LFTC - Letter From The Capitol

Index 11/20/06

5 posts: (1) Milton Friedman: R.I.P.--The Home Front; (2) Palestinian Economics: Can Dell Make AK-47s?--Us. v. Them; (3) Iraq: Is Disaster Avoidable?--Us v. Them; (4) The Federal Judiciary's "Naughty Ninth"--The Home Front; (5) Will the Dutch Lift Islam's Veils?--Weenie Watch.

Milton Friedman: R.I.P.

Speaking of economics, a titan passed away last week.  It would be presumptuous for mere me to attempt to explain Milton Friedman in my words--I was, after all, like many across the nation and the world, a student of his, through reading his books (Free to Choose) and columns (Newsweek).  Best to salute him in his own (ever eloquent) words.

Palestinian Economics: Can Dell Make AK-47s?

Each week gives us new evidence that Palestinians are building a new society.  The latest is a classic case of Palestinian economics--the latest example that the now departed Milton Friedman understood economics better than just about anyone: the price of guns is going up inside the Palestinian territories, as an arms race is underway.  Supply and demand, it seems, are alive and well over there.  An M-16 has risen from 5,000 to 9,000 Jordanian dinar ($7,200 to $9,000).

"When we are happy we shoot. When we are angry we shoot.  At funerals we shoot, and at weddings we shoot.  It's not good, of course."  There's more: "This is part of my hobby and identity.  If I were to get a million dollars, I would spend it entirely on weapons."

Let's see: Dell's popular Dimension PCs (I have owned two) start now at $329.  For $1 million, more than 3,000 such PCs can be bought.  Then again, the definition of a Palestinian PC is, it seems, is an assault rifle.  Where are the gun control folks when we really need them?

Think the Palestinians should read Milton Friedman?

Iraq: Is Disaster Avoidable?

What now in Iraq, which Brit PM Tony Blair now calls a "disaster" (a Freudian slip he regrets)?  Bill Kristol and Frederick Kagan argue cogently that we need more troops--50,000, no less--and that we must use them to deal with the Sunni in Anbar, else there is no hope that Shi'a militias will disarm.  They also say that we cannot train Iraqis fast enough to do this.  Charles Krauthammer, on the other hand, blames the Iraqis, for not coming together, given a real chance for freedom.  He blames the Shi'a for not uniting, and for hampering US military activity in Baghdad.  Frederick W. Kagan argues very cogently that withdrawing to over-the-horizon locales will not work, due to constraints of time to travel after notice, and degraded intelligence (not being on the scene).

The Federal Judiciary's "Naughty Ninth"

George Will presents the gory details of how the Ninth Circuit (one of twelve that comprises the federal appellate court system, covering California and Nevada) lurches left.  Of the 82 cases the Supreme Court heard last term, 18 came from the 9th, and 15 were reversed.  Will, ever true to his baseball school, notes that the 1962 Mets had a .250 win percentage.  Will offers an astounding tale: an outrageous reversal of a death penalty case--despite a crime of stupefying viciousness--and how the Supreme Court reversed the case, thus reinstating the capital sentence.  But N.B. that the vote was 5-4, with the usual suspects (Stephens, Souter, Ginsburg, Breyer) dissenting; Anthony Kennedy saved the day by siding (this time) with the sane side.

Will the Dutch Lift Islam's Veils?

Dutch Muslims are in high dudgeon over a proposed law that would ban public wearing of the Muslim veil--both the burqa, which covers the face and body, save for a mesh screen to see through, and the niqab, which covers the face only, but leaves a slit to reveal the eyes.  Only a few dozen women currently wear the veil in the Netherlands.  Muslim groups say it violates freedom of religion.  Last March the Dutch Parliament passed a law requiring aspiring immigrants to learn Dutch and to pass a test about Dutch society; another pending bill aims to have immigrants take an "integration" test.

Index 11/17/06

2 posts: (1) Surf's Up!--Cyber-Serendip; (2) Bush  Senior's Record--and Now--The Home Front.

Surf's Up!

