"Realists" Have It Wrong

The incomparable Mark Steyn comments on the Middle East:

If the Western world decides in 2005 it can "contain" President Sy Kottik of Wackistan indefinitely, that doesn't mean the relationship between the two parties is set in aspic.

Wackistan has a higher birthrate than the West, so after 40 years of "stability," there are a lot more Wackistanis and a lot fewer Frenchmen. And Wackistan has immense oil reserves, and President Kottik has used that oil wealth to fund radical schools and mosques in hitherto moderate parts of the Muslim world.

Cheap air travel and the Internet and ATM machines that take every bank card on the planet and the freelancing of nuclear technology mean Wackistan's problems are no longer confined to Wackistan: For a few hundred bucks, they can be outside the Empire State Building within seven hours.

Nothing stands still. "Stability" is a fancy term to dignify laziness and complacency as sophistication.

Read the whole thing HERE.

The Iraqi People Have Spoken

The Iraqi people must be congratulated on their election. It takes courage and a dedication to something larger than oneself to decide to vote when voting could cost you your life.

Someone has suggested that Americans who support the Iraqis place ink on their forefinger, as the Iraqis did after voting. It’s a good idea; give the finger to terrorists. And it helps that in the US, terrorists are not likely to kill you for voting, although it may get you some hostile looks in the Blue States.

John Kerry was on Meet the Press this morning challenging the legitimacy of the election. If you are still in the dark about why he lost the election, read the transcript.

The election does not mark the end of the insurgency, it just underscores its illegitimacy, and the desire of the Iraqis to choose their own leaders and for the political freedom they have been denied all their lives.

For the naysayers who claim that the acts of terrorists make the election illegitimate, they have no grasp of history, for there is a precedent. About 150 years ago, the US had its very own Civil War. The nation was wracked by violence and literally hundreds of thousands died. There were elections; they were not postponed for the duration of the military emergency. And, of course, large parts of the country did not participate. You may be interested in the results: click HERE. Was this election illegitimate? Hmmmm?

Of course the New York Times does its best to throw cold water on the first free elections in an Arab country. “Much of the problem is that the elections are being held under the dominion of the United States.” Really? In what manner do we exert “dominion” over the Iraqi election? We (well, those who wish the Iraqis success) are certainly encouraging them to vote, but “dominion?” That implies that we are somehow controlling the election, and no one outside of the moonbats at the DemocraticUnderground (who believe it’s all a Karl Rove plot) thinks that.

More from the Times: “Many Iraqis, interviews in recent months have shown, do not accept that fundamental choices about the shape of their future political system should be made by a foreign power, particularly one they regard as a harbinger of secular, materialistic values far removed from the Muslim world's. “

Funny, I could have sworn that at other times it was claimed that Iraqis are the most secular Arabs in the world. That Osama hated Saddam because he was not a true believer. And now the Times is telling us that Iraqis are deeply religious, non-materialistic and have values far removed from ours. And what are those deeply Muslim, non-material values? The Times gives us no clue. Decide for yourself, read the rest of the article.

Kennedy's Expert.

In his speech just before the Iraqi elections, Ted Kennedy quotes an Army Reservist:“The guerillas are filling their losses faster than we can create them…. For every guerilla we kill with a smart bomb, we kill many more innocent civilians and create rage and anger in the Iraqi community. This rage and anger translates into more recruits for the terrorists and less support for us.”

Just who is Kennedy's expert on the Iraqis? The Answer may surpise you.

Click HERE.

Senator Kennedy Says It's Time to Exit - the Oldsmobile

On Iowahawk, the Senator from the kleptocracy that is Massachusetts, decides it's time to get out.

Like all Americans, I had high hopes for the future of the Oldsmobile and its passengers, as we struggle against the onrushing water and its poorly-designed shoulder belts. But as claustrophobia sets in we must begin to sober up and face the truth: hope is no longer an option.

It is time for us to recognize that our continued presence in this volatile region is a hinderance to the Oldsmobile and its people. Rather than helping the situation we are further weighing down the Oldsmobile, causing it to sink faster and faster into the quagmire of Chappaquidick Bay, creating a dangerous situation for both ourselves as well as its passengers who are desperately seeking an air pocket in which to start a better life.

