internal divisions within the NATO alliance, especially those which demonstrate a lack of enthusiasm for manning the front lines. As a whole, they have engaged their supporters much more openly than any time since their ejection from Kabul. The films of their camps feature far more open faces, and the jihadis seem unafraid to give their full names.

Some of this is patently fake. Last week the terrorists tried to float a video showing that the Taliban had overrun a NATO camp, but it turned out to be a badly-produced hoax. The videos feature grenade launches ad nauseam, interspersed with some stock footage of damaged American military vehicles. Insh'allah, the tapes inform the viewer, the terrorists will hit us again. However, they don't appear to note that five years after they got unceremoniously booted out of Afghanistan, they're still on the outside looking into their former stronghold.

NATO faces some hard choices nonetheless. Dadullah plans on a strategy of suicide attacks across the country, a terrorist favorite that is hard to defense. Commanders at NATO announced that they would quickly mount an offensive to meet the threat, but fighting them in Afghanistan after they disperse will be nearly impossible. If NATO wants to do something effective, they're going to have to attack their bases in Pakistan, if the Pakistanis continue to refuse to do it themselves. It's no different than our own forward strategy to engage the terrorists on their home turf rather than fight them on our home ground.

Otherwise, we'd better be prepared to see the legend of Mullah Dadullah grow. Every successful suicide bombing will be seen as a major victory against the NATO forces by the jihadists -- and by defeatists in the West. The time to act has arrived.

McCain Announces On Letterman

Don't miss the update below!

I missed this yesterday while I traveled to Washington DC for the CPAC conference, but John McCain explicitly announced that he would run for President in 2008. One might think that CPAC would have provided a good platform for that event, but instead he chose Late Night with David Letterman:

Setting aside any doubt, Republican Sen. John McCain of Arizona announced Wednesday he would seek the presidential nomination.

McCain, who had a presidential exploratory committee, made the declaration on the "Late Show with David Letterman," taped earlier Wednesday.

"We are going to formally announce it in early April," John Weaver, a top adviser to McCain, told CNN.

Obviously, Letterman's show has national reach, but it seems more than a little strange in two ways. First, it reminds people of Arnold Schwarzenegger's announcement on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno, but with little of the surprise. Did anyone think John McCain was not going to run for President? Secondly, it wasn't even the formal announcement. McCain's staff had to explain that the formal announcement -- which affects contributor and spending status -- will come sometime in April, and which has become even more of an anti-climax.

Conservatives attending CPAC might wonder why McCain has the time to gladhand Letterman while claiming that any of the three days of CPAC won't fit into his schedule. Considering McCain's claims to be our true representative in the race, the conservative activists gathered here at the Omni Shoreham hotel might expect him to reprioritize a bit.

CBS sent around a few quips from the broadcast by e-mail to everyone. This one sounds enlightening:

“Well, you may remember that in the last election there was some conversation about me being Vice President of the Untied States, it wasn’t clear which party."

Hah, hah. He's a regular laugh riot. I don't think most of us found it funny in 2004, when he played a little public footsie with John Kerry for a few weeks, before finally coming out and explicitly stating that he would endorse George Bush. And given his support for a liberal approach to immigration reform and campaign finance reform, some might still question which party he hopes to represent in 2008.

UPDATE: Apparently, it isn't a scheduling problem, either. McCain tried to organize a reception for attendees at the Omni Shoreham duing the conference without engaging with the event's organizers:

Sponsors of the Conservative Political Action Conference, which begins today in Washington and brings together thousands of conservative leaders and grass-roots activists, say the Arizona Republican has "dissed" organizers by attempting to schedule a private reception for attendees after rejecting invitations to speak at the event. ...

Convening through Saturday at a sold-out Omni Shoreham Hotel, the 34th annual CPAC will feature personal appearances and nationally televised speeches by every Republican presidential hopeful except Mr. McCain, said David A. Keene, chairman of the ACU, which, along with Young America's Foundation and Human Events, is a principal sponsor of CPAC.

Conservative activists have speculated that Mr. McCain did not want to be seen on television "pandering" to Republican "right-wingers" but wanted to court those same activists at a reception in the same hotel.

"He turned down repeated CPAC offers to speak but then tried to get around us by having his office call the hotel to rent a room for a reception for CPAC attendees -- without first seeking approval of CPAC organizers," said Mr. Lauderback.

So he could make it for the party, but couldn't be bothered to speak at the conference? Does anyone at Team McCain understand how insulting that is? Their official response says that "The senator has run, been elected and served as a conservative and looks forward to talking about his conservative record throughout the course of this campaign," but apparently not with the conservatives he supposedly represents.

I'm still betting that someone buys a vowel at the McCain campaign and he winds up on the speaker list. No one can get something this basic this wrong for this long.

CQ Radio From The Nation's Capital

I've landed in Washington DC for the CPAC conference tomorrow. I'm not staying at the Omni Shoreham, where the conference is being held; I got my reservations too late to get a room there. I'm nearby, in a hotel where the accommodations can best be described as "prison chic". The bed appears to be the Mahatma Gandhi model offered at finer hotels everywhere, but it'll do. I don't plan to spend much time here anyway.

The Internet show tomorrow will feature at least one interview, with Arkansas Governor and Presidential contender Mike Huckabee. Describing himself as the one true conservative in the race, and one of the few Republicans running with extensive executive experience in public office, Huckabee wants to re-enact 1992 when another Arkansas Governor came out of nowhere to win the nomination. I'll also update listeners on the events at CPAC, and take your calls at 646-652-4889.

Early Polling Shows Obama Gaining On Hillary

Keep in mind that polling this early in a presidential cycle has the same level of predictive value as Uncle Earl's trick knee has in alerting you to bad weather. With that in mind, if not in knee, the front-page article at the Washington Post on their latest polling does show some developing storms for the presumed frontrunner in the Democratic Party nomination race:

The latest poll put Clinton at 36 percent, Obama at 24 percent, Gore at 14 percent and Edwards at 12 percent. None of the other Democrats running received more than 3 percent. With Gore removed from the field, Clinton would gain ground on Obama, leading the Illinois senator 43 percent to 27 percent. Edwards ran third at 14 percent. The poll was completed the night Gore's documentary film "An Inconvenient Truth" won an Academy Award.

Clinton's and Obama's support among white voters changed little since December, but the shifts among black Democrats were dramatic. In December and January Post-ABC News polls, Clinton led Obama among African Americans by 60 percent to 20 percent. In the new poll, Obama held a narrow advantage among blacks, 44 percent to 33 percent. The shift came despite four in five blacks having a favorable impression of the New York senator.

African Americans view Clinton even more positively than they see Obama, but in the time since he began his campaign, his favorability rating rose significantly among blacks. In the latest poll, 70 percent of African Americans said they had a favorable impression of Obama, compared with 54 percent in December and January.

That contrasts with a poll taken by CNN, which shows black voters giving Obama a "cool reception" and favoring Hillary by 15-20 points. However, as poorly predictive as a February 2007 poll is to the 2008 primary races might be, it still has more credibility than a poll conducted in the first week of December. That's when CNN took the poll that for some reason they released last night:

The CNN/Opinion Research Corporation poll conducted December 5-7, 2006, found that 65 percent of whites thought America was ready, compared with 54 percent of blacks. The poll's margin of error was plus-or-minus 5 percentage points.

I'd say it was plus-or-minus 12 weeks.

The Washington Post poll has more interesting data in its internals. Hillary has now dropped below 50% in favorability, with a thin +1 differential and only a 3-point undecided margin. Obama has a 53% approval rating and a +23 differential. It shows two candidates going in opposite directions, and with Obama scoring better among black voters, both trends will probably continue.

Over on the GOP side, Giuliani continues to outstrip the competition. He's extended his lead over the #2 man, John McCain, from 7 points in January to 23 points now. Newt Gingrich scores a third-place position without having made any moves to join the race, garnering 15%. If he is removed from the equation, most of his support goes to Giuliani, a dynamic that seems very strange on policy, but very predictable based on leadership. Mitt Romney continues to trail in the polling, coming in a distant fourth at 4%.

These numbers will get plenty of discussion -- and plenty of criticism -- at CPAC, which starts tomorrow. I'll be traveling after work tonight to DC to attend the conference and look forward to seeing all of the Republican candidates make their cases for nomination to the gathered conservatives. (Well, almost all.) Keep checking back during CPAC for interviews and assessments during the day.

Citadel Of Capitalism Demands Government Subsidy

When relatives come to the Twin Cities for a visit, natives usually have to endure at least one trip to the Mall of America. The largest shopping mall in the US sports three levels of retail stores and restauarants, and a walk around each level will put three-quarters of a mile on the pedometer. With the revenue that the mall generates, one could feed a small nation -- and yet, when the owners want to add more parking as part of an expansion project that will generate even more revenue, where to they go to cover the cost?

This year, the megamall wants $181 million from state taxpayers to build an 8,000-space parking garage. That's the centerpiece of a package of state and local subsidies worth about $234 million, money the Mall of America says it needs for a $1.9 billion expansion that would double its size.

Last year, state legislators didn't vote on a measure that would have redirected more than $200 million of its future property tax bill toward construction. This time, the mall wants city and state taxpayers to share the burden.

In meetings with legislators, lobbyists representing the mall have insisted that taxpayers will more than earn back these subsidies through higher sales tax revenues, more jobs and extra tourism generated by an even larger megamall. The proposed expansion is known as Phase II.

It will include four hotels, an National Hockey League-size skating arena and a 6,000-seat performing arts center.

"As the biggest beneficiary of this economic development project, the state of Minnesota has the most to gain or lose if this project does not go forward," Bloomington Mayor Gene Winstead and Bloomington Port Authority President Robert Erickson wrote in a Feb. 26 letter to lawmakers.

One part of me almost shrugs at this request. After all, the state will build and then give away at least one stadium to a professional sports team over the next few years, and almost certainly two of them. Legislators gave all sorts of strange reasons to give away hundreds of millions of dollars in taxpayer money to the Minnesota Twins, a private enterprise owned by a billionaire who employs millionaires to play 83 games a year here in Minnesota. Why not give hundreds of millions to a multi-billion-dollar developer whose property employs thousands of ordinary Minnesotans?

Well, one reason would be that the government shouldn't use tax money to subsidize private enterprise, unless the government owns a stake in the enterprise itself. Minnesotans will "subsidize" the mall as they see fit by shopping there, if they desire; if they do not, then the government doesn't need to bail out the developer. All of the citizens of the state would have to see their tax money go to expand the already-massive MOA, regardless of whether they like the mall -- and regardless if the mall competes with their own business.

