Ups And Downs

Apparently, the CQ hosting service has had some interruptions in service, but we're back up at the moment. Remember, if CQ goes down -- a rarity -- I'll post at Heading Right until service is restored.

We're about to go on air, but I've been following the NFL draft. Question: Why have Cleveland, Minnesota, and Miami all passed on Brady Quinn?

UPDATE: Michael Ledeen will be on the NARN at 1:30 pm CT to talk about George Tenet's book and his appearance in it. Don't miss this!

UPDATE II: Cleveland traded up for Dallas' first round pick to get Brady Quinn at #22. KC might have been interested in Quinn at #23. It's a good move for Cleveland, who gets away with its odd choice earlier in the first round.

NARN, The Police State 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.

Today, if we can keep Dan Simpson from invading our radio station, we'll be talking about his disarmament plan for America. While we're fending off Simpson's brownshirts, we'll also talk about the capture of Abd al-Hadi al-Iraqi, what the media left out, and what it means for America's will to fight al-Qaeda in Iraq. We'll probably talk about Jimmy Carter's finances, the Saudi capture of 172 terrorists plotting a 9/11-style attack on their oildfields, the surrender bill in Congress and Joe Lieberman's reaction to it, and more.

Be sure to call and join the conversation today at 651-289-4488, if you can break free while Simpson's storm troopers ransack your house!

Tenet A Little Foggy On The Details

I haven't had the chance to read the book by former CIA chief George Tenet, which Harper Collins will release next week, but it has generated its share of controversy. His top-level insider's account of the pre- and post-9/11 efforts against terrorism have current Bush administration officials unhappy -- and in at least two cases, pointing out deficient fact-checking. Tenet misidentifies a key figure in an argument he makes about how back-channel analyses started, and then neglects to mention his own analysis:

Mr. Tenet also directs scorn at the Pentagon intelligence analyses by Douglas J. Feith, then undersecretary of defense for policy. He describes his fury in August 2002 as he watched a slide show by Mr. Feith’s staff at C.I.A. headquarters suggesting “a mature, symbiotic relationship” between Iraq and Al Qaeda.

He said C.I.A. officers came to call such reports, in a play on words, “Feith-based analysis.” In an interview on Friday, Mr. Feith said Mr. Tenet’s account distorts the facts of the Pentagon effort and obscures Mr. Tenet’s own public statements before the war. Mr. Feith noted that Mr. Tenet, in October 2002, sent the Senate intelligence committee a letter that said, “We have solid reporting of senior level contacts between Iraq and Al Qaeda going back a decade.” Mr. Tenet describes Tina Shelton, who presented part of the Feith slide show at the C.I.A. in 2002, as a “naval reservist” and quotes her as saying in introductory remarks, “It is an open-and-shut case.”

But Ms. Shelton said Friday she was never a Navy reservist and never said such a thing. She was a Defense Intelligence Agency analyst for 22 years before retiring in October, she said.

Tenet also goes after Michael Ledeen for his efforts to meet with Iranian dissidents living abroad to encourage democratization in the Islamic Republic. Calling it nothing more than "Son of Iran-Contra," Tenet describes his anger and frustration at hearing of this back-channel effort to undermine the mullahcracy.

Well, boo hoo. First, it's ridiculous to call this the "Son of Iran-Contra", since the first Iran-Contra dealt with sending military hardware to the mullahs, not the dissidents. Second, since Iran has postured itself in a state of war against the Great Satan since 1979, why exactly did the CIA skip dealing with the dissidents who could have helped push back against the radical Islamists? The Pentagon apparently understood the necessity of engaging with Iranian dissidents, even if Langley and Foggy Bottom couldn't figure it out for themselves, and they leveraged those with contacts in that community, including Michael, a CQ reader and a friend of mine.

It reminds me of the hack job Rolling Stone did on Michael last year. James Bamford couldn't smoke out the the difference between Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden, when the Rolling Stone reporter wrote that Ledeen's Iranian contacts claimed the former was hiding in Iran ... in December 2001. Rolling Stone still has not corrected that mistake to this day, nearly nine months later. (See Section III.)

Tenet does the same with his recollection of the intel showing strong connections between Iraq and al-Qaeda, a connection that seems even stronger with the capture of Abd al-Hadi al-Iraq, a former Saddam Hussein-era officer in the Iraqi Army (rank: major) who became one of al-Qaeda's top field commanders. He claims that such arguments are "Feith-based analysis," but Douglas Feith reminds the Times that Tenet himself told Congress that the CIA had solid reporting of high-level contacts between AQ and Iraq for a decade.

Tenet then misidentifies Tina Shelton as a member of the Feith clique at the CIA and puts words into her mouth. Shelton disputes both her description and Tenet's characterization of her presentation. That forced Tenet's co-author to backpedal, apologizing for not getting the facts straight about Shelton's job, even though it formed a key part of Tenet's argument regarding her credibility.

I'd say the one with credibility problems is Tenet.

UPDATE: Jeffrey Carr points out that it gets released next week, so I'll read it then. The New York Times has had access to at least some portions of the book, and even before its release, the co-author is apologizing for getting its facts wrong.

Did Obama Blow The Debate?

That's the question I pose at Heading Right, after the Washington Post reports that Hillary Clinton has focused on Barack Obama's less-than-muscular response to a hypothetical question about a terrorist attack on the US. What did Obama miss that Hillary, John Edwards, and Bill Richardson get right -- and is it the Kitty Dukakis question of this primary season?

Olmert: The Delay Of A Thousand Tomahawks

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert now distances himself from remarks about how a military strike on Iran could delay their nuclear capabilities for ten years. Hours after the German magazine Focus produced the Olmert assertion that an attack using thousands of Tomahawk missiles could grind the Iranian program down for a decade, Olmert's office called the PM's remarks "general" and "off the record":

"Iran's nuclear program can be thrown back by years in a ten day attack using thousands of Tomahawk cruise missiles," Prime Minister Ehud Olmert was quoted as saying in an interview published online by the German magazine Focus on Saturday.

Olmert had reportedly said that it would not be possible to completely halt Iran's race to attain nuclear capability, but that a brisk attack that would delay it significantly was "technically feasible." While saying that Israel does not seek military confrontation, Olmert added that "nobody excludes it."

Only a few hours after the publication of the Focus article in Israeli media outlets, the Prime Minister's Office issued a statement denying the report.

The PMO said Olmert was giving a Focus reporter only general information and that he was speaking off the record.

Olmert couched this military strategy in terms of a complete failure of global pressure to sway the Iranians, which so far looks prescient enough. Israel cannot abide a nuclear Iran under the present radical-Islamist mullahcracy and would be forced to act. Olmert asked whether it would do more damage in the long run, as a ten-day attack on Iran would certainly transform the Iranian people into the enemy of Israel.

Of course, wars tend to do that, and a "ten-day attack" is somewhat euphimistic. In reality, Israel would declare war on Iran by doing so. However, with their head of state openly declaring his intention to wipe Israel off the map, one can certainly argue that Iran has already declared a de facto state of war with Israel. Given the circumstance, Israel would have little choice but to make sure that their military and political enemy -- a mantle which Ahmadinejad has claimed repeatedly -- does not acquire weapons that would allow Iran to complete its declared mission.

One might ask Olmert why he didn't see this clearly about Syria and Hezbollah last year, when he elected to attack Lebanese targets instead after Hezbollah provoked a war. A ten-day attack with thousands of Tomahawks would have set Bashar Assad back on his rump, and it would have taken all the steam out of Hezbollah by cutting off its political and military lines of communication. It would also have kicked out one of the struts of Iranian power and reach in the Middle East without destabilizing the nominally anti-Syrian government in Beirut.

Maybe Olmert learned a lesson last year, maybe not. At least he's not offering platitudes about the uselessness of any military reaction to the prospect of a nuclear mullahcracy, and what it means for the war on terror.

US Raids Capture AQI Terrorists, Iranian Weapons

A day after the Pentagon announced the capture of al-Qaeda mastermind Abd al-Hadi al-Iraqi, US forces in Iraq captured a number of AQI terrorists in a series of raids. They also found and detonated a truck bomb and discovered a cache of Iranian arms south of Baghdad:

U.S. forces detained 17 suspected insurgents in raids targeting al-Qaida in Iraq on Saturday, the military said, a day after the Pentagon announced the capture of one of the terror network's most senior and experienced operatives.

Elsewhere, U.S. fighter jets destroyed a truck bomb discovered in Anbar province, and an American raid south of Baghdad netted insurgent weapons apparently imported from neighboring Iran, the military said Saturday. ...

The U.S. military in Baghdad said Saturday's raids targeting suspected al-Qaida in Iraq insurgents netted four people in Mosul; six near Karmah, 50 miles west of Baghdad; two near the Syrian border; two in the Iraqi capital; and three near Balad, 50 miles north of Baghdad. The statement linked some to al-Qaida in Iraq, including one who allegedly served as an intelligence officer. ...

In Mahmoudiya, about 20 miles south of Baghdad, U.S. and Iraqi forces detained eight suspected insurgents and confiscated three caches of weapons during a raid on an apartment complex on April 22, including mortars, rockets and ammunition. The weapons appeared to be new and "were stamped with recent dates and Iranian markings," the military said.

In other news, the Danish military will send almost 500 troops to Basra to bolster the British contingent. It seems that ever since Britain and Denmark announced their intention to withdraw, the security situation has deteriorated. Troops from both countries now come under fire from the Shi'ite militias vying for power.

This is what happens when abandoning an area with a weak security apparatus in place. Now that the Brits and Danes have given the people of Basra a drop-dead date for their withdrawal, they have set in motion a fight for power that will only amplify as the withdrawal date approaches. Instead of throwing in with the central government, the flight of the Coalition has convinced Iraqis in that area that they have to find the strongest warlord for protection.

We can expect this across the country if the US withdraws precipitately from Iraq. A pullout will embolden the violent and frighten the law-abiding, and the end result will be a completely failed state. Regardless of whether one supported the invasion or not, it is obviously not in the American interest to leave behind a collapsed Iraq where the boldest and most vicious terrorists rise to power in fiefdoms small and large.

What The American Press Missed

Yesterday, the news broke that US forces had captured Abd al-Hadi al-Iraqi, a senior al-Qaeda commander, in transit back into Iraq to take over the AQ operation there late last year. He had already racked up quite a record, having coordinated operations with the Taliban in Afghanistan and Pakistan, and having masterminded two attempts to assassinate Pervez Musharraf. They forgot to mention one important point on his resumé, however:

The al-Qaeda leader who is thought to have devised the plan for the July 7 suicide bombings in London and an array of terrorist plots against Britain has been captured by the Americans.

Abd al-Hadi al-Iraqi, a former major in Saddam Hussein’s army, was apprehended as he tried to enter Iraq from Iran and was transferred this week to the “high-value detainee programme” at Guantanamo Bay.

Abd al-Hadi was taken into CIA custody last year, it emerged from US intelligence sources yesterday, in a move which suggests that he was interrogated for months in a “ghost prison” before being transferred to the internment camp in Cuba.

Abd al-Hadi, 45, was regarded as one of al-Qaeda’s most experienced, most intelligent and most ruthless commanders. Senior counter-terrorism sources told The Times that he was the man who, in 2003, identified Britain as the key battleground for exporting al-Qaeda’s holy war to Europe.

How many people died in London? Over 50? One might think that should lead a news article that reports his capture -- and yet the American press simply either didn't know or didn't care about their subject.

For instance, Dafna Linzer has the only Washington Post report on the capture, and the word "London" doesn't appear once in it. What captures Linzer's keen reportorial eye? Readers find out that the US held him in secret detention centers before transferring him to Guantanamo Bay:

An Iraqi man accused of being a key aide to Osama bin Laden and a top leader of al-Qaeda was arrested late last year on his way to Iraq and handed over to the CIA, the Pentagon announced yesterday, in what became the first secret overseas detention since President Bush acknowledged the existence of such a program last September.

The disclosure revealed that the Bush administration reopened its detention program within three months of announcing that no secret prisoners remained in the CIA's custody. The program has been criticized by human rights organizations and U.S. allies.

In a statement yesterday, the Defense Department described Abd al-Hadi al-Iraqi, 46, as "one of al-Qaeda's highest-ranking and experienced senior operatives" and announced that he has been sent to the Pentagon-run prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

Bush acknowledged the CIA's detention program last September and transferred all 14 of its senior al-Qaeda suspects to Guantanamo Bay. One intelligence official said al-Iraqi was the first person held by the CIA since Bush made the acknowledgment, but the official would not say whether other people have been held since al-Iraqi was handed over to the agency earlier this year.

"What the president said in September was that there was no one in CIA custody at that time," an intelligence official said, speaking on the condition of anonymity. "This individual was captured late last year, well after the president's speech, and transferred to the CIA several weeks later."

Yes, that's quite a shock. When our intelligence services and military capture terrorists, who do not wear uniforms and conduct attacks on civilians -- such as London commuters -- we do not treat them like Italian POWs in 1944. They don't qualify as POWs, but as unlawful combatants, and we are entitled to hold them and interrogate them without announcing their capture or making them available for outside visits. That makes their detention secret by definition.

How about the New York Times? Mark Mazzetti and David Cloud file the Gray Lady's only report on "Mr. Iraqi", and again it never mentions London. In fact, it doesn't even talk about the involvement of "Mr. Iraqi" in any terrorist activity, just that he "is said" to be a "top aide" Osama bin Laden -- as if he was Osama's favorite personal secretary. Mr. Iraqi conducted terrorist operations that killed many people, but the Paper of Record can't bring itself to mention any of that.

The Los Angeles Times, which goes to bed last among the three papers, manages not to get hysterical about the circumstances surrounding his capture and detention. Josh Meyer provides a more reasoned look at Abd al-Hadi al-Iraq, including some of his personal history that the other papers skipped. He reports that a "key ally" participated in the capture, and that revealing where it took place would put that relationship at risk of rupture -- a good reason not to give al-Iraqi a platform. Meyer also fails to mention anything about the London bombings.

All of these papers had hours after the Times of London report to get the London bombings into the story. The Times goes to bed at 7 pm ET and hits the feeds and wire services. None of the American media bothered to check on Abd al-Hadi al-Iraqi. Readers should ask themselves whether that comes from a lack of intellectual curiosity, or whether it comes from a bias that puts the circumstances of the detention of a terrorist at a higher priority than the terrorism itself. We should also ask ourselves any practical difference exists between ignorance and bias.

Jimmy Carter, Arab Front Man

Alan Dershowitz has often infuriated conservatives with his liberal ideology and sharp-witted speech. He drew insults by the bucketload for defending OJ Simpson in the mid-90s, when it appeared OJ would require a strong team for an appeal-- before a Los Angeles jury proved that celebrities don't need Dershowitz's services. However, Dershowitz has always remained strong in the war against radical Islam and a stalwart defender of Israel, and as such he has come increasingly into conflict with a man he once admired, Jimmy Carter.

Now Dershowitz has discovered that Carter gets his funding for his pro-Palestinian, pro-Arab positions from very suspect sources:

Recent disclosures of Carter's extensive financial connections to Arab oil money, particularly from Saudi Arabia, had deeply shaken my belief in his integrity. When I was first told that he received a monetary reward in the name of Shiekh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahayan, and kept the money, even after Harvard returned money from the same source because of its anti-Semitic history, I simply did not believe it. How could a man of such apparent integrity enrich himself with dirty money from so dirty a source? And let there be no mistake about how dirty the Zayed Foundation is. I know because I was involved, in a small way, in helping to persuade Harvard University to return more than $2 million that the financially strapped Divinity School received from this source. Initially, I was reluctant to put pressure on Harvard to turn back money for the Divinity School, but then a student at the Divinity School, Rachael Lea Fish showed me the facts.

They were staggering. I was amazed that in the twenty-first century there were still foundations that espoused these views. The Zayed Centre for Coordination and Follow-up, a think-tank funded by the Shiekh and run by his son, hosted speakers who called Jews "the enemies of all nations," attributed the assassination of John Kennedy to Israel and the Mossad and the 9/11 attacks to the United States' own military, and stated that the Holocaust was a "fable." (They also hosted a speech by Jimmy Carter.) To its credit, Harvard turned the money back. To his discredit, Carter did not.

Jimmy Carter was, of course, aware of Harvard's decision, since it was highly publicized. Yet he kept the money. Indeed, this is what he said in accepting the funds: "This award has special significance for me because it is named for my personal friend, Sheik Zayed bin Sultan al-Nahyan." Carter's personal friend, it turns out, was an unredeemable anti-Semite and all-around bigot. ...

The extent of Carter's financial support from, and even dependence on, dirty money is still not fully known. What we do know is deeply troubling. Carter and his Center have accepted millions of dollars from suspect sources, beginning with the bail-out of the Carter family peanut business in the late 1970s by BCCI, a now-defunct and virulently anti-Israeli bank indirectly controlled by the Saudi Royal family, and among whose principal investors is Carter's friend, Sheikh Zayed. Agha Hasan Abedi, the founder of the bank, gave Carter "$500,000 to help the former president establish his center...[and] more than $10 million to Mr. Carter's different projects."

Wow. I have no great love for Jimmy Carter and think his jeremiad against Israel demonstrates a seriously foolish policy, but I had no idea of the scale of which the Saudis have bought him. There is no doubt that Carter has climbed into bed with some of the worst anti-Semites. Dershowitz points out that Abedi intended his BCCI bank to act as "the best way to fight the evil influence of the Zionists."

The Arabs seem to have gotten a great deal for their investment. The Carter Center, Dershowitz notes, focuses its human-rights interests almost exclusively on Israel. It also scolds the Bush administration for its approach to the war on terror. Notably absent are any declarations against the Arab world for funding radical Islamist terrorism.

Dershowitz then calls out Carter for his hypocrisy on the impact of money on debate. Carter has argued that certain well-known journalists cannot be trusted to report accurately on Israel because some of their money comes from Jewish sources, although Front Page doesn't link to those statements. However, Carter continues to write books and give speeches about the Middle East without disclosing his financial ties to anti-Semitic Saudi sheikhs.

The professor ends by saying that no one in public discourse has a " lower ratio of real to apparent integrity than Jimmy Carter." Many of us have known that for years, after Carter's various Logan Act violations and selective outrage. No one makes the case quite as well as Dershowitz. (via TMV)

UPDATE: Zayed was not Saudi, but from Abu Dhabi; the correction comes courtesy of the infallibly discourteous Nandrews3 in the comments. I note that Nandrews doesn't address the anti-Semitism of BCCI's founder, however, nor the hypocrisy of Carter claiming that Jewish money makes people unable to be honest brokers in the Middle East while he rakes in millions from Arabs of whatever nationality.

UPDATE II: Bruce Kesler covered this topic in December, and tends to agree with Dershowitz. It would help if Carter opened the books at the Carter Center to get a clearer picture of who funds his work. Keep checking back with Bruce -- he's doing more research and may have more information later.

CQ Radio: Michael Zak, Victory Caucus

UPDATE: NZ couldn't make it today, but hopefully we can get together on Monday. Michael and I had an excellent conversation, and James Boyce called from MS-NBC and talked about the Democratic debates. You can listen to the entire download at this link -- just as you can with all CQ Radio and BTR shows.

Today's installment of CQ Radio (2 pm CT) welcomes Michael Zak, author and blogger. He has a message for the Republican Party and that message is Back To Basics. He blogs at the Grand Old Partisan, and joins us in the first half to discuss how the Republicans need to proceed in order to regain power.

We'll also talk again with NZ Bear from the Victory Caucus to discuss the developments yesterday in the Senate. We'll talk about Joe Lieberman, the two Republican defections, what we can expect from the President and when, and what we can do to make a difference.

