August 07, 2004
July 22, 2004
"I CONFESS:
I do not like Sandy Berger; and I have not liked him since the first time we met, long ago during the McGovern campaign, not because of his politics since I more or less shared them then, but for his hauteur. He clearly still has McGovernite politics, which means, in my mind, at least, that he believes there is no international dispute that can't be solved by the U.S. walking away from it."-- Martin Peretz.
PUT A FORK IN THE ANNIE JACOBSON
Northwest Airlines Flight 327 story. The 14 Syrian musicians played at the Sycuan Casino & Resort, near San Diego July 1st. The story was broken by a Stanford U. radio station "news director" and his research director. A simple Google search and a phone call produced a story that all of the major magazines, newspapers and cable channels couldn't produce. It turns out the headliner for the band is the the Syrian Wayne Newton.I'm not surprised that the NY Times, the LA Times and the Dept of Homeland Security couldn't crack this story -- but what about KFI's radio news team? Or the blogosphere?
July 21, 2004
July 16, 2004
July 13, 2004
July 09, 2004
Dick Riordan gets PC bit.
In our neighborhood the community Mr. Loraw was the garbage man. We loved him too.
July 07, 2004
"Government To Close In Honor Of Reagan."
"Alas, the Federal Government was merely taking a day off. But somewhere up there Ronald Reagan is enjoying the joke."-- Mark Steyn.
July 02, 2004
The Courage of Cosby.
Courage, character, guts. Anyone who's read Shelby Steele's A Dream Deferred : The Second Betrayal of Black Freedom in America will understand the significance of Cosby's actions here.And note well: the AP equates black trash with "the black community". That must be the most racist implicit bigotry I've ever come across in a news story.
June 30, 2004
"Because he could."
Isn't this the punch line to a joke about a dog, not the considered moral reflections of a President?I guess the joke would work just as well for the case of a man with no backbone ...
June 29, 2004
Horowitz on the Democrat Party.
"What is disturbingly new in this political season is not that there exists a large radical culture that has learned nothing from the fall Communism and that identifies Americans as agents of evil and George Bush as their Fuehrer-in-Chief. What is new is that they are joined in this electoral campaign by the Democratic Party establishment .. ". MORE "Where Have All The Democrats Gone?" by David Horowitz.
June 27, 2004
June 25, 2004
IF only Rudy Giuliani had been special prosecutor ..
"Had [Ken Starr] been the vindictive sort, the latter could have trapped Clinton in a lie before the federal grand jury investigating Whitewater .. Starr's team eventually learned from the FBI lab that the stain on Lewinsky's dress was in fact semen .. as Schmidt and Weisskopf wrote, "prosecutors could have waited until after the (Clinton's) testimony to ask for a blood sample, keeping him in the dark. Then, if he stuck to his denial of a sexual relationship with Lewinsky, Starr would have an open-and-shut case of perjury." Rather than trap him in a lie, Starr chose to throw "Clinton a lifeline" and ordered a blood test of then President Clinton. In asking for the test, Starr team-member Bob Bittman "tacitly confirmed DNA had been found on the dress," a truthful admission that saved Clinton from making false ones .. ". MORE "Ken Starr Saved Bill Clinton from Himself".
June 23, 2004
Who is Douglas MacEachin?
"As it happens, the staff member who reported to 9/11 Commission members yesterday that there was no �collaborative relationship� between Iraq and Al Qaeda was none other than Douglas MacEachin � a man who once held senior positions at the CIA, including posts with the Office of Soviet Analysis from 1984-1989, the Arms Control Intelligence Staff for the next few years, and the job of Deputy Director for Intelligence from 1992 until 1995. In these capacities, MacEachin appeared to colleagues to get things wrong with some regularity. For example, he was reflexively averse to conclusions that the Soviets were responsible for supporting terrorism. He reportedly rejected as �absurd� analyses that suggested Moscow was illegally developing bioweapons. And, as DDI, he forced CIA analysts to tailor their assessments to please Clinton administration policy-makers. MORE "The 9/11 Commission Fails to Connect the Terror Dots" by Frank J. Gaffney Jr.
June 16, 2004
June 14, 2004
Reagan's Commencement Address -- Eureka College 1957.
This is rather revealing. A serious man seriously interested in the fate of liberty, America and -- tied up in all that -- Eureka College.
June 13, 2004
Your professors where the stupid ones.
"Ronald Reagan was always dismissed by the academic left and its legion of pundits and public mouthpieces because they deemed him simple, ideological, not sufficiently in tune with the complexities of contemporary politics. As usual, the academic left had it wrong: Reagan was never simple, nor an ideologue in the sense in which the left uses that term - meaning by it someone who invents and simplifies ideas to serve ulterior motives. He was, instead, a skilled communicator of complicated ideas in terms that nearly everyone who paid attention could understand .. To appreciate why the sophisticated class got Reagan so wrong, one needs to understand the intellectual framework within which most of these folks operate. Any claim to know something about ethics, political principles or comparative government is deemed by these people to be too judgmental, Eurocentric and otherwise fraught with hubris - the only exception being all of their own pronouncements, which are, of course, gems of human wisdom as they see it. To think that one's society has it over another in, say, its legal constitution, its public priorities and its institutions is to be nothing but blindly boastful, and never correct based on evidence and argument. So someone who unabashedly proclaims the opposite isn't merely in disagreement with others but must be a simpleton, intellectually defective. That way no one needs to argue with such a person and those who dismiss him can proclaim victory by sheer default. Ronald Reagan was never fooled by such sophistry and knew his purpose well enough to pay very little attention to these essentially ad-hominem attacks. He was all the wiser for this, and his detractors found that nearly intolerable, retaining a disdain for and opposition to him to this day .. ". More TIBOR MACHAN -- A great friend of liberty is lost. UPDATE: Steyn on Reagan & the Professors raises the question, What is an Intelligent" person anyway?
Great stuff -- Chris Matthews' commencement address.