Proponents of the subsidy justify it as an investment in future tax earnings by the state. Perhaps that might even be true -- I'd like my friend and super-economist King Banaian to judge that -- but that's true of every significant private commercial construction project in the state. If the state should foot the bill for MOA's new parking structure, why shouldn't taxpayers pay the bill for every single new build or remodel of commercial property?

Government should use taxes for public projects: roads, schools, security, and the like. If we have enough money in the budget for subsidizing stadiums and parking garages for private enterprises, then we have collected too much money in taxes. Let the Mall of America pay for its own expansion, and then lower the taxes all of us have to pay. Let the individuals choose which enterprises they want to "subsidize" through a free market and normal competition. That makes much more sense and will have a much better effect on the state economy in the long run.

Sadr City Showdown

Combined US and Iraqi forces swept through Sadr City yesterday, arresting more than a dozen suspected militia members and making a statement about the lack of limitation on the new surge operation. The US characterized their targets as "rogue" elements of the Mahdi Army and the captured could include as many as ten Iraqi policemen:

American and Iraqi troops on Tuesday stormed several buildings in Sadr City, Baghdad’s main bastion of Shiite militancy, and detained at least 16 people suspected of participating in militia violence including killings, kidnappings and torture, the American military and local officials said.

The early morning raids appeared to be the largest military operation in Sadr City since the new American-led crackdown began this month, intended to wrest control of Baghdad, the capital, from sectarian militias.

American and Iraqi forces have conducted aggressive sweeps through neighborhoods abutting Sadr City, but Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki has resisted a large-scale push into that teeming, working-class district itself for fear of antagonizing the Mahdi Army, the militia loyal to the Shiite cleric Moktada al-Sadr that is entrenched there.

Conflicting reports of attacks arose yesterday. News agencies reported that a bomb had exploded in a playground, killing at least eighteen, most of them children playing soccer. However, Centcom insisted that no attack had taken place at the location cited in the reports, which is adjacent to an American military position. The only explosion Centcom knew about on Tuesday was the one they caused themselves when they blew up an ammunition cache. They miscalculated the force of the blast, and it blew out nearby windows and created a scare for the neighborhood's residents.

Even better news came from Ghamas, in the southern part of the Diwaniya province. Security forces arrested over a hundred followers of the Shi'ite splinter group that attempted an attack on the Shi'ites in Najaf. The aim of the Soldiers of Heaven cult group was to eliminate the traditional Shi'ite religious leadership there and take over the town. Instead, hundreds of them died fighting the Iraqi Army, supported by US forces.

The latest push shows that the Maliki government meant what it said when it gave the green light to the new rules of engagement in Baghdad and around the country. Shi'ite militias have been confronted and shut down, including "rogue" Mahdi elements. Sadr City is no longer a sanctuary for death squads. If the Mahdis continue to stand down, the pacification of Sadr City may come sooner than expected -- and the surge will have proven itself successful.

How Discovery Channel Lost Its Groove

The news that the Discovery Channel, a leading organization in the attempt to make science and education more attractive and entertaining, would broadcast a documentary by James Cameron and Simcha Jacobovici claiming to have found the bones of Jesus and evidence of his marriage has begun to backfire. Archeologists have condemned the conclusions drawn from the evidence by Cameron and Jacobovici, including one who ran the site from which the ossuaries come:

Leading archaeologists in Israel and the United States yesterday denounced the purported discovery of the tomb of Jesus as a publicity stunt.

Scorn for the Discovery Channel's claim to have found the burial place of Jesus, Mary Magdalene and -- most explosively -- their possible son came not just from Christian scholars but also from Jewish and secular experts who said their judgments were unaffected by any desire to uphold Christian orthodoxy.

"I'm not a Christian. I'm not a believer. I don't have a dog in this fight," said William G. Dever, who has been excavating ancient sites in Israel for 50 years and is widely considered the dean of biblical archaeology among U.S. scholars. "I just think it's a shame the way this story is being hyped and manipulated." ...

Similar assessments came yesterday from two Israeli scholars, Amos Kloner, who originally excavated the tomb, and Joe Zias, former curator of archaeology at the Israeli Antiquities Authority. Kloner told the Jerusalem Post that the documentary is "nonsense." Zias described it in an e-mail to The Washington Post as a "hyped up film which is intellectually and scientifically dishonest."

Jodi Magness, an archaeologist at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, expressed irritation that the claims were made at a news conference rather than in a peer-reviewed scientific article. By going directly to the media, she said, the filmmakers "have set it up as if it's a legitimate academic debate, when the vast majority of scholars who specialize in archaeology of this period have flatly rejected this," she said.

The Cameron/Jacobovici hypothesis fails on a number of points. First, Jacobovici claims that having the names of Jesus, Mary, Joseph, and Judah (noted as Jesus' son) defies odds in a range between 600:1 and 2 million:1. That's a very wide range, and completely inaccurate. Other archeologists note that the names listed by the documentarians were the most common names in use at the time for Jerusalem. They also dispute that the name 'Jesus' on the ossuary is confirmed; some believe it is an early version of the name Hanoun.

Magness has more objections about this than the media hype. She also finds the names interesting, but for a different reason. Recall that the Bible refers to Jesus as Jesus of Nazareth, not Jesus ben-Joseph. The patronymics on the ossuary would have been appropriate for Judeans, not Nazareans, which indicates that the family uncovered in the Talpiot tomb were native to Jerusalem or its environs. The use of stone ossuaries rather than graves also indicates a middle-class status or above for the family, rather than the poor and/or ascetic life of Jesus of Nazareth and his family.

All of these are facts that archeologists like to take into consideration before leaping to conclusions. They especially tread with caution when trying to determine whether the evidence they have contradicts written history from the period in question. Archeology involves a level of speculation, but the true scientists make sure to minimize it as much as possible -- and this documentary amounts to nothing but speculation.

Who will bear the brunt of this fiasco? James Cameron will go on to make more big-budget Hollywood movies, unless he's dumb enough to make another Terminator sequel. Simcha Jacobovici will continue with his "Naked Archeology" series on History International, an entertaining but usually unconvincing half-hour of pop archeology that presaged this disaster. Discovery Channel, however, will take a hit to its reputation for serious science.

Quid Pro Qu'Iran

The Bush administration has reversed its position on engaging with the two terror-sponsoring nations in the Middle East to help stabilize Iraq. After rejecting the recommendations of the Iraq Study Group to start conducting diplomatic talks with Iran and Syria, Condoleezza Rice announced that she would be doing just that -- but only after the White House forced Iraq to forge an agreement on its toughest internal issue:

American officials said Tuesday they had agreed to hold the highest-level contact with the Iranian authorities in more than two years as part of an international meeting on Iraq.

The discussions, scheduled for the next two months, are expected to include Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and her Iranian and Syrian counterparts.

The announcement, first made in Baghdad and confirmed by Ms. Rice, that the United States would take part in two sets of meetings between Iraq and its neighbors, including Syria and Iran, is a shift in President Bush’s avoidance of high-level contacts with the governments in Damascus and, especially, Tehran.

Critics of the administration have long said that it should do more to engage its regional rivals on a host of issues, including the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and Lebanon. That was the position of the Iraq Study Group, the high level commission that last year urged direct, unconditional talks that would include Iran and Syria.

It's no secret that the government of Nouri al-Maliki wanted the US to open talks with Iran. They haven't been quiet about it, and they have insisted that Iraq will have diplomatic relations with Teheran regardless of what the US says. The Bush administration used this as leverage to get the Iraqis to move on the oil revenue plan, a longstanding issue that created political tension and mistrust between the Sunnis and the Shi'ites and Kurds that control the oil.

So perhaps the Bush rejection of the ISG recommendation could be seen as tactical rather than strategic, but just the same, this is a reversal of their position on Iran at the least. The US and Syria have diplomatic relations -- strained, but they exist -- and so opening a dialogue with Damascus doesn't represent as much of a climbdown as including Iran in regional talks does. The White House, especially Dick Cheney, had insisted that Iran could not be a viable partner for Iraqi security while it sponsored terrorism throughout the Middle East.

Somehow, that view has changed, and it could mean something significant in the balance of power in the Bush administration. It seems like Condoleezza Rice may have prevailed over the Vice President, whose influence appears to be waning in the last two years of the Bush presidency. The abrupt replacement of Donald Rumsfeld and the questionable resolution of the Korean crisis indicates a softening of the approach taken by the administration, at least in tone.

The State Department disagrees with this analysis. Philip Zelikow, who recently departed from Rice's senior staff, told the New York Times that the intent of the rhetoric was to get the Iranians to take us seriously. We saw the result of that effort this week in Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's loss of face over his own careless rhetoric. Now that the Iranians understand that we mean business, Zelikow says, we can do business.

Well, perhaps. If so, then the brinksmanship was also tactical rather than strategic. However, the fact remains that Iran sponsors terrorism in and out of Iraq, and its interests in doing so exist in almost complete contradiction to our interests in the region. We can jaw jaw instead of war war, but unless Iran stops sponsoring Hezbollah, Islamic Jihad, and other regional terror organizations, they will continue conducting war war whether we jaw jaw or not.

Meanwhile, Iran Has Its Own Problems

While the US chews over the change in policy regarding engagement with Iran, the Iranians have a burgeoning leadership crisis of their own. With Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khameini falling more seriously ill, the future leadership of the Islamic Republic seems up for grabs -- and Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani is not too shy to make his move before an abrupt departure creates chaos:

After Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's recent defiant announcement about installing 3,000 uranium enrichment centrifuges in Natanz, signs of an emerging leadership crisis in Iran have appeared. They expose the power group of Ahmadinejad and his Revolutionary Guard supporters (usually backed by the supreme leader, Ali Khamenei) and the more "pragmatic," though no less extreme in their final goals, clerical leadership.

In a speech on January 8 Khamenei warned against any withdrawal from the Iranian nuclear program by any person or Iranian official in the present or in the future. Recently there have been rumors that Khamenei is seriously ill, and may die soon. His speech seems to be the proclamation of a dying man's will.

Simultaneously, former president Akbar Hashemi-Rafsanjani, the recently elected chairman of the Experts Assembly, which has the authority to select the supreme leader, had an intensive two-day meeting with the top-level ayatollahs in the holy city of Qom. The most important issue discussed was the selection of a new supreme leader. Rafsanjani asserted in his speech in Qom that the Experts Assembly should choose the leader soon, in order to keep the regime safe and avoid a future power struggle after his death.