What can a 600-foot tsunami do, besides provide the ultimate opportunity to "hang ten"?  For the answer read the linked article.

Bush Senior's Record--and Now

WSJ columnist Bret Stephens recalls four major failures of the Bush 41 foreign policy: (1) the Madrid/Oslo "peace process"; (2) Serbia; (3) "Chicken Kiev"--trying to save the USSR; and (4) betraying the Shi'a.  Crisp work from a top young talent.

Index 11/16/06

4 posts: (1) Iranian "Reality" TV--Us v. Them; (2) UK Tracking 30 WMD Plots--Weenie Watch; (3) Mideast: Blair Goes Batty--Weenie Watch; (4) Iran: Get Google?--Us v. Them.

Iranian "Reality" TV

Here is a script presented on Iranian TV, a tale of how a Jewish interrogator viciously abuses in innocent detainee at Guantanamo.  Read it and try not to throw up.  This is the poison being fed young Muslim minds around the world.  MEMRI, the Mideast Media Research Institute, provided the translation.

UK Tracking 30 WMD Plots

A senior Foreign Office official says that there is "no doubt at all" that al-Qaeda is plotting to unleash WMD inside the UK; there are at least 30 such plots underway.  This follows last week's disclosure by MI5's intelligence chief that UK authorities are tracking 1,600 Muslim terror suspects, most of whom are British-born and of Pakistani descent.  This represents but one-tenth of one percent of the total UK Muslim community, and illustrates the extreme vulnerability of Western societies, even given 99.9 percent non-terrorists among alienated communities--and in the UK and estimated 200,000 Muslims are deeply sympathetic to Islamist terror.

Mideast: Blair Sings "Kumbaya!"

Tough Tony says everyone can be friends in the Mideast--Iran & Syria our partners, Palestinians settling down with Israel, Sunni, Shi'a, Mouseketeeers, all sing "Kumbaya!...."

Iran: Get Google?

Iranians are expressing outrage at a Google online map that puts parts of northern territory Iran claims in Azerbaijan instead.  Russia annexed northern Azerbaijan in 1813; Stalin tried unsuccessfully to annex the southern part after World War II.

Index 11/15/06

3 posts: (1) Hail to a Fallen Hero--The Home Front; (2) Sow Rap Culture; Reap Death--The Home Front; (3) Google Care--"It's the Earth Stupid!"

Hail to a Fallen Hero

On Friday, President Bush awarded the second Congressional Medal of Honor citation for the Iraq War, won posthumously by 22-year-old Corporal Jason Dunham.  In 2004, during hand-to-hand combat in a machine-gun nest, Corporal Dunham threw himself on a grenade, saving two of his comrades.  The first award, also posthumous, went to Army Sgt. 1st Class Paul Smith, for his saving comrades in a 2003 firefight, holding off onrushing Iraqis with a machine gun, though mortally wounded, while his comrades scrambled to safety.  First class indeed, both of them.

On wonders why we do not hear more about these magnificent soldiers?  Much publicity was given hero Pat Tillman, who gave up a zillion-dollar NFL career only to be tragically killed by friendly fire in Afghanistan.  Then there was Jessica Lynch, rescued in the initial combat, after having been captured; we heard about her for weeks.  (One can sympathize with her awful injuries, but that does not make her a war hero; her recovery after may well have been heroic, on a different scale.).  Lyndie England, up to her zero-IQ ears in Abu Ghraib, was a poster girl for prisoner abuse for months; she is now in jail, where she belongs.

But true heroes are passed up, unless there is military misconduct or error involved.  Ditto with the appalling Ground Zero Memorial; its theme "reflecting absence."  Absence?  Gone fishin'?  That terrible day there were victims by the thousands, and heroes by the hundred.  Where is the statue saluting the firemen raising the flag at Ground Zero?  Honoring police and other first-responders?  Honoring those who, while others exited the Towers, went in?  Honoring firefighters who took last rites before going in?  And here is the embarrassingly sappy memorial to the passengers on Flight 93 in Pennsylvania, Garden of Reflection.  Better they simply erect a statue depicting a plummeting plane, and play United Flight 93 continually 24/7 on the memorial grounds.