That is why I believe we have reached the point where we must take a deep breath and immediately depart the Oldsmobile. We must seek through the watery darkness and release the belt latch of madness that has kept us here, and reach out for a sane and honorable window crank.

Read the rest HERE.

Iraqi Voting Disrupts News Reports of Bombings

Scappleface creates the definitive story of the MSM vs. the Iraqi people.

Hopes for a return to the stability of tyranny waned as rank upon rank of Iraqi men and women filed out of precinct stations, each armed with the distinctive mark of the new freedom guerrillas -- an ink-stained index finger, which one former Ba'athist called "the evidence of their betrayal of 50 years of Iraqi tradition."

Ha!

Liberals Go for Holocaust III

Fred Barnes writes in the Weekly Standard:

ON THE EVE of the election in Iraq, Democratic senator Edward Kennedy called President Bush's Iraq policy "a catastrophic failure." He demanded that American troops immediately begin to withdraw. "We have no choice," he declared, "but to make the best we can of the disaster we have created in Iraq." Kennedy said the retreat of American forces should be completed "as early as possible in 2006," and suggested that, in Iraq, American troops are a bigger problem than terrorists.

Kennedy invoked the ghost of Viet Nam and referred to Iraq as a quagmire. The first person to use the term “quagmire” to describe Viet Nam was Walter Cronkite, after turning against the war. The Peace Movement, John Kerry, Jane Fonda, Tom Hayden and the rest of the Left captured the old media – the one-way media - as the press turned against the US in Viet Nam and the rest is history.

Turn with me now to an article “Not Bombing Auschwitz a mistake”
co-authored by former Representative Steve Solarz, quoting former Senator and Presidential candidate George McGovern extensively.

Allied bomber pilots had Auschwitz in their gun sights yet were never given the order to attack.

George McGovern was one of those pilots. …

… Jewish organizations repeatedly asked the Roosevelt administration to order the bombing of Auschwitz and the railroad lines leading to the camp.

The U.S. War Department rejected the proposals as "impracticable," asserting that such raids would require "considerable diversion" …

The U.S. administration's "diversion" argument was just "a rationalization," McGovern said in the interview. How much of a "diversion" would it have been, when he and other U.S. bomber pilots were already flying over the area?...

"Franklin Roosevelt was a great man, and he was my political hero," said McGovern, "but I think he made two great mistakes in World War II: One was the internment of Japanese-Americans; (the other was) not to go after Auschwitz. ...

As George McGovern emphasized, the Auschwitz experience should produce "a determination that never again will we fail to exercise the full capacity of our strength in that direction ... we should have gone all out against Auschwitz, and we must never again permit genocide."

It need not be said that we won that war and the camps were finally liberated. But of course there have been other holocausts. The slogan "never again" has, until now, applied to the Jews, but no to other peoples.

What do Iraq, Viet Nam and the failure to bomb Auschwitz have in common? I’ll tell you , gentle reader:

The Left wants us to accept blood guilt for our failure to bomb Auschwitz.

The Left is proud of driving the US out of Viet Nam. The genocide that followed: the killing fields, the “re-education” camps, the boat people that followed are flushed down the memory hole. The success of the Left in Viet Nam and the millions that died as a result MUST NOT BE CONNECTED.

Let me say this as plainly as I can: the Kerrys, Kennedys, Fondas and Haydens; the Cronkites and their ilk in the MSM have blood on their hands. They knew what they were doing. They knew the holocaust that would follow, but they just did not care. And even after they saw what they had done, the still did not care. And because they held the keys to the printing presses and dominated the college campuses, the truth has never been told. The accusation has never been made, and they have never had to defend themselves.

They have built a legend of moral superiority around themselves, aided and abetted by their hangers on. Anti-war? Who in his right mind is for war? Bombing? Who in his right mind is for dropping bombs? But there are worse things than war. Genocide, when the guardians of the weak slink away is worse than war. And bombing death camps may be better than not bombing at all.

But since the Left has stolen the mantle of virtue, consigned the dead of Southeast Asia to oblivion, the Left wants to repeat the Viet Nam experience in Iraq.