Be sure to join us at 646-652-4889! We'd love to get you into the conversation. And make sure you're keeping up with the conversation at Heading Right!

US Nabs Top AQ Commander (Updated)

We caught Abd al Hadi al-Iraqi in transit to Iraq a week ago, but the news has just been released. Apparently al-Masri hasn't cut the mustard, as al-Iraqi meant to take over al-Qaeda operations in Iraq and push back against the joint US-Iraq effort (via Mac at Heading Right):

The United States has taken into custody a top al-Qaeda operative who plotted to assassinate Pakistan's President Pervez Musharraf and other officials, a Pentagon spokesman said Friday.

Abd al Hadi al-Iraqi, who was taken to the US navy prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba about a week ago, was intercepted while trying to reach Iraq to take over Al-Qaeda operations and to plot attacks from there against western targets outside Iraq, Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman said.

He is "one of Al-Qaeda's highest ranking and senior operatives at the time of his detention. He is associated with leaders of extremist groups allied with Al-Qaeda in Afghanistan and Pakistan, and including the Taliban," Whitman said.

It's a good thing we're committed to staying in Iraq, isn't it? Because if we left, then we couldn't catch AQ commanders before they had a chance to get situated in Iraq and start killing people by the dozens.

Oh, wait ...

UPDATE: The Weekly Standard has more:

While in Pakistan, al-Hadi directed cross-border military operations against U.S. and Afghan forces in Afghanistan. Al-Hadi also served as a conduit between al Qaeda in Iraq, the Taliban and al Qaeda senior command operating inside Pakistan. He was behind the assassination attempts against Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf.

"'Abd al-Hadi was known and trusted by Bin Ladin and Ayman al-Zawahiri," notes the Department of Defense. He was "in direct communication with both leaders and, at one point, was Zawahiri's caretaker. 'Abd al-Hadi also interacted with other senior al Qaeda planners and decision makers, such as Khalid Shaykh Muhammad and Abu Faraj al-Libi, and deceased al Qaeda members Hamza Rabi'a and 'Abd al-Rahman al-Muhajir."

Al-Hadi's capture and subsequent interrogation will likely yield significant intelligence on al Qaeda's global operations, and specifically operations in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iraq and Iran. Al-Hadi was a vital link in al Qaeda's global network, who possesses knowledge on al Qaeda's training, communications, personal ties and operations in the critical theaters of Pakistan, Afghanistan and Iraq. Al-Hadi's knowledge of al Qaeda's command structure inside Pakistan will be of particular interest, as the U.S. believes Osama bin Laden, Ayman al Zawahiri and other al Qaeda senior leaders are operating from command centers in Waziristan and Bajaur.

He'll be valuable if he talks. Either the interrogators got a lot out of him in a week, or they've decided that they can't get anything useful out of him at all. Otherwise, they wouldn't tip off AQ by letting them know he's been captured.

UPDATE II: Via the always-dependable Allahpundit, here's some background that won't surprise anyone but the "reality-based" community:

Abd al-Hadi al-Iraqi was captured by the CIA as he was attempting to travel back to his native country, Iraq. He was going to Iraq, officials say, to “manage” al Qaeda’s operations, including plots on Western interests outside of Iraq.

He was captured by the CIA in late 2006…

During his time with the CIA, Abd al-Hadi al-Iraqi was interrogated and revealed useful information about al Qaeda plots, which, officials say, have been disrupted as a result.

Abd al-Hadi al-Iraqi had met with al Qaeda members in Iran, officials also said.

So AQ is not only in Iraq but also in Iran. That headline at TalkLeft seems a bit ... outdated. Also, this answers the question about timiing -- they've had him for several months now, and have just transferred him to Gitmo.

Saudis Avoid Their Own 9/11

Saudi Arabia has arrested over 170 suspected terrorists, including foreign-trained pilots, to end a plot against their oil fields. The terrorists allegedly planned to use commercial airliners to smash into the oil facilities and disrupt the entire global economy:

Police arrested 172 Islamic militants, some of whom had trained abroad as pilots so they could fly aircraft in attacks on Saudi Arabia's oil fields, the Interior Ministry said Friday. A spokesman said all that remained in the plot "was to set the zero hour."

The ministry issued a statement saying the detainees were planning to carry out suicide atttacks against "public figures, oil facilities, refineries ... and military zones" — some of which were outside the kingdom.

"They had reached an advance stage of readiness and what remained only was to set the zero hour for their attacks," Interior Ministry spokesman Brig. Mansour al-Turki told the Associated Press in a phone call. "They had the personnel, the money, the arms. Almost all the elements for terror attacks were complete except for setting the zero hour for the attacks."

The ministry did not say the militants would fly aircraft into oil refineries, as the Sept. 11, 2001 hijackers flew planes into buildings in New York and Washington, but it said in a statement that some detainees had been "sent to other countries to study flying in preparation for using them to carry out terrorist attacks inside the kingdom."

Of course, these are the Saudis, so the possibility exists that this is a ruse used to round up dissidents. However, al-Qaeda has conducted operations against the Saudis before. The Sauds have had gun battles and extensive operations against AQ, and of course, we all remember Khobar Towers last decade.

The terrorists intended this to be a wide-ranging raid. They wanted to storm prisons to free their associates, attack military installations, and destroys economic targets, especially oil facilities. Apparently assassinations were also on the menu, as the Saudis said that "public figures" had been targeted. Saudi security forces uncovered a large cache of arms in the desert, which they displayed for domestic television audiences.

They also captured a whopping $32 million in cash. That kind of loss has to hurt.

What does this mean for the West and for the world? It will probably spike oil prices briefly, until investors and speculators are sure the immediate danger has passed. Once again, we will have to address the training of pilots for larger passenger jets, as it appears that we have inadvertently enabled the conversion of airliners into guided missiles. The amount of money confiscated shows that we have yet to fully cut off the financing of these groups, and that exposures of efforts like the Swift banking surveillance can seriously damage our ability to prevent terrorist attacks, in a general sense.

One big hit on the Saudi supply centers will make the economic fallout of 9/11 look like a minor Wall Street correction in comparison. We had better start getting serious about eliminating dependence on the world oil market and developing our own resources as quickly as possible.

Your Friendly, Gun-Free Police State

Ever wonder how liberals would implement a gun-free America? After incidents like the mass murder at Virginia Tech, arguments for total gun control appear faster than anyone can say Ismail Ax, but they never quite explain how to get from point A to point Z. Fortunately for us, Toledo Blade columnist Dan Simpson takes us step by step through the process. The retired diplomat assures us that he's no "crazed liberal zealot" as he skips merrily down the path to a police state (via QandO).

It starts off quietly enough:

Now, how would one disarm the American population? First of all, federal or state laws would need to make it a crime punishable by a $1,000 fine and one year in prison per weapon to possess a firearm. The population would then be given three months to turn in their guns, without penalty.

One might think to start with a Constitutional amendment first. Simpson appears to have forgotten that pesky little 2nd Amendment -- you know, the one that the Founding Fathers thought so unimportant as to put it before unreasonable search and seizure.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. The former hunter explains that he doesn't want to shut down that pastime:

Hunters would be able to deposit their hunting weapons in a centrally located arsenal, heavily guarded, from which they would be able to withdraw them each hunting season upon presentation of a valid hunting license. The weapons would be required to be redeposited at the end of the season on pain of arrest. When hunters submit a request for their weapons, federal, state, and local checks would be made to establish that they had not been convicted of a violent crime since the last time they withdrew their weapons. In the process, arsenal staff would take at least a quick look at each hunter to try to affirm that he was not obviously unhinged.

Aha, the tried and true "quick look"! So what would that "quick look" entail -- checking for drool? A T-shirt that says, "The voices in my head don't like you"? In the meantime, all of these "hunters" would have their firearms for weeks on end while the rest of us would be forcibly disarmed. Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold probably would have qualified for a hunting license, and Cho managed to get past a records check, too. Would a "quick look" have stopped either of them -- and would it provide a due process for the innocent that would get denied access to their hunting weapons?

But wait -- remember that whole bit about unreasonable search and seizure? Well, if Simpson can ignore the 2nd Amendment, then why should he worry about the rest of the Constitution?

The disarmament process would begin after the initial three-month amnesty. Special squads of police would be formed and trained to carry out the work. Then, on a random basis to permit no advance warning, city blocks and stretches of suburban and rural areas would be cordoned off and searches carried out in every business, dwelling, and empty building. All firearms would be seized. The owners of weapons found in the searches would be prosecuted: $1,000 and one year in prison for each firearm. ...

On the streets it would be a question of stop-and-search of anyone, even grandma with her walker, with the same penalties for "carrying."

Got that? No search warrants, no probable cause, not even the suspicion of a "quick look" would be required. "Special squads" of police would simply blockade you, storm into your house without permission, and rip it to pieces looking for your weapons.

But he's not a "crazed liberal zealot". Oh, no, no, no. He just thinks that the government should have the right and the duty to ignore the Constitution and to invade your homes. Oddly, Simpson doesn't see the irony in that the 2nd Amendment intended to keep government from acting in exactly the manner he describes and endorses. The 2nd Amendment was meant to stop people like Don Simpson.

Oh, by the way: this defender of America is a member of the editorial boards for both the Toledo Blade and the Pittsburgh Gazette.

Note: I'm really, really hoping this turned out to be satire, but I somehow doubt it.

Debate Drones

I skipped watching the first Democratic presidential debate, but according to all accounts, I didn't miss too much. The New York Times tried to frame the evening in the best possible light, but even the Gray Lady conceded that it turned into an ennui to forget:

Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton was professorial and emphatic as she spoke Thursday night about health care, Iraq and whether Wal-Mart was good for America (a “mixed blessing,” she decided) .

Senator Barack Obama of Illinois, by reputation a dynamic performer, was reserved and cautious as he talked about a donor with a shady past, how he would respond to a terrorist attack on American shores and his biggest mistake (not doing more to stop Congress from intervening in the Terri Schiavo case, he said).

The setting was the first Democratic presidential debate of the 2008 campaign, a surprisingly sedate and meandering affair, filled with as many moments of awkward humor as memorable insight into the qualifications of the candidates or the policy differences among them. ...

The debate, at South Carolina State University, was shown on MSNBC and moderated by the NBC news anchor Brian Williams, who at times appeared to struggle with the unwieldy field of eight candidates whose remarks were packed into a 90-minute event; at several points he resorted to asking for a show of hands to try to spotlight similarities or differences among them. (None went up when Mr. Williams asked if any of the others on stage supported the call by Representative Dennis J. Kucinich of Ohio to begin impeachment proceedings against Dick Cheney, the vice president).

At another point, when Senator Joseph R. Biden Jr. of Delaware, one of the most verbose senators, delivered a one-word answer that drew laughter from the audience, when Mr. Williams asked whether he had the discipline to lead the free world.

“Yes,” he said. The audience laughed at his brevity. Mr. Biden, looking proud of himself, said nothing else, as Mr. Williams silently if slightly uncomfortably waited for him to expand on his remarks.

One has to credit any event in which Joe Biden, a man known for his love for his own voice, restricts himself toa single syllable. Unfortunately, this is the one event where people watch to learn the candidates' positions. "Listless" was the one descriptive used by Adam Nagourney and Jeff Zeleny that seems to sum up the event.

Even terrorist talk apparently did not rouse the Democrats from their stupor. Tigerhawk live-blogged the debate last night, and reported what looks like a minor Michael Dukakis moment for Obama and Edwards:

To Obama: "If we learned that two American cities were hit by terrorists and we further learned beyond a shadow of a doubt that it had been the world of al Qaeda, how would you change the U.S. military stance overseas as a result?"

Obama: Talks about our domestic emergency response. Then says we need good intelligence, even though the question presumed that we knew. Says we should not "alienate the international community." We need to talk.

Me: Obama totally avoided the question, refusing to say a single thing about our military stance.

Edwards (same question): I would make certain we knew who was responsible, and then I would act swiftly and strongly. Then I would want to know how this happened without us knowing in advance.

Me: These are very cerebral, "talking points" answers. I think Williams was looking for a passionate response, and that these guys blew it.

Same question to Clinton: "Having been a senator on 9/11, I understand the horror of that sort of attack. I think a president must move as swiftly as prudent to retaliate." Lots of emphasis on reliation. "That doesn't mean we should go looking for other fights. Let's focus on those who have attacked us and do everything we can to destroy them."

Me: Hillary crushed Edwards and Obama on this question. They looked like were deer-in-the-headlights, and bleated on irrelevantly. Clinton rolled through them, focusing on the need for retaliation. On that answer, she would have my vote (if somebody put a gun to my head and made me vote for a Democrat).

Unfortunately, she gave that one back when she claimed that the Virgina Tech massacre was the fault of the federal government. Huh? Was V-Tech a federal facility? She claimed that Cho's access to guns after his mental problems was a federal problem -- one that she and Bill made sure was solved during the Clinton administration -- but the problem was in Virginia state law, not the federal law. The federal law had not changed since the Clintons left the White House.

And besides, the correct answer was that the fault lies with Cho.

I have a deep skepticism about televised debates in any case. It's usually a forum for posturing and gotchas, where the only insight one gets is whether candidates have a quick enough wit to keep pace. It tells nothing else about a candidate that one couldn't glean from a campaign website and a little research, and often tells less than nothing at all. This appears to be the case with last night's debate, where America got to see nine varieties of political vanilla.

Gateway Strikes Out

Pardon the slow start today, but CQ has had a number of technical difficulties last night and this morning. And one of them is unfortunately an old story.

As I wrote last night, I got my Gateway laptop back from Gateway's service team yesterday afternoon. As expected, the hard drive had been re-imaged, so I had to spend several hours reloading the software. As I finished doing that, the wireless network connection failed -- again. It did the same thing twice more in a half hour, following reboots after the previous failures.

This morning, my Sony Vaio started acting up (it was a problem with my anti-virus program that I eventually solved), and I could have used a reliable backup laptop. Unfortunately, I have a Gateway. The network connection failed twice in rapid succession, forcing me to install the external adapter again -- but by that time, the Sony was up and running smoothly.

So what did Gateway do with my laptop? I'd guess it was one of two possibilities. Either they stopped at wiping out my hard drive and re-imaging it, or they replaced the motherboard. Either way, they obviously never tested it at any length with secure wireless networks. If they did the latter, then the laptop has some serious hardware design or sourcing issues.

In any event, I'm now more unhappy than I was before. I've wasted several hours of my time last night and this morning getting this Gateway laptop to work, and now I'll probably have to ship it off again for another round of posturing from Gateway corporate.

Don't buy Gateway.

Mogadishu Still Roiled By Insurgents

The fight for Mogadishu goes on, as Islamists and warlords fight the recognized government of Somalia for control of the capital. Just weeks after Ethiopian troops invaded Somalia and put the Islamists to flight, they still face heavy fighting, delaying them from transferring control to the Somali government and a peacekeeping force:

The fighting in Somalia's ruined capital worsened still further yesterday as Ethiopian troops launched a new offensive against areas held by insurgents.

The number of refugees may now have reached 400,000 - more than one third of Mogadishu's entire population. But Somalia's internationally recognised government hailed a victory last night and claimed to be in full control of the city.

"We have won the fighting against the insurgents," said Ali Mohammed Gedi, the prime minister. "The worst of the fighting in the city is now over."

He added: "We have captured the stronghold of the terrorists. We will capture any terrorists who have escaped."

The Telegraph reports that heavy artillery fire can still be heard in the city. The new fighting has killed over 350 people. Even more worrisome are reports that over 400,000 citizens of Mogadishu may now be refugees, or almost a third of its inhabitants. That will create a heavy load for humanitarian relief, even if the end of fighting arrives soon.

The Ethiopians are still waiting for African Union troops to replace them. The AU still has not sent the bulk of the troops it pledged. Last month it sent less than 100 advisors, hardly enough to hold a neighborhood in the war-torn capital. The Ethiopians would like to leave, but they do not want to leave a power vacuum.

Will the AU step up, or will Somalia have to rely on its one neighbor for its protection?

Return Of The Living Gateway

Those who have noticed a quiet over CQ this evening might wonder what has kept me from my regular blogging into the evening. Keeping me from my keybord is no mean feat; in fact, one might presume that some kind of monster had taken me away! And, in a way, you would be right -- in fact, two distractions developed this afternoon.

First, the Gateway laptop returned from the Dark Lagoon, or Gateway tech support, whichever you prefer. I had only sent it back on Tuesday afternoon, and didn't expect it until a week or two had passed. However, my blog posts on this subject did get the attention of Gateway's corporate public relations people, and I have had a couple of conversations with them this week. Their Corporate Escalation department promised to keep an eye on the progress of my complaint, and perhaps that moved things along.

Now, however, I have to reload all of my software all over again. I expected this, as several people warned me that the hard drive would get wiped and re-imaged, and that's exactly what happened. I backed it all up to my network storage system and thankful I don't have to redo a lot, or at least at the moment it looks that way. Right now I'm restoring my profiles from Firefox and Thunderbird, and I've still got to reboot before I can reload Microsoft Office.

Before I started all that, though, I skipped the dancing around at the Democratic debate and went to see the Little Admiral start Irish-dancing lessons. The Twin Cities has an excellent dance school for Irish dancing called Scoil na Trí, which I have known since I studied Irish locally. In the 3-5 age group, there was a lot less dancing and a lot more cat-herding going on, but she loved it. She's been asking to do this since she saw Irish dancers at a fair almost three years ago, so Grandma & Grandpa decided to get her started.

So, I'm going to be doing configuration changes until late in the night; expect a slow start in the morning, but a refreshed and hopefully stable infrastructure for tomorrow. In the meantime, keep checking Heading Right for more great conversation from your favorite conservative BTR hosts!

CQ Radio Today: Chris Muir

For today's installment of CQ Radio, we'll talk with Chris Muir, the cartoonist behind Day By Day. Chris does not shy away from controversy, and his entry for today shows that he likes to challenge taboos on both right and left. We are going to discuss the firestorm that erupted with today's cartoon, plus Chris' trip to Iraq, his philosophy for his art, the use of suggestive imagery in defense of conservatism, and much, much more.

Be sure to join the conversation today by calling 646-652-4889!

BUMP: To top.

Breaking: Senate Passes Supplemental, 51-46

CNN reports that the Senate just passed the bill that the House approved last night, 51-46, setting up the second veto of President Bush's two terms in office. More as it develops ...

UPDATE: AP has it up now:

The 51-46 vote was largely along party lines, and like House passage of the same bill a day earlier, fell far short of the two-thirds margin needed to overturn the president's threatened veto. Nevertheless, the legislation is the first binding challenge on the war that Democrats have managed to send to Bush since they reclaimed control of both houses of Congress in January.

"The president has failed in his mission to bring peace and stability to the people of Iraq," said Sen. Robert Byrd (news, bio, voting record), D-W.V., chairman of the Appropriations Committee. He later added: "It's time to bring our troops home from Iraq." ...

Republicans said the vote amounted to little more than political theater because the bill would be dead on arrival after reaching the White House. Bush said he will veto the bill so long as it contains a timetable on Iraq, as well as $20 billion in spending added by Democrats.

"The solution is simple: Take out the surrender date, take out the pork, and get the funds to our troops," said Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (news, bio, voting record), R-Ky.

Sen. Joseph Lieberman (news, bio, voting record), I-Conn., sided with Republicans in opposing the bill.

Looks like the Democrats got two Republicans to cross the aisle. I'm betting on Gordon Smith and Chuck Hagel. I'm still waiting for the roll-call report.

UPDATE II: I hate being right. Hagel and Smith crossed for the Democrats. Only Lieberman crossed for the Republicans.