What happens if Khameini goes to his 72 virgins without having established a successor? The nation turns its lonely, veiled eyes to a triumvirate of officials to act in his stead until the Assembly of Experts can select the next true power of Iran. Right now, that triumvirate would consist of the head of Iran's Supreme Court, a representative of the Guardian Council, and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as President. All of these will be hard-liners and radicals, making the appointment of a radical most likely.

Rafsanjani wants to keep that from happening. Towards that end, he has done something rather unprecedented: he has started campaigning for Khameini's post while Khameini has the bad taste to still be alive. This sounds more dangerous than it is, mostly because Khameini's latest speech on the nuclear program -- which echoed Ahmadinejad's lunacy of late -- has rattled some within the regime. Rafsanjani is gambling that the mullahcracy will not allow Khameini to choose his successor now that he seems both close to death and less rational, although given Iranian mullahs, it must be hard to tell the difference on the latter score.

Rafsanjani has gone on Iranian television to speak about his qualifications for the role. Considered something of a clerical lightweight, he has engaged interviewers on the subject of Islam in order to improve his reputation. He even tells the story of how he convinced Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the father of the Iranian Islamic state, that mullahs should run the government and not just lead in spiritual matters, and Khomeini replaced Abulhassan Bani-Sadr as a result.

Why is that important? Bani-Sadr was not a mullah. Neither is Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

The internal dissent within the mullahcracy appears to have grown. The military pressure placed on Iran by the US and the British have had a dividing effect on the Iranian government, with the first official objection within Teheran to the nuclear program's continuance coming last week. Rafsanjani may use this dissension to press for an impeachment of Ahmadinejad and his ascension to the post, perhaps sooner than later. American attempts to open a dialogue on Iraq may be complicated by the lack of a clear contact within the Iranian government, if Rafsanjani continues his efforts.

Look Who's Coming -- And Not Coming -- To CPAC

The American Conservative Union must have its staff on call this week, because they keep getting last-minute RSVPs for the CPAC event that starts Thursday. No, I don't mean attendees, I mean speakers -- especially those who want the Republican nomination for the Presidential election next year.

In the past couple of days, almost every GOP candidate announced and presumed have been added to the CPAC agenda. Today both Duncan Hunter and Tom Tancredo announced their addition to the list of impressive speakers addressing conservative activists:

ALEXANDRIA, VA—The Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) announced today that California Congressman Duncan Hunter will address the nation’s oldest and largest gathering of conservatives on Saturday, March 3, 2007 at 8:30 a.m. in the Omni Shoreham Hotel’s Regency Ballroom in Washington D.C.

“For more than a quarter of a century, Congressman Duncan Hunter has been a strong and reliable voice in the U.S. House for conservatives, fighting the good fight to keep our military up to speed, up to date, and up to the dangerous tasks our nation asks of them,” said J. William Lauderback, Executive Vice President of the American Conservative Union (ACU), CPAC’s lead sponsor. “What some conservatives may not know is that also during that quarter century Congressman Hunter has proved himself as a Member of solid conservative credentials on a host of other issues important to conservatives, as reflected by his ACU Lifetime Rating of 92. We look forward to hearing from our friend and ally,” concluded Lauderback. ...

“Few Members of Congress consistently display the brand of conservative leadership Tom Tancredo exhibits,” said J. William Lauderback, Executive Vice President of the American Conservative Union (ACU), CPAC’s lead sponsor. “He is a man of principle, honesty, and distinct courage. While Tom’s Lifetime ACU Rating of 99 makes him an obvious friend of ACU and CPAC, it is his willingness to stand up and fight for what he believes in that makes him a hero to so many of our 5,000 grassroots activists. We look forward to hearing his views on the state of the border enforcement debate in Congress and other important issues of our day,” concluded Lauderback.

They join other late arrivals, such as Sam Brownback, Mike Huckabee, Jim Gilmore, and frontrunners Rudy Giuliani and Mitt Romney. As this is the last CPAC conference before the primaries begin, it makes sense for the presidential hopefuls to make their case to the activists they hope to engage in the primaries. For Rudy and Mitt, it makes the most sense; they have some work to do in building bridges to the conservatives in the party, and they will never have a better chance to win them over than at CPAC.

All of which makes the absence of John McCain even more curious. McCain has argued that he has the most solid conservative record of all the major contenders, and with some cause. Yet it is hardly a secret that the Senator has a rocky relationship with conservatives in the Republican Party. After the McCain-Feingold assault on political speech, his work with Ted Kennedy on immigration, the Gang of 14 rebellion that allowed the Democrats to filibuster judicial nominees for appellate assignments for the first time in American history, and a generally hostile attitude until just recently towards social conservatives, McCain has more work than most to convince conservatives to support him.

That's why his absence makes little sense. If he wants to win conservatives, he needs to make an effort to meet them -- literally. CPAC provides a golden opportunity to do so. It's one of the oldest conservative forums in existence, and it gathers opinionmakers on the Right from across the country. If he can't be bothered to go out of his way to face conservatives there, where exactly does he plan on addressing them?

A pass on CPAC would be a bad mistake for McCain, especially since all of his competitors have already committed to being there. I'm guessing that the Senator will see that by tomorrow and make the necessary efforts to join the conference and engage with those he claims he best represents. Otherwise, it will be hard to see how conservatives will take his refusal as anything but a badly-timed snub -- and whatever one thinks of John McCain, he's smarter than that.

Addendum: I'll be traveling tomorrow night to DC for the CPAC conference. I'm one of the credentialed bloggers and will be reporting constantly during the event. Here's a list of the other terrific bloggers I'll meet there.

Democrats Hit Reverse On Hitting Reverse

Democrats have delayed further consideration to restrict or cripple the Iraq war deployments, apparently stunned by the lack of cohesion among their own caucuses and fearful of the backlash their efforts might produce. Harry Reid has delayed the progress of a Joe Biden bill to revoke the 2002 AUMF, and Nancy Pelosi has started to distance herself from John Murtha (via Memeorandum):

Democratic leaders backed away from aggressive plans to limit President Bush's war authority, the latest sign of divisions within their ranks over how to proceed.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said Monday he wanted to delay votes on a measure that would repeal the 2002 war authorization and narrow the mission in Iraq.

Senior Democrats who drafted the proposal, including Sens. Joseph Biden of Delaware and Carl Levin of Michigan, had sought swift action on it as early as this week, when the Senate takes up a measure to enact the recommendations of the bipartisan Sept. 11 commission. ...

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., meanwhile, said she doesn't support tying war funding to strict training and readiness targets for U.S. troops.

The comments distanced her from Rep. John Murtha, D-Pa., who has said he wants to use Congress' spending power to force a change in policy in Iraq, by setting strict conditions on war funding.

Pelosi said she supports holding the administration to training and readiness targets, but added: "I don't see them as conditions to our funding. Let me be very clear: Congress will fund our troops."

It appears that the Democrats may have misinterpreted their mandate, and that they have finally discovered that they're on the brink of demanding surrender while at war. While a majority of Americans have serious doubts about the management of the war, most understand that pulling troops out of a fight means surrender and retreat, and they don't see how that makes America any more secure. In fact, a surrender to terrorists in Iraq will make this country a good deal less secure and embolden the terrorists to continue attacking our interests, and the Democrats seem to be the last to that realization -- or the realization that Americans understand these stakes.

Now the Democratic leadership has to backpedal from their enthusiasm for defeat. John Murtha made the mistake of talking too much about the purposes of the Democrats to force an end to the Iraq deployment by starving Centcom of supplies and fresh troops. Now Pelosi has to assure angry voters that she will not defund the troops fighting in the field. She won't even publicly support putting conditions on the pending $100 billion supplemental that Congress must approve in the coming weeks.

This is a major step backwards for the Democrats, and it doesn't come a moment too soon. They have earned the reputation as defeatists already, but they came close to owning responsibility for that defeat, and even members of their own ranks pointed that out. The attempt to double down after the failure of the non-binding resolutions has backfired, helped in large part because the new efforts would have had an actual impact on operations, crossing a line at which some supporters of the non-binding resolutions balked.

Make no mistake, though; as Harry Reid told his caucus, "Iraq is going to be there — it's just a question of when we get back to it." They're going to redeploy over their political event horizon to find some other strategy to appease their anti-war activists while avoiding responsibility for the consequences of their actions. Perhaps the third time will be the charm, but it seems more likely that they will experience a slow bleed of their credibility across the political spectrum.

Rudy Going Reaganesque

Rudy Giuliani, out to an early and somewhat surprising lead in the Republican presidential primary race, has begun addressing conservative groups to make his case for the nomination. The New York Sun reports that Giuliani has adopted a vision-style approach while retaining his strengths in policy, painting a future for the GOP as the party of freedom:

Mayor Giuliani is calling on the Republican Party to redefine itself as "the party of freedom," focusing on lower taxes, school choice, and a health care system rooted in free market principles.

Delivering a policy-driven overview of his presidential platform yesterday, Mr. Giuliani outlined the agenda in a Washington speech before a conservative think tank that sought to make clear distinctions between his vision and that of the Democrats, if not his rivals for the Republican nomination in 2008. The former New York mayor's proposed redefinition of the Republican platform would signal a shift away from any focus on social issues, on which Mr. Giuliani is much less ideologically aligned with the party.

Mr. Giuliani reserved his strongest criticism yesterday for Democrats, but he also said the government's handling of the war on terrorism had done "damage" to America's reputation abroad.

"We have to say to the rest of the world, ‘America doesn't like war,'" Mr. Giuliani said. "America is not a military country. We've never been a militaristic country," he added, saying national leaders have fallen into an "analytical warp" by defining the battle as a war on terrorism and not, as he deemed it, a "war of the terrorists against us."

Sounds a bit like "Morning in America" again, an approach that will help garner support for Giuliani among conservatives -- at least on vision. On policy, they will likely continue to challenge Giuliani, as the attendees at the Hoover Institution did yesterday. Giuliani apparently included a Q&A session as part of his presentation yesterday, and the Sun reported that some of the questions were "pointed" -- not surprising, given Rudy's policy differences on abortion and guns.

Russell Berman did not include the content of the questions except for one on Giuliani's foreign-policy experience. Opposition and Democratic activists have questioned the amount of experience the former Mayor could have, considering the local nature of his only public office. He gave a pretty good answer. As Mayor of New York, the position has responsibilities that outstrip some governors, especially in terms of population; Rudy had more citizens in his executive responsibility than does Tim Pawlenty now as our governor. Giuliani also talked about his dozens of international trips and meetings with heads of state or their senior staffs. He also runs an international consultancy, giving him free-market experience in foreign policy as well.