"I've come here today with five bits of advice on how to get where you want to get, follow your dreams, keep your values and make good on the best hunch you ever had about yourself. William Butler Yeats once said "Education is not the filling of a pail but the lighting of a fire." I'm here to light your fire.Rule One: Get yourself in the game. Ever watch a little kid standing along courtside while the big kids play basketball? When a ball goes out of bounds, he or she runs for it and passes it back in. As time goes on, when an older kid has to get home for dinner, somebody yells "Hey! Wanna play?" That's it, the heart of it really: the first rule of building a life and a career. Whatever your ambitions, whatever the field you want to enter, if you want to play a game go to where it's played. If you want to be a lawyer, go to law school. If you can't get into the best law school, get into the best one you can. Same with medical or business school or whatever. If you want to get into TV, get yourself a job, any job in the business. The important thing is to get your seat at the table. Newspapers, same deal. Name your dream; there's a place people are pursuing it. Three things happen when you get in the door: You learn how the game is played but also how the players act with each other. You learn the game's manner, its cadence, its culture. Second, you meet people. Let's face it, it's not who you know, it's who you get to know. Third, and this is the big one, you're there when the lightning strikes! ..
Rule Two: If you want something, ask for it! Some people aren't going to like the cut of your jib. But those who do will change your life. They will open doors for you. If nine people will say "No" to you, then ask ten. It's like dating. But just as it takes only one strike to transform a prospector into a gold miner, it only takes one "Yes" to turn a proposal into a marriage. There is magic that results when a person invests in you. He becomes a big-time investor in your success, a stockholder in your dreams. Because, when you ask someone for help, you are implicitly asking him to place a bet on you. The more people you get to bet on you, the larger your network of investors and the shorter the odds. This isn't Pollyanna I'm talking. It comes from the smartest man who ever wrote about politics, or human nature for that matter, Niccol� Machiavelli. "Men are by nature as much bound by the benefits they confer as by those they receive." "If you want to make a friend," said Benjamin Franklin, a fellow who grows wiser the older I get, "let someone do you a favor." Know that and you know an awful lot about life. How did I get to be a Presidential speechwriter? First I got a no-big-deal job at the White House. I got the tip on that from someone I worked with in the Senate, an ex-girlfriend actually. As for the speechwriting job? I had met a guy while working in a Congressional campaign in Brooklyn. We've been friends ever since. He introduced me to a Presidential speechwriter. When that fellow moved up to chief speechwriter, he put me up for his job. There's a false assumption out there that talent will surely be recognized. Just get good at something and the world will beat a path to your door. Don't believe it. The world is not checking in with us to see what skills we've picked up, what idea we've concocted, what dreams we carry in our hearts. When a job opens up, whether it's in the chorus line or on the assembly line, it goes to the person standing there. It goes to the eager beaver the boss sees when he looks up from his work: the pint-sized kid standing at the basketball court in the playground waiting for one of the older boys to head home for supper. "Hey, kid, wanna play?" That's life .. ". MORE -- Chris Matthews 2004 Commencement Address -- Hobart and William Smith Colleges.
Reagan got it.
"The Nazis never had the means to destroy the United States, and Arab radicals don't today; the Soviets did. In Reagan's War, Peter Schweizer describes a fascinating incident during the all-out Soviet war games of the early 1980s. The Russians (just for the hell of it) blipped the orbiting Challenger space shuttle with a high-power laser. Only minor damage resulted, but the message was clear. We are feeling our oats, and we have you in our sights. We can hit where and when we please .. ". MORE - "What Ronald Reagan Understood".
June 12, 2004
A Ronald Reagan Flag.
My 2 year old loves to say "Ronald Reagan", a name she picked up over the week listening with me to the news. The kids and I were walking into McDonald's today, with a giant American flag standing out in front at half mast. I thought I'd entertain her by using the name "Ronald Reagan". Now, my daughter is a big fan of flags, so I said, "Do you see that flag? The flag is half way down today for Ronald Reagan." She looked up at me and simply asked "Why?". Maybe it was the way she said it. For a second or two I lost it. I was sad, I was thankful, I thought of death, love and many things. And I answered as best I could "Because Ronald Reagan is a good man" I said.Later tonight, as my wife and I were watching the burial ceremony with the little ones, my daughter pointed at the screen and said, "Look daddy, it's a Ronald Reagan flag."
"Yes, it is," I replied.
June 11, 2004
Thatcher on Reagan -- Transcript 6/11/04.