Joe Lieberman Sends A Warning

Joe Lieberman delivered a speech today warning of the consequences that will arise from the passage of the troop-withdrawal bill that the House sent over to the Senate this morning. The Tank has the whole speech, and it should be read all of the way through, but here are a few highlights:

When we say that U.S. troops shouldn’t be “policing a civil war,” that their operations should be restricted to this narrow list of missions, what does this actually mean?

To begin with, it means that our troops will not be allowed to protect the Iraqi people from the insurgents and militias who are trying to terrorize and kill them. Instead of restoring basic security, which General Petraeus has argued should be the central focus of any counterinsurgency campaign, it means our soldiers would instead be ordered, by force of this proposed law, not to stop the sectarian violence happening all around them—no matter how vicious or horrific it becomes.

In short, it means telling our troops to deliberately and consciously turn their backs on ethnic cleansing, to turn their backs on the slaughter of innocent civilians—men, women, and children singled out and killed on the basis of their religion alone. It means turning our backs on the policies that led us to intervene in the civil war in Yugoslavia in the 1990s, the principles that today lead many of us to call for intervention in Darfur.

This makes no moral sense at all.

It also makes no strategic or military sense either.

Al Qaeda’s own leaders have repeatedly said that one of the ways they intend to achieve victory in Iraq is to provoke civil war. They are trying to kill as many people as possible today, precisely in the hope of igniting sectarian violence, because they know that this is their best way to collapse Iraq’s political center, overthrow Iraq’s elected government, radicalize its population, and create a failed state in the heart of the Middle East that they can use as a base.

That is why Al Qaeda blew up the Golden Mosque in Samarra last year. And that is why we are seeing mass casualty suicide bombings by Al Qaeda in Baghdad now.

Lieberman makes five specific refutations of the supplemental, and all of them are spot-on.

This speech has led some to wonder if Lieberman may not be warning Harry Reid and the rest of the caucus that he's about ready to leave. That would put the Democrats in the minority and the Republicans in the majority, effectively "firing" Reid. Allahpundit notes that it may actually have no effect, at least in terms of committee leadership assignments. The Democrats at that point might convince a Republican to switch to their caucus as well, perhaps Gordon Smith of Oregon or one of the gentleladies from Maine.

Perhaps, and perhaps. A majority can probably override that organizing resolution if they tried, and the Democrats would have to offer some mighty tempting considerations to get any Republican to defect on the basis of surrendering to the Iraqi insurgents. I think Lieberman may well be playing out the string here in hope that he can pull Reid back from the brink.

The Goalpost-Shifting Of The Democrats

I decided to follow up yesterday's Five Myths piece with another look at Harry Reid and Nancy "No-Show" Pelosi. The inconsistencies between Democratic positions on the Iraq war in just a matter of weeks are astonishing, once one does a little research. It was just in January that Democrats scolded the White House for not listening to its generals. In at least one case, the vacillation occurs within the same interview.

For instance, here's what the two Democratic leaders had to say earlier in the year:

* Senate Democrats voted unanimously to confirm General Petraeus in January.

* “Listen to the generals.” - Sen. Harry Reid, 01/19/2007

* “If the President won't listen to generals, he won't listen to the American people, who have spoken for a new direction, then perhaps he will listen to us, Congress, when we send him a supplemental bill that acknowledges reality in Iraq.” - Reid, 03/26/2007

* “Just listen to the generals.” - Speaker Nancy Pelosi, 02/27/07

Got all that? Now here's a few more quotes from the last ten days for comparison:

* “The Pentagon first approached Armed Services Committee aides to set up a briefing [with General Petraeus], but panel aides said they were “too busy” to schedule a meeting next week, the administration official said. A second attempt to set up a briefing with the Speaker’s office was likewise declined.” - Roll Call, 04/18/2007

* “Initially, some Democrats rejected the offer to meet with General Petraeus, but said they changed their minds to avoid being cast as unwilling to compromise.” - NYTimes, 04/19/2007

Abd for those looking for constancy in Democratic leadership even within a single day, we get nothing but disappointment:

* He's the man on the ground there now. … I agree with General Petraeus. … …I stick with General Petraeus. … He's the commander on the ground there.” – Reid on Gen. Petraeus, 4/23/07

* “I don’t believe him.” - Reid on Petraeus in the same interview

So we should listen to the generals but avoid meeting with them, and support the commander in the field but not believe him. That sums up the Democrats on the war since they took control of Congress. There's been room for plenty of criticism about the war strategies in Iraq over the past sixteen months when insurgencies started becoming much more deadly, but the vacillation of the Democrats serves as a reminder of why American voters don't trust them with national security.

Breaking: Dollar Bill Keeps His Committee Assignment

Over the past week, two Republican Congressmen have resigned their committee assignments after having been raided by the FBI for investigations into potential corruption. John Boehner asked John Doolittle and Rick Renzi to step down to maintain confidence in the legislative process. Nancy Pelosi apparently doesn't care much about that, as Roll Call reports this morning (subscription required):

House Democratic leaders are not expected to pressure embattled Rep. William Jefferson (D-La.) to forfeit his lone remaining committee assignment, even as two Republican lawmakers who similarly face intense FBI scrutiny have relinquished their posts in recent days.

Democratic sources indicated that Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) is unlikely to ask the Louisiana lawmaker, who is under federal investigation, to give up his seat on the Small Business Committee. ...

The Louisiana lawmaker has not been indicted in the investigation, but the FBI has asserted it videotaped Jefferson allegedly accepting $100,000 in marked bills from an informant, and a related raid of his home reportedly found $90,000 in cash in his freezer.

The FBI also raided Jefferson’s Congressional office in May 2006, an action that drew criticism of the agency from both Republican and Democratic leaders.

In addition, a former Jefferson aide and a Kentucky businessman have both pleaded guilty in connection with the case, receiving lengthy prison terms.

Democrats did force Jefferson to withdraw from the House Ways and Means Committee last year and declined to seat him there this year after his re-election. However, Nancy Pelosi originally wanted to assign Jefferson to the Homeland Security Committee, despite the corruption investigation and convictions of his associates. Only after the Republicans threatened a floor fight did Pelosi back down from that assignment.

When Democrats campaigned on the culture of corruption, voters thought they opposed it. Instead, they have been busy rewarding it. The Republicans have been the party which takes responsible action in Congress when corruption comes to light, and John Boehner has proven it twice over.

More Questions About The Charlton Firing

The firing of US Attorney Paul Charlton in Arizona took a dark twist yesterday from the fallout of the Department of Justice investigation of Rep. Rick Renzi. Alberto Gonzales told Congress that he had fired Charlton over a policy dispute over the FBI's general refusal to tape interrogations. However, six weeks before his termination, Renzi's office contacted Charlton to inquire whether Charlton was investigating the Republican Congressman:

The top aide to Rep. Rick Renzi (R-Ariz.) called the office of Arizona's U.S. attorney about six weeks before the prosecutor was fired, inquiring about a federal probe into the congressman's role in a land deal that benefited a former business partner and political patron.

The former U.S. attorney, Paul K. Charlton, told House investigators this week that his office alerted the Justice Department's headquarters about the call from Renzi's chief of staff, Brian Murray, because he considered it potentially improper, according to congressional sources who spoke about the probe on the condition of anonymity. Justice rules require prosecutors to report contacts from members of Congress seeking information about investigations.

The incident means that Charlton was the third of eight U.S. attorneys forced to resign last year who had reported to Justice officials that Republican members of Congress or their staffs made inappropriate overtures to their offices about politically sensitive investigations they were supervising. ...

Sen. Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.), who has been leading the Senate Judiciary Committee probe of the dismissals, fired off a letter yesterday to Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales, saying the Renzi case raises "new and serious questions about whether improper political motivations were involved" in Charlton's firing.

In addition, Schumer drew attention to suggestions, first published in yesterday's Wall Street Journal, that Justice officials delayed the investigation into Renzi to help him win reelection. "I am troubled by the possibility that the practice of having U.S. attorneys coordinate with the Justice Department's Public Integrity Section in cases involving lawmakers, which is intended to be a check on politicization, may have been used in this instance for the contrary purpose of influencing a case for political reasons."

First, we should point out that Charlton's removal did not end the investigation. The FBI raided Renzi's home last week, and Renzi stepped down from his committee assignments as a result. If he corrupted his office and sold out his constituents, it does not appear that Charlton's termination has kept that from coming to light.

That being said, this makes the entire process of terminations look even more suspect. At the least, it shows political stupidity on a scale so grand as to be almost unbelievable. Who in their right mind would fire a federal prosecutor who just had improper contact from the Congressman he's investigating -- especially in the days after a Democratic takeover of Congress? That call should have alerted anyone with any sort of political antennae that firing Charlton would set off all sorts of red flags if that call came to light.

Instead, they added him to the list six weeks before they started the terminations. It reminds one of how David Iglesias made the list late in the process, just after Pete Domenici and Heather Wilson contacted Iglesias about a political=corruption investigation and then complained to the White House about the answers they received. Small wonder that Democrats and Republicans alike on the Hill have a hard time buying the ever-changing stories from Gonzales.

The worst part of this once-molehill is that more and more embarrassing details keep popping out. Just when we think we've heard it all, another scandalous tidbit rises to the surface. The White House should have acted early to end this debacle by insisting on Gonzales' resignation and canning his entire staff.

Day By Day: Crossing A Line?

Today's panel of Day by Day uses blackface on Hillary Clinton to make a political point about her pandering to the African-American community by changing the cant and accent of her speech to sound more "black". Rick Moran of Right Wing Nut House criticized Chris Muir on his own blog and on Heading Right this morning:

Considering how we conservatives trashed Jane (”you ignorant slut”) Hamsher for photoshopping Lieberman in black face, shouldn’t we police our own and give Mr. Muir a few well chosen jabs for his insensitivity?

As I point out in my blog post, there is more than political correctness at stake here. The Minstrel Show - which is where black face comes from - did more than any other American institution to spread the black stereotypes we’re so familiar with today.

I responded by agreeing with Rick, although I think the Hamsher example is less apropo than the Steven Gilliard incident. Gilliard photoshopped blackface onto Michael Steele to accuse him of pandering to whites -- in short, of being black only on the surface. He also called Steele "Simple Sambo", a rather unsubtle support for his argument.

Conservatives and liberals alike slammed Gilliard for his blogpost then; eighteen months later, should Chris Muir get a pass? It's going to be a running topic on Heading Right, so keep checking back for more discussion on the topic.

Leonardo Da Vinci And The Stallion's Erection

I have to admit that I like a wide variety of films, and sometimes for the wrong reasons. I'm an aficionado of bad films -- not mediocrities, and not just bad, but so unbelievably bad that they become unintended comedies. The greatest of modern example is undoubtedly Battlefield Earth, which has such bad acting, poor direction, and logic holes so huge that even "ratbrains" could deduce them.

I also like bad film reviews, and today's New York Times has a great example. Manohla Dargis tries to sell a documentary about a repulsive subject, and invokes the Enlightenment to do so:

Written by Mr. Devor and Charles Mudede, “Zoo” is nothing if not artful. Even before its premiere at the Sundance Film Festival in January, it had attracted a fair amount of attention that quickly morphed into a reassuringly familiar drone. Documentaries, particularly the kind shown at festivals like Sundance, tend to reaffirm the audience’s worldview, partly by appealing to its presumptive tolerance and partly by underscoring the artistry of the endeavor (the vision thing). Like many such documentaries, “Zoo” wraps its sensationalistic core in a seductive mantle, an approach that appeals to viewers already predisposed to art and the Enlightenment, “Sesame Street” and all things not Rush Limbaugh. These are films as documents of reason (yours, mine, the creators’), the cinema of indoor voices.

Got that? If you appreciate the Enlightenment and love Sesame Street, then you will understand the artistic essence of Zoo. From that description, the film might be about the elegant nature of animals contrasted with their confinement in urban centers -- a cri de coeur for the once-proud creatures of the wild. Given the Sesame Street reference, perhaps it focuses more on those born into captivity, whose true natures will never be expressed.

Or, perhaps, it's about people who have sex with animals:

The director Robinson Devor apparently would like viewers who watch his heavily reconstructed documentary, “Zoo,” to see it as a story of ineluctable desire and human dignity. Shot on Super 16-millimeter film, with many scenes steeped in a blue that would have made Yves Klein envious, “Zoo” is, to a large extent, about the rhetorical uses of beauty and metaphor and of certain filmmaking techniques like slow-motion photography. It is, rather more coyly, also about a man who died from a perforated colon after he arranged to have sex with a stallion.

Mercifully, you don’t see this death on camera, though if you sit close enough to the screen, you will see a few fairly brief images of one sexual event, accompanied by graphic sounds. It isn’t pretty, which is why the images appear only on a small television monitor. Art-house devotees may be a tolerant lot, but it’s doubtful they want to look at a stallion’s erect penis stretched across the big screen like a sailboat boom, at least in public. Certainly such an image would work directly counter to the self-conscious poeticism of Mr. Devor’s film, to its carefully confected narrative of misunderstood barnyard love and baleful testimonial. It is, after all, difficult to sing of the bodies electric and equine amid a chorus of “yucks.”

Indeed. As Leonardo himself once said, "Once you show the stallion's erection, all of the mystique is gone." Or at least that's what Dargis would have him say, since the Enlighhtenment requires one to sympathize with a man so stupid as to be unaware that a stallion's erect penis would injure him during sex. Dargis also pre-emptively scolds "Bible-believers" for eating animals but not approving of engaging in bestiality, in what I'd call one of the largest rhetorical stretches I've seen in a long while -- and I regularly read the New York Times.

Rubbish. One can hardly find a less sympathetic and more useless subject for a documentary than bestiality, something that says almost nothing about the human condition and is generally considered beyond the pale even by the perverse. Equating a film like Zoo with Enlightenment values shows that Dargis slept through the Western Civilization classes in college. Invoking a children's show like Sesame Street, where animal characters interact with children, in a review about bestiality is even more sick and twisted than the movie.

If Dargis wants to insult Rush Limbaugh and people of faith, that certainly is her prerogative. If she wants to champion bestiality to do it, it says a lot more about Manohla than it does about Rush and Christians. (hat tip: CQ reader Topcopy)

When David Dumped Harry

The port side of the blogosphere rings with rage over David Broder's Washington Post column today. Talking Points Memo has called for a "blogswarm" to shout down Broder for the unforgivable offense of pointing out that Harry Reid has been as incompetent as Alberto Gonzales [not quite -- see update below]:

Here's a Washington political riddle where you fill in the blanks: As Alberto Gonzales is to the Republicans, Blank Blank is to the Democrats -- a continuing embarrassment thanks to his amateurish performance.

If you answered " Harry Reid," give yourself an A. And join the long list of senators of both parties who are ready for these two springtime exhibitions of ineptitude to end. ...

[C]onsider the mental gyrations performed by Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) as he rationalized the recent comment from his majority leader, Harry Reid, the leading light of Searchlight, Nev., that the war in Iraq "is lost."

On "Fox News Sunday," Schumer offered this clarification of Reid's off-the-cuff comment. "What Harry Reid is saying is that this war is lost -- in other words, a war where we mainly spend our time policing a civil war between Shiites and Sunnis. We are not going to solve that problem. . . . The war is not lost. And Harry Reid believes this -- we Democrats believe it. . . . So the bottom line is if the war continues on this path, if we continue to try to police and settle a civil war that's been going on for hundreds of years in Iraq, we can't win. But on the other hand, if we change the mission and have that mission focus on the more narrow goal of counterterrorism, we sure can win."

Broder offers more examples of Reid's ineptitide as caucus leader. Remember when Reid's intellectual basis for opposing George Bush was that the President was a "loser"? Brave Harry managed to wait until Bush traveled to Europe before calling him names. He called Alan Greenspan "one of the biggest political hacks" in DC, despite Greenspan's successful management of the Fed. He insulted Bill Frist for keeping his campaign pledge to serve only two terms in office.

Of course the netroots love him -- he's pandering to them. Rather than exercise statesmanship and decorum, Reid spews personal insults as argument and hyperbole as analysis. Schumer and Dianne Feinstein had to hit reverse away from his unprecedented announcement of defeat last week. Only Nancy Pelosi, with her no-show at the Petraeus briefing, could make the Majority Leader look mediocre. Otherwise, Reid is Keith OIbermann with less coherence.

And let's not forget the land deals that Reid has conducted in Nevada. Add that to Harry's deep involvement with disgraced lobbyist and Democratic Bogeyman of 2006, Jack Abramoff, and we have a picture of a floundering hack kept alive only by the blind loyalty of the Democratic base. Now that base has become enraged because David Broder has the audacity to point out what an embarrassment Reid now is.

Hope you like the view from under the bus, David.

UPDATE: As I reread Greg Sargent's post at TPM, my characterization is unfair. He was more predicting the blogswarm than stumping for it ... and he was prescient indeed. My apologies to Greg for the error.

Syrians Riot Over Rigged Elections

Bashar Assad has some riots on his hands after an attempt to hold a rigged election in Syria. He had to bring in the army to put down protests in the north, and apparently the army fired live rounds into the crowds:

Violent protests broke out in northern Syria amid accusations of vote rigging following Sunday's parliamentary elections.

Five protesters were left seriously injured, including three men who suffered gunshot wounds and remain in hospital, after the army was brought in to quash the demonstrations. There are unconfirmed reports that two people were killed.

Anti-riot police and security forces were called to the main road linking the north-eastern cities of Raqqah and Deir Ezour on Tuesday afternoon, where 700 tribesmen staged a sit-in and destroyed nearby poll centres.

Protesting later spread to the centre of Raqqah when a further 3,000 people gathered near the Governor's home. Six people were injured and a temporary curfew was imposed on the city.

What prompted the riots? It turns out that the tribesmen of the region had the audacity to elect non-Ba'athists to local offices. That was enough for Syria's government to throw out the results from 21 precincts after the polls closed. That action caused the thousands of Syrians to march openly against their dictatorship, a breathtaking development for a society that lost thousands of dissenters at the hands of Assad's father.

Even more interesting, the region in which this took place seems near the footprint of Syrian Kurdistan. Raqqah and Deir Ezour sit on the Euphrates; north of that, the Kurds populate the region. The Kurds in the region have reacted to the liberation of their Iraqi cousins with the hope of freedom for themselves. The election of independent candidates in that area, and the protests that followed, may have been an indicator that the Syrian Kurds will assert themselves more in the near future, although it should be noted that Kurds make up a lesser percentage of the population in Syria than they do in Iraq.

Rigged elections spelled the end of oppressive and/or corrupt regimes before, notably Ukraine. Whetting peoples' appetite for self-determination and then stealing it from them is an inherently destabilizing act. Assad may yet pay the ultimate price for his tease.

House Disregards Petraeus, Votes For Withdrawal

The House rejected the message from General David Petraeus, the man the Senate sent just three months ago to command the American forces in Iraq, and voted for a supplemental spending bill that will require the start of an American withdrawal by October 1. It passed on the barest of majorities and has no hope of surviving a veto, but the Democrats insist that they will play this game of chicken all the way to its conclusion:

The House on Wednesday narrowly approved a $124 billion war spending bill that would require American troops to begin withdrawing from Iraq by Oct. 1, setting the stage for the first veto fight between President Bush and majority Democrats.

Only hours after Gen. David H. Petraeus, the commander in Iraq, told lawmakers that he needed more time to gauge the effectiveness of a troop buildup there, the House voted 218 to 208 pass a measure that sought the removal of most combat forces by next spring. Mr. Bush has said unequivocally and repeatedly that he will veto it.