That fits well with his emerging campaign theme. He wants to emphasize a more libertarian approach for the Republican Party -- free markets and smaller government. School vouchers fit into this vision, as well as continuing support for public education. Health care reform is important, but the solutions must use free-market principles rather than top-down government control. It's a moderate policy that fits within a conservative vision, which could be a winning combination, especially in attracting moderates and independents.

Giuliani will have an opportunity to test this approach at CPAC, especially if he follows his Hoover appearance with a Q&A. He needs to engage conservatives directly in order to gain their trust, and it looks like he's made the decision to do so. This should make for an interesting appearance, one among several for Presidential candidates. Those who have not yet committed to CPAC had better not let Giuliani, Mitt Romney, and Mike Huckabee steal a march on their campaign.

This Is Draining The Swamp?

I have a new opinion piece in today's Examiner, part of the Blog Board series that Mark Tapscott has pioneered at the newspaper chain. Today's essay looks at the efforts by Democrats to meet their campaign rhetoric, drain the swamp and end the "culture of corruption", efforts that appear almost non-existent at this point:

Democrats won control of Congress by emphasizing Republican scandals and corruption and promising clean government. The start of the 110th Congress has not demonstrated much of a commitment to making that a reality, and the start of the 2008 primary campaign leaves even less hope that the Democrats will address corruption. ...

National Review highlighted a new effort by recently ascendant progressives that has more than a ring of familiarity. The well-connected Campaign for America’s Future announced that it will take back K Street from conservatives, and that the new Democratic majority has helped lead the way ...

The list of founders and advisers to CAF reads like a who’s who of Democratic Party activists. Jesse Jackson, former Sen. Howard Metzenbaum of Ohio, former California state Sen. Tom Hayden, Jim Hightower of Texas, and Clinton-era Secretary of Labor Robert Reich lead a host of union leaders and academics who have all stumped for Democrats.

These activists have set CAF up as the middleman to do exactly what Democrats excoriated DeLay for doing directly.

I also discuss the recent efforts by Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama to buy endorsements from South Carolina politicians, a development that has received little attention from any news organization outside CNN and AP. Barack Obama loses a bit of his outsider/reformist glow here, as the only reason he didn't buy Darrell Jackson and a handful of South Carolina legislators is because he wouldn't bid high enough to make the sale. Perhaps Obama can run as a fiscal conservative instead.

We're less than eight weeks into the Democratic majority in Congress, and already lobbyists have been rehabilitated and Democratic politicians have put themselves on the auction block for endorsements. That swamp keeps getting higher and higher ...

Venezuela Seizes Oil Projects From Foreign Firms

Venezuelan president-cum-dictator Hugo Chavez continued his confiscation of private property and foreign investment yesterday by seizing oil projects and assimilating them into the state-owned petroleum organization. Delivering on his pledge to create a socialist state along the same lines as Fidel Castro's Cuba, Chavez told foreign-owned firms that they now had to accept a minority stake in their own properties:

President Hugo Chavez ordered by decree on Monday the takeover of oil projects run by foreign oil companies in Venezuela's Orinoco River region.

Chavez had previously announced the government's intention to take a majority stake by May 1 in four heavy oil-upgrading projects run by British Petroleum PLC, Exxon Mobil Corp., Chevron Corp., ConocoPhillips Co., Total SA and Statoil ASA.

He said Monday that has decreed a law to proceed with the nationalizations that will see state oil company Petroleos de Venezuela SA, or PDVSA, taking at least a 60 percent stake in the projects.

"The privatization of oil in Venezuela has come to an end," he said on his weekday radio show, "Hello, President." "This marks the true nationalization of oil in Venezuela."

Interestingly and not surprisingly, the Venezuelan strongman didn't mention how he planned to compensate these companies for 60% shares of their projects. Instead, he told them that he didn't want them to leave, and take all of their expertise and technology with them. Chavez wants them to accept the fact that they would do all the work while he gets most of the profits.

These projects were the only privately-financed oil production facilities in Venezuela, and their worth is estimated at $17 billion. Will Chavez send them a check for the $10.5 billion he owes for his share of their operations? Don't bet on it. Chavez has offered compensation for other business assets that he has nationalized, but he has tried nothing on this scale so far.

Chavez's diktat will take legal effect in four months, although Chavez says he'll seize the projects by May 1. The companies have that long to negotiate terms with Chavez, who has an army to occupy the oil fields, making negotiations somewhat one-sided. The oil producers will likely try to strike a bargain with Chavez, but it makes little sense to do so. They will only be delaying the inevitable; Chavez will eventually steal it all from them. They should dismantle their operations and leave forthwith, taking the losses now and leaving Chavez to explain why the workers have lost their jobs as well as the expertise necessary to produce their primary export.

The Assassination Attempt Misses

Dick Cheney made an unannounced visit to Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan after a stop in Pakistan to tell Pervez Musharraf that the US needs him to fight the al-Qaeda and Taliban forces organizing in Pakistani territory. As if to underscore that message, a suicide bomber attacked Bagram while Cheney visited, killing 10 people outside the base but leaving Cheney unharmed:

A suicide bomber killed up to 10 people outside the main U.S. military base in Afghanistan in an attack aimed at visiting Vice President Dick Cheney on Tuesday, but Cheney was not hurt in the blast.

An American soldier and a South Korean who was part of the U.S.-led coalition were killed, as was a U.S. government contractor whose nationality was unknown, officials said. NATO put the toll at four, including the bomber, and 27 wounded. Local police said 10 people died.

The Taliban claimed responsibility, saying the bomber knew Cheney was visiting the sprawling Bagram Airbase, about 60 km (40 miles) from Kabul. "We wanted to target ... Cheney," Taliban spokesman Mullah Hayat Khan told Reuters by phone from an undisclosed location.

Soon after the blast, Cheney went ahead with planned talks with Afghan President Hamid Karzai in the capital, Kabul.

The Taliban could not have done more to prove the US case to Pervez Musharraf. Cheney's presence during the attack will put even more pressure on the beleaguered Pakistani leader.

The Bush administration sent Cheney along with high-level intelligence officers in order to conduct a presentation of the evidence we have collected of terrorist activity in Waziristan. Reportedly, we identified locations and support networks for al-Qaeda and the Taliban forces that will conduct their spring offensive in the coming weeks. Identification of these sites makes it very difficult for Musharraf to shrug off our warning, as does the high level of the visit. It's the final warning to get something done, or suffer us getting it done for him.

In fact, that point may already have been crossed. With the Taliban taking responsibility for the attack and with Cheney as its target, the US may determine that those camps present a clear and present danger to the US. That would allow President Bush to launch an attack on the camps even though they are in Pakistani territory. That move would be constitutional and necessarily limited, and since it targets al-Qaeda, would likely generate little dissent from Congress. I'd expect some members of the new Congressional leadership to ask why we hadn't attacked them before this assassination attempt.

Cheney remained in Afghanistan after the attack to meet with Hamid Karzai, who was likely to have emphasized the continuing and growing threat in Waziristan, and the lack of Pakistani cooperation in reducing it. Karzai can scratch that issue from the agenda at this point. Cheney and the US understand it clearly now, if they didn't before, and we have made it clear to Musharraf that the clock is ticking faster than ever.

Iraqi Cabinet Approves Oil Revenue Sharing

The plan recently approved by the Kurds to split the oil revenue of Iraq with the Sunnis won approval from the Iraqi cabinet. It now faces debate in the National Assembly, whose final approval will resolve one of the toughest issues in post-war Iraq and one that has helped fan the flames of the insurgencies:

The Iraqi cabinet approved a draft of a law on Monday that would set guidelines for nationwide distribution of oil revenues and foreign investment in the immense oil industry. The endorsement reflected a major agreement among the country’s ethnic and sectarian political blocs on one of Iraq’s most divisive issues.

The draft law approved by the cabinet allows the central government to distribute oil revenues to the provinces or regions based on population, which could lessen the economic concerns of the rebellious Sunni Arabs, who fear being cut out of Iraq’s vast potential oil wealth by the dominant Shiites and Kurds. Most of Iraq’s crude oil reserves lie in the Shiite south and Kurdish north.

The law also grants regional oil companies or governments the power to sign contracts with foreign companies for exploration and development of fields, opening the door for investment by foreign companies in a country whose oil reserves rank among the world’s three largest.

Passage is critical for the future of Iraq, mainly because it gives the Sunnis a reason to invest in the central government. The Kurds and Shi'ites understand this, and conceded on critical points for that reason. By giving responsibility for revenue distribution to Baghdad, it creates a situation where the Sunnis need the central government for their compensation -- which means that insurgencies aimed at crippling the democratic government will take money out of their pockets.

It also establishes some momentum for representative government as a solution to seemingly intractable problems. During the post-war period, the last thing that the formerly oppressed factions wanted to do was to stick their oil money into the wallets of the Sunnis who oppressed them. The Kurds and Shi'ites had celebrated their economic liberty, thanks to the vast oil reserves on which they sit, while the Sunnis looked at starvation and subjugation as their only future.

That certainly fed the insurgencies, even if it didn't cause all of the problems that created the terrorism. Now, however, the Kurds and Shi'ites have given the Sunnis a stake in the success of a unified Iraq, and a substantial stake at that. Having a central government to enforce this agreement becomes a critical point for the Sunnis. Even if the government has more Shi'ites than any other faction thanks to proportional representation, the Sunnis will have better representation in Baghdad than in any of the provinces with significant oil revenue.

Insurgents could get put out of business with this agreement. The al-Qaeda nutcases will continue their mission to impose ultraconservative shari'a law on the Sunnis, but those terrorist networks getting support from native Sunnis will likely starve. The Sunnis want to start living again, and if they can rely on a solid oil income, they will take it.

Ahmadinejad Gets A Scolding

Remember when people started speculating that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad may have lost some political ground with his reckless rhetoric and nuclear brinksmanship? Many of us wondered whether it was for real or just a sop to international sensibilities. The veracity seems more clear now, as even the state-run newspapers have begun openly criticizing the Iranian president for his antagonistic approach to the West:

Iran's president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, came under fire from domestic critics yesterday for his uncompromising stance on the nuclear issue as the US and Britain launched a new diplomatic effort to agree harsher UN sanctions they hope will force Tehran to halt uranium enrichment.

Mohammad Atrianfar, a respected political commentator, accused the president of using "the language of the bazaar" and said his comments had made it harder for Ali Larijani, the country's top nuclear negotiator, to reach a compromise with European diplomats.