We live, it seems, in an age when the regnant culture is anti-heroic.  Beware: In the long run, a nation that fails to properly honor its heroes will get less of them.

Sow Rap Culture: Reap Death

A Washington Times front-pager reports that a number of major cities, including Washington, DC, report that killings over arguments have supplanted drug-related killings as the prime cause of murders.  Folks seeking "respect" are prepared, it seems, to kill to keep it.  Ten years ago drug-related homicides were one-third of the total; now they are but ten percent.  Of 2006's 196 homicides, 57 (29 percent) were due to arguments.  In the past five years, 1,126 homicides were reported; of these, 1,058 (94 percent) of the victims were blacks, with 36 Hispanic and 32 white.  "Respect" is, of course, what rap artists famously "sing" about.  Sow the seeds, reap the whirlwind.

One the plus side, the District homicide total, 301 when Chief Ramsey took control in 1997, and having been 262 as recently as 2002, were 196 last year, on a pace to hit 174 for the year, the lowest total since the 147 recorded in 1985.  Clearance of homicides has topped 60 percent the past three years, and is 57.4 percent in 2006; this is also a significant improvement.  Praise to Chief Ramsey and his staff for improving the District's homicide record.

Google Care

A recent survey conducted by researchers in Brisbane, Australia, found that given the correct search terms, Google's web search engine came up with useful information in 58 percent of medical diagnosis cases, including some cases in which doctors had been stumped.  Caution though: this presumes proper input of search terms, which often requires expert assistance.  But still the results are intriguing indeed. Stay tuned--and online.

Index 11/14/06

3 posts: (1) Iran: Message from Ali; Memo to Nancy--The Home Front; (2) Rumsfeld: Tragic Titan: Bush Too?--The Home Front; (3) Germany Strikes US?--The Home Front.

Iran: Message from Ali; Memo to Nancy

Iran's Supreme Leader, the Ayatollah Ali Khameini, gave the world his take on the 2006 elections: "This issue (the elections) is not a purely domestic issue for America, but it is the defeat of Bush's hawkish policies in the world."  He continued: "Since Washington's hostile and hawkish policies have always been against the Iranian nation, this defeat is actually an obvious victory for the Iranian nation."  Finally: "With the scandalous defeat of America's policies in Iraq, Palestine, Lebanon and Afghanistan, America's threats are empy threats on an international scale."

To which House Speaker-Elect Nancy Pelosi fired back in a fury: "No two-bit mullah is going to imply that the policies Democrats will support are any less strong than those of Mr. Bush.  Indeed, we intend to take a harder line on Iran than Mr. Bush has, so that America regains the respect that will make its threats once again credible to all."

Oh, Nancy didn't say that?  Must have been static on the line!  But there is a serious point here.  Democrats would take any suggestion that Iran is happy about their victory as a slur on their patriotism.  Yet patriotism is not a synonym for sound judgment.  Were Democrats serious, they would ask themselves why Iran is pleased with the election results, and take policy cues from there.

Nancy has taken the first step in showing seriousness: she is backing super-dove "cut and run from Iraq" John Murtha for the No. 2 position in the House.  And she has apparently taken a second: bypassing Jane Harman, ranking Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee and a moderate, for the chairmanship.  Meanwhile, Senate Democrats have declared that UN Ambassador John Bolton, one of the greatest our country has produced, will not even get the courtesy of a confirmation vote on the floor.  Take that...and that...and THAT, Ayatollahs!

Rumsfeld: Tragic Titan; Bush Too?

Historian Frederick W. Kagan writes that the fall of Donald Rumsfeld came about because, confronted with a messy post-Baghdad insurgency in Iraq, he refused to address it, lest it undermine his vision of "transformation" of the military.  Kagan's critique seems sounds, except that he is wrong to fault Rumsfeld for preparing to fight "Enemy X in 2025."  We must fund today's and tomorrow's potential wars at once.  We are easily wealthy enough to do this.  If need be we can run a larger deficit--commonplace in wars; as future generations will share in the benefit of victory, they can share in paying for victory.