“This bill is a statement that Congress will no longer fund the war as it exists today,” said Representative Louise Slaughter, the New York Democrat who is chairwoman of the Rules Committee, as she opened the debate. Republicans accused Democrats of establishing a “date certain” for America’s defeat in Iraq.

“There will be no greater event to empower radical Islam than our retreat and defeat from Iraq,” said Representative Jeb Hensarling of Texas, leader of a conservative wing of House Republicans.

The Democrats want to send the bill to the White House on Monday, April 30th, one day before the fourth anniversary of his appearance on an aircraft carrier flying a banner that read, "Mission Accomplished". Never mind that the banner referred to the carrier group's mission; the Democrats want to use the bill to score a few more political points, on top of declaring defeat and funding some of their pet pork projects. They have even coordinated with outside groups to use the anniversary for television advertisements.

All that's missing is the ringmaster.

The President will likely oblige them by publicly vetoing the bill. The White House has already called on the Senate to rush the bill onto his desk for the purpose of casting the second deep-six of his presidency. Dana Perino, the president's acting press secretary, said that the nation needs to see how President Bush deals with this legislation, and they likely will get a chance to do that before the Democrats' political-action groups get much airplay from the commercials they have already made.

And so we get to see the two elective branches play a game of chicken while American troops fight the enemy. Both branches have some responsibility for this sorry outcome; the White House certainly hasn't been impressive in its communications for much of the war, and proved slow to respond when problems arose in Iraq at the beginning of last year. Congress has acted like petulant children in the last week, refusing to attend briefings and claiming that the commander that they sent to Iraq less than three months ago doesn't know what he's talking about.

The difference is that the Bush administration understands the catastrophe in store for the region if the US yanks the troops from Iraq, while the Democrats have played this new strategy strictly for political gain. The same party leaders that scolded Bush during the election last year for listening to Donald Rumsfeld rather than his field commanders now won't even bother to attend a briefing with Petraeus before setting out on this course. They set the vote up in order to coordinate campaign commercials while declaring defeat from Capitol Hill. They have made themselves into a disgrace in less than four months in power, reminding the nation why they locked them out of power for the previous six years.

Congress has become the Cirque du Capitulé, and the point is that there is no ringmaster worthy of the name.

Duke Bandy, RIP (Update: Also Clint Thrasher, RIP)

I received an e-mail message from a CQ reader, Lee Bandy, who earlier had offered to assist me with my Gateway computer problems. I had replied that the problems seemed related to the hardware, but that I'd let him know if I needed anything else. Lee wrote me back this evening, and agreed to let me share this with all of you:

I want to apologize for not getting back to you.

I never actually expected you to respond. I was genuinely tickled when you responded, and called my father, as Captains Quarters is his favorite blog. I figured he would get a huge kick out of it.

That was the phone call no child ever wants to be a part of: LT Col Maurice ‘Duke’ Bandy USAF (Ret) 1930-2007

However, I would like to thank you for providing years worth of father/son conversations. Dad was a huge fan of “the blogs” and we would talk daily about the latest posts and news. Yours was always first on the list. It may seem like just another blog, but it meant much more to us.

Blogging is an odd business. One writes and writes about those items that provoke a reaction, in what seems like a relentlessly solitary effort. It isn't until people comment or e-mail that one knows a connection has been made with an audience, and sometimes the blogger never understands the depth of those connections. Hearing this from his son is a touching and humbling moment for me, and I'm blessed that Lee chose to share this story with me -- and allowed me to share it with you.

We have lost a member of our family here. Godspeed, Maurice "Duke" Bandy. Thank you for honoring us with your service and your presence. Please keep the Bandy family in your prayers, and send them your condolences in the comments section.

UPDATE: And we have another loss in the CQ family. The cousin of SoldiersMom, Clint Thrasher, was killed in a plane crash while serving in the Border Patrol. Please also add the Thrasher family to your prayers while they try to get more details, and offer thanks that the nation has fine men like Clint to protect us.

The Five Myths Of Harry

These have floated in and out of the blogosphere in various forms, but I thought it would be useful to CQ readers to see the counterarguments to Harry Reid's assertions in one easy format. I asked for some research from a friend connected to Capitol Hill on rebuttals, and he put together the resources on this. Enjoy.

MYTH #1:
General Petraeus Says The War Is A “Lost Cause”

SEN. HARRY REID (D-NV): Gen. Petraeus "Told" Our Troops That "They’re Fighting For A Lost Cause." CNN BASH: "Is there something to that, an 18- and 19-year-old person in the service in Iraq who is serving, risking their lives, in some cases losing their life, hearing somebody like you back in Washington saying that they're fighting for a lost cause?" REID: "General Petraeus has told them that.” BASH: "How has he said that?" REID: "He said the war can't be won militarily. He said that. I mean he said it. He's the commander on the ground there." (CNN's "The Situation Room," 04/23/07)

FACT:
General Petraeus Sees “Positive” Signs in Iraq

GEN. DAVID PETRAEUS: "While It Is Too Early To Judge The Success Of The Surge And The Emphasis On Population Security In Iraq, We Have Seen Some Positive Results – Though The Enemy Has Certainly Sought To Overshadow Our Achievements By Carrying Out Sensational Attacks." "… Your visible presence alongside Iraqi soldiers and police has begun to restore a sense of normalcy to many areas that have seen little other than violence over the past year. Your hard work ahs also led to the uncovering of sizable weapons caches, the detentions of a number of death squad and car bomb network members, the bringing to justice of a number of militia extremists, a decrease in the number of sectarian killings, and a renewal of commerce in many markets and neighborhoods." (Gen. David Petraeus, Letter To Soldiers Serving In Multi-National Force-Iraq, 04/14/07)

MYTH #2:
General Petraeus Does Not Know What Is Happening In Iraq

SEN. HARRY REID (D-NV): “I Don’t Believe Him.” Q: “…General Petraeus is going to come to the Hill and make it clear to you that there is progress going on in Iraq, that the so-called surge is working. Will you believe him when he says that?” SEN. REID (D-NV): “No, I don't believe him, because it's not happening. All you have to do is look at the facts.” (CNN’s “The Situation Room,” 04/23/07)

FACT:

David H. Petraeus:
Four-Star General, Commander, Multinational Forces-Iraq

Harry Reid:
Senator Who Doesn't Listen To Commanders of Military Forces

MYTH #3:
General Petraeus Says There Is No Military Solution

SEN. HARRY REID (D-NV): “…There Is No Military Solution In Iraq. General Petraeus, The Commander On The Ground, Has Said So Himself.” (Sen. Reid, “Reid: As Situation In Iraq Worsens, America Can And Must Change Course,” Press Release, 04/22/07)

FACT:
General Petraeus Believes “Improv[ing] The Security” With “Additional Forces” Is Necessary To Achieve A Political Solution

GEN. DAVID PETRAEUS: “I want to assure you that Lieutenant General Odierno and I would not have asked to maintain the surge force levels in Iraq – a request that led to your tour extensions – if we did not view the additional forces as being absolutely necessary to our ability to accomplish our mission. That mission – to help Iraq improve the security for its population – is intended to provide Iraqi leaders with an opportunity to begin to tackle the crucial issues that must be resolved to achieve a sustainable outcome in Iraq." (Gen. David Petraeus, Letter To Soldiers Serving In Multi-National Force-Iraq, 4/14/07)

MYTH #4:
General Petraeus Does Not Support the Surge

SEN. HARRY REID (D-NV): “Those We Trust The Most Do Not Believe Escalation Is The Right Way Forward. America’s Generals Don’t Support This.” (Sen. Reid, Congressional Record, S. 2507, 02/5/07)

FACT:
General Petraeus Testified In His Confirmation Hearing That ‘The Additional Forces’ For The Surge Were ‘Essential’

GEN. DAVID PETRAEUS: “The additional forces that have been directed to move to Iraq will be essential.” (Gen. Petraeus, Armed Services Committee, U.S. Senate, Hearing, 01/23/07)

MYTH #5:
General Petraeus Does Not Need Immediate Funding

SEN. HARRY REID (D-NV): The President's "Own Generals Have Said [Funding] Will Last Until The End Of June." (Sen. Reid, Press Conference, 04/3/07)

FACT:
The Army Chief Of Staff Stated ‘Draconian Measures’ Will Begin Without Funds In April

ARMY CHIEF OF STAFF GEN. PETER J. SCHOOMAKER: "We are particularly concerned as Congress is set to recess until mid-April without enacting this essential legislation. Without approval of the supplemental funds in April, we will be forced to take increasingly draconian measures which will impact Army readiness and impose hardships on our soldiers and their families." (Gen. Peter J. Schoomaker, Letter To Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell, 3/28/07)

UPDATE: Michelle Malkin has more great links. Also, Duncan Hunter has called for Harry Reid to resign as Majority Leader:

Rep. Duncan Hunter called Wednesday for Sen. Harry Reid to resign his post as Senate majority leader over remarks that the senator made last week that the war in Iraq "is lost" if the United States continues on its current policy.

Hunter, a candidate for the Republican presidential nomination, is the ranking member of the House Armed Services Committee.

"In my opinion Sen. Reid, having made that statement, which can only have a demoralizing effect on our troops and an effect of encouragement of the adversary, I think it would be appropriate for Sen. Reid to resign his position as the leader of the United States Senate," he said.

After basically calling Petraeus a liar and the war lost, it's hard to see what he could do for an encore. Bring on Dick Durbin! Er, maybe not ...

Egypt To Hamas: Knock It Off

The Egyptians apparently don't like the triangle offense any better than the Israelis. They have sent a message to Ismail Haniyeh and the Hamas-led Palestinian Authority government scolding them for allowing fresh Hamas rocket attacks on Israel:

Egypt has threatened to cut off its relations with Hamas unless the movement halts its rocket attacks on Israel, Palestinian Authority officials said Wednesday.

The officials said Egyptian Intelligence Chief Gen. Omar Suleiman sent a "tough" message to Hamas leaders, warning them against the continued rocket attacks. The message was delivered to PA Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh of Hamas by Burhan Hammad, a senior Egyptian intelligence officer based in the Gaza Strip, the officials added.

They said that Suleiman also warned that Egypt would not side with the Palestinians if Israel launched a military operation against Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

"We hope that the Hamas leaders will listen carefully to what the Egyptians are telling them," said one official here. "Hamas must return to the period of calm so as not to give Israel an excuse to invade the Gaza Strip."

Fatah president Mahmoud Abbas meets with worldwide Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal this weekend, and the rockets were seen in part as an attempt to pressure Abbas into concessions. The Egyptians have no particular love for Hamas or for any other radical Islamist movement, and they want to make sure that Haniyeh and the Palstinians know it. Telling the Palestinians publicly that Egypt will not ally with them if they provoke a military response from Israel is unprecedented, almost a signal for Israel to attack.

Egypt and Saudi Arabia want an end to the Palestinian conflict, and believe that only a plan which offers security guarantees with Israel can deliver that. They suddenly see a much larger and more existential conflict arising with radical Shi'ites in the region, and the continued provocations by Hamas and Hezbollah do nothing but distract and provoke the population. That's quite a turnaround for both regimes, which have been happy in the past to use the Palestinian troubles as an excuse for their own oppression, but the moderate states can no longer afford that kind of sideshow.

Hamas has enough trouble getting money from the West without alienating Egypt. The rockets will likely stop soon, but their deployment once again shows Hamas to be a disastrous partner for any real peace in the region.

CQ Radio: Heading Right And Rick Moran

Today's installment of CQ Radio will feature one of my good friends in the blogosphere, Rick Moran of the Right Wing Nut House. Rick has written excellent commentary for serious conservatives for the last few years at his site, and he has now joined Blog Talk Radio as a show host. Today we'll pick Rick's brain on a number of issues he covers at his site and talk about his new BTR show. I especially want to talk about his criticism of the Pentagon over the way they handled the Pat Tillman and Jessica Lynch stories.

We'll also talk about the launch of Heading Right, the new group blog for conservative BTR hosts, and what we plan to build at the new site. Rick and I join an excellent group of bloggers at HR, which will feature fresh content and commentary as well as discussions about upcoming shows. Be sure to join the conversation by calling 646-652-4889 between 2-3 pm CT today!

BUMP: To top. Be sure to listen live at the link above!

Subpoenaville

Democrats turned up the heat on the White House today by approving several subpoenas and granting immunity to a key aide to Alberto Gonzales. Monica Goodling, who had notified Congress that she would invoke the Fifth Amendment if subpoenaed, will have to testify now that the House Judiciary Committee voted almost unanimously to shield her from prosecution:

In rapid succession, congressional committees Wednesday ramped up their investigations of the Bush administration by approving a subpoena for Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and granting immunity to a key aide to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales.

By 21-10, the House oversight committee voted to issue a subpoena to Rice to compel her story on the Bush administration's claim, now discredited, that Iraq was seeking uranium from Africa.

Moments earlier in the committee chamber next door, the House Judiciary Committee voted 32-6 to grant immunity to Monica Goodling, Gonzales' White House liaison, for her testimony on why the administration fired eight federal prosecutors. The panel also unanimously approved _ but did not issue _ a subpoena to compel her to appear.

Simultaneously across Capitol Hill, the Senate Judiciary Committee approved _ but did not issue _ a subpoena on the prosecutors' matter to Sara Taylor, deputy to presidential adviser Karl Rove.

Democrats took control of Congress on the promise to launch investigations into the Bush administration, and they are fulfilling that pledge. The subpoenas themselves do not surprise much, although the one to Condoleezza Rice might run into some legal wrangling depending on the subject matter. Everyone widely expected the investgations to take the widest possible viewpoint and get conducted in the most confrontational style possible.

The fact that the Democratic majorities got so much Republican support in each instance may come as a shock to the White House, though. Goodling's immunity only got opposed by six Republicans on the committee, where 17 GOP Representatives serve. Seventeen Republicans sit on Henry Waxman's Oversight Committee, and only 10 opposed the Rice subpoena. We have no word on the Senate Judiciary Committee vote on teh Sara Taylor subpoena, but given the hostility of the Republicans during and after the Alberto Gonzales testimony, it's doubtful that it passed on a 10-9 vote.

This does not bode well for the White House. The President's insistence on keeping Gonzales in place has apparently angered his GOP allies on the Hill. It also has provided no barrier to other investigations, and it appears the Democrats have no problem staying aggressive regardless of whether Gonzales stays or goes.

Practically speaking, though, these subpoenas will have little effect. Rice will go before Congress and tell them -- again -- that they saw the intelligence prior to the Iraq invasion, and that it was basically the same as it was during the Clinton administration. No one faked anything, and the one piece that people use to claim Bush lied (a) was based on Joe Wilson's misrepresentation of his findings in Niger, and (b) still backed by British intelligence, where it originated. Goodling may say something damning, or all they may have bought with immunity is a confirmation that the entire mess was nothing more malevolent than incompetence.

But get used to this. We have two years to live in Subpoenaville.

UPDATE: Andy McCarthy explains why Gonzales has not generated much sympathy among Republicans on the Hill:

Throughout her tumultuous tenure as attorney general, Janet Reno could always rely on Democrats and liberals to circle the wagons when critics ripped her judgment, competence, and forthrightness. They’d close ranks when the opposition claimed her Justice Department elevated political considerations over legal ones. By contrast, in Alberto Gonzales’s present hour of need, his only enthusiastic supporter appears to be the president. Why?

Because of politics. Not politicization, as in partisan obstruction of particular investigations. Rather, good, old-fashioned politics in the best sense of the word: namely, an administration’s accountability to its supporters and its fealty to the policies that induced their support.

The Reno Justice Department, whatever else you may think about it, cared passionately about signal “progressive” causes and backed them to the hilt, regardless of criticism. To the contrary, the Gonzales Justice Department and, indeed, the president, often turn spaghetti-spined when the priorities of their base are at stake. How surprising, then, that when friends are most sorely needed there are none to be found.

New Blog: Heading Right

Part of the effort for my new position at Blog Talk Radio involves building the community of conservative radio hosts at BTR. Since all of us are bloggers, creating a central blog to highlight the hosts, their blogs, and a new narrative made the most sense. We have launched Heading Right, which we hope to create as its own destination for hot links and hot debate among the conservative and libertarian BTR hosts.

And we have a great start on building that stable of writers! Here are the bloggers we already have:

Rick Moran
Fausta
Pam Oshry
Jim Lynch
David Odeen
Jenn
Mac
Kit Jarrell
Mike Ryan
Douglas Gibbs
Jaco Pastorius

With a line-up like this -- and the writers we will be adding -- the conversation will get heated in no time! Be sure to keep up with the latest from your favorite BTR hosts at Heading Right. You can add the RSS feed to your reader to watch the conversation unfold as it happens.

McCain Announces Today

John McCain makes his formal entry into the presidential race today from Portsmouth, New Hampshire this afternoon:

Republican John McCain — senator, ex-Navy pilot and former Vietnam captive — is casting himself as the most qualified person to lead the country in wartime as he officially opens his second presidential bid and tries to succeed where he once failed. ...

McCain was largely using the speech and a four-day romp through early primary states and his Arizona home to make the case for his candidacy, outline his vision for the country and promise "common sense, conservative and comprehensive solutions" to the nation's problems.

The high-profile events also give McCain an opportunity to restart his campaign and inject momentum into it after a troubling four-month period. He went from presumed front-runner for the GOP nomination at year's end to trailing former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani in national polls and ex-Gov. Mitt Romney of Massachusetts in money raised.

I have excerpts from the speech that McCain will deliver later today. Like most of his speeches, this is well worth the read:

We are fighting a war in two countries, and we’re in a global struggle with violent extremists who despise us, our values and modernity itself. If we are to succeed, we must rethink and rebuild the structure and mission of our military; the capabilities of our intelligence and law enforcement agencies; the purposes of our alliances; the reach and scope of our diplomacy; the capacity of all branches of government to defend us. We need to marshal all elements of American power: our military, economy, investment, trade and technology. We need to strengthen our alliances and build support in other nations. We must preserve our moral credibility, and remember that our security and the global progress of our ideals are inextricably linked. ...

Government spends more money today than ever before. Wasteful spending on things that are not the business of government indebts us to other nations; deprives you of the fruits of your labor; fuels inflation; raises interest rates; and encourages irresponsibility. ...

Our dependence on foreign sources of energy not only harms our environment and economy, it endangers our security. So much of the oil we import comes from countries in volatile regions of the world where our values aren’t shared and our interests aren’t a priority. ...

When I’m President I’ll offer common sense, conservative and comprehensive solutions to these challenges. Congress will have other ideas, and I’ll listen to them. I’ll work with anyone who is serious and sincere about solving these problems. I expect us to argue over principle, but when a compromise consistent with our principles is within reach, I expect us to seize it. Americans expect us to disagree, but not just to win the next election. They want us to serve the same goal: to ensure that a country blessed with our matchless prosperity, ingenuity, and strength can meet any challenge we confront.

Miss America, Crime Fighter

Earlier this month, a former Miss America in her 80s got the drop on a thief with her .38-caliber handgun, shooting out one of his tires so that police could arrest him. Venus Ramey, meet Lauren Nelson, the current Miss America and the latest beauty-pageant crimefighter. Nelson teamed with John Walsh to take down some on-line sexual predators:

Miss America can add crime fighter to her resume. Lauren Nelson recently went undercover with police in New York for a sting targeting sexual predators. Officers with Suffolk County's computer crimes unit created an online profile of a 14-year-old girl that included photographs of Nelson as a teenager.

"I got to chat online with the predators and made phone calls, too," Nelson said by phone from Atlantic City, N.J. "The Suffolk County Police Department was there the whole time."

The operation was filmed for a segment of "America's Most Wanted" that will air Saturday on Fox. Police spokesman Tim Motz said the operation was ongoing and declined to comment Tuesday evening.