"We have lost a great president, a great American, and a great man. And I have lost a dear friend. "In his lifetime Ronald Reagan was such a cheerful and invigorating presence that it was easy to forget what daunting historic tasks he set himself. He sought to mend America's wounded spirit, to restore the strength of the free world, and to free the slaves of communism. "These were causes hard to accomplish and heavy with risk. "Yet they were pursued with almost a lightness of spirit. For Ronald Reagan also embodied another great cause - what Arnold Bennett once called 'the great cause of cheering us all up'. "His politics had a freshness and optimism that won converts from every class and every nation - and ultimately from the very heart of the evil empire. "Yet his humour often had a purpose beyond humour. In the terrible hours after the attempt on his life, his easy jokes gave reassurance to an anxious world. "They were evidence that in the aftermath of terror and in the midst of hysteria, one great heart at least remained sane and jocular. They were truly grace under pressure. "And perhaps they signified grace of a deeper kind. Ronnie himself certainly believed that he had been given back his life for a purpose. "As he told a priest after his recovery 'Whatever time I've got left now belongs to the Big Fella Upstairs'. "And surely it is hard to deny that Ronald Reagan's life was providential, when we look at what he achieved in the eight years that followed. "Others prophesied the decline of the West; he inspired America and its allies with renewed faith in their mission of freedom. "Others saw only limits to growth; he transformed a stagnant economy into an engine of opportunity. "Others hoped, at best, for an uneasy cohabitation with the Soviet Union; he won the Cold War - not only without firing a shot, but also by inviting enemies out of their fortress and turning them into friends. "I cannot imagine how any diplomat, or any dramatist, could improve on his words to Mikhail Gorbachev at the Geneva summit: 'Let me tell you why it is we distrust you.' Those words are candid and tough and they cannot have been easy to hear. But they are also a clear invitation to a new beginning and a new relationship that would be rooted in trust. "We live today in the world that Ronald Reagan began to reshape with those words. It is a very different world with different challenges and new dangers. All in all, however, it is one of greater freedom and prosperity, one more hopeful than the world he inherited on becoming president. "As prime minister, I worked closely with Ronald Reagan for eight of the most important years of all our lives. We talked regularly both before and after his presidency. And I have had time and cause to reflect on what made him a great president. "Ronald Reagan knew his own mind. He had firm principles - and, I believe, right ones. He expounded them clearly, he acted upon them decisively. "When the world threw problems at the White House, he was not baffled, or disorientated, or overwhelmed. He knew almost instinctively what to do. "When his aides were preparing option papers for his decision, they were able to cut out entire rafts of proposals that they knew 'the Old Man' would never wear. "When his allies came under Soviet or domestic pressure, they could look confidently to Washington for firm leadership. "And when his enemies tested American resolve, they soon discovered that his resolve was firm and unyielding. "Yet his ideas, though clear, were never simplistic. He saw the many sides of truth. "Yes, he warned that the Soviet Union had an insatiable drive for military power and territorial expansion; but he also sensed it was being eaten away by systemic failures impossible to reform. "Yes, he did not shrink from denouncing Moscow's 'evil empire'. But he realised that a man of goodwill might nonetheless emerge from within its dark corridors. "So the President resisted Soviet expansion and pressed down on Soviet weakness at every point until the day came when communism began to collapse beneath the combined weight of these pressures and its own failures. "And when a man of goodwill did emerge from the ruins, President Reagan stepped forward to shake his hand and to offer sincere cooperation. "Nothing was more typical of Ronald Reagan than that large-hearted magnanimity - and nothing was more American. "Therein lies perhaps the final explanation of his achievements. "Ronald Reagan carried the American people with him in his great endeavours because there was perfect sympathy between them. He and they loved America and what it stands for - freedom and opportunity for ordinary people. "As an actor in Hollywood's golden age, he helped to make the American dream live for millions all over the globe. His own life was a fulfilment of that dream. "He never succumbed to the embarrassment some people feel about an honest expression of love of country. "He was able to say 'God Bless America' with equal fervour in public and in private. And so he was able to call confidently upon his fellow-countrymen to make sacrifices for America - and to make sacrifices for those who looked to America for hope and rescue. "With the lever of American patriotism, he lifted up the world. "And so today the world - in Prague, in Budapest, in Warsaw, in Sofia, in Bucharest, in Kiev and in Moscow itself - the world mourns the passing of the Great Liberator and echoes his prayer 'God Bless America'. Twilight "Ronald Reagan's life was rich not only in public achievement, but also in private happiness. "Indeed, his public achievements were rooted in his private happiness. The great turning point of his life was his meeting and marriage with Nancy. "On that we have the plain testimony of a loving and grateful husband: 'Nancy came along and saved my soul.' We share her grief today. But we also share her pride - and the grief and pride of Ronnie's children. "For the final years of his life, Ronnie's mind was clouded by illness. That cloud has now lifted. "He is himself again - more himself than at any time on this earth. For we may be sure that the Big Fella Upstairs never forgets those who remember Him. "And as the last journey of this faithful pilgrim took him beyond the sunset, and as heaven's morning broke, I like to think - in the words of Bunyan - that 'all the trumpets sounded on the other side'. "We here still move in twilight. But we have one beacon to guide us that Ronald Reagan never had. "We have his example. Let us give thanks today for a life that achieved so much for all of God's children."link.
Don Feder.
"In coverage of Ronald Reagan�s passing, a network anchorman noted that the ex-president "gave conservatism a human face." As opposed to what -- the Frankenstein mask it usually wears? Now, try to imagine a newscaster speaking of someone who "gave liberalism a human face." .. ". MORE "It's a Vast Right-Wing (Literary) Conspiracy!".
Reagan vs. the Left -- the war goes on.
"Next to Abraham Lincoln, Ronald Reagan was perhaps the most divisive president in the nation's history. Lincoln ended a way of life for the American South. Reagan said that he was ending a way of life for [the] American [Left] .. On hearing the Reagan inaugural in January 1981 -- a radical's blunt challenge to establishment Washington orthodoxy -- the [left] mounted a counteroffensive. To any who were there, the first Reagan term was bloody .. The air burned with political antipathy. I recall in 1985 attending a confirmation hearing .. for Edwin Meese to be attorney general. The confirmation was a long ordeal whose details are forgotten. But on this day Sen. Joe Biden ended a long, dramatic denunciation of Mr. Meese by intoning, twice, that the nominee was "beneath contempt." There was a sound in the silent room. It was Mr. Meese's wife seated behind him, sobbing violently .. ". MORE "Ronald Reagan Started a War That Rages Today".
LECH WALESA.
"When talking about Ronald Reagan, I have to be personal. We in Poland took him so personally. Why? Because we owe him our liberty. This can't be said often enough by people who lived under oppression for half a century, until communism fell in 1989 .. ". More LECH WALESA.
June 10, 2004
June 09, 2004
The return of 1970's style inflation doublespeak.
Here is Alan Greenspan's latest statement on inflation.In the alternative universe of "Greanspanian Economics" inflation isn't always and everywhere a monetary phenomenon, no, it's a product of what Greenspan calls "pricing power". Well, whatever. The important thing is that Greenspan & Co. finally recognized that something has to be done to put the kabosh on ever accelerating Fed-generated inflation. Quotable:
"Lastly, let me emphasize that recent financial indicators, including rapid growth of the money supply, underscore that the FOMC has provided ample liquidity to the financial system that will become increasingly unnecessary over time. The Committee is of the view, as you know, that monetary policy accommodation can be removed at a pace that is likely to be measured. That conclusion is based on our current best judgment of how economic and financial forces will evolve in the months and quarters ahead. Should that judgment prove misplaced, however, the FOMC is prepared to do what is required to fulfill our obligations to achieve the maintenance of price stability so as to ensure maximum sustainable economic growth."
Here is how the Finanicial Times covered the story.