And one of the leaders of this pack, Edward Kennedy, committed vehicular homicide by drowning his girlfriend in a moment of drunken driving. But an all seeing God may have intervened in the affairs of this world. Without that, this moral pustule may have become President. The world owes Mary Jo Kopechne a debt of gratitude.

I am grateful that a man with the moral sense of George Bush is president.

I pray for peace, but prepare for war because this time, the holocaust could happen, not just in the Middle East, but here.

The Communication Revolution - Redux.

Hugh Hewitt has another good article in the Weekly Standard on the revolution that is occurring in the dissemination of information and opinion, thanks to the internet and bloggers.

Same flight, but now the Atlantic. Jonathan Rauch:

"On balance it is probably healthier if religious conservatives are inside the political system than if they operate as insurgents and provocateurs on the outside. Better they should write anti-abortion planks into the Republican platform than bomb abortion clinics. The same is true of the left. The clashes over civil rights and Vietnam turned into street warfare partly because activists were locked out of their own party establishments and had to fight, literally, to be heard. When Michael Moore receives a hero's welcome at the Democratic National Convention, we moderates grumble; but if the parties engage fierce activists while marginalizing tame centrists, that is probably better for the social peace than the other way around."

The comparison of "the religious right" to Michael Moore is jarring enough, but the idea that the "religious right," however broadly or narrowly Rauch defines it is a lost platform fight away from becoming killers is quite simply astounding. And it might have gone unnoticed by that "religious right," except that I posted it at my blog, and reference it in this column, and now the new information network takes over.
Will some portion of that new network absorb the contempt and ignorance Rauch managed to get by his editors at one of the most respected journals in America? And will that change their political behavior? I think so.

On Tuesday I had Rauch on my program. He pleads hasty writing and objects that the focus I put on these sentences is unfair to the intent of his piece. I offered to post the entire article and any response he wants to make. He agreed that I was at least allowing him the chance to reply. I did not note to him that this is a courtesy the Atlantic did not extend to a religious conservative in its package of essays on the divide in America.
Five years ago--or even two--if a religious conservative had read the piece, and if he had written a letter, and if the Atlantic's editors had read it, perhaps they might have printed it three months later. In the new information age, Rauch is defending himself on a national show as scores of bloggers munch on his words.

THAT is the difference the internet has made possible.

It was less than five year ago that media communication was a one way street: from the MSM to the captive reader. O yes, there was the “letters” page, but letters were printed – and edited – at the whim and the fancy of the same people.

Today, when a Rauch equates Christians and bombers, the complaints are not limited to letters to his editor that fail to see the light of day. It is likely that more people will read his scurrilous slur and comment on his bigotry than will have read his original article in the Atlantic. That’s a remarkable change in the power equation.

Stop Bitching, Start a Revolution!

Evan Coyne Maloney gets the candid views of the protestors at the Bush inauguration.

Fascinating: click HERE

Sunnis and Shias, Who Can Keep Them Straight?

From TechCentralStation:

But Western media and governments are also handicapped in dealing with Iraq by a peculiar double standard regarding the very status of the Iraqi Arab Sunnis as a formerly-ruling, and oppressive, minority. Twenty years ago, nobody would have listened to the argument that dismantling of the apartheid regime in South Africa and the holding of elections there should be blocked out of fairness to the white minority in that country. Few today listen to those who declare that fair elections and the forging of a new political system in Northern Ireland should be delayed out of concern for the feelings of the Protestant minority.

The Iraqi Arab Sunnis are no different from the white South Africans. (I pointed out this parallel in an interview with Netherlands Radio on January 14 [see here]). The Arab Sunnis have exploited and degraded the Shia majority in Iraq for a long, long time, reserving the wealth of the country for themselves. But why is the rule applied to the white South Africans not equally appropriate in Iraq?

The only explanation seems to be that the causes of Black South Africa and of the Northern Irish Catholics were considered leftist, and were therefore identified with opposition to U.S. and other government policies, while the cause of the Iraqi Shias is "contaminated" by association with the Bush administration.