Rumsfeld's tragedy, however, is that today's military is weaker than the one he inherited in 2001, a weakness that came not from his being anti-defense, but being too inflexible.  A corporate manager he was, but managing wars, it seems, is messier than running corporations.  His desire to reform the Pentagon bureaucracy was laudable, but came at, alas, the worst possible time.  Rumsfeld was, ironically, also a victim of his lifelong super-success: Folks who hit the top all the way from kindergarten to Cabinet posts tend not to take advice, as most people they encounter do not have their uber-resume.

Former Reagan Defense official Dov Zakheim offers both a list of Rumsfeld's largely ignored transformational achievements--which are real--and also, sage advice to Gates (and Bush) re Iraq.  The latter: Withdraw from the poisonous center and guard the peripheries--protect Kurdistan to the north against Turkey, western Iraq near Jordan and the Shi'a areas in the south against Iran.  As sending more troops to clear Baghdad is a political non-starter here, this is the best Plan B I have seen to date.

For the Iraq mess, blame the military commanders too.  And what of Bush?  Call him a titan for grasping that the war we were cruelly drawn into was not just a fight against al-Qaeda.  But call him tragic for the same reason Rumsfeld is: he failed, attempting great things.

Germany Strikes US?

In Germany, a top prosecutor reportedly aims to file criminal charges against senior US officials for Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo interrogation "abuses."  Among the targets: Donald Rumsfeld and Attorney-General Alberto Gonzales.  Among the charges: when interrogating at Gitmo Muhammad al-Qahtani, a Saudi who was the 20th hijacker (and not Zaccharias Moussaoui, as often reported, including--oops--on LFTC), the use of forced nudity, sexual humiliation, religious humiliation, prolonged stress positions, sleep deprivation.  The information yielded saved lives, an apparent irrelevancy to the prosecutor.

Since when does Europe set itself up as the conscience of the universe, and judge how the US interrogates a Saudi national on a Cuban island jail to learn about acts of terror to be committed against United States territory?  It is as if the war were a contest in which America's goal is to meet a standard of idealized purity, or else deserve to fail.  Such preening moral exhibitionism should carry a steep price: Next time Germany wants help against terrorists, call the World Court, the International Criminal Court and the United Nations, and see how much help you get.

Index 11/13/06

One post: 2006: The Grover Cleveland Election--The Home Front.

2006: The Grover Cleveland Election

The Ghost of of Grover Cleveland roams the White House, spotted first after news confirming the Democratic victory, and again when Robert Gates was hired to replace Donald Rumsfeld.  Gates, a Bush 41 intimate, sits on the Iraq Study Group (ISG), co-chaired by none other than Bush 41 Secretary of State James Baker (also WH Chief of Staff in Reagan I & Secretary of the Treasury in Reagan II).  In what is already being called the "Baker Regency"--Bush appears poised to default his Iraq policy to the ISG, which is co-chaired by Lee Hamilton, ex-Indiana Democratic Congressman, a moderate; also on the panel is Gates, who was Deputy National Security Adviser (to Bush intimate Brent Scowcroft, Condi Rice's sponsor); Leon Panetta, WH Chief of Staff under Clinton, longtime member of the Democratic Congressional leadership in the 1970s and 1980s; power broker and Clinton "First Buddy"' Vernon Jordan; Clinton Defense Secretary William J. Perry; former Senators Alan Simpson (R-WY) and Chuck Robb (D-VA); Reagan White House Counselor, later Attorney-General Ed Meese; and former Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor.  Author James Mann, however, has a fine op-ed defending Gates, pointing out his skepticism of Gorbachev in the late 1980s.  He does not convince me, but his column merits a read.

Thus Bush Senior (via his confidantes) appears to have taken the reins of his son's Presidency.  He becomes the first President returned (if unofficially) to the White House for non-consecutive terms since Grover Cleveland (1885-1889 & 1893-1897).  (In one respect, however, neither Bush resembles our 22nd and 24th President, whose Presidential record includes 584 vetoes--414 in his first term alone, compared to 204 vetoes cast by all preceding Presidents--23 Presidents covering 26 terms.)