June 08, 2004
Remembering Reagan -- Reagan reads Hayek.
"That Reagan was indeed an "idea guy" is for sure. One time John Hospers, the first LP candidate for president and USC philosophy prof. was on a radio talk show in Cal. and a call came in from the governors mansion; it was Reagan jumping into the conversation. In 1976 when he was trying to wrest the GOP nomination from Ford he came to Colorado to give a speech in Ft. Collins. I drove up from Denver to hear him and after the speech when he and Nancy got to me in the receiving line, they found a wide eyed kid who was jazzed that he cited The Road to Serfdom by Hayek in his talk. He told me he also really liked Hayek's The Constitution of Liberty. This, of course, put me in orbit.I then mentioned that I enjoyed the points he made in an interview with Reason ( July 1975.) (it was in this interview where he made the, "If you analyze it I believe the very heart and soul of conservatism is libertarianism" quote.) I remember he then said, I swear, "Well, I'll have to look at that again". (remember when the "Well" was the stock in trade of a Reagan imitation?) As I shook their hands in an enthusiastic "fare well", Nancy assured me that; "Ronnie loves that little magazine" .. ". Rick Barton in the comments section -- Hit & Run: Ronald Reagan, RIP.
Here's a picture of Reagan & Hayek together in Reagan's White House office.
Jesse Walker.
"On his death, let's do both him and history a favor, and start talking about the real Reagan as opposed to the Reagan of our nightmares and fantasies .. ". MORE "The Search for the Historical Reagan".
Wall-to-wall Reagan.
There's lots of Reagan stuff at the LA Times, National Review, the CATO Institute, and the Heritage Foundation.
June 07, 2004
The book that changed Ronald Reagan's life.
"Paul Kengor [God and Ronald Reagan: A Spiritual Life] .. outlines three crucial books that shaped Reagan's faith throughout the course of his life: the Bible, which Reagan believed was divinely inspired; Whitaker Chambers' Witness; and Harold Bell Wright's That Printer of Udell's. After reading That Printer of Udell's, a story about a young boy who became a Christian and pursued a life in politics, Reagan, at the tender age of 11, told his mother, "I want to be like that man. I want to be baptized." Soon after, he was baptized in the Disciples of Christ, of which Reagan was a lifelong member." -- Loredana Vuoto .Ronald Reagan and I were raised and baptized in the same church. The history of the Disciples of Christ can be found here and here.
There's also another new book on Reagan's religion and faith -- Hand Of Providence: The Strong and Quiet Faith of Ronald Reagan by Mary Beth Brown.
And here is the web page on Ronald Reagan and his family produced by Reagan's church in Dixon, Illinois.
UPDATE: Here's a cartoon Reagan would have liked.
Textbook Reagan.
"The change of one word -- from Strategic Arms Limitation Talks to Strategic Arms Reduction Talks -- displayed Reagan's refusal to accept the Cold War as he found it and instead make a difference .. ". MORE "Reagan's gifts to Americans".
Patti Davis on her father.
This is remarkable stuff -- "A Daughter's Remembrances":Eventually, I grew beyond the girl who wanted more from her father than he was able to give. I began to focus on the gifts he gave me. He taught me to talk to God, to read the stars, respect the cycles of nature. I am a strong swimmer and a decent horsewoman because of him. I plucked from the years the shiniest memories, strung them together. It's what you do with someone who is always a bit out of reach. You content yourself with moments; you gather them, treasure them. They are the gemstones of the years you shared ..I don't know whether the loss is easier or harder if a parent is famous; maybe it's neither. My father belonged to the country. I resented the country at times for its demands on him, its ownership of him. America was the important child in the family, the one who got the most attention. It's strange, but now I find comfort in sharing him with an entire nation. There is some solace in knowing that others were also mystified by him; his elusiveness was endearing, but puzzling. He left all of us with the same question: who was he? People ask me to unravel him for them, as if I have secrets I haven't shared. But I have none, nothing that you don't already know. He was a man guided by internal faith. He knew our time on this earth is brief, yet he cared deeply about making his time here count. He was comfortable in his own skin. A disarmingly sunny man, he remained partially in shadow; no one ever saw all of him. It took me nearly four decades to allow my father his shadows, his reserve, to sit silently with him and not clamor for something more.
I have learned, over time, that the people who leave us a little bit hungry are the people we remember most vividly. When they are alive, we reach for them; when they die, some part of us follows after them. My father believed in cycles�the wheel of birth, and life, and death, constantly turning. My hand was tiny when he held it in his and led me to a blackened field weeks after a fire had burned part of our ranch. He showed me green shoots peeking out of the ashes. New life. I let go of his hand for too long, pushed it away, before finally grasping it again, trusting that even in his dying, I would find new life.
Noonan on Reagan.
"After the war, Ronald Reagan went on the local speaking circuit, talking of the needs of veterans and lauding the leadership of FDR and Truman. Once a woman wrote to him and noted that while he had movingly denounced Nazism, there was another terrible "ism," communism, and he ought to mention that, too. In his next speech, to industry people and others, he said that if communism ever proved itself the threat to decency that Nazism was, he'd denounce it, too. Normally he got applause in this part of the speech. Now he was met by silence. In that silence he built his future, becoming a man who'd change the world. The long education began. He studied communism, read Marx, read the Founders and the conservative philosophers from Burke to Burnham. He began to tug right. The Democratic Party and his industry continued to turn left. There was a parting. A word on his intellectual reflexes. Ronald Reagan was not a cynic--he did not assume the worst about people. But he was a skeptic; he knew who we are. He did not think that people with great degrees or great success were necessarily smart, for instance. He had no interest in credentialism. He once told me an economist was a fellow with a Phi Beta Kappa key on one end of his chain and no watch on the other. That's why they never know what time it is. He didn't say this with asperity, but with mirth. He did not dislike intellectuals--his heroes often were intellectuals, from the Founders straight through Milton Friedman and Hayek and Solzhenitsyn. But he did not favor the intellectuals of his own day, because he thought they were in general thick-headed. He thought that many of the 20th century's intellectuals were high-IQ dimwits .. ". More NOONAN ON REAGAN.