The BBC, Then and Now

Before the invasion, the BBC was convinced that Saddam had WMDs, and accused the American sof ignoring the threat. After the invasion, the BBC knew that Saddam never had WMDs, accusing the Americans of lying about them.

Read this from Highway99.

While I was trying to find out whether BBC reporter and presenter Jeremy Paxman had explicitly endorsed the idea that HIV is a manufactured virus (see previous post) -- apparently he did not -- I came across a new 2002 edition of his book, A Higher Form of Killing: The Secret Story of Chemical & Biological Warfare, with a newly written final chapter; and the final chapter said something which, in the context of the way the BBC has covered the Iraq war, is almost as startling.Most of that final chapter is a strong argument trying to convince the reader that Saddam Hussein kept his arsenal of chemical and biological weapons after the first Gulf War, and that, at the time of the writing and publication of the new edition in 2001 and 2002, Saddam had an active program of producing chemical and biological weapons. Indeed, the new chapter is one of the most powerfully persuasive pieces of writing in favor of the idea of taking action against Saddam Hussein that I've ever seen. If I didn't know better, I might have guessed that Tony Blair or Christopher Hitchens had written it.Doesn't exactly sound like the BBC's point of view these days, does it?So why the difference in Paxman/BBC attitude between 2002 and 2003? I'll offer a hypothesis on that puzzle in a minute. But first the relevant excerpt. It's a long one, so if your time is limited, you might want to skim through and read the sections I've put in bold, which I consider the most immediately relevant. Remember, this edition of the book came out in August of 2002:

Red Staters Not Stupid!

Mark Steyn in the Sun Times makes a great point about Red Staters failing to fall for the Left's (and the media's) spin:

The other day David von Drehle of the Washington Post did a monster tour of what he called "The Red Sea" -- Bush country -- and went to almost painful lengths to eschew the condescension the coastal media elite usually apply to their rare anthropological ventures into the hinterland. But in the middle of his dispatch was this quote from Joyce Smith of Coalgate, Okla.: "When Kerry said he was for abortion and one-sex marriages, I just couldn't see our country being led by someone like that."

Von Drehle added: ''Later, I double-checked what Kerry had said on those subjects. During his campaign, he opposed same-sex marriage and said that abortion was a private matter.''

If the point is that Red Staters are ignorant, double- or even triple-checking John Kerry isn't the best way to demonstrate it. Insofar as I understand it, Kerry's view on abortion was that, while he passionately believes life begins at conception, he would never let his deeply held personal beliefs interfere with his legislative program. On gay marriage, likewise. That's why gay groups backed Kerry and why von Drehle's media buddies weren't running editorials warning that a Kerry presidency would end "a woman's right to choose": They understood his deeply passionately personally deep personal passionate beliefs were just an artful but meaningless formulation designed to get him through election season. Message: If Kerry's elected, abortions will continue and gay marriage will happen and he'll be cool with both. Joyce Smith understood that. Von Drehle seems vaguely resentful that she wasn't dumb enough to fall for the spin cooked up by Kerry's hairsplitters and enthusiastically promoted by his media cheerleaders.

Read the whole thing.

A Conservative Answer to Michael Moore

Thanks to the NY Sun, we get a preview of Evan Coyne Maloney, who is making a documentary from a conservative slant. The Right's Micheal Moore? Could be, but only if he lies.

No Relief in Sight for the Lincoln

An officer on the USS Abraham Lincoln gives us shocking account of the "aid" workers that have descended on the Tsunami victims.

A must read. Click HERE

This just emplifies the point made by The Diplomad

Iraq, the Internet and the NY Times.

The Internet is buzzing with the story of the NY Times writer, Sarah Boxer, and her article Pro-American Iraqi Blog Provokes Intrigue and Vitriol.

It’s an article about an Iraqi blogger who has said some very nice things about the American removal of Saddam from power in Iraq. He, and his two brothers operated a blog site called Iraq the Model.

The problem is, Sarah Boxer goes to agonizing lengths to imply that the Iraqi, who she identifies by his real name, is a CIA agent. In Iraq today, that instantly makes his a target of assassination. As you can appreciate, the Blogosphere did not take kindly to Ms. Boxer’s effort to have her subject killed.. Several bloggers wrote about this HERE, HERE and HERE.