What makes this of concern is that James Baker's track record includes matters that are hardly reassuring: (1) as Reagan I WH Chief of Staff, Baker was a major promoter of the tax increase passed one year after Reagan's historic 1981 tax cut, thus slowing economic recovery; (2) as Reagan II Treasury Secretary, his cheap dollar policy was a major culprit in the 1987 stock market crash; (3) as Bush I Secretary of State Baker tried to keep the Soviet Union intact, in the sacred name of "preserving stability"; (4) Baker helped rescue Yasser Arafat from exile in Tunisia after the Gulf War, despite Arafat having backed Saddam, leading to the Oslo fiasco and the sustained assault on Israel since.  And there is even worse.

Baker was a prime architect of one more mess, rescued from the Memory Hole by WSJ columnist Dan Henninger: He betrayed the Kurds and Shi'a in 1991, after the Gulf War.  On Feb. 11, 1991 President Bush called upon the Iraqis to rise up in revolt, asking generals to "take matters into your own hands."  They did.  And we stood by with over half a million troops while Saddam flew helicopters (in violation of his accord with the coalition) and sent in tanks.  That betrayal was long forgotten by most Americans by 2003; it was bitterly remembered in Iraq, especially among the Shi'a in the south, which accounts for much of our difficulty in getting Iraq support.  (We did better with the Kurds, because we did belatedly intervene to help them.)

Turning to election specifics: Ironically, as an excellent column by NRO's Rich Lowry shows, the corruption issue seems to have trumped Iraq as the number one reason Republicans got blitzed.  However, George Will calls Iraq "arguably the worst foreign-policy disaster in our history"; he likens its political impact to that of Hillary's 1993 health-care plan, which ushered in a Republican majority in the House.  The Senate was close: Charles Krauthammer's column likens Bush losing both houses to be the equivalent of a parliamentary vote of "no-confidence"; only 8,942 votes separated the Virginia senatorial candidates, and only 2,847 votes did so in Montana.  A Republican win: Gay marriage bans passed in seven of eight states.  Michael Barone sees more negotiations between Bush and the Democrats, but fewer with House Republicans, who are marginalized; Senate Republicans, due to the power vested in minorities under Senate rules, will hold some sway.

In a landmark win against liberal activism, Michigan rejected racial preferences 58-42 in a referendum, despite a 5:1 spending edge on the part of the pro-preferences side, and the usual gutter scare tactics.  Former U.S. Civil Rights Commissioner Abigail Thernstrom provides details, including the well-kept secret that campuses are "starkly" segregated between the races these days.  David Frum notes that unlike the 1974 tidal wave and the 1986 mini-tsunami, this time Democrats who won were moderate to conservative, not the Watergate-era liberals; yet Frum fears that Bush will sign an immigration bill with amnesty in all but name only, and thus enrage the Republican conservative base.  NRO judicial maven Ed Whelan, who clerked for Scalia at the Supreme Court, argues that a Democratic Senate might still confirm a Roberts or Alito for a Supreme Court vacancy, as highly visible hearings enable the case for the nominee to reach the public.  However,, appellate court nominations--far less visible to the public--will continue to be bottled up by Democrats determined to keep conservatives off the federal bench.

Failure in Iraq, writes Jim Hoagland, was a case of "right vision, wrong policy."  David Brooks canvassed policy types in both parties after the election and found common ground: change Iraq policy.  He thinks the ISG will recommend regional negotiations.  Within Iraq, mass migrations are creating facts on the ground that amount to de facto partition.  Both parties want an exit or near-exit by 2008 election-time, with or without democracy.  As Bush opposes this--he sees a long-run pro-democracy timeline--the major fight may be between Bush and his own party.

But Bush has lost control over his Iraq policy.  The composition of the ISG is truly remarkable: (1) not a single expert with deep knowledge of Iraq or the surrounding area; (2) not a single top-drawer military name, like Barry McCaffrey; (3) mostly a bunch of lawyers. plus four long-serving senior ex-members of Congress.  This is a group that will chart a path to victory?  Hardly likely.  It apparently aims to find a face-saving exit strategy.