Reagan & the Boy from Troy.
"As a third grader I sent President Reagan all I had left of my allowance one week--a quarter--because I wanted to see him re-elected. A few weeks later, I got a note from the President, with a shiny new quarter in the envelope." Boi from Troy has a long compilation of blogosphere reactions here.
June 06, 2004
Steyn on Ronald Reagan, dead at 93.
"�The Great Communicator� was effective because what he was communicating was self-evident to all but our dessicated elites: �We are a nation that has a government - not the other way around.� And at the end of a grim, grey decade - Vietnam, Watergate, energy crises, Iranian hostages � Americans decided they wanted a President who looked like the nation, not like its failed government. Thanks to his clarity, around the world, governments that had nations have been replaced by nations that have governments. Most of the Warsaw Pact countries are now members of Nato, with free markets and freely elected parliaments."One man who understood was Yakob Ravin, a Ukrainian �migr� who in the summer of 1997 happened to be strolling with his grandson in Armand Hammer Park near Reagan�s California home. They happened to see the former President, out taking a walk. Mr Ravin went over and asked if he could take a picture of the boy and the President. When they got back home to Ohio, it appeared in the local newspaper, The Toledo Blade. Ronald Reagan was three years into the decade-long twilight of his illness, and unable to recognize most of his colleagues from the Washington days. But Mr Ravin wanted to express his appreciation. �Mr President,� he said, �thank you for everything you did for the Jewish people, for Soviet people, to destroy the Communist empire.�
And somewhere deep within there was a flicker of recognition. �Yes,� said the old man, �that is my job.�
Yes, that was his job.
June 04, 2004
Thomas Sowell.
"Whether you are for or against [partial birth abortion], you ought to know what you are for or against. But there are newspapers, TV programs, and whole networks that you could watch for years without ever finding out .. The partial birth abortion issue is just one of those issues in which major parts of the media filter out facts that might lead you to take a position different from the one the journalists have. MORE Thomas Sowell.
June 02, 2004
May 23, 2004
Libya had N Korean Uranium.
Libya wasn't building centrifuges capable of enriching weapons grade uranium for no reason. Quotable: "International inspectors have discovered evidence that North Korea secretly provided Libya with nearly two tons of uranium in early 2001 .. The classified evidence .. has touched off a race among the world's intelligence services to explore whether North Korea has made similar clandestine sales to other nations or perhaps even to terror groups seeking atomic weapons .. ". MORE "Evidence Is Cited Linking Koreans to Libya Uranium".
May 21, 2004
Another Army Sargent charges coverup at Abu Ghraib.
Abu Ghraib computer network manager Sgt. Samuel Provancel speaks out.
Charles Krauthammer.
"Americans have every right to shop for groceries in vehicles built for hunting elephants, but then they should stop whining about the inevitable oil price crunch that follows. Especially when they drive their SUVs to environmental rallies to prohibit drilling in the largest untapped oilfield in North America because of an exquisite sensitivity for the mating habits of Arctic caribou ..". More CHARLES KRAUTHAMMER.
May 20, 2004
This is sick.
Where do these people come from? An Abu Ghraib photo that is truly disturbing. Does the Army still give hard time for truly heinous crimes? Ugly, ugly stuff.
March 17, 2004
America vs. the world.
And the winner is .. Quotable: "The 1992 Clinton-Gore campaign book, "Putting People First," somehow imagined that "Japan and Germany "threaten to surpass America in manufacturing by 1996." .. ". more ALAN REYNOLDS.
February 05, 2004
August 24, 2003
June 24, 2003
John McWhorter on the Michigan rulings:
This is the worst day in civil rights history since the Bakke case in 1978. First of all, black students do not like being used as pawns of diversity and class. You hear this from black students again and again, that it's a burden to be sought for your views on race in classrooms. I've heard this so often when I've given talks that it gets almost monotonous -- it's a standard opinion. I felt that way, too, when I was a kid. Second, poll after poll of African-Americans, when you ask them, "Do you agree with admitting black students to higher institutions with lowered standards?" they say no, overwhelmingly.So what we've now seen is that the highest court in the land has ratified a policy that black people do not approve of, especially when really apprised of what makes up that policy. Instead, what we've got is the idea that it's OK to take race into account. Of course, many people think that in saying that, you're adding a little bit of nuance, and it's assumed people will follow that with a certain kind of forbearance. But since 1978 we've seen what actually happens: It gives the leeway to admit black people under the bar, even those who've suffered no particular disadvantage in their lives -- which is the case with most people admitted to higher institutions. Indeed, now it's been said that there can't be quotas, but frankly, that was already old news. The general idea that you can take race into account means that all of these [institutions] can continue admitting black students with lower standards. And they will.
So the status quo will continue: Good, smart white people deeply assuming that it's not cool to submit any brown-skinned person, regardless of ability or achievement, to the [high] standards they would submit their own kids to. That's tragic. Not to mention that the people who are mistakenly in favor of this policy are now going to have in their pocket the fact that the Supreme Court has ratified it.
For about 10 years the quota idea has been out of fashion. What the issue has required is finer minds, more judgment, more reflection and a broader view. This is the whole notion of diversity. Diversity is a cute way of saying, "Shall we submit black students to lowered standards?" And now it's, "OK, now you can't have a quota," but that doesn't mean the practice won't continue. Nobody who's seen that practice up close -- and I have spent a lifetime in higher education -- should consider this a good thing. Many of the people making the decisions about this have not seen how it operates close up. It's a hideous policy.
I'm saddened by this ruling, and I'm surprised that what we would regard as nine of the most sophisticated legal thinkers in the land could not come out in a majority against a policy that is so full of holes, so unjust, so condescending.
Yes, it is condescending, but it gives white folks a warm feeling and a racial get out of jail free card. And of course, it gives jobs, power, and money to those in the race industry.
June 20, 2003
Nearly all of the missing uranium at the Tuwaitha site in Iraq has been recovered, IAEA officials are quoted as saying in Science. More good news. Very good news.