The president made global headlines at the weekend by declaring that his country's quest for nuclear energy was an unstoppable train, adding to the sense of crisis as emergency talks got under way in London yesterday.

Critics from across the Iranian political spectrum took him to task for his "no brakes or reverse gear" remarks, bolstering claims in the west that his hardline position may be starting to backfire.

"This rhetoric is not suitable for a president and has no place in diplomatic circles," said Mr Atrianfar, a confidant of Hashemi Rafsanjani, an influential regime insider and rival of Mr Ahmadinejad. "It is the language people in the
bazaar and alleyways use to address the simplest issues of life."

Want to know how bad the criticism has gotten? The head of the so-called reformist party compared Ahmadinejad to Hugo Chavez. Instead of taking lessons from Vaclav Havel, Fayaz Zahed noted, Ahmadinejad opted to pander to populist sentiments and completely missed the mark.

Even his own allies took an opportunity to score a few points off of the man who promised Iran a world without Israel. The fundamentalist Islamic newspaper Resalat, which normally would support the mullahcracy and its policies, wagged its editorial ringer at Ahmadinejad's lack of nuance in tone, if not in substance. "Neither weakness nor inexperience and unnecessary rhetorical aggression is acceptable in our foreign policy," the editors instructed Ahmadinejad, who has managed to hit just about every fault they listed.

It seems that the saber-rattling -- such as it is -- has hit the mark in Iran. The mullahs appear to have decided to let Ahmadinejad absorb the criticism for the tenor of the conflict, while maintaining the policies that prompted it. Most of the pushback has followed along those lines, reflecting on the rhetoric while avoiding any criticism of the Iranian nuclear program itself.

This shows that little leeway for significant movement away from the nuclear agenda exists. We may get better diplomacy if the mullahs completely abandon Ahmadinejad, but the room for actual progress looks very limited. It also shows that staying tough on the Iranians has kept at least that much room open.

The Mote And The Beam Of Global Warming (Updated: Gore Responds)

After last night's Oscar win, Al Gore has ridden a wave of good press about his efforts to end global warming. Having Leonardo DiCaprio try to push Gore into a Presidential run in front of a billion people worldwide has to be heady stuff for the former VP and erstwhile candidate. I'm sure Gore left feeling energized -- although not as energized as his mansion in Tennessee, according to the Tennessee Center for Policy Research (via Hot Air):

The average household in America consumes 10,656 kilowatt-hours (kWh) per year, according to the Department of Energy. In 2006, Gore devoured nearly 221,000 kWh—more than 20 times the national average.

Last August alone, Gore burned through 22,619 kWh—guzzling more than twice the electricity in one month than an average American family uses in an entire year. As a result of his energy consumption, Gore’s average monthly electric bill topped $1,359.

Since the release of An Inconvenient Truth, Gore’s energy consumption has increased from an average of 16,200 kWh per month in 2005, to 18,400 kWh per month in 2006.

Gore’s extravagant energy use does not stop at his electric bill. Natural gas bills for Gore’s mansion and guest house averaged $1,080 per month last year.

Okay, before we start really throwing the hypocrisy label at The Goracle of Global Warming, we should take care not to hit ourselves with it first. Most CQ readers are free-market thinkers. There's nothing wrong with Gore using that kind of energy if he's willing to pay for it. A mansion would use a lot more energy than a normal single-family dwelling; I'm sure that Bill Gates' electrical bills dwarf what Gore's paying for his Tennessee juice. My objection to his level of consumption would only be that he's driving prices up with his large demand.

That being said, the fact that his energy use increased so dramatically after the release of his documentary makes him look a little ridiculous. After all, he's on the road more now, and energy use should decrease, although his family may not travel with him much. Besides, as we saw at the Oscars last night, Gore wants the rest of us to downsize and conserve rather than just treat energy like any other market -- and Gore is obviously not doing that for himself.

He may retort that he purchases carbon waivers that help fund efforts to clean the environment and reduce global warming to balance his large energy usage. I'd respond: so? The point that the global-warming alarmists make is that we have to stop releasing carbons in order to reverse the "crisis", as they called it over and over again, not to create a rations market that acts like a parasite to the energy market. If the situation is as dire as Gore painted it in An Inconvenient Truth and at the Oscars last night, then one might expect a little more self-discipline from the chief alarmist disciple.

UPDATE: Al Gore has responded via Think Progress, one of the better liberal blogs:

1) Gore’s family has taken numerous steps to reduce the carbon footprint of their private residence, including signing up for 100 percent green power through Green Power Switch, installing solar panels, and using compact fluorescent bulbs and other energy saving technology.

2) Gore has had a consistent position of purchasing carbon offsets to offset the family’s carbon footprint — a concept the right-wing fails to understand. Gore’s office explains:

What Mr. Gore has asked is that every family calculate their carbon footprint and try to reduce it as much as possible. Once they have done so, he then advocates that they purchase offsets, as the Gore’s do, to bring their footprint down to zero.

Interesting that he doesn't dispute the numbers; he just tries a little misdirection instead.

First, the solar panels and the compact fluorescent light bulbs will certainly make a difference -- but the TCPR report looks at his electricity bill, which still indicates (a) a high level of usage, and (b) an increase since the movie's release. Solar panels generate electricity at the location, which should then decrease the amount of power he's buying from the utility. If it's still going up, there seems to be a serious management problem somewhere.

Second, as I mentioned above, purchasing offsets only means that Gore doesn't want to make the same kind of sacrifices that he's asking other families to make. He's using a modern form of indulgences in order to avoid doing the penance that global-warming activism demands of others. It means that the very rich can continue to suck up energy and raise the price and the demand for electricity and natural gas, while families struggle with their energy costs and face increasing government regulation and taxation. It's a regressive plan that Gore's supporters would decry if the same kind of scheme were applied to a national sales tax, for instance.

And basically, it doesn't address the issue of hypocrisy. If Gore and his family continue to increase their consumption of commercial energy with all of the resources they have at hand, then they have no business lecturing the rest of us on conservation and down-scaling our own use. (via The Anchoress)

Jesus Buried In Plain Sight?

Many people have discussed the supposed discovery of the family tomb of Jesus in a section of Jerusalem. The finding, which forms the basis of a Discovery Channel special next Sunday, purports to show that Jesus married Mary Magdalene and had a son named Judah, also buried at the tomb with his own ossuary:

New scientific evidence, including DNA analysis conducted at one of the world's foremost molecular genetics laboratories, as well as studies by leading scholars, suggests a 2,000-year-old Jerusalem tomb could have once held the remains of Jesus of Nazareth and his family.

The findings also suggest that Jesus and Mary Magdalene might have produced a son named Judah.

The DNA findings, alongside statistical conclusions made about the artifacts — originally excavated in 1980 — open a potentially significant chapter in Biblical archaeological history.

Well, maybe. The DNA analysis, which has been trumpeted without much explanation, does not identify the Jesus of the ossuary as the same Jesus in the Bible. All it does is show that the bones in a tomb that the researchers speculate belonged to Mary Magdelene have no familial relation to the bones in the Jesus ossuary. That is how the archeologists assumed that the two in this crypt were married, and that the Judah ben-Jesus of the ossuary had to be their offspring.

This shows why pop science rarely delivers anything but entertainment. I enjoy Simcha Jacobovici in his incarnation as "The Naked Archeologist", but I don't pretend that the show is anything more than a superficial and oversimplified trek through history. The speculations made by the team working on the Talpiot tomb show how a series of assumptions can lead to a wild and likely incorrect conclusion.

Let's take a few things in the context of the times. Jesus was a well-known agitator whose crucifixion creates a cult following, in the eyes of the Romans and the leading Jews of the time. The basis of that cult formed around the notion that Jesus rose from the dead. If the Romans knew where his body was buried, why then did they not produce it as proof of his immutable death? In order to be placed in an ossuary, he would have to lie in the tomb for a year, decomposing to skeletal remains. During that time, the Romans could easily have produced the body -- or the cult followers could have stolen it and buried it elsewhere to prevent it.

The familial ties also seem rather odd. In the first generation of Jesus, no one mentions his marriage or family. Yet his familiy and followers -- ossuaries of Matthew and James are supposedly among the discoveries -- supposedly felt it of no moment to bury him with his wife and son, despite their refusal to acknowledge a marriage. By the time his son would have died, the Gospels would already have been written and prophesied in the region and further to Greece and Rome.

And all of this evidence would have been left in the open, in a tomb in the middle of the largest city in the region, where anyone could have discovered it.

I'm sorry, but this relies on faith at least as much as the Christian religion does, and contradicts common sense. It's nonsense. None of this makes any sense at all, but I'll bet it sells lots of advertising. (h/t: CQ reader Peyton R)

UPDATE: The Anchoress, my favorite Catholic blogger, has more.

Giuliani And CQ At CPAC

Republican front-runner Rudy Giuliani has garnered some mild criticism for maintaining a fairly safe appearance schedule since forming his exploratory committee for his Presidential campaign. Conservatives have wondered when he would begin making appearances at events targeted at the conservative community. They can rest easy now; Giuliani has announced that he will speak at The American Conservative Union's CPAC event this weekend. Patrick Ruffini e-mailed me last night to point out the announcement on The Politico.

If this is Giuliani's coming-out party, he's not alone. Mike Huckabee has been added to the CPAC agenda, a good event for the Arkansas governor. Newt Gingrich has signed up for the closing speech to the conservatives gathered there. Jim Gilmore, the former Governor of Virginia and a Presidential candidate who has not garnered much attention, will also deliver a speech. So far, no word on whether John McCain or Mitt Romney will become last-minute additions to the event, but their representatives will definitely be there.

This is a smart move for Giuliani. He needs to make his debut with conservative groups soon, before a meme of avoidance starts to gain traction. If my earlier experience with Giuliani gives any indication, he'll shine there as he does anywhere he speaks live. Conservatives there will ask tough questions, and I'm interested to see if he decides to engage in a dialogue at CPAC rather than just a speech.

I'm hoping to talk to them all. I'll be attending CPAC for the first time, blogging the event. Starting at 10:00 am on Thursday, I'll be live at CPAC, attending the speeches and reporting on the developments at the conference. I'll be especially interested in the appearances of Giuliani and Gingrich, but I'm looking forward to familiarizing myself and CQ readers with Gilmore, Huckabee, and others. Be sure to keep checking back with CQ for constant updates.

UPDATE: Mitt Romney will also appear at CPAC, on Friday. This is rapidly becoming the can't-miss event for 2007. Glad I decided to go!