At least four men were arrested and face charges, said Avery Mann, a spokesman for the show. Another six men agreed to meet Nelson, of Lawton, Okla., he said.

This effort mirrors the series of staged events by NBC's Stone Phillips that has caught dozens of men who prey upon young girls on the Internet. The producers work with local law-enforcement agencies and set up an on-line identity for their bait, having a young woman play the role of a young girl in order to catch the predators. When they arrive, they briefly meet the woman, who gives way to Phillips or Walsh, a camera crew, and a nightmare.

Kudos to Phillips, Walsh, NBC, Fox, and to Lauren Nelson -- who shows that Miss America serves the community.

UPDATE: I'm told the NBC man to thank is Chris Hanson rather than Stone Phillips by CQ commenter GiovanniAPeters.

UPDATE II: Also, credit should go to the group that first implemented the strategy -- Perverted Justice, as CQ commenter sgtted notes.

Rudy: Democrats Want A 9/10 World

Of all the candidates running for president, Rudy Giuliani knows best what a 9/10 mentality means in an age of radical Islamist terror. He had to deal with the aftermath of bureaucratic confusion and politically-correct counterterrorism on 9/11 and the weeks afterward as the mayor of a city who saw almost 3,000 of his citizens killed by terrorists. So when Giuliani talks about the folly of returning to the defense against terrorists, he knows of what he speaks:

Former New York mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani wrapped up a day of campaigning in New Hampshire on Tuesday night by issuing a stark warning that Democrats would put the country on defense in the campaign against terrorism and needlessly prolong a conflict that he said America can and must win. ...

"If one of them gets elected, it sounds to me like we're going on the defense," he said. "We've got a timetable for withdrawal from Iraq. We're going to wave the white flag there. We're going to try to cut back on the Patriot Act. We're going to cut back on electronic surveillance. We're going to cut back on interrogation. We're going to cut back, cut back, cut back, and we'll be back in our pre-September 11 mentality of being on defense."

Giuliani said he believes the United States ultimately will win the war on terrorism, regardless of whether the country is led by Republican or Democratic presidents, but added that Republicans will do a better job of keeping the country safe, with fewer losses.

"The question is going to be, how long does it take [to win that war] and how many losses will we have along the way. And I truly believe that, if we go back on defense for a period of time, we're going to ultimately have more losses and it's going to go on much longer," the former mayor said.

Giuliani called the war on terror "the defining conflict of our time," and that cuts many ways. The conflict will define political parties and movements based on how they approach it; it will define nations based on whom they support; and it will define an era based on who eventually prevails. Rudy wants to continue the forward strategy of engaging terrorists and their sponsors abroad with the American military, rather than allow terrorists to gather their strength abroad for an attack on the US, with law-enforcement resources as our only defense.

Democrats, he argues, want to take us back to the 9/10 national posture that allowed Osama bin Laden to finish what terrorists started in 1993. We imprisoned those we caught after the first World Trade Center attack, and the terrorists kept coming. After the Khobar Towers attack, we sent the FBI after the terrorists, and found out that our law-enforcement writ didn't extend to Saudi Arabia. The same held true after the African embassy bombings, as well as the attack on the USS Cole. None of these attacks prompted the US to use its military power to defeat the terrorists except in one-off missile attacks that did nothing to slow the enemy down.

Now we have Democrats who declare defeat from the well of the Senate, and who can't be bothered to meet with field commanders to determine whether American forces have made progress in Iraq. They have already decided that we have lost and have to withdraw back home. They want to roll back the Patriot Act provisions that have allowed the counterintelligence assets we have to work with law-enforcement personnel instead of against them. Democrats want to return us to the 9/10 posture, where all we can do is wait for the next attack -- because we will have removed our military from the region where these attacks get planned and staged.

The war will define our era and our politics. Either we continue taking the war to the terrorists, wherever we find them -- and we've found them in abundance in al-Anbar -- or we declare defeat and return home, awaiting the next attack. Rudy has made his choice clear.

Why No One Wants An American Withdrawal

The Guardian (UK) has relentlessly opposed the war in Iraq for the past four years and more, giving its readers on the Left a steady diet of bad news and angry opinion based on its editorial policy. British newspapers have an open editorial bias, and readers expect news from a point of view. Guardian readers may find themselves surprised today, however, to find a detailed explanation of all the reasons why the nations in the Middle East do not want an American withdrawal from Iraq -- and the catastrophes that would follow one:

The so-called axis of moderate Arab states - comprising Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Jordan - dreads an early US withdrawal. First, because it would be widely interpreted as an American defeat, which would weaken these pro-American regimes while both energising and radicalising their populations.

Second, if the US leaves, the emergence of a Shia regime in Iraq - in itself an offensive prospect to them - would only be a matter of time. Facing Arab antipathy, this regime would be likely to look eastward and forge close ties with its Iranian co-religionists. In the view of most Arabs, this would present a formidable challenge, setting in motion a series of dangerous events - an Iranian-Iraqi alliance; political and material support from Arab countries being offered to disgruntled Iraqi Sunni groups; retaliation by Iraqi forces; and the threat of broader regional involvement.

Third, a US departure risks triggering Iraq's partition. As some Arabs see it, the occupation is what holds the country together. So long as coalition forces are deployed, a full-blown breakup can be avoided.

The fallout of a withdrawal would not be contained within Iraq, either. An Iranian hegemony in Iraq would allow the radical Shi'a of both nations to export their destabilizing influence to other nations with restive Shi'ite populations, most notably Bahrain. From there, it could spread to the other smaller emirates in the region, destabilizing the power structure that the Sunnis have built in the last century -- a power structure based on oppression and religious fanatacism of their own, to be sure. Without American forces based in the region, we would have no ability to control or shape the outcome of such a collapse.

A partition of Iraq could prove even worse for the region. If Iraqi Kurdistan declares its independence, the Turks will almost certainly declare war on the new state. They already have a problem with their own Kurds, one that has not improved with Iraqi liberation and democratization. A secession of Iraqi Kurdistand would prompt Turkish Kurds to declare their own independence to form a greater Kurdistan. Syrian Kurds might do the same thing, although destabilizing Bashar Assad's regime may not be a bad idea.

Hussein Agha does not make these points in favor of American occupation. In fact, he believes that the "magic has taken over the magician," and that the US has boxed itself into a situation with no exit solutions. However, his argument becomes all the more powerful as a result. We cannot just walk away from Iraq; no matter how bad some believe it to be, the chain of events a precipitate withdrawal will commence will be exponentially worse for the region and for the US.

Bad Taste For The Ages

The Virginia Tech shootings have called into question a pastime among some college students that USA Today has apparently just discovered. Some students organize a game called "Assassin" on their campuses, which involves play-acting murders of each other until one person remains "alive" and wins the game. William Welch reports that the massacre has put a damper on the game and called some of the weapons used into question -- but fails to report that "Assassin" has been around college campuses for over twenty years and has been controversial in the past:

After the horrors of the Virginia Tech massacre, a popular game on campuses nationwide called "Assassin" is raising concerns and prompting warnings from police.

Officers in three communities in Illinois and Pennsylvania urged students to halt the games, which involve ambushing other players with sometimes realistic-looking toy guns or other objects, after the Virginia Tech shooting last week that left 33 people dead.

Police say they worry that players, mostly college and high school students, would be mistaken for real-life killers, endangering themselves and others.

"Virginia Tech has heightened everyone's concern and alerted them to what's going on in the country," said Leland Grove, Ill., Police Chief Mark Gleason. "It's just terrible."

Some games have been cancelled due to the massacre, while others look for alternatives to weapons that bear resemblance to the real thing. In the picture published with the article, it shows two men tapping each other with spoons to score a "kill". National organizers -- who operate a web site to assist local groups in staging the games -- also recommend socks to avoid any problems with realistic-looking toys.

And problems have arisen. Police have responded to calls about masked men stalking campuses. One incident involved three men walking into a movie theater and assaulting a woman while trying to catch their prey. Springfield (IL) police hav warned high school and college kids to drop the game and will arrest those they catch for disorderly conduct, tired of the calls they get from neighbors unaware of the game and believing themselves in danger from prowlers.

All of this should be very familiar. Twenty-five years ago, when I went to college, the fad had already been around for a few years -- and it got the same criticism back then. At the time, the game was called "Assassin" or sometimes "Gotcha!", and it had the same set-up: basically a game of "tag" for young adults. It inspired two dreadful movies in that decade, Tag: The Assassination Game, starring Robert Carradine and Linda Hamilton in 1982, and 1985's Gotcha! with Anthony Edwards and Linda Fiorentino. It inspired the same kind of scolding about tasteless and danger to the community, too, and some campus violence put a damper on it as well.

Will the massacre put an end to Assassin now? It's unlikely. As long as young adults feel invulnerable, they will play-act at the macabre, and spoons and socks will not long satisfy that impulse. It's one tradition that deserves to wither into oblivion.

CQ Radio Transcript: Duncan Hunter, Part II

Here is the second half of my conversation with Duncan Hunter on the inaugural installment of the daily CQ Radio show. Part 1 can be found here.

EM: Let’s move on to the borders. Now, you live nearby the border in southern California, and obviously this is an issue politically. How susceptible are we on the southern border to terrorist infiltration because of our border situation?

DH: Well, we’re very susceptible to infiltration of anything because we have essentially open borders, except for the small area in California where I built the double border fence. Let me tell you, as a congressman who represented that area, what we had in the mid-1980s was basically a no-man’s-land between San Diego, California and Tijuana, Mexico. In that area, what I call Smuggler’s Corridor #1, was the area through which most of the people and most of the narcotics that came into the entire United States were smuggled. They came through that narrow gap. So we built the double border fence, and at the time that we built it, we had armed gangs that roamed that no-man’s land. They often robbed the illegal aliens; many of them carried automatic weapons. They would abuse the women, and it was so terrible that we had a plainclothes police force that dressed like illegal aliens, headed by a Sergeant Lopez, who came from the San Diego Police Department. They would hang around by the border, wait for the border gangs to attack them, then they would pull their weapons and they’d have either a shootout or a series of arrests. It was that bad.

Nobody would go down to the border at night, and of course it was the center of the American smuggling industry because we have two massive freeways that went right down to the border. Once they got across, people or narcotics, they would immediately be on those freeways and gone. I built the double border fence and we reduced the smuggling of people and narcotics by more than 90%. Let me tell you, my fence is not that scraggly little fence you see on CNN with people climbing over it. Nobody climbs over my fence. It’s a double fence; you’ve got a steel fence on the border. True, they can get over that fence because they can put a ladder up to it. They then have to run across a 50-yard wide high-speed border patrol road inside the United States that parallels the border. Then they’ve got a 15-foot high fence with a large overhang to it. And what happens is you have border patrol patrolmen patrolling in between the fences, and when the smugglers come across, they get trapped between the two fences. Because of that, we reduced smuggling of people and narcotics by more than 90% in that sector, and we would reduce it way down close to 100%, but the environmentalists kept us from closing a three-mile gap in the fence because they claim that the flora and the fauna and the birds would not migrate over that particular section of fence. They kept it open for a number of years, and we’re just now getting permission to close it. But when we built that border fence, we reduced smuggling of people and narcotics by more than 90%, we stopped the border murders, and we stopped all the drug drive throughs, and let me tell you something else: the crime rate in the City of San Diego by FBI statistics since we built the border fence has fallen 53%. There is a large criminal population that goes back and forth across the border, and right now in America’s penitentiaries, local prisons and jails, we have over 250,000 criminal aliens. Those are people who have come across to hurt Americans, many violent crimes, some of them these MS-13 gang members who are so violent their home countries won’t take them back. We spend 3 billion dollars a year putting those people up, incarcerating them. We would save enough money in one year of incarceration to be able to build 1,000 miles of border fence.

So in October, I wrote a bill that was put in…the provisions that were put into the Homeland Security bill that passed the Senate, passed the House, and the President signed that extends the San Diego border fence, the double fence, 854 miles across Arizona, New Mexico and Texas. That is now a law that that fence is supposed to be built. So far, the Department of Homeland Security with its great lack of speed, has only built two miles of that border fence. They started it at Yuma, Arizona. As President of the United States, I will finish that fence. I’ll build it from start to finish in six months. It’s just a fence. You take sections of that fence and you give them to individual contractors and they all start with a one- or a two-mile section at the same time; they build it concurrently, and we can do a great deal to sew up our borders within six months with the border fence, which is now the law, and there’s now $1 billion cash on hand sitting at the Department of Homeland Security available to build the border fence. You elect Duncan Hunter President of the United States; you’re going to have a border fence.

EM: Well, Congressman Hunter, the border fence bill was passed last year. There’s been some talk that the Congress might reverse that this year, and also that the current administration isn’t exactly enthusiastic about building that fence and might drag their heels on it. What are you hearing about that?

DH: Here’s the answer to that. When I mandated the construction of the border fence in San Diego under the Clinton Administration, when the Republicans took control of Congress in ’94, I wrote the bill that mandated that we build that fence in the number one smuggler’s corridor in San Diego. That was a triple fence. The Clinton Administration did not like it and they said, “Well, we’d rather not.” I said, “Look at the words I used. The word is ‘shall’. It doesn’t say you might do it. It doesn’t say it’d be a good idea. It says you shall build a border fence. That’s the law; now build it.” The Clinton Administration confronted the fact that it was the law, that they were ordered to build it, that the law was signed by the President, and they built the border fence. So, if I used exactly the same language in writing the bill this year that says take the San Diego fence and build it all the way across 854 miles of Arizona, New Mexico and Texas; I used exactly the same mandatory language; and the Bush Administration is under exactly the same mandate, and they need to follow the law. Now if you call Homeland Security, they’ll say, “Yes, we’re going to follow the law,” but you can tell that they’re obviously not enthusiastic about building it. It’s been four months now and they’ve built a total of about two miles. Now that’s either massive ineptitude, or it’s a desire to tap dance on this thing and hope that somebody changes the law. But actually it’s the law right now that the fence be built. It’s not a suggestion, and it’s not a discretionary thing where they can do this or something else. It says 854 miles of real fence.

EM: Let me ask you now about the War on Terror. It’s obviously another key part of your platform. Do you think that we’ve lost our way in the War on Terror at this point?

DH: No, I think that the war against terror does not come wrapped in a neat package. It involves many, many dimensions. It involves American forces and intelligence capabilities in lots of remote parts of the world and actually, in a way, we’ve done a lot of things right. You know if people were going to make a bet on 9/11 as to whether or not we would be hit again over the next six years, probably most folks would vote that we probably would be. They would think that it was logical to feel that we would be struck again. One reason we haven’t been struck again, first we’ve been very fortunate, one reason we haven’t been is that we’ve gone after the bad guys aggressively. It’s tough to be able to put together a plan for a strike of the United States if some of your planners don’t show up because they’re dead. We aggressively went after the bad guys, and the Administration should be commended for that. Let’s not blast everything that we’ve done with our intelligence and our military apparatus, because we’ve done a lot of things right. This war is a difficult war with lots of dimensions. It’s not a war that’s going to culminate with a surrender on the Battleship Missouri; it’s a war that’s going to take a lot of American endurance. Sometimes endurance and patience is a quality that we have a short supply of. We have to develop patience and endurance.

We are bolstering our intelligence capability. That’s extremely difficult to do. It’s extremely difficult to penetrate places like the Middle East with our intelligence apparatus. We had an intelligence apparatus that really was shaped for Europe. It was shaped for the Cold War, and you have lots of people who if you asked them to go out in our agencies and try to recruit folks who are operatives in the Middle East, you’re going to get blank stares. They don’t have language skills, they don’t have contacts, and intelligence apparatus, especially the human part, is very painstakingly put together. We’re slowly putting that together.

EM: What have we done in the five years to try to get the people with the language skills and try to penetrate some of those areas? We’ve talked about remaking the intelligence community since 9/11, and it’s been kind of a slow process. Do you think that we, I mean have we made much progress at all there?

DH: Yeah, we’ve made progress and without getting into classified stuff, it takes relationship building. I mean, the person that’s going to give you information on a situation that’s developing in a foreign country, who may have a job or a position that’s close by where he’ll be able to observe and understand what’s happening and get that back to you, developing that relationship is something that takes a period of time. That’s what intelligence is; human intelligence is a series of developed relationships. There’s no quick fix on that things. You can’t microwave and you can’t e-mail a relationship. It’s something that takes a long time. In the 1990s under the Clinton Administration, we divested ourselves of a huge part of our case managers, our operators, our people who have those relationships. It’s hard to sew those back together in a short period of time. My answer is that it’s a lot better than it was a few years ago, and because of our presence in the Middle East right now, we have a lot of connections and a lot of contacts. But maturing those contacts in the long term, a long-term intelligence apparatus, is a slow building process. But it’s getting better. We have what is known as national technical means -- that is our apparatus gives us eyes and ears through technical capability. That’s been developing apace and that’s helpful to us. Also the intelligence capability that emanates from our war fighters is also pretty substantial. So it’s an imperfect situation and you’ve got other places in the world, like North Korea, where you have almost no penetration, and it’s very difficult to ever get intelligence penetration from a closed society with massive scrutiny, especially if it’s governmental efficiency. So we have certain areas where we just have to work with big blind spots.

To answer your question, we have reacted with lots of efficiencies in small compartmentalized areas against these people who have tried to kill Americans. The fact that you have Khalid Sheik Mohammed, who is the prime architect according to his own testimony and who will be coming up for trial, one of the guys who’s been held in Guantanamo -- if the Democrats don’t follow through on this kind of silly insistence that we either try them or free them, we’re going to be trying that guy. That’s one of the guys responsible for killing millions of Americans. He was picked up in a very efficient way. Zarqawi, as you know, was killed in Iraq in a safe house, also a function of America’s intelligence operations, our capability to couple that with precision strike. So we have made a lot of small victories in places where the American people don’t see the victory, but what they do see is we’ve gone without a strike on our homeland for a number of years now, which is quite remarkable and quite a testament to the people who serve in the US military and US intelligence agencies. Now we can always get better and we have to keep building, but once again this is not a system. Human intelligence is not a system that you can turn out with a microwave. It’s long term.

EM: I know we’re going to have to let you go pretty quick because you’re on a tight schedule here, Congressman Hunter, but just to talk a little bit about the race, we’ve seen a couple of people jump out into an early lead in early polling in the Republican primary. It’s tough for a Congressman to run for President. I think you’ve probably got the best résumé of anybody who’s tried that in a very long time. What’s your strategy to try to pull some of that momentum away from the two or three people who seem to be enjoying more of it right now?

DH: Well, first you have to get the word out. Our website is www.gohunter08.com and that tells you a lot about our campaign. If you go to that website, you can find out a lot about what we’re doing. But this is a building process, and I think that the publicity will follow the message. I’ve been doing a lot of national shows based on my work on the Armed Services Committee as a former Chairman and now ranking member, so we get some good coverage there. We’ve gone from, in a national poll in January we were at basically at zero percent in the polls; nobody knew about me. In February we went to 1% and in this last poll we went to 2%. Now that doesn’t sound like much, but I think in that same poll Mr. Romney was at 7%, so he’s only five ahead of me and he’s spent $12 million so far. Now in the areas where we can focus, like the Arizona straw poll among elected Republican leaders, I won that straw poll because they knew about my border fence and they voted for me. In the biggest straw poll that’s been held in South Carolina where people had to actually go to the polls and vote – that’s the Spartanburg Straw Poll (that was the one carried live on Fox News – I came in within one percentage point of the top of McCain and Giuliani at 22%, and I beat Romney by 2-1, even though he probably spent 2- or 300,000 on that straw poll. So, my point is where we can focus and get our message out, we get lots of votes. What I have to do is keep working, keep being on shows like yours and keep getting this message out to the American people. I think that at some point the money follows the message because big donors, especially multi-national companies, have operations in China and elsewhere are not the folks that in the end control the American political scene. Whether you donate $2,300 or $5, everybody has one vote. I think our message is one that resonates with average Americans, folks that carry a lunch bucket for a living and don’t necessarily have a piece of stock in a company that’s overseas, that really care deeply about this country. I think that among people that really care deeply about this country, I’ve got a lot of support.