UPDATE: A more complete story can be found here. (Via Instapundit)
June 10, 2003
BusinessWeek also has a story on "The Spam Crisis".
June 09, 2003
A drumbeat of stories on the battle to send bigger "tax credit" checks to those who don't pay taxes. David Warsh calls this playing it "straight down the middle" and "a shining example of what good newspapers are supposed to do". Certainly many at the NY Times do see their role as social advocates -- and the news is a vehicle for moving the agenda of the country. And it works.
June 02, 2003
Memo to Gray Davis -- Washington State does it with cuts and freezes and no tax increases.
It's an amazing world. Yesterday I ran into a young warrior already returned from combat in Baghdad. A few weeks ago he was exchanging gunfire with the enemy. Now he has a new apartment in Orange County, CA and he was out getting himself a vacuum to keep it clean. In the short time we spoke he didn't have much to say about the war. He did say he'd traveled and fought with several of the embedded reporters, Ollie North among others. Ollie, he says, tended to hang out with the high ranking officers rather than with the young enlisted men.
May 30, 2003
My first thought on Wolfowitz .. well spoken by Power Line
Paul Wolfowitz has no goddam business giving interviews to Vanity Fair or similar magazines. Just because liberals are now listing him as an influential "neoconservative" is no reason for Wolfowitz to go Hollywood. And no matter how much he may claim to have been misquoted, it is simply inexcusable for him to have said anything that could be translated as: "bureaucratic reasons" caused the administration to use weapons of mass destruction as the justification for attacking Iraq. We need minor functionaries like Wolfowitz to shut the hell up and do their jobs, not set out to become celebrities like David Stockman. In other words, if Vanity Fair calls for an interview, just say no.
Tanenhaus has mischaracterized Wolfowitz's remarks .. Vanity Fair's publicists have mischaracterized Tanenhaus's mischaracterization, and .. Bush administration critics are now indulging in an orgy of righteous indignation that is dishonest in triplicate.
I watched Tanenhaus flat-out lie about about what Wolfowitz said on Fox News. The lie was too good not to "print" and sell. When good men and women have died in war, my stomach gets queezy at the sight of a reporter behaving like a dumpster rat.
May 28, 2003
Rich Tucker explains why you don't have to be an economist to know that the Fed Gov's 20 billion dollar bailout of the states is a bad idea.
May 27, 2003
Some sensible thoughts on bringing peace and liberalism to Iraq from America's Sec. of War, er, Defense. Among his points are these two important ones: "� Property claims. Mechanisms will be established to adjudicate property claims peacefully. � Favor market economy. Decisions will favor market systems, not Stalinist command systems, and activities that will begin to diversify the Iraqi economy beyond oil. The Coalition will encourage moves to privatize state-owned enterprises." And a little heads-up for the French and Germans "� Contracts--promoting Iraq's recovery. Whenever possible, contracts for work in Iraq will go to those who will use Iraqi workers and to countries that supported the Iraqi people's liberation."
May 24, 2003
Remind me again why it's a good thing that the U.S. takes my money at gunpoint and sends it to the UN?
United Nations officials looked the other way as Saddam Hussein's regime skimmed $2 billion to $3 billion in bribes and kickbacks from the U.N. Oil-for-Food Program, said U.N. officials who told ABCNEWS they were powerless to stop the massive graft. An international investigation conducted by ABCNEWS found widespread corruption in the U.N. program, which helped Saddam build his fortune in U.S. currency. "Everybody knew it, and those who were in a position to do something about it, were not doing anything," said Benon Sevan, the executive director of the Office of Iraq Program.
May 22, 2003
Somehow I missed Hugh Hewitt's trashing of the Leftist only editorial policy of the news division of the LA Times.
It's a blogger vs. peacenik google battle. And the winner is .. The 'googlewash" meme has struck PrestoPundit.
Debra Saunders to Karl Rove -- hands off California. Choice cut:
L.A. County Supervisor Mike Antonovich complained recently that the county has becoming "an HMO for illegal immigrants."
John Derbyshire on journalism. There is more than a bit of truth to this:
Bill Deedes, my old editor at the London Daily Telegraph, started working as a national-newspaper reporter in 1930 at age 17, after the Wall Street Crash wiped out his family's finances. Nowadays you need several years' worth of college degrees on your r�sum� before a big-city American newspaper will let you in the door. The main effect of all that education, of course, is to dull the mind and fill up its empty spaces with left-wing flapdoodle. Newspaper reporting isn't difficult work; an intelligent person can pick up the essentials in a few weeks on the job. To say such things out loud, though, is of course gross heresy in this over-educated, over-credentialed age.
Posted by Greg Ransom / Permalink | Comments (0)
The decadence and corruption of the French business/government elite may be beyond anything anyone ever imagined.
What do Shi'ite Saudi's want? Well, among other things:
They want the kingdom to purge its educational textbooks of "vicious lies and slanderous claims" against Shi'ites. (Some books, often government-financed, claim that Shi'ism was "invented by a Jew as a means of splitting Islam" and accuse Shi'ites of practicing incest and cannibalism in secret.)
May 21, 2003
The Saudi's look to be the Romanovs or the Hapsburgs of the 21st century:
Saudi Arabia may be the worst example in modern times of a corrupt and reactionary absolute monarchy whose rulers have great difficulty perceiving the depth of the crisis that faces them, as well as the way out of the crisis .. Saudi Arabia is ruled by an alliance of the Wahhabi sect, the official Islamic dispensation in the kingdom, with the house of Sa�ud. This alliance, which created the monarchy, is only 250 years old. And Wahhabi Islam is not traditional Islam. It is an extremely destructive, nihilistic, and radical form of Islam. Wahhabism preaches an ultra-Puritanical way of life. Meanwhile the Saudi elite swims in whisky. Wahhabism claims to be the purest form of Islam, while the Saudi monarchy depends on secular bayonets for its protection. These mixed signals, or, more bluntly, these forms of hypocrisy, have a deranging effect on Saudi society. But they are also the essential source of Islamist extremism and terrorism. To close the gap between Wahhabi blandishments and Saudi reality, and in a desperate attempt to recover their credibility � particularly in the 20 years since the emergence of Khomeini in Iran � the reactionary faction of the Saudi monarchy has financed terrorism and infiltration in Central Asia, Pakistan, Kashmir, the Balkans, Algeria, Egypt, Israel, Afghanistan, the Caucasus, the Philippines, Indonesia, and, finally, in the ultimate form of al-Qaida.