Bush staked his Presidency on Iraq; now he has lost his Presidency.  His final two years are likely to prove once again that White House residency and a functioning Presidency are not synonyms.

Index 11/10/06

On post: Veteran's Day: Help a Veteran Today--The Home Front.

Veterans' Day: Help a Veteran Today

Today is being celebrated as Veterans Day, although the actual calendar date is November 11.  Originally it was known as Armistice Day, celebrating the official end of World War I--the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month of 1918.  Instead of a posting today, LFTC wishes to post sites of military charities, to help the brave men and women of our armed forces, who are without question the finest citizens we are privileged to have.  Armistice Day was proclaimed a national holiday in 1938 by FDR, and renamed Veterans Day in 1954 by President Eisenhower.  In 1968, Congress made the fourth Monday in October the holiday, but in 1978 it was put back to November 11.  Here is the history, on the VFW page.

Herewith some site to help out finest of the finest--the last site (Code of Support) asks what we owe our soldiers in return:

Intrepid Fallen Heroes Fund

Operation Uplink

Helping Our Heroes Foundation

Code of Support

Let us let those who put themselves in the line of fire know we appreciate them, once again.

Index 11/09/06

One post: Bombs Away: On your Block--Classics.

Bombs Away: On Your Block

A slim volume published this year is heftier in content than the vast majority of 500-page doorstops masquerading as books that are sold today to customers who assume that a short book means few things to say.  Arms control expert (one of the very best ever) Fred Ikle's Annihilation From Within (Columbia University Press 2006) is both deeply depressing and deeply brilliant.  He writes:

"The greatest threat to the world order in this century will be the next Hitler or Lenin, a charismatic leader who combines utter ruthlessness with a brilliant strategic sense, cunning, and boundless ambition--and who gains control over just a few weapons of mass destruction."

Ikle begins by pointing to a cultural split that was opened during the Enlightenment and has been widening ever since.  He writes: "This widening split is ominous.  It might impair the social cohesion of societies, and of nations, by drawing the human psyche in two directions: to the personal and national identity that resides in acquired beliefs, memories and traditions of the past; and to the promise of greater wealth and power offered by untrammeled technological progress."

Technology may create in but a generation computers more powerful than the human brain.  This will exacerbate the cultural split.  While in civilized countries ethical and religious concerns will limit the research done, in other places no such limits apply.  Synthetic bio-agents may make natural ones seem like a stroll in the park.

Ikle distills five lessons from the nuclear age: (1) benevolence is not enough; (2) deterrence was oversold; (3) we were lucky--so far; (4) nuclear accidents remain a grave danger; (5) beware of "peaceful use."  The last point is most salient.  The greatest impetus to nuclear proliferation was the spectacularly idealistic--and even more spectacularly dumb--Atoms for Peace program instituted by President Eisenhower in 1953.  Intended to spur commercial nuclear power, it wound up diffusing nuclear know-how--for weapons and well as power plants--far more rapidly than otherwise would have been the case.

Ikle warns: "The ineluctable dissemination of technology and scientific discoveries will make nuclear and biological weapons accessible to merciless insurgent movements, small terrorist gangs, secretive anarchist groups, and genocidal doomsday cults."  In event of an attack, our government may not be able to trace it (the 2001 anthrax attacks in the US remain unsolved), and in the emergency after a WMD attack governments must rely on procedures already in place.  Dumb bureaucrats are a big problem: After the US victory in Afghanistan a Taliban Afghan won permission to emigrate to the UK, because he feared (so he said, at least) persecution by the new, democratic government!!

Survival demands, Ikle writes: (1) continuity of government measures in place; (2) a path to resume nuclear non-use after a nuclear attack; (3) global economy focus; and (4) a spiritual restoration.  Ikle's closing note is that our "common emotional bond" with the American Constitution is a vital assets to rely on.  This last point is true only if the Constitution does not become a suicide pact in tying our hands so we cannot head-off a catastrophic WMD strike.