EM: Congressman Hunter, thank you for sharing that with us today. I would hope to have you back soon. Best of luck to you. I think you are picking up some traction here and I look forward to talking to you as one of the frontrunners.

DH: Well listen, thank you. Thank you so much and frontrunner or not, I look forward to being back on your show and thank you, and God bless our country.

EM: Thank you sir, I appreciate it. That was Congressman Duncan Hunter, who is running for President and also the ranking member of the Armed Services Committee, one of the genuine good guys there in Congress. You can see Congressman Hunter’s efforts to run for President at www.gohunter08.com.

Triangle Offense Gives Way To Normal Two-Faced Posturing

The Palestinians have used a triangle offense for years now, throughout the post-Oslo era, when it comes to supposed cease-fires. Whenever the Palestinians want to set Israel up as the fall guy for their terrorism, Hamas and Fatah usually propose a cease-fire while Islamic Jihad continues attacking Israel. When Israel finally responds to that provocation, Hamas and Fatah declare that Israel has violated the cease-fire and continue the attacks.

The new Hamas-led Palestinian Authority has apparently tired of the ruse. This time, they have attacked Israel themselves while claiming to still support the cease-fire:

The first public signs of division within the Hamas movement emerged yesterday when the armed wing of the Palestinian Islamist movement fired rockets from Gaza into Israel and announced the end of a ceasefire.

A spokesman for the Hamas-dominated government, however, said it wanted the ceasefire with Israel, which has lasted six months, to continue. Several mortars and crude rockets were fired early yesterday from the Gaza strip as Israelis celebrated their 59th Independence Day. Nobody was injured, but for the first time since the November ceasefire, Hamas claimed responsibility. Dozens of homemade Qassam rockets have been fired out of Gaza in recent months, but by other militant groups.

Abu Obeida, a recognised spokesman for the armed wing of Hamas, the Izzedin al-Qassam Brigades, told a Palestinian radio station that this marked the end of the ceasefire between Israel and the armed groups in Gaza. "The ceasefire has been over for a long time, and Israel is responsible for that," he said. "This is a message to the Zionist enemy that our strikes will continue. We are ready to kidnap more and kill more of your soldiers," he said.

Of course Hamas still wants the cease-fire to continue. As far as they are concerned, it only applies to Israel and it allows Hamas to take free shots at Israelis without fear of military reprisal. It has become so transparent that this time they haven't even bothered to farm the job out to Islamic Jihad terrorists.

The alternative is actually worse. If Hamas can't control its own militants, then they have ceased even the pretense of governing. A state worthy of that status has to have monopolized military power in its own hands. Renegades cannot launch rockets into neighboring countries without the government having to take responsibility for the attacks -- and suffering the consequences. If Hamas cannot control its own people, they have no chance at all of governing the rest of the Palestinians.

One measure of their lack of control can be found in the case of Gilad Shalit. Hamas and Fatah have promised Egypt and the Israelis that they would get Shalit released in order to build trust in the peace process. Egypt and Saudi Arabia have insisted on it, and Israel had prepared to release hundreds of Palestinians from prisons in exchange. Now, however, it turns out that neither Hamas nor Fatah can gain custody of Shalit, who is being held by a crime family in Gaza. Similarly, gangsters also kidnapped a BBC reporter, which no one can find or free.

Either Hamas has decided to play both sides against the middle, or it is even more incompetent at governing than Fatah -- a small surprise, considering the terrorist nature of both factions. The truth is probably both: Hamas is both incompetent and deceitful ... which again comes as little shock, given their nature and their aims.

Nancy No-Show

Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid have insisted that the American military has done nothing to improve the situation in Iraq. Reid has gone so far as to declare the war lost and to malign the character of General David Petraeus, whose report he dismisses as valueless. Pelosi has a simpler way of dealing with Petraeus and his briefing for Capitol Hill -- avoid him:

As the House and Senate prepare to vote this week on the final conference report on the $124 billion troop funding bill — which would also mandate that U.S. combat troops begin withdrawing from Iraq on Oct. 1 at the latest — Gen. David Petraeus is scheduled to come to the Hill tomorrow to brief lawmakers on the progress of the recent troop escalation.

ABC News has learned, however, that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., will not attend the briefing.

"She can't make the briefing tomorrow," a Democratic aide told ABC News Tuesday evening. "But she spoke with the general via phone today at some length."

A Pelosi aide said the speaker on Tuesday requested a one-on-one meeting with Petraeus but that could not be worked out. He said their phone conversation lasted 30 minutes.

So what was so important that Pelosi could not attend a briefing on the progress of the war? It does not appear to be an emergency, since no one has suggested that she has left Washington in the middle of a work week. Is there another more pressing matter than the war in Iraq? Certainly the Democrats have not thought so to this point; they have made it their most pressing issue in attempting to force Petraeus into a retreat in the face of terrorists and gangsters.

The most pressing policy issues revolve around our efforts in the war on terror, including the war in Iraq. If Pelosi cannot fit that into her schedule, and Reid cannot bring himself to listen to the field commanders, then neither of them should hold leadership positions. The Democrats apparently want to surrender at every opportunity they can find.

UPDATE: And let's not forget that Pelosi had time to meet with Bashar Assad. What does it say about Democratic leadership that they would prefer to break break with a murderous dictator rather than meet with an American general reporting on developments in his command?

CQ Radio Today: Team Rudy

Today's installment of CQ Radio will feature Katie Levinson of the Rudy Giuliani campaign in the second half of the show. Levinson works as a spokesperson for the campaign and will answer our questions about Rudy's platform, his strategies, and his outreach to conservatives. We'll also be talking about the supplemental spending bill for the Iraq war, and a new addition to Blog Talk Radio that I think will generate a great deal of enthusiasm.

Join the conversation today at 646-652-4889 when we go to air at 2 pm CT!

UPDATE: I'll also be talking about the conflicting stories regarding Barbara Comstock and her potential shift from Mitt Romney to Fred Thompson -- reported yesterday by the New Hampshire Insider and refuted by Chris Cillizza at The Fix. Chris also had a couple of posts about John McCain and his efforts to reshuffle the deck at his campaign, both in tone and in personnel.

Don't forget to call in your questions to either me or Katie Levinson ...

CQ Radio Transcript: Duncan Hunter, Part 1

Our inaugural edition of the daily CQ Radio show featured an excellent chat with Congressman Duncan Hunter. Hunter has started campaigning for the Republican presidential nomination, and his efforts are based on his national-security and trade policies. Hunter served for years on the Armed Services Committee and chaired it for four years, and he brings an informed perspective to those issues. This is Part 1 of the Hunter interview; part 2 will be posted tomorrow.

EM: Our first guest and it’s a tremendous honor, let me introduce Congressman Duncan Hunter, the Congressman has served 27 years in the House, chairing the House Armed Services Committee for four of them. He fought in Vietnam with Airborne and Ranger units, and he lives near the Mexican border and wants to be our next President, and those two facts are not unrelated. Welcome to CQ Radio, sir.

DH: Thanks. Great to be with you.

EM: Well, Congressman Hunter, we certainly appreciate you taking time off of your busy schedule to talk to us here today. I got a chance to take a look at your campaign website today, and I’m just going to give that address out for our listeners. The address is www.gohunter08.com. On the website, you have three main issues highlighted for your campaign, and that’s securing the borders, fair trade, and the war on terror. I’d like to start with the second, as it seems to be a little different than the traditional Republican things of free trade, and I’d like to ask you what the difference is between free trade and what you’re representing as fair trade.

DH: Well, right now, China is cheating on trade. And let me tell you as Chairman of the Armed Services Committee two years ago when our guys started getting hurt by roadside bombs in Iraq, I sent our teams out from the Armed Services Committee in Washington to find an American steel company that could make high-grade armor steel plate that we could put on the sides of our Humvees. We found only one company left in America still capable of making high-grade armor steel plate, and when the Swiss cut off our main guidance devices for our smart bombs because they didn’t like our Iraq policy, we could only find one company left in this country that still made those guidance devices. So the great arsenal of democracy, that is our industrial base, our ability to make things, is being fractured and sent overseas because of unfair trade practices by other countries, and China is a big part of that and China is cheating on trade right now.

Let me tell you what they’re doing. They’re devaluing their currency by 40%. That means that if the microphone that you’re talking into right now is made in China, and it costs a hundred bucks, and it’s shipped to the United States, when it goes to the water’s edge in China to be shipped, to be exported to us in the United States, the government of China gives that exporter, that Chinese company, a 17% rebate of all their taxes. They have a VAT tax, that’s a value-added tax in China; they give them all their tax money back. Now everybody, except the United States in the trading regimen that we operate under, under GAT, gets to rebate every country except the US gets to rebate to its exporters all their tax money. We’re the only dummies who signed up to this deal with an agreement that we couldn’t rebate our taxes to our exporters. But beyond that, China devalues its currency by 40%. That means that if that microphone you’re talking into is on a showroom floor somewhere in the world, and there’s an American microphone sitting next to it and they’re both a hundred bucks, the government of China basically walks by and says, “We just had a markdown. We marked our product down to $60.” Because by devaluing their currency as compared to the American dollar, they make that product cheaper, in many cases they’ve made the Chinese product cheaper than even the materials that the Americans would use to build the product. Now what that does is sweep American products off the shelf around the world, not only in the United States but around the world, and that is motivating many American companies to pack up and move their production to China. What that means to me as a guy who cares about defense is that at some point in the future, we’re going to need this great arsenal of democracy, this industrial base of this country, and we’re going to find out that by dumb trade policies, and by allowing others like China to cheat on the policies, we’ve moved a great deal of our industrial capability offshore. I’m very concerned about that.

As the American President, you do a couple of things that are uniquely reserved to the Executive branch. One is to negotiate arms control deals, and the other is to negotiate trade deals. And like Ronald Reagan negotiating arms control deals, when he was saw a bad one, he junked it and he brought they guys back to the table for another deal. I will junk bad trade deals and bring our competitors back to the table for another deal. There is no such thing as free trade when one country is cheating and not following the rules. That’s another saying of Ronald Reagan. Right now, the Chinese are cheating, and they’re buying ships and planes and missiles, lots of military equipment, with American trade dollars.

EM: Do you see this as primarily a problem with the Chinese, or do you see NAFTA and CAFTA as being part of a trade policy that may be too problematic for American businesses?

DH: I see first that we’ve signed a dumb trade deal with the rest of the world. If you understand what we’ve done, we’ve signed a deal that says with all these countries which have value-added tax systems, that’s a VAT tax, that they can rebate all of their taxes to their exporters. So that means that if you have a table company or a car company in Mexico, in France, in Japan, take any of the top 25 trading nations in the world, all of those countries rebate, give back all the taxes to their manufacturers. There’s only one country that’s not allowed to give its taxes back to its manufacturers under the deal we signed. That’s the United States. So that means if you make a product in your studio where you’re at right now, you’re probably going to pay 20% of your cost will be embedded tax cost. Corporate taxes, property taxes, etc. When you send that product to another country, you will have paid American taxes while you’re making the product here, and when it arrives in the other country, like China, they will hit you with a penalty for all of their taxes, which in China is 17%. So you’ll pay 20% taxes in the US making your product, then when your product gets to China they’ll add 17% on top of that, so you will have a product that ends up on the showroom floor in China at 37% taxes. Your competitor, who may be shipping his product to the United States, will have no taxes. He will have his taxes rebated to him by the government of China, so he pays no Chinese taxes. And when that product gets to the United States, we let it in duty-free, so he pays no American taxes. So this is like you working with a competitor across the street who operates tax free. That means that basically you have to hit a home run every day just to keep your head above water. That’s why hundreds of financial consultants around the country every week are advising their companies to pack up their production and move it offshore.

So you have a problem with the deal that we made. We made a dumb business deal. Trade deals are basically business deals between nations. We made a dumb business deal with the rest of the trading world, but beyond that, China is cheating on the deal that we do have because they’re devaluing their currency 40%. What that is, is a government subsidy of 40% to every product that they make, and that is killing American industry in this country.

EM: So, is there a way out of …

DH: There’s a way out…if you’ve got a bad business deal you can always pull out of it. We reserve the right to remove ourselves from these deals. We need to renegotiate. Very clearly, the people that told us that NAFTA was going to be the greatest thing in show business have been proven wrong. When we passed NAFTA, they said that we’re going to build on this $3 billion trade surplus that we had with Mexico in 1994. It went immediately to a $15 billion trade loss. With respect to China, we’ve given Most Favored Nation trading status to China and we’d have this deal with them that they’re cheating on right now. They now have us at a $2-$300 billion trade loss annually with China and they’re using American billions to buy ships and planes and missiles. They just bought these Sovremenny-class missile destroyers from the Russians, which were designed to kill American aircraft carriers. So we need to do what Ronald Reagan did when he saw bad arms-control deals. That’s to junk those deals, bring the competitors back to the table for another deal, put together a group of good, hard-headed, sharp businessmen, let’s put together a deal that benefits American workers and American businesses. That’s called smart trade.

We’ve been engaged in to date dumb trade, and the problem with China is that that involves a security element because Chinese are one country with the industrial capacity that could challenge us strongly in the future in a military way, and it’s not very smart of the United States to be sending them the hard dollars that they’re using to arm. China I arming right now. They’ve got heavy submarine development right now. They’ve got lots of tactical fighter development going on. They shot a satellite out of space January 11th. That heralded a new era of competition in space on a military basis with China, because America’s military assets depend highly on our eyes in space. And so we have a real security dimension to the trade problem with China. The answer is we’ve got to fix those things, and the American president is the one who’s in the best position to negotiate change; I’m going to negotiate change.

EM: Congressman Hunter, I’m glad we’re talking about this because there’s another aspect to the supplier issue, I think, in terms of defense. By the way for our listeners, if you want to call in and talk to Congressman Duncan Hunter, you can call (646) 652-4889. But Congressman, I worked with the defense industry a long time ago, and at the time that I worked in the defense industry, there were probably one or two dozen companies that could be prime contractors, defense contracts for defense systems, and over the years the consolidation of the defense contracting industry, we’re really left with about only two or three different companies that are capable of being prime contractors for systems. Do you see that as also part of the problem in getting supplies and getting sources for some of these materials?

DH: Of course, that’s totally unrelated to the trade issue.

EM: Exactly, and you’re right. I’m sorry.

DH: No, no, that’s still an issue and it’s still a problem and you’re absolutely right, Ed. You know, the less competition you have in defense, the fewer innovations you’re going to have, and of course, the higher the cost is going to be. Now let me tell you what I did a couple of years ago to meet this problem. I introduced a program and put it into law called the Challenge Program. The Challenge Program was based on the idea that even though you had a prime contractor, let’s call him an incumbent contractor, which were generally the biggest contractors, which had a system. Let’s say it made a particular system for the F-22 aircraft. Because most of our innovation comes out of small companies, a small company could challenge that large company for that particular component of that big program. Let’s say there was some kind of a guidance system in the F-22 aircraft. You could challenge the incumbent and the Department of Defense could take a look at what you had and if it was a throwaway idea, it wasn’t very good, they could dismiss it very quickly, but if it looked like it had some merit they could evaluate it, and if it looked like you did have more war-fighting capability for a better price, or a combination of those two factors, then the challenger could be given the contract and the incumbent booted on that particular contract. And I gave lots of discretion to DOD. They could wait, for example, until the present contract ran out and then renegotiate using the challenger with the better system, or if it was a very extreme situation, or a critical situation, one in which they were being vastly overcharged, they could actually kick out the incumbent contractor and give the new guy, the challenger, a shot at the deal. That was passed to encourage innovation.

Now in practice, the Pentagon hasn’t made it all that I wanted it to be. They’ve relegated it to more of a small business set-aside type of thing, but they way you get innovation in defense is to get lots of defense companies into the game and the rounds of consolidation did not help our innovation in national security.

EM: Well, I’m glad you answered that question because it’s been a concern of mine over the years watching this consolidation. It’s one of the reasons why I think that your candidacy has got so much substance to it. It’s because you’ve been really working on all of these issues around national security and national defense for all these years, and I’m glad to be able to pick your brain on that. Thank you very much.

DH: Absolutely.

Note: I received dozens of offers for transcriptions, and I will reply to each of you shortly. I'd love to spread the effort around, if people don't mind, so please accept my apologies for a slow response and stay patient. I honestly had no idea I'd get this much of a response!

Hillary Losing Critical Constituency

During the first quarter of this extended presidential primary season, people discounted Barack Obama's candidacy for a number of reasons, but one related to his supposed lack of resonance in the African-American community. The New York Times reported in early February that Obama was not considered "black enough" by activists within the African-American community. Now, less than three months later, the Gray Lady reports that they have discovered that Hillary looks a lot more pale in comparison:

Only a few months ago, the vast majority of black elected officials in New York were expected to support the presidential candidacy of Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton. But no longer.

In a series of interviews, a significant number of those officials now say they are undecided about whether to back Mrs. Clinton or one of her main rivals for the Democratic nomination, Senator Barack Obama of Illinois, the only black politician in the race.

The officials described themselves as impressed with the strength of Mr. Obama’s campaign in recent weeks, saying it reflected a grass-roots enthusiasm for Mr. Obama that many noticed among black voters in their own districts. And that could signal trouble for Mrs. Clinton, forcing her to devote precious attention to her home state, where blacks made up 20 percent of the Democratic primary vote in 2004, just as she has had to scramble to keep black support nationwide.

As I wrote at the time, the notion that black voters would snub Obama for Hillary was ludicrous. Those who believe in identity politics would not prefer a Caucasian woman to a man of African descent, regardless of whether he had American slavery as part of his family history or not. Those who claimed that Obama would drag down the national ticket because of the color of his skin aligned themselves with Hillary for profit. Serious people never took those claims for anything other than fringe rhetoric or self-interested argument.

No the Times seems to have caught onto Hillary's dilemma. Not only has she lost the hard Left in the primaries, but now she's poised to lose a constituency that her husband had cemented for her. In her own backyard, Harlem Congressman Adam Clayton Powell has switched to neutral, impressed with the Obama campaign's staying power and fundraising. Rep. Nick Perry of Brooklyn says that Obama has a much more realistic chance than Jesse Jackson, who won his constituents when he supported someone else in 1988.

Charles Rangel is still working hard for Hillary, and that's not nothing. He has lots of connections, both national and local, and his efforts will keep some of her support structure in line. However, it has become clear from Obama's fundraising that his candidacy has found resonance in liberal circles regardless of race, and also within the community that Hillary needs to win the primaries. She cannot rely on friendly media playing up the silly notion that Obama isn't black enough for black voters, but somehow she is.

War Supplemental Now Includes Minimum-Wage Increase?

House and Senate conferees have reached agreement on the supplemental funding bill for the war in Iraq, the Washington Post reports. It maintains the timetables for withdrawal that could get initiated as early as July 1 and maintains a few of the pork-barrel items that raised such ire during the debates in both chambers. Democrats have also added their minimum-wage increase to the bill, an odd addition to war funding:

House and Senate negotiators reached agreement yesterday on war-funding legislation that would begin bringing U.S. troops home from Iraq as early as July, setting a goal of ending U.S. combat operations by no later than March.