NZ Bear then proceeded to create an hilarious parody of Boxer’s article that is a must-read, especially if you disdain the NY Times.

Is the GOP Really the Governing Party?

Paul Gigot asks, in the Wall Street Journal:

I don't mean "governing" in the sense of merely making the Beltway trains run on time and surviving as a majority. The Republican test going forward, and one voters should hold them to, is whether the party can now put its permanent stamp on Washington in a way that is consistent with its professed conservative philosophy. More than just a challenge for Mr. Bush, the next two years will tell us if this GOP majority is made to last or will be as evanescent as the Whigs.

Read the whole thing HERE.

Do You Vote Against the Party That Thinks You're Stupid?

Via Power Line we get a thoughtful essay on the reason the Left lost the last election.

David Lebedoff is a Minneapolis attorney and long-time friend. David is also the author of my two favorite books on Minnesota politics, The Twenty-First Ballot: A Political Party Struggle in Minnesota and Ward Number 6. Most recently, he is the author of the widely reviewed and admired The Uncivil War: How a New Elite is Destroying Our Democracy, published this fall just before the election. David has now forwarded to us "IT'S CALLING PEOPLE STUPID, STUPID," in which he applies the thesis of The Uncivil War to the outcome of the election:

This is so simple. It's astonishing that they still don't get it. "They" is the people who write and fund the ads and run the campaigns and control the nominations of the Democratic party.

It's a relatiavely small group of people. Most Democrats are not allowed to participate in the workings of their party. Most Republicans, who in truth are remarkably like most Democrats, face the same exclusion--but that's another article. This one is about why Democrats keep on losing elections.

Voters may not be fully consulted on who the presidential contestants are, but they are absolutely free to choose between them. And they keep voting against the Democrat.

Read that again. They aren't voting for anyone as much as they are voting against the Democrat. They are voting against the Democrat in election after election, because they think that the Democrat thinks that they're stupid.

Read the whole thing, click HERE.

Pictorial Report from Iraq

Lance Frizzell is a 2nd Lieutenant and Medical Platoon Leader with the Tennessee National Guard 278th Regimental Combat Team, currently serving in Northern Iraq. He makes two important points about reports coming out of Iraq. :

A quick way to tell if someone is an honest broker in the debate over Iraq is use of the claim that we damaged the infrastructure of this nation, now or in the past. Throughout much of Iraq, Saddam never got around to building much of an infrastructure.

A second red flag should fly upon use of the words "occupation" and "imperialism." While thoughtful arguments have been made with those loaded terms, most usage falls into the category of what used to be called the radical left but now, sadly, falls squarely into the mainstream of the Democrat Party.

Thanks to the internet, the news is not entirely filtered by the MSM. Click HERE to see the pictures.

The Pilot, Warner and Marrs

The “ladies” who run the Virginian Pilot go weak in the knees over Governor Mark Warner. Well, that’s not quite right. You see they go weak in the knees about just about everyone in the governor’s fraternity .. er party. So I attribute today’s editorial page gush to hormones run amuck, like the girls in Tom Wolfe’s new book “I Am Charlotte Simmons.” Nothing else can explain why the editors today came out for less accountability in government; for the public’s right to not know.

Like freshmen girls discussing a good looking guy: “Oh my God, he’s so hot!” the editorial begins:

“Gov. Mark Warner should be commended for his prodigious, if not always popular, effort to restore the citizenship rights of men and women who have broken the law and paid the price.

Warner has restored to nearly 2,000 ex-felons the right to vote, hold public office, serve on a jury or act as a notary public. Not every person who does time goes to the trouble to get his rights back. But for those who do, the restoration signifies their willingness to play by the rules and to stay on the straight and narrow. “

But, there’s an “evil” member of the dorks club who doesn’t like our White Knight.

“Recently, Del. Brad P. Marrs, a Chesterfield Republican, filed a duplicitous [sic] court petition seeking to force Warner, a Democrat, to release thousands of pages of documents pertaining to the restorations.