Our Polish Allies. Joella is blogging for her mother, Judith Klinghoffer, while she travels in Europe.
My mother emailed me the following exchange between herself and a Polish journalist: When she asked him whether Poland is not alienating her new European allies by her recent pro-American stands, he answered, "Who should we trust? The Germans who attacked us twice in the last century or the French who betray everybody?"
Glenn Reynolds is all over the various media scandals. Lots of links. Lots of bad journalism. Go read.
May 20, 2003
BLOGIC 101. I teach logic. Here is a bit of blogic. If you've been close to a news story, you are aware of the logic of media truth: the nearer you are to a news story, the falser it is, the farther you are from a story, the truer the story seems. Enter the blogger. How the blog world works is like a Darwinian filter machine, a fast pace culling of expert judgments which take you point-blank up to the pertinent details of a news story. Take, for example, Instapundit's coverage of the 300 millimeter pistol story, the CNN assault weapon story, and the BBC Jessica Lynch story. Today we are getting an experience of journalism which in the past was the privilege only of those who had some specialized knowledge of the details of the story. In effect, we are getting a tour inside the sausage factory. It isn't pretty. We see a lot of scraps shoveled off the floor and into our news. We see journalists who think we should be eating soybeans or pork -- and stuff their journalism with this stuff -- when what we want is kosher beef. We see the guy who sells ad copy to the boss put in charge of the factory line. And we see con men with substance problems in charge of sausage content for reasons of politics -- both personal and politically correct. Blogging technology makes anyone with specialized knowledge an effective muckraker -- of the sausage factory which is CNN, The New York Times, The Miami Herald, the BBC. And that's your blogic lesson for the day.
Oliphant on the journalism scandal at the Miami Herald. Quotable quote:
Jose Santos was victimized, however, because the values of the tabloid have infected the entire journalism business. At the core, those essentially entertainment values embrace the fake drama of ''questions raised'' followed by ''questions answered.'' To us it's a two-day story; to the hapless target it's a nightmare. Jayson Blair is a profound embarrassment to all who came within spitting distance of him (including those of us in the Globe's bureau here where he ''worked'' before his Times scam. His victims were also his colleagues who enabled his perfidy by letting their own baggage (race included) get in the way of one of our most healthy traits -- skepticism. But the Santos story is more treacherous, because what happened to him could happen tomorrow -- to you.
May 19, 2003
Liberals gain, greens collapse in Belgian elections. A dogs & cats living together partnership between liberals and socialists will continue.
The Free French forces are undertaking operations as we blog.
May 18, 2003
The Saudi Arabian social order .. more deeply pathological than you've heard -- America's political elite .. more deeply compromised by Saudi money than you ever imagined. A former CIA operative explains. (From his forthcoming book Sleeping with the Devil).
May 17, 2003
Ate my first Cameo� apple the other night. As the grandson of an apple grower I've always considered the red delicious apple God's most perfect food. How did they manage to improve perfection? Well, it looks and tastes like they've taken a red delicious and somehow made it tastier and a bit more complex. Family Farms Direct says this, "This is a new and upcoming variety that was discovered within the last decade in an orchard near Wenatchee, Washington. A chance seedling, the Cameo is believed to be a cross between Red and Golden Delicious apples". Evidently this cross was discovered sometime in the 1980's and the apple has been in grocery stores for only 3 or 4 years (perhaps not in your area). The apple even has its own marketing association. Wenatchee is one beautiful valley, the perfect place for growing -- and eating -- God's perfect food. I've gotten direct ship fruit from Wenatchee in the past from the Stemilt folks. Anyone who's lived in the state of Washington misses it.
May 16, 2003
"If the issue is ethics, no one has less than Sidney Blumenthal." -- Money quote from Susan Estrich, wishing the Democrats could escape from the clutches of the Clintons and their friends.
May 14, 2003
It's an "ugly campaign to destroy the image of France" says, well, France.
Andrew Sullivan's review of Sidney Blumenthal's new book has to be read to be believed. Sullivan's Blumenthal is a character out of the 1930's, an utterly unprincipled, almost crazed fanatic with ties of faith only to party and leader. Literally, a Goebels of the Clinton administration. Sullivan's description is loathsome and frightening:
"in some respects, he is completely out of his mind. Those jokes that no one else in the universe got; those pauses at the end of anecdotes, while he grinned and puffed and waited for you to assent to his latest impenetrable concoction; the sweet-natured way in which he assassinated characters who violated his sense of manifest destiny and the tenets of his secular religion .. The religion to which Sid subscribes is a strange one. His faith is not in the ideals of the Democratic Party. It�s not in the political philosophy of any one thinker .. He doesn�t pledge his allegiance to some noble conception of America, but rather a noble conception of how America should be governed. To be precise, he�s loyal to an institution, the Democratic Party. Fealty to that institution � and its success at all costs�is the only moral criterion I can find in Mr. Blumenthal�s writing .. Like all religious fanatics, Sid sees no distinction between religion and politics or, for that matter, between religion and life .."
Of course, the President had this man within his inner circle. This fact isn't lost on Sullivan: "The fact that the President and, more worryingly, his wife sought out this slightly nutty man as their confidant � a man whom they knew would never question them, never challenge them, never leave them � reveals the brittleness of their characters and the ruthlessness behind their sanctimony." But read the rest yourself.
Daniel Pipes gives a primer on the Saudi family and the Wahhabi religion. Money quote:
In other words, the less fanatical version of Wahhabism triumphed over the more fanatical. The Saudi monarchs presided over a kingdom extreme by comparison with other Muslim countries but tame by Wahhabi standards.
The editors have set up a special e-mail address for readers to report falsehoods they discover in Jayson Blair articles. OK, but how about setting up one for Paul Krugman?