Still, this book still says more in 107 pages than most authors today can say in 1,070.

Index 11/8/06

One post: Will's Election '06 Scorecard--The Home Front.

Will's Election '06 Scorecard

George Will is a repository of election statistical arcana, as befits the nation's most prominent baseball (and Chicago Cubs) fan.  His Elex Night Cheat Sheet is chock-full of trend indicators.  Print it out and check it Wednesday morning (or Thursday, if results remain up in the air).  One nugget, however, bears direct quotation.  Regarding the election travails besetting Florida Republican Congressman Clay Shaw, a quality candidate, Will notes that the Medicare drug benefit "doughnut" may sink Shaw.  The law provides that the feds pay 75 percent of the first $2,250 annual cost, and 95 percent of the cost over $5.100; but the beneficiary pays the entire cost between $2,250 and $5,100.  (In all, the feds pay one-third of the first $5,100.)  Voters, Will warns, are angry over this, and Shaw may lose his seat.

To which Will quips that if Shaw loses it will validate an axiom as to entitlement programs: "Any new entitlement generates less gratitude for what is given than it does resentment at what is withheld."  Call it the politics equivalent of "No good deed goes unpunished."

Index 11/7/06

Two posts: (1) Non-Union Nancy (Pelosi)--The Home Front ; (2) My Vote: For James Webb--and Scoop--The Home Front.

Non-Union Nancy (Pelosi)

Investor's Business Daily informs us that America's possible next Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, employs only non-union labor at the Napa Valley vineyard she owns with her husband.  Pelosi, it seems, is worth about $55 million, yet somehow she has, IBD notes, never seen fit to return any of the tax cut for the rich that she declaims.

Funny, how with the mainstream media (MSM) the charge of hypocrisy stings Republicans, which is why Mark Foley was front-page news for a fortnight, and why Dan Quayle was ridiculed for serving in the National Guard.  Yet when the House leader of the party of the poor--ferociously backed by unions--turns out to rely on non-union labor, MSM is AWOL.  The United Farm Workers, BTW, awarded Pelosi the Cesar Chavez Award in 2003 (Chavez was a populist 1960s labor organizer in California who made his name on the plight of Mexican farm laborers).

In 2001 another Chavez, the redoubtable Linda, a staunch Republican and superbly qualified to be Secretary of Labor, was destroyed because she did a kindness--one of many she has done--and hired an illegal who had been a battered spouse; she was unfortunate to have a tattletale neighbor who was, naturally, a Democrat.  She shrieked to the heavens, and MSM crucified Linda.   Pelosi?  MSM has practically canonized her.

My Vote: For James Webb--and Scoop

I am in not registered to vote in Virginia, so in a sense this is a cost-free vote.  On the other hand, as a voter registered in the District of Columbia, where Democrats typically win 80 to 90 percent of the vote--John Kerry got 90 percent in 2004--my vote is symbolic in  D.C., too.  And as I happen to be going to NYC today, I will be absentee anyway as to either jurisdiction.  But there are principles to discuss, as to why I would vote for Webb, were I a Virginia resident.

The strongest argument against voting Democrat is that that in event of a Supreme Court vacancy, a Democratic Senate will force Bush to nominate a swing Justice instead of a conservative in the Roberts-Alito mold.  But the reality is that even if the Republicans hold the Senate, their margin will be less than the number of liberals in their own Senatorial delegation; Republican would need to keep their five-seat majority, while losing (as they almost surely will) Rhode Island leftie Lincoln Chafee, to be in a position to keep nominating conservatives.  On everything we see going into the election this won't happen.

The second argument for voting Democrat in Virginia just appeared on my TV screen as I write this piece: George Allen, whose voice is saying in a campaign ad that one reason to vote Allen (I paraphrase) is that Virginians ought to reject misrepresentation and character assassination.  How right he is: That is why Allen's pathetic, desperate attack on Webb's novels--intimating that coarse sexual passages reflect their author--is the prime example, in this election cycle, or an appalling pandering to voters' worst instincts.  Put simply, George Allen ran the worst Senatorial race of 2006, and one of the worst ever; he has destroyed his Presidential hopes--rightly so.