Controversial For Showing The Truth

The documentary Obsession has finally started to receive attention for its presentation of the indoctrination of Arabs into an Islamist mindset, thanks to programs shown on state-run television in places like Saudi Arabia, Iran, and other countries in the Middle East. The New York Times reports on the controversy the documentary has created on college campuses:

When “Obsession: Radical Islam’s War Against the West,” a documentary that shows Muslims urging attacks on the United States and Europe, was screened recently at the University of California, Los Angeles, it drew an audience of more than 300 — and also dozens of protesters.

At Pace University in New York, administrators pressured the Jewish student organization Hillel to cancel a showing in November, arguing it could spur hate crimes against Muslim students. A Jewish group at the State University of New York at Stony Brook also canceled the film last semester.

The documentary has become the latest flashpoint in the bitter campus debate over the Middle East, not just because of its clips from Arab television rarely shown in the West, including scenes of suicide bombers being recruited and inducted, but also because of its pro-Israel distribution network. ...

The documentary’s proponents say it provides an unvarnished look at Islamic militancy. “It’s an urgent issue that is widely avoided by academia,” argued Michael Abdurakhmanov, the Hillel president at Pace.

Its critics call it incendiary. Norah Sarsour, a Palestinian-American student at U.C.L.A., said it was disheartening to see “a film like this that takes the people who have hijacked the religion and focuses on them.”

Like most documentaries, Obsession has a point of view, and that has to be considered when evaluating the film. However, as I note in my review of the film last August, Obsession has an unusual defense for charges of bias and hyperbole: it uses the words and images shown on Arab television to make its point. Most television stations in these countries are run by the state, and the programs shown on the channels have the implicit imprimatur of the governments. Thus, Sarsour's criticism falls short.

In fact, if one watches the full-length version of the film, it does attempt to separate the extremists from the moderate Muslims. Several of the people who comment on radical Islam in the film are in fact moderate Muslims. (I mistakenly included Brigitte Gabriel among them in my review; she's Christian.) At least one of them, Walid Shoebat, is a former Islamist extremist himself who recognizes the dnagers his former comrades in arms represent.

Karen Arenson's description of the film gives an impression that it uses random footage of attacks and indoctrination, "interspersed with those of Nazi rallies," as some kind of narrativeless rant. That's simply false. The film spends some time pointing out the historical connections between radical Islamists and the Nazis in Germany, and the shared aim of both: extermination of Jews. As I wrote in August:

To this purpose, the film makes excellent use of Alfons Heck, an elderly German academic who once served as a high-ranking officer in the Hitler Youth. Heck points out that a worldy and sophisticated German people fell for the crudest kind of anti-Semitic propaganda -- so why should anyone expect the Arabs to resist their own government-produced propaganda? Indeed, Obsession fills itself with television clips gleaned from all over the Arab world, giving American viewers perhaps their first real taste of how pervasive the paranoia gets in Arab culture.

This connection with Naziism goes beyond the hordes of jihadis sporting salutes that look suspiciously like Sieg Heils. Obession also reviews the historical connections between Adolf Hitler and the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, whom Hitler embraced to the bemusement of his race-baiting followers. Heck recalls questioning why HItler allied with a non-Aryan group, and getting the answer that Nazis and Arabs wanted the same thing: the annihilation of the Jews. The Mufti later went to Bosnia and created an SS regiment of Muslims, one of the reasons that the Serbians -- who fought the Nazis -- felt betrayed by the West's alliance with the Bosnians in the 1990s.

Arenson doesn't do justice to the work the documentarians did in showing those connections. Nor does the Times reporter delve too deeply into the supposed controversy and polarization that she claims this film has promoted. Even when I attended college in the early 1980s, Palestinian activists held campus rallies showing the exact same kind of propaganda to support the PLO terrorists and their mission to wipe out Israel. Supporters of Israel got shouted down in much the same fashion as they do today. The Left adopted the Palestinian cause decades ago; in fact, one of the most controversial moments in Oscar history came in the 1970s, when Vanessa Redgrave used an acceptance speech to politick on behalf of PLO terrorists, and Paddy Chayefsky used his speech as an impassioned rebuttal to Redgrave's nonsense.

The college scene at the time differed only in that Chayefsky's point of view was usually suppressed by those who did want any competing points of view. With that history in mind, I have a difficult time understanding why a documentary like Obsession -- which uses the television images of the mainstream Muslim societies and the undeniable historical record -- seems like such a danger.

Or perhaps I've answered my own question.

Is Japan Wrong To Honor Its Kamikaze Pilots?

Japan will confront its World War II history with a new film this May honoring the sacrifice of its kamikaze pilots. I Go To Die For You comes from the pen of a well-known politician, and will open up a debate over the nature of the Imperial culture that sent 5,000 young men to their deaths as the pilots of guided missiles:

Japan's kamikaze pilots are to be honoured in a new film praising their bravery, sacrifice and "beautiful lives" in the Second World War.

The release in May of I Go To Die For You confirms a growing nostalgia in Japan about its wartime generation, even among the majority who accept the cause was wrong. ...

The screenplay by the 74-year-old outspoken politician, Shintaro Ishihara, is based on conversations he had with Tome Torihama, a woman who ran a restaurant near the base and became a mother figure to many of the trainee kamikaze. ...

Widely viewed as fanatics in Britain and America, kamikaze pilots have a complex place in the Japan's collective memory. Far-Right nationalists venerate them as martyrs, while liberals see them as young victims of state brainwashing, bullied into volunteering to die.

Almost 5,000 kamikaze were sacrificed in a desperate and futile attempt to change the course of the war in its last months. Many did not reach their targets. A few would-be pilots are still alive today, saved by engine failure or by the end of the war.

Apparently, the screenplay indicates that this film will not follow the example of Letters from Iwo Jima, showing the bravery and the futility of the Japanese in the final straits of a collapse. It tends to glorify the decision to conduct so many suicide missions, even though the operation ended in disaster, and arguably in the atomic bombs dropped on two of their cities. The kamikazes had the intended effect of convincing the Americans of the lunacy of the Japanese government, a conviction that entered into the calculation of using those weapons as a means of avoiding the millions of deaths on both sides that a full-scale invasion would have caused.

Americans have a clear view of kamikaze missions; they believe them to be appalling. The pilots get consideration for their bravery, but they get portrayed as fanatics. The Japanese have conflicted views about the "special attack forces", as Ishihara puts it. Newer generations of more liberal Japanese consider them to have been duped by a desperate war machine facing ruin and shame, while older and more conservative Japanese believe them to have sacrificed themselves with honor.

Both could be right, but this film might not deliver that kind of nuance. The kamikazes cannot speak for themselves, except for those few who missed their chance to commit suicide for the Emperor. The risk that Ishihara runs is in crossing the line between understanding the men themselves and lauding the mission, which was a truly insane operation that in the end did Japan far more damage than they could have imagined. If the film glorifies the kamikaze program, then it will almost certainly raise a firestorm of criticism, especially on this side of the Pacific.

Bush To Musharraf: Try Harder

Pervez Musharraf insisted that the peace deal he signed with tribal chiefs would not interfere with the fight against the Taliban and al-Qaeda. No one really bought it, but the Bush administration put the best face on it in order to keep Musharraf in the fold. Now that seems to have ended, and the White House has decided on a different, tougher approach to the Pakistani president:

President Bush has decided to send an unusually tough message to one of his most important allies, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, the president of Pakistan, warning him that the newly Democratic Congress could cut aid to his country unless his forces become far more aggressive in hunting down operatives with Al Qaeda, senior administration officials say.

The decision came after the White House concluded that General Musharraf is failing to live up to commitments he made to Mr. Bush during a visit here in September. General Musharraf insisted then, both in private and public, that a peace deal he struck with tribal leaders in one of the country’s most lawless border areas would not diminish the hunt for the leaders of Al Qaeda and the Taliban or their training camps.

Now, American intelligence officials have concluded that the terrorist infrastructure is being rebuilt, and that while Pakistan has attacked some camps, its overall effort has flagged.

“He’s made a number of assurances over the past few months, but the bottom line is that what they are doing now is not working,” one senior administration official who deals often with South Asian issues said late last week. “The message we’re sending to him now is that the only thing that matters is results.”

Democrats have started pressuring the White House to push Musharraf harder, and it seems to have had an effect. Of course, the Bush administration has made more of an effort of late to call in markers. First, they told Nouri al-Maliki in no uncertain terms that he had to quit protecting the militias. Now they have made it clear to Musharraf that our aid won't go to someone who allows AQ to build bases in his country.

The Bush administration still rules out direct attacks on training camps inside Pakistan, but someone will have to attack those camps. Bush will probably give Musharraf the same kind of talk he gave to Maliki about that, too. If an American attack on those bases will destabilize Musharraf -- and they probably will -- then Musharraf had best start doing it himself. We can't wait forever while al-Qaeda re-establishes themselves as a fully operational terrorist group.

Make no mistake, though -- a destabilized Musharraf could be a very big problem. Pakistan has a full-blown nuclear-weapons program, and if Musharraf gets ousted by a popular Islamist revolt, then the Islamists will have their hands on an arsenal that they could aim almost anywhere in south Asia. They could transfer the weapons to al-Qaeda in order to use them as proxies, too.

Pakistan has always been a tightrope, and our coordination with them will become even more of a high-wire act over the next few weeks. The status quo is obviously not acceptable, and the only two options are to press forward or go back, and both are equally dangerous.

Appeasement Doesn't Work, Part 37B

Thailand has struggled with a Muslim insurgency for the past several years, with radical Islamists pushing for the upper hand in a nation more associated with Buddhists. After recent political turmoil, the government decided to appease the terrorists and attempt conciliation. Big mistake:

Some are already calling it war, a brutal Muslim separatist insurgency in southern Thailand that has taken as many as 2,000 lives in three years with almost daily bombings, drive-by shootings, arson and beheadings.

It is a conflict the government admits it is losing. A harsh crackdown and martial law in recent years seem only to have fueled the insurgency by generating fear and anger and undermining moderate Muslim voices.

A new policy of conciliation in the past four months has been met by increased violence, including a barrage of 28 coordinated bombings in the south that killed or wounded about 60 people on Feb. 18. ...

Now the insurgents seem to be taking their war to a new stage, pitting local Buddhists against Muslims by attacking symbols of Buddhism with flamboyant brutality.

The two religions had coexisted through the years here, often in separate villages. That mutual tolerance is breaking down now, and there are fears of a sectarian conflict that could flare out of control.