Ann Coulter -- line of the week. Ok, one more.
Instead of being a record of history .. Sulzberger has turned the paper into a sort of bulletin board for Manhattan liberals.
Is Daniel Drezner part of the cabal behind the invasion of Iraq?
I teach in the very same political science department where Leo Strauss taught and Paul Wolfowitz studied forty years ago. In 1994, I briefly worked with Abe Shulsky, one of the Straussians highlighted in the New Yorker article. Last night, I attended a talk that my overlord -- I mean, respected commentator William Kristol -- gave for the Chicago Council on Foreign Relations .. [more]
Those privy to the conspiracy have their theories.
Sixteen of the missing tourists in the Algeria Sahara have been freed. Someone send Instapundit a note.
May 13, 2003
Most of the books and manuscripts of the Iraqi national library were safeguarded by Iraqi heros. 400,000 of these are stacked to the rafters in a mosque. The Boston Globe has the scoop.
May 12, 2003
May 09, 2003
"A humble man, an honest man -- a moralist, really -- he was always true to himself." -- Mrs. Kelly on her son, Michael Kelly. Read it all.
"Everybody lies about gambling" -- this has got to be the next move in the defense of Bill Bennett, who says he's "come out pretty close to even" during his binges at the casino. Brad DeLong and Brendan Koerner do the math.
Randy Barnett reads Bill Bennett the riot act:
Bennett's behavior also reveals something more insidious than hypocrisy, though it is a very old tale. Those who argue most loudly that, were it not for state coercion, people would go to hell in a hand basket have long been suspected of speaking knowingly from introspection. Think Jimmy Swaggart. Bennett provides an even better example. Bennett has had three consumptive vices of which we know: cigarettes (which he had to give up to take the drug-czar position), gambling (which he now has to give up to preserve his viability on the lecture circuit as virtue authority) and, obviously, food. In his latest admissions he stresses that he broke no laws, which is also true of his consumption of nicotine and calories. Lucky him.This only means that his vices do not carry the additional legal baggage that he would willingly impose on others with different vices. So suppose, instead of merely issuing a statement that he was through with gambling, he had to hire a big-time lawyer (other than his brother), and go to court in handcuffs like Robert Downey Jr. has had to do. Downey is a sad character, but why does he deserve the orange jumpsuit and jail-time for his admittedly self-destructive behavior and Bennett only our compassion and goodwill?
Perhaps Bennett (or Kurtz) would respond that, were Bennett's chosen vices illegal, the laws would have saved him from himself. But this incident proves only that, unless one prohibits all vices, which the virtue proponents like Bennett deny they favor, poor weak souls like Bennett will find some other legal pleasure to abuse. The only question is what happens to them when they are caught. For the average citizen smoking marijuana, they get the tender mercies of such places as the Circuit Court of Cook County where I used to prosecute real criminals. In California and elsewhere, they get both the Clinton and Bush justice departments prosecuting as felons sick people acting legally under state law.
Naturally, Bennett opposes medical-cannabis initiatives. In a 2001 Wall Street Journal essay he dismissed them "as little more than thinly veiled legalization efforts." So much for his compassion for the suffering of others, not to mention his ability to make morally relevant distinctions. Here is where Kurtz's defense of Bennett based on positive law unravels completely. In what universe does opposition to medical cannabis under sanction of state law and subject to state regulation create even close to the social harms caused by legal gambling? But Bennett is not interested in such nuances. He disregards the judgment of the electorate of at least eight states who voted to allow this practice. He knows better than the voters. Just ask him. He advocates punishing sick people and denying them access to physician-recommended medical cannabis just so other people do not get high.
Frankly, I just do not see the virtue in this position, much less the compassion Kurtz and Frum show Bennett, who has only to withstand a bit of the verbal abuse he dishes so well. All this is why some libertarians think this latest admission of Bennett's vices significant and worthy of criticism, not whitewash.
Posted by Greg Ransom / Permalink | Comments (0)
The red-hot New York Post has a must read on the importance of the documents linking Western journalists and politicians to the sadistic killers of Iraq. Highlights:
Iraqi leaders who should have been treated as criminals got red-carpet reception in major capitals, including Washington, London, Paris and Moscow. Saddam was an honored guest in Jacques Chirac's private home in Correze at exactly the time that the Ba'ath was massacring thousands of political opponents in 1976. Tariq Aziz was always welcome whenever he dropped by for tea with the Pope in the Vatican. Nizar Hamdoun, one of Saddam's diplomatic minions, spent many weekends in Arkansas with then-Gov. Bill Clinton."Putting journalists and politicians on the payroll was a well-established policy," says Khalid Kishtaini, who worked for the Iraqi Cultural Office in London in the 1980s .. Saad al-Bazzaz, another writer who worked with Saddam before joining the opposition, confirms this: "The principle was that everyone could be bought, if the price was right," he says. " You would be surprised to know who was in Saddam's pay."
The documents' real value lies elsewhere: Properly studied, they would reveal how a large number of multinational companies (no doubt encouraged by major industrial nations) helped Saddam build his war machine. Who gave [Saddam] the heavy bombers that in 1983 destroyed Iran's main oil-export terminal at Kharg Island? Which European company sold him the chemicals he used to massacre 5,000 Kurdish men, women and children in Halabchah in 1988? .. Which French company built Saddam's palaces and bunker, and which German firm provided the surveillance and communication systems? What about the British companies that helped Saddam built his "supergun," "The Fist of Allah"?
May 08, 2003
Clich� of the Day: Bill Bennett's The Book of Virtues is number two for the week at All Consuming, proving that "All publicity is good publicity" in today's celebrity driven culture.
But it's hard to top this.
May 07, 2003
Payback for hypocracy can be a bitch. Might make for a useful moral tale -- one that will sell:
"What rankled a lot of people in Atlantic City and Las Vegas was that Bennett's organization, Empower America, opposes the expansion of casino gambling," Green says. Bennett's enemies in the casino were angered by "what they considered to be the hypocrisy between the public stance of his organization and his private gambling."