The $124 billion bill, slated for final votes in the House and Senate tomorrow and Thursday, sets up a veto clash with President Bush by week's end. Some congressional Democrats had considered making advisory all dates for withdrawing U.S. troops in the hopes of persuading Bush to sign the bill, which Democratic leaders said provides $96 billion -- more than the White House requested -- for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. But with the president standing firm on his plans to veto any language on the timing of the war, Democratic leaders stuck to binding dates for initial troop pullouts. ...

Democrats hope to put the president on the spot for rejecting the money he has said he badly needs to prosecute the war. The compromise bill provides $95.5 billion for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, $4 billion more than he requested. It would spend on veterans' health care $1.8 billion that Bush had not asked for and boosts funding for troop training and equipment. It also includes $2 billion more than the White House requested for homeland security.

On the domestic side, Democrats stripped out some items that Bush and congressional Republicans ridiculed, but defied criticism on others. The final legislation will no longer fund peanut storage facilities and relief for spinach farmers harmed by product recalls. Nor will it aid Christmas tree farms, or beet or sugar cane growers. But it keeps $3.5 billion in agricultural assistance, less than the House and Senate had approved. It retains $500 million for wildfire emergencies, and $425 million for a rural schools and roads program that was set to expire.

Readers don't find out about the attachment of the minimum-wage hike and its balancing tax cuts until the last paragraph of the story. Democrats have had to throw in everything but the kitchen sink to get this mess passed in Congress. The minimum-wage hike would have attracted the hardliners opposed to any more war funding, buying votes for surrender just as surely as the billions for agricultural assistance does.

It makes it easier for the President to veto, though he has not vociferously opposed the minimum-wage hike. The bill will quickly get torpedoed at the White House, and it's entirely possible that Bush will make a big show of it. That will put all of these programs at a legislative disadvantage, as they will have to start over from scratch and send them back through committees -- unless Congress can override the vetoes. And given the razor-thin majorities that approved these bills, everything will have to start over again.

Most amusing, though, are the comments Democrats made in support of the bill. Patty Murray, who once lauded Osama bin Laden for his sponsorship of schools, said that the Democratic strategy of withdrawal "sets us on a path with the best chance of achieving success in Iraq," without explaining how surrendering equates to success. Harry Reid, who declared defeat in Iraq last week in a move that took even his fellow Democrats by surprise, expanded on his military analysis by insisting that "no progress has been made" in Iraq, despite the assessment of General Petraeus on the scene. They also casted this bill as an effort to reach a compromise with the White House, which has insisted that fixed timetables for withdrawal will be completely unacceptable -- making the Democrats' inclusion of those timetables an odd form of "compromise".

Democrats hope to run out the clock on war funding in order to force Bush to accept withdrawal. It continues their insistence on a passive-aggressive strategy that they hope will insulate them from the consequences of an American withdrawal by blaming it on Bush, rather than having the courage of their own rhetoric and defunding the troops in Iraq. When Iraq collapses into a conflagration of complete civil war because of our precipitate withdrawal, the disaster will belong to the party of defeat and retreat, no matter how much blame-shifting Reid and Nancy Pelosi attempt.

I Thought Cho Tabloidism Was Bad Enough

I just received a press release from WellTunes that I literally could not believe until I read it twice. WellTunes offers New-Agey CDs of music that "brings together modern psychology and Scripture to carry the Word to your heart and mind." Apparently that isn't enough to sell the product, because now Welltunes wants to leverage the Virginia Tech massacre to really convince people that they need WellTunes to avoid becoming a mass murderer. Here's the release:

WellTunes Music Founder is Available for Interviews

The recent massacre at Virginia Tech reveals that severe depression and profound unhap-piness can have horrific consequences.

Although we all seek happiness, why is it that we are ten times more likely to suffer from depression than our grandparents? Having so much more than they did, how did we get to be so unhappy, and how do we change?

Designed by psychologist and radio broadcaster Dr. Roy Vogel, WellTunes Music builds hope, or what Vogel refers to as the "Hope Response". Hope, he says, is essential for happiness and health.

"WellTunes Music is a way to get focused on core beliefs that promote hope. This album provides a structured way to create that much-needed Hope Response," Vogel states.

So instead of Cho tabloidism, we get Cho merchandising? Eight days after one of the worst civilian shootings in our nation's history, WellTunes is using it to sell CDs. What's next -- the Cho blend for coffee, in order to perk you up but not set you off?

Despicable. WellTunes should fire its PR firm and issue an apology to everyone who received this.

Hot Air Turns One

Happy anniversary to Michelle, Bryan, Allahpundit, and Ian, as Hot Air celebrates its first anniversary. Michelle writes:

This is the very first business I’ve ever run. The experience has deepened my already abiding respect for entrepreneurs small and large. It ain’t easy. Not everyone has the intestinal fortitude to attempt to create something from nothing, if I may say so. It takes a great leap of faith–and I’m grateful to all the members of the Hot Air team who took that leap with me.

The risks are great, but the rewards can be, too. And not just financial rewards. Hot Air is not just a business. It’s a mission. I intentionally brought together an eclectic group of incredibly talented people to bring something new to the blogosphere. One of the things, I think, that makes this site compelling and interesting to read and watch every day is that we have diverse views and diverse personalities here. If you want standard GOP talking points, if you want uniformity of thought, if you want a comfy echo chamber, you know you are in the wrong place.

It's no secret that I read Hot Air constantly through the day, not just for the stories it highlights, but for its unique voice. It blends the sensibilities and viewpoints of its various authors and transforms into a tone and voice that differs from all of them. They have made their site a must-read just for the fun of what they do. In fact, it's hard to believe it's only been a year since their launch.

Congratulations to my friends at Hot Air, and we can't wait to see what Year 2 will bring!

Summer Heat Got You Down? Try Wearing A Sack

Summer approaches in Iran, and the temperatures will start rising dramatically. So will police interventions to ensure proper shari'a wear for women. The Iranian government announced that, as they do every year, they will start cracking down on women who react rationally to the heat by not wearing a head-to-toe sack:

Iranian police have begun a summer campaign to ensure women do not flout the nation's sharia dress code as temperatures soar. ...

Under sharia, imposed in Iran after the 1979 revolution, women are obliged to wear a head-to-toe black chador or cover their hair with scarves and choose long, loose-fitting clothes.

Women who "violate" the law can receive lashes, fines or imprisonment. Mahdi Ahmadi, a police spokesman, said: "Police have started to confront those women who appear in public in an inappropriate way."

Have they ever! The police announced that they have already issued 1,300 warnings about immodest dress, and it's only mid-April. If a strand of hair makes an appearance, the Iranian police will be there to defend Iranian men from the dastardly display.

It could be worse. The police will merely beat women who continue to flout their sexuality by dressing unlike an old lady in mourning. The Basijis have received free reign to kill people who they determine to be "morally corrupt", courtesy of the Iranian Supreme Court. So far the Basijis have restrained themselves to the most egregious social violations, such as a man and woman walking together, but Iranian women have no protection against them if they start killing every woman who dares to dress in muted pastels.

At some point, one has to think that the Iranian people will get so disgusted by these oppressive laws and their brutal application that they will act to rid themselves of the lunatics who impose them. So far, however, they seem too cowed by their masters to do much of anything, but it is this younger generation that holds the promise of rebellion against the mullahcracy. We hope that comes quickly.

Word Up -- Word Out (Updated)

The fall of Don Imus may have accomplished what twenty years of finger-wagging couldn't: to get rap to clean up its act. Influential rap mogul Russell Simmons has called for the removal of curse words from hip-hop music, especially those that carry offensive racial and sexist meanings:

Hip-hop mogul Russell Simmons said Monday that the recording and broadcast industries should consistently ban racial and sexist epithets from all so-called clean versions of rap songs and the airwaves.

Currently such epithets are prohibited in most clean versions, but record companies sometimes "arbitrarily" decide which offensive words to exclude and there's no uniform standard for deleting such words, Simmons said.

The recommendations drew mixed reaction and come two weeks after some began carping anew about rap lyrics after radio personality Don Imus was fired by CBS Radio and NBC for referring to the players on the Rutgers university women's basketball team as "nappy-headed hos."

Expressing concern about the "growing public outrage" over the use of such words in rap lyrics, Simmons said the words "bitch," "ho" and "nigger" should be considered "extreme curse words."

"We recommend (they're) always out," Simmons, the pioneering entrepreneur who made millions of dollars as he helped shape hip-hop culture, said in an interview Monday. "This is a first step. It's a clear message and a consistency that we want the industry to accept for more corporate social responsibility."

When people like you and I complain about rap lyrics, it generates gales of laughter from the hip-hop culture. When Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson complain about it, rappers just throw more money at their organizations. When Russell Simmons says, "Enough!", people notice. Simmons has promoted and produced rap acts for longer than some of the artists have been alive, and his opinion counts.

It doesn't mean that everyone will agree with him. One writer, Joan Morgan, considers it nothing more than a smoke screen to cover hip-hop's issues of misogyny and homophobia. The RIAA, busy with suing college kids over file sharing, had no comment on Simmon's recommendation. Undoubtedly, some artists will issue objections ... but Simmons will have forced them to defend themselves.

Will Simmons' recommendations change the industry overnight? Of course not, and some artists will never change. However, when someone as influential as Simmons insists that a problem exists, then it will be harder for others to deny it, and then they have to explain why they're not contributing to it. The degradation of women and the glorification of lowlifes like pimps has hopefully run its course, and moguls like Simmons will have to decide that first before it finally falls out of fashion.

UPDATE: I share many of the same libertarian concerns of the commenters about censorship in society, but that's not exactly what Simmons means. In the first place, rap artists already produce those "clean" versions for radio play. Simmons wants them to stop using those words altogether, in recordings for sale as well as for airplay.

Censorship is the government placing a prior restraint on speech. If rap producers and record labels refuse to publish rap music with those words as Simmons proposes, that's not a First Amendment issue at all. The labels own the press, not the artists, who could still perform live and use all the filthy, degrading words they wanted ... but they wouldn't reap the economic benefit of CDs. That's a market decision, not censorship; there is no "right" to have a label record someone for commercial benefit.

Otherwise, I'd make you all listen to my version of "Margaritaville".

Cho Tabloidism

We're going to see a lot of these Seung-hui Cho stories pop up over the next few weeks -- I never realized who I was with! -- but perhaps none quite as weird and lurid as this one. Virginia's WSLS television station gives a first-person account from a woman who went out on a "date" with Cho two weeks before he killed 32 at Virginia Tech ... as an escort (via Hot Air):

"I'm just so shaken by this, I don't know what to say." Chastity Frye says she spent an hour, all alone, with Virginia Tech killer Cho Seung-Hui last month.

Frye said "He was so quiet, I really couldn't get much from him, he was so distant, he really didn't talk a lot. It seemed like he wasn't all there."

Frye works for an escort service. She says, Cho hired her, and the two met at a Valley View motel.

She says "I danced for a little while and I thought we were done because he got up and went to the restroom and began washing. And I said, 'well, do you want me to go? I'm going to go ahead and go'. And he's like, 'I paid for the full hour, you've only been here for 15 minutes,' and then he came back in the room. And I started dancing and that's when he you know, touched me and tried to get on me and that's when I pushed him away."

I asked Frye if she was afraid at that point: "No, because he went away right away." She said she didn't see any guns, any ammunition, and nothing else that made her feel nervous.

Why did WSLS publish this account? Like so much of the information about the mass murderer, it tells us little about the murders or the murderer that we didn't already know. He was a social misfit, so much so that he couldn't even figure out how to handle an escort. The FBI confirmed the story through credit card receipts, the same way they tracked his weapons and ammunition purchases, which might tell us that he knew he wouldn't have to pay anyone back. That he planned the murders was obvious from his NBC package.

Be prepared for more close encounters of the Cho kind. We're going to hear from every fast-food clerk and every mall rat that crossed Cho's path. These stories will fill the void that the factual reporting of the case leaves as people realize that they've heard just about every relevant fact from a press corps determined to exhaust this story.

An Bhlog Ghailge - Scátháinín Mháire

One of the hobbies I had before succumbing to my obsessive passion of blogging and political commentary was the study of Gaeilge, the language of Ireland. One of six Celtic languages, its renaissance has been slow and halting since the independence of Ireland in the 1920s. Few speak it as a first language, and only around 20% or so of the Irish population speak it conversationally, despite its status as one of the two official languages in the Republic of Ireland. However, its use in poetry and music is unbelievably beautiful, and its connection to Irish culture is unmistakable.

I live in an area where Irish language resources are in good supply. Chief among them is the non-profit group Gaeltacht Minnesota, which holds free language lessons on a weekly basis. My instructor, when I had time to attend, has started her own blog called Scátháinín Mháire for some amusement in Irish language study. Pronounced SCAW-neen WHY-ruh, it means "Mary's mirror", and it reflects her gentle and playful nature.

In one post, Máire points out a typo on an Irish sign in the airport, and in another, she gives a quick lesson for students. She shows a picture of a house on blocks, and lists three statements:

Trí rud: 1. Bhí cara dom ina cónaí in aice leis an teach seo. (7/7/06) 2. Thóg mé pictiúr an fhógra (inné) i 2005, sílim. 3. Lá breithe sona dhuit, a Pham! (cara eile)

The third means "Happy birthday, Pam! (another friend)". I'll let you guess what the other two mean. I plan to start taking it up as a hobby, so I'll need to make sure I have the other two correct before I return to class!

CQ Radio: Patterico & Alberto Gonzales (Updated)

UPDATE: Well, we had some transmission problems at the beginning, but Patterico gave some great background and perspective to the case. I hope you enjoy it!

Today's installment of CQ Radio will feature Patterico of Patterico's Pontifications, the excellent blog of a Los Angeles-area prosecutor who covers law, politics, and especially media criticism. He has done an excellent job of cataloguing the various gaffes and outrages of the Los Angeles Times, so much so that his annual reviews of the paper become a must-read. Patterico will join me to discuss the testimony of Alberto Gonzales and what it means for the Bush administration.

I know that CQ readers have strong opinions on the subject, so be sure to join the conversation by dialing 646-652-4889.

Note: Blog posting may be slow, as the FM and I are at the hospital this morning for some investigation into recent lab results. The best part of Blog Talk Radio is that you can host a show from danged near anywhere, and it wouldn't be the first time I did my show from a hospital room...

UPDATE: Actually, things turned out well at the hospital, and we're back home. We thought the FM would require a biopsy of the new kidney, but they decided it wasn't necessary. The results look stable, but we'll continue to keep an eye on them.

BUMP: To top.

Searching For A Transcriber

Due to my current workload, I'm finding it difficult to produce transcripts of my interviews -- and I would like to have them available for use in promoting my shows. I'm looking for someone who wants to do transcriptions for a reasonable rate and who can accept PayPal for their payment. If anyone would like to inquire, please e-mail me at the address on the sidebar with the subject line "Transcription". Thank you!

Gonzales On The Watch List

Note: We will be discussing Gonzales on CQ Radio today, so be sure to join the conversation!

According to Newsweek, which has multiple articles on Alberto Gonzales in its April 30th issue, Republicans on Capitol Hill have told the White House that the Attorney General has to go if the Bush administration wants to see any progress on its legislative agenda, including immigration. The Judiciary Committee's most vocal Democrat has suggested a list of replacements which would receive quick and painless confirmation as an incentive:

With that performance, Gonzales lost the Hill. When he spoke with the attorney general on Friday, Sessions urged Gonzales to "take the weekend" to determine whether he can still "be an effective leader," he said later in a statement. Rep. Adam Putnam, chairman of the House Republican Conference, called on Gonzales to step down—echoing a position that a group of top House GOPers privately delivered to Bush earlier in the month. "He's done something I didn't think possible. He's lost the confidence of almost all the Republicans in Congress," said one top GOP strategist who is close to the White House, anonymous when talking about sensitive personnel matters. A big GOP concern: Gonzales's continued presence will make it hard to move measures important to the party's base, like immigration reform, through the judiciary committees, said the strategist.

But Gonzales himself was hanging tough. "We believe the burden is now on the Democrats to prove that something improper occurred here—and they haven't done that," said a top Justice official (who asked not to be ID'd talking about nonpublic matters). Publicly, the White House was standing by its A.G. One White House adviser (who asked not to be ID'ed talking about sensitive issues) said the support reflected Bush's own view that a Gonzales resignation would embolden the Dems to go after other targets—like Karl Rove. "This is about Bush saying, 'Screw you'," said the adviser, conceding that a Gonzales resignation might still be inevitable. The trick, said the adviser, would be to find a graceful exit strategy for Bush's old friend.

Chuck Schumer even helpfully provided a list of acceptable replacements, promising an easy ride in the Judiciary Committee for any of three possibilities. One looks surprisingly acceptable, at least initially. Larry Thompson served as the Number Two official in Justice during John Ashcroft's term as AG, and he helped lead prosecutions in the Enron case and other corporate fraud prosecutions. He would be the first African-American AG if he was appointed and confirmed. Of course, someone would have to convince him to leave his lucrative position at Pepsico first.

The other suggestions seem less likely. James Comey opposed the NSA's terrorist-surveillance program, almost certainly excluding him from any potential consideration by the White House. Comey also selected Patrick Fitzgerals for the Plame inquiry, and anyone associated with that decision would probably be less than welcome. Michael Mukasey spent the last twenty years on the federal bench, with the highlight being the 1995 prosecution of the "blind Sheikh", Omar Abdel Rahman. He hasn't had the public profile of other AG candidates, but that might not be all that bad, considering. He hasn't had a lot of managerial experience either, which under the circumstances would not play well.

That's if the White House decides to replace Gonzales, and Newsweek reports that Bush appears to have dug in his heels at this point. He believes that any attempt to move Gonzales would encourage the Democrats to go after Karl Rove. However, as long as Gonzales remains in his post, they will continue to keep this alive and go after Rove anyway, and Gonzales' presence gives them an opening to do so. It would be better to have a competent AG at Justice that could turn down the heat on the issue of the firings and take away some of the excuse that Democrats have at the moment to continue their full-court press.

UPDATE: Mike Huckabee, running from the Right for the 2008 presidential nomination, calls Gonzales a "distraction" for the GOP:

"Sometimes the best position would be for the appointee to make the decision and not force the president to do so. You best serve the person you work for when you can decide that if you are a distraction that you no longer will create that level of problem for your boss," Huckabee told Associated Press reporters and editors in an interview.

"The attorney general is clearly creating a major distraction for the president and for the administration and for the Republican Party," Huckabee said. ...

"It seems that a growing number of Republicans in Congress say, yes, it is a distraction," he said. "For reasons I don't fully understand, the president hasn't quite seen it that way yet."

UPDATE II: My good friend Paul at Power Line echoes James in the comments about Gonzales' drag on immigration reform: "Finally, a compelling reason why Gonzales should stay."

Boris Yeltsin, RIP

Boris Yeltsin, the man who saved Russian democracy so that Vladimir Putin could dismantle it, has died at the age of 76. The cause is not yet known, but Yeltsin had a host of medical problems:

In 1991 he famously outmanoeuvred former Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev and then triumphed against parliament hardliners in 1993.

Mr Yeltsin became Russia's first democratically elected head of state after Mr Gorbachev resigned as Soviet leader in December 1991.

He won international acclaim as a defender of democracy when in August 1991 he mounted a tank in Moscow, rallying the people against an attempt to overthrow Mr Gorbachev's era of glasnost and perestroika.

Yeltsin had his share of political problems, too. It was Yeltsin that initiated the military response to Chechnyan rebels, before they became inflitrated with Islamist terrorists. He also presided over the wild ride of Russian privatization, a process that undermined the press for democratic reform.