“Buddhist monks, temples, novices,” said Sunai Phasuk, a political analyst with the monitoring group Human Rights Watch. “Buddhist monks have been hacked to death, clubbed to death, bombed and burned to death. This has never happened before. This is a new aspect of violence in the south.”

The effort to find conciliation and bolster the influence of moderate Muslims in Thailand's south has han an unintended effect. It has created tension within the Muslim community to the point where half of all Islamist violence targets Muslims, especially those who cooperate with the government. The Thai effort to find a rational middle has doomed those who qualify.

Thailand's new government, on top after conducting a coup against the democratically-elected but corrupt government that preceded it, decided shortly after taking power to engage with the Islamists. For these kind of results, they could have skipped the coup. While the previous government didn't effectively fight the Islamists, at least they never surrendered to them. All the new government has done is to unleash the terrorists.

We say over and over again that appeasing terrorists only sets up incentives for more terrorism. Thailand merely provides the latest practical example of this axiom. They need to learn to enforce order more effectively, rather than cede control and initiative to lunatic bomb-throwers.

A Quiet Night With Oscar

Originally, I planned to attend the Oscar festivities with Michael Medved and AM 1280 The Patriot this evening at the beautiful Saint Paul, one of the classiest hotels in the world. However, I had to clear my driveway twice today after the big snowstorms that hit the Twin Cities this weekend. I tweaked my back a little, just enough to convince me that resting it tonight makes the most sense. I apologize to my friends and listeners here who I'd hoped to see, but I'll be sure to make it to the next event.

However, I still plan on live-blogging the Oscars, so keep checking back on this post. We'll have lots of fun with the pomp and pompousness that comes with the Academy Awards, and by the time the evening's over, we'll all feel like giving 30-second acceptance speeches in which we thank everyone we ever met in our lives.

7:31 - The show's beginning with an interesting montage of oddball interviews with various Oscar nominees. Peter O'Toole looks so old. Helen Mirren still looks pretty good, though ...

7:36 - I'm looking forward to Ellen DeGeneres as Oscar MC. I think she's got the proper kind of low-key humor for this kind of event.

7:38 - "The most international Oscars ever." Yeah, whatever. I suppose that's exciting.

7:42 - Al Gore, laughing goofily at Ellen's dig at 2000. I think this sets an Oscar record for the longest running gag ever.

7:44 - "Say Hallelu"? Excuse me? For Oscar nominees? Oooooo-kay!

7:46 - Not a bad opening. They avoided a Oprah-Uma embarrassment, anyway. However, they didn't lead off with a major award, deciding to announce the award for Art Direction. It took 16 minutes give away the first one, though.

7:55 - Oh, Lord. Jack Black and John C Reilly may recover from this embarrassing musical number. For Will Farrell, it's an improvement. This is the kind of thing that the attendees might find amusing, but the rest of us find tiresome and way too self-referential.

7:58 - Pan's Labyrinth has already won two Oscars. The only two Oscars awarded after 30 minutes of the show. Hope you want to stay up late.

8:02 - Okay, the two kids were terribly cute, and so far the most entertaining and honest part of the entire show. Will Smith thought so too. I guess they can do two with no problem -- maybe they should have done them all?

8:04 - "West Bank Story"?? I have to see that one!

8:07 - Off topic: Weird political story of the year ... Strom Thurmond's ancestors owned Al Sharpton's ancestors. I'm not kidding. How strange is that?

8:12 - Are we going to have Judi Dench plastic surgery jokes all night long? Because if we are, perhaps they can make a few of them funny.

8:14 - The Foley choir was actually pretty cool -- very inventive and well done.

8:16 - I won the JAT Award for the longest running live-blog! Well, this is the fourth year in a row, I believe ...

8:19 - Eddie Murphy looks bored. As well he should.

8:22 - Why are they giving away Best Supporting Actor in the middle of the show? If they're not going to do a major at the beginning, why not build up to the end? Alan Arkin -- good to see him win one.

8:25 - Ellen's not doing a bad job, but the stroll down the aisle left something to be desired. It finished nicely with Martin Scorscese accepting a screenplay from Ellen, but the Mark Wahlberg part was painful.

8:26 - Can we skip the silhouette dancers?

8:32 - Randy Newman at the ivories and Sweet Baby James on the vocals? They should have saved this for last. Excellent stuff...

8:34 - The only thing making this Melissa Etheridge segment tolerable -- besides her voice, which I enjoy -- is the fact that the camerawork is skipping most of the climate-scare scolding we're supposed to be getting from the screen behind her. "When you pray, move your feet"???

8:37 - The climate crisis? Yeah, that must have been the global warming I was shoveling today that tweaked my back.

8:38 - That was a pretty funny joke with Al Gore. Come on, admit it, you laughed. (If you missed it, Leonardo DiCaprio kept after Gore to make a major announcement, and Gore started to unfold a speech -- but the orchestra cut him off as he got started in a spoof of their speech-limiting policies.)

8:50 - I'll bet Children of Men wins.

8:52 - I lose! The Departed wins for Best Adapted Screenplay. This is usually considered a good sign for the Best Picture category.

8:55 - Holy cow, what the hell was that with the guy toting up the awards and running into Tom Hanks and Helen Mirren? Hanks seemed to be caught off guard as well.

9:02 - "Mary Antoinette"? The costumes were literally "eye candy"?

9:04 - The winning costume designer HAS to have been the inspiration for "Edna" in The Incredibles!!

9:08 - Tom Cruise did a nice job of presenting the humanitarian award for Sherry Lansing, but without him jumping up and down on couches, I just didn't believe he meant it.

9:13 - Hey, this hasn't updated -- sorry, I thought it had. If Children of Men should win anything, it should be cinematography.

9:16 - Come on, the silhouette dancers are so pretentious, only the Academy would use them to identify their Best Picture nominees. Ugh. And Pan's Labyrinth looks like it has a lot of fans tonight.

9:21 - Robert Downey, Jr delivers a great line about his drug use, throwing Naomi Watts for a moment.

9:24 - Catherine Deneuve looks pretty good -- still ...

9:32 - Pan's Labyrinth didn't win for Foreign Language film? That's a shocker!

9:34 - Goodness, George Clooney's looking uglier every year, isn't he? He's not? Ah, hell ...

9:36 - Jennifer Hudson looked pretty shocked to win, didn't she? And the Japanese actress looked shocked, too, but in a different way.

9:43 - We're getting to the Best Documentary - Feature Length award. Be prepared to crown Al Gore. I doubt the orchestra will cut him off if he rambles.

9:46 - Jerry Seinfeld presenting for Best Documentary - Feature? Okay ... why? He's giving a good monologue to start it off, but that has nothing to do with documentaries, either.

9:48 - So we have two documentaries about Iraq, two about Christians, and Al Gore's Inconvenient Truth. Now that's a tough choice for Hollywood.

9:48 - Not that tough. No big surprise, Truth wins. I told you that the orchestra wouldn't cut him off.

9:51 - Don't hire Clint Eastwood to deliver any speeches ...

9:55 - After all of these unforgettable scores, how is it possible that Ennio Morricone never won an Oscar?

10:00 - Italian is a beautiful language, and Morricone's more coherent than Clint. Just kidding, Clint. Don't kill me.

10:10 - Okay, I give. What's up with Jack Nicholson's hairdo ... or scalp-do?

10:15 - I guess Mathew Arndt doesn't need to kiss Matthew Broderick's tucchus any more, eh?

10:17 - CQ natives are getting restless. They're attacking Tobey Maguire and Kirsten Dunst for being dull. Did y'all miss Al Gore earlier tonight?

10:20 - Jennifer Lopez, the "excellent reason for high-definition television"? Perhaps. She's the most overexposed celebrity this side of Anna Nicole Smith.

10:21 - It's almost three hours now, and we still haven't seen the Best Original Song award given out yet? This will be a long one. Jennifer Hudson appears to have recovered from the shock of winning nicely, though.

10:28 - Ellen's been a non-entity most of the night, hasn't she?

10:30 - Inconvenient Truth won for Best Original Song -- after that showstopping performance of the Dreamgirls songs? What a joke. I like Melissa Etheridge, but that song hardly compares to what we just heard. Any self-aware artist would have been embarrassed to be in Etheridge's position.

10:40 - Jeez, are these montages more self-indulgent than the silhouette dancers, or the other way around?

10:42 - I was hoping that United 93 would win for Film Editing. Of course, I was rather hoping this would have wrapped up by now, too.

10:50 - Does anyone notice that the commercials are more interesting than the show?

10:53 - Leading ladies. I'm hoping for Meryl Streep, who was delicious in The Devil Wears Prada.

10:55 - But Helen Mirren was my second choice. Nice salute to Elizabeth II.

11:01 - Reese Witherspoon needs better eye makeup. I'm hoping O'Toole wins, but I think it will be Will Smith.

11:04 - Wow -- they forgave Forest Whittaker for Battlefield Earth?

11:07 - Okay, I predict that Martin Scorcese wins tonight. Funny bit with George Lucas about not having won one. I'm shocked that he didn't win for Phantom Menace.

11:09 - Yep. About damned time, too. I haven't seen The Departed yet, but he should have won for Goodfellas and Raging Bull.

11:12 - I'm on a roll. I'm going to predict that The Queen wins Best Picture.

11:14 - I'm off the roll. I should have stuck with the hint from Scorsese's Oscar. I'm looking forward to seeing this movie at some point. I wanted to catch it in the theater, but never made it.

FINAL ANALYSIS: Dull and odd. Ellen Degeneres didn't do a terrible job, but she didn't do much at all. The politics of the evening almost all revolved around Al Gore, and fortunately didn't bleed into other categories. The choices seemed OK, especially Scorsese's award, but they produced so few memorable moments, if any at all. One might expect a little more from 3 hours and 40 minutes.

Thanks to all the CQ readers that stuck it out with me!

'Commanders' Will Quit If We Attack Iran?

The Times of London set the blogosphere abuzz this morning, reporting that six senior commanders at the Pentagon will quit if the US attacks Iran. The Pentagon, claims their source, has no stomach for a war with the Islamic Republic:

SOME of America’s most senior military commanders are prepared to resign if the White House orders a military strike against Iran, according to highly placed defence and intelligence sources.

Tension in the Gulf region has raised fears that an attack on Iran is becoming increasingly likely before President George Bush leaves office. The Sunday Times has learnt that up to five generals and admirals are willing to resign rather than approve what they consider would be a reckless attack.

“There are four or five generals and admirals we know of who would resign if Bush ordered an attack on Iran,” a source with close ties to British intelligence said. “There is simply no stomach for it in the Pentagon, and a lot of people question whether such an attack would be effective or even possible.”