[snip]

On the surface, the delegate’s argument had some merit: Why shouldn’t the public be allowed to know the reasons for reinstatement? Even with allowances for keeping some purely personal details private, the public would be served by knowing the basis for the governor’s decisions.

But is the public’s right to know, transparency in government and officeholders’ accountability not a good thing? Well, no, not if your motives are political, and if you are a Republican (or a dork … same thing).

“But Marrs’ true motivation for this battle seems to have come in comments to Virginian-Pilot staff writer John Hopkins. Saying the controversy could be an issue in the upcoming governor’s race between presumptive party nominees Jerry Kilgore and Timothy Kaine, Marrs notes: “If it helps to get Jerry Kilgore elected, then I would be pleased with that result.”

In other words, Marrs’ intent was to make political mischief, not to strengthen public access to government records. That’s the kind of cynicism that’s passed off these days in Richmond as governing and lawmaking.

[snip]

On this issue, Marrs’ partisanship is embarrassingly naked.“

Shocking; politicians having political thoughts. Surely not in Virginia!
Coming so close after the embarrassing spectacle of Dan Rather’s attempted “hit” on President Bush’s re-election campaign, you would think that news organizations would be more careful about blatant partisanship. But you would be wrong.

Hormones trump reason, and if you’re not careful, you get to walk that “walk of shame.” Of course that would not be new for the ladies of the Virginian Pilot. They know the way well.

The Constitution Is What Zimbabweans Say It Is.

John Hindraker at Powerline.blog takes issue with Justice Breyer in Does Zimbabwean Law Overrule the Constitution?

Several Liberal Supreme Court Justices including both Breyer and Ruth Bader Ginsberg have defended citing foreign legal decisions in making their judicial decisions.

Of course if you believe that the Constitution is an “evolving” document that may be changed by judges based on their perception of evolving community standards, what is to prevent you from applying not just evolving American community standards, but international community standards. And what standards are to be used? Well, in one case, the standards of the Zimbabwean court.

Iraq: We’re winning.

Lieutenant Colonel Tim Ryan - a Task Force (Battalion +) Commander in Iraq - who has some words about the Fourth Estate. From Blackfive.

What if domestic news outlets continually fed American readers headlines like: "Bloody Week on U.S. Highways: Some 700 Killed," or "More Than 900 Americans Die Weekly from Obesity-Related Diseases"? Both of these headlines might be true statistically, but do they really represent accurate pictures of the situations? What if you combined all of the negatives to be found in the state of Texas and used them as an indicator of the quality of life for all Texans? Imagine the headlines: "Anti-law Enforcement Elements Spread Robbery, Rape and Murder through Texas Cities." For all intents and purposes, this statement is true for any day of any year in any state. True -- yes, accurate -- yes, but in context with the greater good taking place -- no! After a year or two of headlines like these, more than a few folks back in Texas and the rest of the U.S. probably would be ready to jump off of a building and end it all. So, imagine being an American in Iraq right now.


As a recent example, the operation in Fallujah delivered an absolutely devastating blow to the insurgency. Though much smaller in scope, clearing Fallujah of insurgents arguably could equate to the Allies' breakout from the hedgerows in France during World War II. In both cases, our troops overcame a well-prepared and solidly entrenched enemy and began what could be the latter's last stand. In Fallujah, the enemy death toll has already exceeded 1,500 and still is climbing. Put one in the win column for the good guys, right? Wrong. As soon as there was nothing negative to report about Fallujah, the media shifted its focus to other parts of the country.

[snip]

What about the media's portrayal of the enemy? Why do these ruthless murderers, kidnappers and thieves get a pass when it comes to their actions? What did the media not show or tell us about Margaret Hassoon, the director of C.A.R.E. in Iraq and an Iraqi citizen, who was kidnapped, brutally tortured and left disemboweled in streets of Fallujah? Did anyone in the press show these images over and over to emphasize the moral failings of the enemy as they did with the soldiers at Abu Ghuraib? Did anyone show the world how this enemy had huge stockpiles of weapons in schools and mosques, or how he used these protected places as sanctuaries for planning and fighting in Fallujah and the rest of Iraq? Are people of the world getting the complete story? The answer again is no!