However, Yeltsin will always be remembered for that tank ride that stopped the Soviet Communists from retaking the Kremlin in 1991 and ending Mikhail Gorbachev's political career. Whatever else he did, that one shining moment of courage and tenacity will serve as an example not just for the Russians, who could use one right now, but for all people to remember as they seek -- or protect -- their liberty.

The Culture Of Corruption In High Gear

Maybe we misunderstood the Democrats in the midterm elections last year. When Nancy Pelosi talked about the "culture of corruption", we assumed she meant that the Democrats opposed it. It turns out that they wanted a chance to benefit from it, as their first-quarter fundraising numbers show, as Ken Silverstein at Harper's reports (via Memeorandum)

Last spring, with Republicans controlling both houses of Congress, I wrote an item saying that for corporations and federal contractors looking for favors in Washington, it was hardly even worth buying a Democrat anymore. But the November 2006 Democratic victory changed all that. Political fundraising numbers were released last week and they show that during the first quarter of 2007, Democrats raised slightly more money overall ($47.7 million) than Republicans ($47.4 million). Compare that to the first quarter of 2003, when the GOP trounced the Democrats in the hunt for cash $54 million to $19 million.

Fundraising figures for key members of Congress are particularly striking. For example, during the entire 2005-2006 period Congressman Steny Hoyer of Maryland, then merely a member of the lowly minority party, raised a grand total of $2.3 million. Now that he's Majority Leader, Hoyer was able to raise $929,631 during the first quarter of this year alone—more than any other member of the House of Representatives. At that rate, Hoyer will raise over three times more during this election cycle than he did during the last one.

What makes Hoyer's current pace even more notable is that he raised all that dough during a traditionally light fundraising period. Hoyer won't even face the voters again for another 19 months and he's already got a lock on the seat (he won last November with 84 percent of the vote, versus 16 percent for a Green Party candidate). But of course, Hoyer's donors aren't giving him money for his re-election campaign; they're making tribute payments in recognition of his enhanced status in Congress, and down payments on favors they'll be looking for down the road.

Steny Hoyer isn't alone. Silverstein looks at several Democrats in key positions and finds that their fundraising has improved exponentially as well. Charles Rangel now chairs the Ways and Means Committee, which controls tax policy, and he has raised over $800,000 in Q1, a third of the entire total of his fundraising in the 2005-6 cycle. James Clyburn, now Majority Whip, put over $700,000 in the bank in Q1, more than half of his $1.1 million in the 05-06 cycle. Jack Murtha, whom Silverstein calls the Pork King, collected over $550,000 in Q1, some of which came from companies with business in front of his subcommittee.

Senate Democrats have done even better. Carl Levin raised $1.5 million in the first quarter, or about five times what he raised in the 05-06 cycle. Mary Landrieu raised $1 million in Q1 after raising $1.4 million in the last cycle. She shares a seat on the Appropriations Committee with Tom Harkin, who also had a million-dollar quarter, about half of his total receipts in the past two years. Max Baucus, who now heads the Finance Committee, received $1.1 million, more than a third of what he raised in the last two years.

The Democrats have discovered that it pays to be in the majority -- literally. Silverstein projects that several of the above will far outstrip the $5 million mark in the 07-08 cycle, thanks to their new positions of power. I'm sure that they will, at that point, fight the "culture of corruption", or at least they will tell us that to keep their beaks in the trough for another cycle.

Former Putin Advisor: Russia Is The Next Zimbabwe

Der Spiegel interviewed Andrei Illarionov, a former economic advisor to Vladimir Putin, to discuss the recent political strife in Russia. Illarionov did not paint a pleasant picture of what lies ahead. Despite robust economic growth and a lack of military enemies, Putin has begun dismantling democratic institutions and moving towards a police state:

SPIEGEL: We see the same images in the news almost every weekend: The powerful state has its police officers converge with clubs on small groups of protestors. Given his popularity, does President Vladimir Putin really need this?

Illarionov: Those in power deliberately use violence to intimidate. They want to break the people's will to resist and act independently, and to do so they are constantly raising the level of aggression. Unlike the mass terror under Hitler, Stalin and Mao, we in Russia are currently experiencing a campaign of terror against individuals and groups.

SPIEGEL: Who is conducting it?

Illarionov: Employees of the intelligence agencies. These people now occupy more than 70 percent of all top positions in the state machinery. The destruction of Mikhail Khodorkovsky's Yukos oil company, the murder of journalist Anna Politkovskaya, the polonium poisoning of former agent Alexander Litvinenko -- the goal in each of these cases is to keep society in a state of constant fear. That makes it easier to control the people. This is the only reason the state-controlled media are allowed to report at length on these cases. It contributes to the climate of fear.

Putin says, according to Illarionov, that there are no former intelligence agents. The former KGB chief has made good use of his colleagues from the intel community, moving them into positions of power in order to strengthen his autocratic rule. Illarionov also made clear that Putin will almost certainly stick around for a third term in office, regardless of the constitution, as his underlings have already begun making it impossible for him to refuse.

When asked about Western business interests and how they can be brought into play, Illarionov talked coyly about action. He said that he wouldn't presume to tell Germany about how to conduct business with Boris Gryzlov, the Speaker of the Duma, who praised the police response to the demonstrations in Moscow last week. DS asked Illarionov whether the West should kick Putin and Russia out of the G-8, and he would only answer that "One cannot overestimate the options the West has available with which it can apply pressure on Russia."

Clearly Illarionov would like to see economic pressure brought to bear on Putin, or at least some form of resistance from the West to the anti-democratic moves made by Putin. He asserted that Putin would become a Mugabe-like figure, someone who rose to power on the promise of democracy but who in the end would destroy the nation in the pursuit of personal power. "We suffer from the Zimbabwean disease," Illarionov told Der Spiegel, and it would create diplomatic and economic isolation for Russia unless stopped. In this case, the best cure might be a small measure now of the end result of the disease.

My Weekend With Gateway

Many thanks to those who commented and e-mailed after my post detailing my frustrations with Gateway support. Some were even kind enough to offer free technical support from other companies, but I wanted to see how Gateway would respond to the issue. I'm a certified masochist in that regard, but as a former customer service professional, I wanted to see how long they would try to string me along before acknowledging the hardware problem.

First, I should note that I left the external wireless adapter attached all weekend long -- and it never failed. Actually, the adapter is specifically not Vista compliant, but it worked anyway. In fact, I'm writing this post on the Gateway system now. That shows pretty conclusively that my router works just fine, as if the other two computers using it wasn't proof enough.

Over the weekend, I received a series of four e-mails from the "Advance [sic] Technical Support" group. The first e-mail instructed me to make a series of changes to my TCP/IP protocols, which their Tier 1 group had already performed when I allowed them to take remote control of the laptop. I sent an e-mail reminding them of this, and their next reply instructed me to reload my drivers from the Recovery program. I replied that if they would have bothered to read the chat dialogues from my earlier contacts with Gateway support, they would know that I had done that several times already. The next e-mail instructed me to change my router, and my reply instructed them to quit wasting my time and read the damned dialogues.

Finally, this morning, they acknowledged what CQ readers and I knew all along: the hardware is faulty. They told me that "based on the troubleshooting, we have determined that parts of your notebook need to be replaced." No kidding! I wonder which part of "troubleshooting" determined that -- my input to them on all of the ways I had already isolated the problem, or the fact that I wouldn't go away? I'm suspicious that it's the latter and not the former.

Gateway will send me a box and an RMA to get the work done, which they say will take 7-10 business days after delivery. I expect it to be gone three weeks. I'd take it back to the store, but I'd wind up with the same hardware, and I think the problem is in the Realtek chipset. I can't believe it took Gateway this long to reach this conclusion, and I'm left unsatisfied as a result.

There Aren't Any Now?

The Times of London reports on the mood among the French now that Nicolas Sarkozy and Ségolène Royal have advanced to the playoffs of the presidential season in France. Both candidates had widely expected to make it to the run-off, and the results give France a choice to move from the status quo to either the left or the right. The Times speaks to a man on the street who will vote Royal because Sarkozy will bring riots and chaos:

With a smile on his face, flip-flops on his feet and a cannabis joint in his hand, Jean-François Charmand wandered up to the polling station at Buffle Primary School in Grigny, south of Paris.

"I’m not going to tell you who I’m going to vote for," said the 38-year-old painter decorator. "But I’ll tell you who I’m going to vote against - Nicolas Sarkozy."

Amongst the largely immigrant population on Grigny’s infamous Grande Borne estate - scene of riots in 2005 and again last year - Mr Charmand’s opinion was widely shared.

“If Sarkozy’s elected, it’s going to be chaos,’ he said, fingering his multi-coloured necklace. "We’re going to have even more police coming after les blacks and even less freedom than we do now."

Okay, so maybe it's the mood among joint-smoking Frenchmen. The Times even reports that Charmand seriously considered carrying the joint into the polling place, but thought there might have been some who would be shocked by it, and toked up the last hit outside before entering. Charmand worried about riots in the streets, but the French already have that -- which is why the police go after the troublemakers. Sarkozy appears to conflict with Charmand's inclination to surrender to the rioters.

In another indication of Charmand's Everyfrenchman status, he opined that Jean-Marie Le Pen would create less division among his fellow citizens -- despite Le Pen's xenophobic rants.

In other words, it looks like the Times of London took one interview with one particular man on the street and extrapolated it into a "national mood" piece that bears little resemblance to reality. Sarkozy ouitpolled Royal and the more moderate Left candidate, François Bayrou, by a significant margin. The question for the runoff will be Bayrou's 18.5%, most of which were centrist voters left without much of a choice in this election. Will they shift Left or Right? The majority of centrist votes have gone to the Right in past elections, which might be enough to push the election to Sarkozy -- but it will be very, very close.

Of course, what will happen in the runoff is that both candidates will move to the center in an attempt to capture those voters. That may be easier for Sarkozy than Royal. She defined herself as an unabashed Socialist during the campaign, which doesn't leave much room to claim moderation later. Sarkozy is more conservative than Jacques Chirac, but in France, that term is relative; socialism plays a part in the conservative philosophy there. With the chronic unemployment and economic ennui in France, a heavy dose of Socialism will not have the attraction it once did.

Or, it might. As one of the commenters from France put it on the Times of London website, French voters tend to elect those who will protect them from reality. We'll see.

McCain Falters In Former Stronghold (Updated)

John McCain will formally announce his candidacy for the 2008 Presidential nomination in South Carolina next week, but the state's Republicans made it clear he should have showed up this week. Instead of appearing for the party's straw poll yesterday, McCain sent former Oklahoma governor Frank Keating -- and South Carolina sent him a third-tier finish:

The weekend before Arizona Sen. John McCain makes his official presidential announcement in South Carolina, polls show he's not popular with local Republican voters.

The Republican parties in Greenville, Spartanburg and Richland counties held conventions Saturday, where the candidates had the chance to speak and voters participated in polls. McCain did not attend and opted to send former Oklahoma Gov. Frank Keating to appear in his place. Spartanburg County Republican Party Chairman Rick Beltram blamed McCain's absence for his poor showing.

"I thought that McCain missing these South Carolina conventions was a major error in his strategy," Beltram said. "I don't understand what [McCain's strategists] were thinking. McCain is coming here next week to announce that he's running for president, and the newspapers have stuff about him doing so poorly in the straw polls. It is beyond me what their strategy was."

McCain finished far below the pack in the three straw polls taken. In Spartanburg, he finished last, trailing behind people like Tom Tancredo and Tommy Thompson in Greenville for sixth place. Richland voters gave him a fourth-place tie with Mike Huckabee.

In 2000, McCain had a strong base of support among South Carolina Republicans. He came close to derailing George Bush in that state, and his loss prompted complains about a smear campaign against the Arizona Senator. As one of the early primary states, McCain needs that base of support again in 2008, which is why he selected the state for his official announcement.

This early in the campaign, straw polling doesn't mean a lot. McCain has plenty of time to repair whatever damage he did by skipping this round of polling. However, the results clearly show that he has some ground to regain in South Carolina.

UPDATE: McCain has, of course, won a number of these polls in the past, and normal polling shows McCain competing for the top spot in the state. Straw polls generally take the temperature of the activists in the local party, and they probably didn't care much for McCain's failure to include the event in his schedule.

Good Cop, Really Bad Cop

The New York Times reports on the interrogation methods of the new Iraqi Army in an article that will likely renew the debate on torture. Iraqi Army forces whipped a suspected terrorist with an electrical cord to get a confession -- but that confession led to the discovery of safe houses, bomb-construction facilities, and the names of insurgency leaders. All of this will make American soldiers safer in Iraq, but at what cost?

“The detainee gave us names from the highest to the lowest,” Captain Fowler told the Iraqi soldiers. “He showed us their safe houses, where they store weapons and I.E.D.’s and where they keep kidnap victims, how they get weapons, where weapons come from, how they place I.E.D.’s, attack us and go away. Because you detained this guy this is the first intelligence linking everything together. Good job. Very good job.”

The Iraqi officers beamed. What the Americans did not know and what the Iraqis had not told them was that before handing over the detainees to the Americans, the Iraqi soldiers had beaten one of them in front of the other two, the Iraqis said. The stripes on the detainee’s back, which appeared to be the product of a whipping with electrical cables, were later shown briefly to a photographer, who was not allowed to take a picture.

To the Iraqi soldiers, the treatment was normal and necessary. They were proud of their technique and proud to have helped the Americans.

“I prepared him for the Americans and let them take his confession,” Capt. Bassim Hassan said through an interpreter. “We know how to make them talk. We know their back streets. We beat them. I don’t beat them that much, but enough so he feels the pain and it makes him desperate.”

As American and Iraqi troops set up these outposts in dangerous neighborhoods to take on the insurgents block by block, they find themselves continually facing lethal attacks. In practice, the Americans and Iraqis seem to have different answers about what tactics are acceptable in response.

Beatings like this, which are usually hard to verify but appear to be widespread given the fears about the Iraqi security forces frequently expressed by ordinary Iraqis, present the Americans with a largely undiscussed dilemma.

For the sake of argument, let's presume that the Times is correct about the widespread nature of the beatings. They offer little evidence of it, but regardless, it's almost certain that this is not an isolated incident.

When the Americans found out about the torture, from the reporter and photographer, they made it clear that they did not condone the actions of the Iraqi Army personnel. In fact, as the Times points out, the use of torture is illegal for both the American and Iraqi armed forces. And yet, the information that they derived turned out to be accurate and to allow them to shut down an IED factory that otherwise would kill American troops.

The problem, of course, is not just the Jassams in Iraq, but the people who get caught in the net of suspicion by mistake. Not everyone suspected of insurgent activity will be guilty of it. What happens when the Iraqi security services start breaking out the electrical cord for some intense "interrogation"? Will they remain steadfast in their innocence, or will they start saying anything to make the torture stop and get transferred, as in this case, to American custody?

Even if we restrict the argument to Jassam and his terrorist ilk, it still presents Americans with a tough question. If we allow, actively or passively, the beating and torture of prisoners in order to save the lives of American troops, have we not created a Saddam Light in Iraq with our blessings? We want to protect American troops in order to ensure the success of the mission in Iraq -- but if we have to allow torture to reach success, what has success meant?

And even if we object, how do we impose our objections and values on the Iraqis? After all, it's their country and their values that will run it. If the answer is withdrawal, then we will only force the Iraqis to rely on these methods more and more as the security situation deteriorates. We can't just pull out and leave the Iraqis to that kind of fate. We need to teach them better interrogatory techniques that will free this kind of information without whippings and worse tortures. If the Iraqi people fear torture from their government, that government will not last long under any circumstances.

Tough questions and no easy answers are what we can expect in the long journey to bring democracy and freedom to the Middle East.

The Arrogance Of Silence

This week, I wrote that our national character these days seems to demand that everyone assume that all tragedies belong to the entire country, and that we all have to participate in a mourning/healing cycle that imposes itself of the real victims of the tragedies. We saw this yet again with the Virginia Tech shootings, where the media invaded the campus for much longer than factual reporting required, to intrude on the community there and give a voyeuristic and vicarious account of the ral grief of the friends and family of the dead and wounded.

Now we have a suggestion that we extend this arrogance to the entire blogosphere by a group called One Day Blog Silence. They propose that all bloggers take Monday, April 30th off in honor of the victims at Virginia Tech:

Silence can say more than a thousand words. This day shall unite us all about this unbelievable painful & shocking event and show some respect and love to those who lost their loved ones. On April 30th 2007, the Blogosphere will hold a One-Day Blog Silence in honor of the victims at Virginia Tech. More then 30 died at the US college massacre. But it´s not only about them. Many bloggers have responded and asked about all the other victims of our world. All the people who die every day. What about them? This day can be a symbol of support to all the victims of our world!

I don't want to get too strident in my criticism, because I'm sure the organizers are well-meaning people who have gotten caught up in this sensationalized American mourning process, but silence makes no sense at all for either the V-Tech dead or "all the other victims of our world". This assumes that "victims" will get more support by taking a day off from the computer to do ... whatever anyone does when they're not blogging. Going to the park, taking in a movie, getting together with friends -- all of these are good for the blogger, but say nothing for "all the victims in our world".

How did the blogosphere get selected for silence, anyway? Why not the mainstream media? Why not universities, which would have been more appropriate, if still a poor idea? How about engineering web sites, or something that had any connection to the shootings -- instead of the rather arrogant connection to grief that some in the blogosphere and the media have claimed for the past week?

Want to make a difference? Speak out! Discuss the issues of the day, propose solutions, and work to get those solutions implemented. Don't offer empty, meaningless gestures like a day of keeping your mouth and your laptop shut. (via Michael van der Galien at TMV and Outside the Beltway)

Gore To Run For 2008 Nomination

Al Gore has insisted that he has no interest in returning to electoral politics and wants to focus on his media interests and on solutions to global warming. The former Vice President has shown no inclination to run against the wife of his former boss, at least not publicly. However, the London Telegraph reports that Gore has secretly begun to recruit a campaign staff and will challenge Hillary Clinton for the nomination:

Friends of Al Gore have secretly started assembling a campaign team in preparation for the former American vice-president to make a fresh bid for the White House.

Two members of Mr Gore's staff from his unsuccessful attempt in 2000 say they have been approached to see if they would be available to work with him again.

Mr Gore, President Bill Clinton's deputy, has said he wants to concentrate on publicising the need to combat climate change, a case made in his film, An Inconvenient Truth, which won him an Oscar this year.

But, aware that he may step into the wide open race for the White House, former strategists are sounding out a shadow team that could run his campaign at short notice. In approaching former campaign staff, including political strategists and communications officials, they are making clear they are not acting on formal instructions from Mr Gore, 59, but have not been asked to stop.

Gore has run in the top tier of Democratic candidates without having announced any intention to run. Thanks to the buzz from his Oscar-winning documentary, Gore has not needed to eat up resources for traditional campaigning. With a new book coming out this spring, Gore will have even more free media access, expanding his reach and making him seem even more presidential than ever.

After jumping into the race, though, Gore has to win it. He has proven himself rather wooden on the stump in past campaigns. He has improved during his global-warming tour, but that may not equate to the kind of speechmaking that a presidential campaign requires. It will also task his ability to project a warm and engaging personality, rather than the cold scold of 2000.

A Gore entry will probably prove fatal to the ambitions of Barack Obama and John Edwards. Both have run on Gore's turf so far, and neither will outshine him with party donors desperate to find a credible alternative to Hillary Clinton. Gore has a great deal more substance than both candidates put together and will almost immediately be the chief challenger on Hillary's left, once he formally enters the race.

Given that Hillary's negatives keep going higher, Gore could easily convince the Democrats that he has more electability than his ex-boss' wife. If so, that gives the Republicans an opening among the center.