A British defence source confirmed that there were deep misgivings inside the Pentagon about a military strike. “All the generals are perfectly clear that they don’t have the military capacity to take Iran on in any meaningful fashion. Nobody wants to do it and it would be a matter of conscience for them.

First, as McQ at QandO points out, commanders serve in the field, and staff officers serve in the Pentagon. If in fact there exists a coterie of staff officers who will resign rather than follow orders, they are not commanders in the military sense, at least not now. Troops will not be left leaderless. Secondly, there are hundreds if not thousands of staff officers at the Pentagon. The resignation of six will be noteworthy but hardly representative of the morale at the Pentagon, as the Times claims in this piece.

However, those who resign under those circumstances will have taken the honorable route, if they truly do not believe in the mission. Jules Crittenden intimates that this will amount to a de facto desertion, but senior staff officers have no duty to remain in their commissions if they object to the course of action taken by any administration. They have undoubtedly met their commitments to the service in terms of time, and they can disconnect from the Pentagon as they see fit. It's not the only honorable route, and it may well be more honorable to stay and try to convince the political leadership to change course, but staff officer resignations are not desertions and have never been considered as such.

In fact, that was one of the bases of trying Nazi staff officers and military commanders at Nuremberg and elswhere. When they claimed that they had to follow the Fuehrer's orders, the answer was that they had the option -- and in this case, the duty -- to resign rather than commit the crimes they did.

All of which is secondary to the underlying premise that we are about to attack Iran. I find that hard to buy, especially since the Bush administration has taken every opportunity to argue against it. Dick Cheney says the option remains on the table, which it must to maintain a credible deterrent to the Iranian nuclear program, but otherwise the administration has done nothing to build political support for such a move. That lack of preparation clearly indicates that the White House has not embarked on that course, not even preliminarily. All we hear are leaks from various sources that the US has "plans" for an attack on Iran -- which means nothing except that we've gamed the scenario for the sake of being prepared. We probably have 'plans" to invade Russia and China as well.

We cannot attack Iran without gathering many more resources than we did for Iraq. Iran is three times the size of Iraq, and its terrain presents a much higher degree of difficulty than the relatively flat Iraq. Their military, while underresourced, is not in the same dreadful state of readiness that we saw in Iraq. Military strikes on Iran could not wipe out their defenses at the onset of action, and the war would result in a conflagration that would halt oil supplies to the entire world. That's a last-gasp option, and everyone knows it.

Israel might attack Iran, however. Supposedly, they want to get overflight permission from the US to transit Iraqi airspace for an attack on Iranian nuclear facilities. Even that is at the preliminary planning stages, in case the Iranians refuse to back away from their nuclear program. The leak is intended as brinksmanship from the Israelis after Ahmadinejad's reckless rhetoric about wiping them off the map. I have no doubt the Israelis would carry out the attack if they deem it necessary, with our without our cooperation, but again, this is just working out the details of plans that have to be made in order to ensure preparedness.

If the US decides to attack Iran, we need to be sure we have people in charge who believe in the mission. Right now, I don't think it's a good idea, and I'm not surprised to find out that some senior staff officers at the Pentagon agree with that.

Kurds Support Oil Revenue Sharing Plan

The Kurds have signed off on a plan to share oil revenues that will address many of the Sunni economic concerns that have driven some to extremism. The political breakthrough may help de-escalate the internal conflict in Iraq and allow the Sunnis to feel that they can participate in the representative government without losing everything:

Leaders of Iraq's oil-rich Kurdish region have apparently approved a draft oil law that will be presented to Iraqi lawmakers in coming weeks, an eagerly awaited breakthrough that is expected to professionalize and expand drilling in the country.

The agreement was announced Saturday by Massoud Barzani, president of the regional government in Kurdish-populated northern Iraq, during a news conference in the northern city of Sulaymaniyah attended by Iraq's president and the U.S. ambassador, the Associated Press reported. ...

Iraqi officials in recent weeks have been struggling to reach an agreement on legislation that would govern the exploitation of the country's vast oil reserves and who should control the revenue.

Among the contentious issues are to what extent oil exploration will be controlled by the Shiite-led government in Baghdad; how proceeds will be distributed among oil-rich and oil-poor areas; and to what extent foreign companies will be allowed to drill for oil.

The draft has not been released to the public yet, so the details are murky. However, in the past these plans have attempted to pool some percentage of the revenues from both the Kurdish north and the Shi'ite south in order to give the Sunnis a substantial taste. The Sunnis need to accept the security of those revenues over the long term, and so the plans have complex formulations that create opportunities for dissent and failure.

It appears, at least from the Kurdish side, that this new structure will meet their requirements. Nouri al-Maliki already supports it; he's been trying since late last year to get it ratified. The Sunnis have not publicly commented on the draft yet, but it had been thought that the Kurds presented the last obstacle.

If this gets passed and implemented quickly, it has the potential to take the wind out of the Sunni insurgencies, especially if the US/Iraqi "surge" succeeds in dialing down the violence in Baghdad. It could add to the breathing room needed for the Iraqi government to take control over the capital and the Sunni areas of its nation. Let's hope the Iraqi National Assembly senses the urgency and immediately move this proposal into law.

The Full Bill

One of the motivations behind the Hillary Clinton campaign's reaction to David Geffen's barbs this week was to mark the boundaries for the debate in the primaries and general election. Hillary has a better reason for that than most; she wants to avoid any debate or discussion of her husband's impeachment. Other Democrats, however, wonder how she can justify that while trotting Bill onto the hustings:

Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton has a new commandment for the 2008 presidential field: Thou shalt not mention anything related to the impeachment of her husband.

With a swift response to attacks from a former supporter last week, advisers to the New York Democrat offered a glimpse of their strategy for handling one of the most awkward chapters of her biography. They declared her husband's impeachment in 1998 -- or, more accurately, the embarrassing personal behavior that led to it -- taboo, putting her rivals on notice and all but daring other Democrats to mention the ordeal again. ...

Although she has spent the past seven years establishing her own identity as a public servant, Clinton has been embracing the more popular aspects of her husband's presidency more widely as she mounts her own campaign, with frequent references to their time together in the White House and their joint legacy.

And as she has invoked the good Bill Clinton, she has risked invoking the bad, several Democratic strategists said.

"She's using him in this campaign, so why can't somebody else use him?" asked a veteran of Democratic presidential politics who is not currently aligned with a candidate but who, like numerous other Democrats, spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of angering the Clintons. "She's just made him fair game. He's part of her strategy, so why can't he be part of one of her opponents'?"

I'm of two minds on this subject. If Hillary distanced herself from her husband and refrained from having him politick on her behalf, a case could be made that the impeachment isn't germane to her own candidacy. After all, we rarely allow attacks on candidates' spouses to pass without scolding the attacker for aiming below the belt, as it were. We criticize the content of their activities within the boundaries of the campaigns -- for instance, Teresa Heinz-Kerry's "Asses Of Evil" buttons called into question her general temperament and judgment -- but we don't usually debate their personal peccadilloes of the past.

However, in this case, that really doesn't apply. First, Hillary simply can't avoid sending Bill into campaign mode; he remains her greatest political asset. She will also argue -- in fact, she has already argued -- that the country will benefit from a return to the years and policies of the previous Clinton administration. If she wants to use that argument, then those years and that administration becomes fair game for debate.

She can't have it both ways. In fact, demanding a "thou shalt not" commandment is the height of arrogance, a quality for which she has already won reknown. Reagan issued a "commandment" too, but it wasn't for his own personal benefit -- and Hillary Clinton is no Ronald Reagan.

I'm somewhat surprised to see the Democrats push back against this effort. One might have expected them to shy away from the impeachment for their own purposes; who wants to remind people what happened the last time the Democrats held the White House? However, they probably (and rightly) fear that the Republicans would use it against Hillary in a general election and want to see if it will have any traction before they nominate her for the Presidency. (I'm not so sure the GOP will use it against her, however, as it might just backfire against them. Recall what happened in the midterms following impeachment?)

The point is clear. If Hillary wants Bill, she's going to get the full Bill, and she will have to deal with it.

France: We Can Work With Terrorists

The unanimity of the global community that demanded that the Palestinian government recognize Israel before restoring aid has sported its first cracks, and to no one's great surprise, those cracks have come from France. Foreign minister Phillipe Douste-Blazy, who once called Iran a stabilizing force in the Middle East, pledged cooperation with the Hamas-Fatah government that refuses to meet the demands of the Quartet:

France has pledged to cooperate with a coalition Palestinian government that would include Hamas, in a key boost for Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas. But Abbas's European tour failed to make headway on resuming aid for his struggling people.

French Foreign Minister Philippe Douste-Blazy's promise Saturday to work with a government including Hamas and Fatah was the bright spot in Abbas's four-country swing through Europe this week. Other European leaders were more cautious, preferring to wait until the government is formed before making any commitments.

"I encouraged Mr. Abbas to persevere in his efforts to quickly form a national unity government," Douste-Blazy told reporters Saturday evening as Abbas wrapped up his trip.

If the government is formed according to the power-sharing deal worked out in Mecca last month, Douste-Blazy said, "France will be ready to cooperate with it. And our country will plead on its behalf within the European Union and with other partners in the international community."

French pleas will fall on deaf ears. This isn't brain surgery to anyone but Douste-Blazy and the Chirac government. When the Palestinians recognize Israel's right to exist and renounce violence and terrorism as well as ratify the previous agreements made with the PA, then aid will flow back into the territories and the process towards statehood can start again. Until then, the West should not -- and hopefully will not -- underwrite terrorist organizations, regardless of how much unity they display amongst themselves.

Unfortunately, Douste-Blazy isn't the only one slow on the uptake in this process. Kinf Abdullah II of Jordan urged the West to recognize this historic opportunity for peace, even though Hamas has explicitly rejected peace. He said that the situation had reached a crossroads, and the opportunity to integrate Israel into the "neighborhood" and achieve a two-state solution was slipping away. However, Abdullah didn't tell that to the right people. Israel already has committed themselves to the two-state solution; it's Hamas that has thrown out all of the PA's treaties and refuses to support anything short of the annihilation of Israel.

For some reason, people see the union of Hamas and Fatah as some sort of breakthrough in the peace process, but a unity government for the Palestinians only addresses their internal tensions, not their relationship to Israel. Actually, that's not quite true -- it makes the relationship to Israel worse than before. Why some nations want to leap to their checkbooks to reward the Islamist integration into the PA is a question only Douste-Blazy could answer, if he could even comprehend the question.