Now, are there positive reasons to support James Webb?  Yes.  As I recently wrote on LFTC, the worst development in America over the past generation has been the destruction of the old Democratic Party; in the struggle between the George McGovern and Scoop Jackson wings, the wrong side prevailed.  Henry M. (Scoop) Jackson was a tower of strength on national security, a man of unimpeachable integrity, and able to oppose an Administration controlled by the opposition party without undermining its ability to fight a war.  Webb would bring a little of Scoop back to the Democrats--he did oppose the Iraq War, as Scoop might not have--but Webb did so because he foresaw--correctly--that an insurgency would develop. and swallow up our war effort.

Webb's economics are liberal, and mostly wrong, but in this Webb echoes Scoop as well, whose own economics remained mired in new Deal philosophy even as the American economy shifted dramatically. And Webb is right about one economic issue: executive pay.  CEOs today are not paid based upon value delivered; they are paid as a sultan class, often taking platinum parachutes when they depart companies whose floundering they were a major factor in causing.  this violates the capitalist principle of rewarding enterprise and good management, while ruthlessly penalizing failure (a ruthlessness that liberals object to).

One day the CEO issue will really bite Republicans, and a bad, anti-market liberal solution will be adopted to stop an unconscionable anti-market CEO pig-out.  CEOs today get parachutes before they sign on, thereby removing the risk of being penalized for bad performance, other than a public embarrassment few seem capable of feeling.  They pay themselves--or a cozy Board votes them, "retention bonuses"--a bribe not to leave (and take the bonus they get for leaving).  So, they get bonuses to stay and bonuses to leave.  Not a bad racket.  They get merger bonuses, before the Board knows how the deal works in real-life--many backfire financially.  Crony capitalism?  Hardly?  There is nothing capitalistic about these practices.  Crony corruption--moral as well as financial--is more like it.

Electing James Webb will be a step in trying to re-start reform of the Democratic Party, especially on national security.  The prospect will remain a long shot, but even so, the Republicans deserve to take a pasting, and a Senate loss may wake them up in time to run a strong race in 2008.  Webb is the kind of Democrat how was virtually eliminated in the 1994 Republican 52-seat Congressional landslide, an ironic outcome that polarized Beltway politics more than most Republicans intended.  And if one refuses to vote for Webb, what kind of Democrat--other than a conservative Republican in Democratic clothing--can one vote for?

Index 11/6/06

2 posts: (1) Mideast Mushroom Clouds--Us v. Them; (2) Palestinian Chivalry in Gaza--Us v. Them.

Mideast Mushroom Clouds

A New York Times front-pager reports that US officials posted a dozen documents seized in Iraq that offer a cookbook on how to build a nuclear bomb; it details the errors made by the Iraqis in their defunct nuclear program.  The information had been shared with the Security Council in 2002, but redacted to remove sensitive data; the versions posted online--now pulled off the website--were not scrubbed.  The Times notes (with schadenfreude) that pressure from Republican conservatives to post data in Iraq documents contributed to the debacle.  Not mentioned is that no one asking for more public airing of documents about Saddam's regime wanted this kind of stuff posted.

However, Rep. Peter Hoekstra (R-MI), Chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, has issued a rebuttal to the Times piece.  According to Hoekstra, the IAEA never raised any concerns as to this material--to the contrary, the IAEA, and not the US, may have provided the Iraqis with some documents.  Nor did any US agency raise concerns.  But perhaps most significantly, the Times story confirms that what we discovered after the Gulf War indicated that the Iraqis may have been but one year away from producing an atomic bomb.

Meanwhile how about the news that 6--count 'em, SIX--Mideast nations are planning to form a consortium to develop nuclear technology: In alphabetical order (a Western concept, but it will do), Algeria, Egypt, Morocco, Saudi Arabia, Tunisia, United Arab Emirates (UAE).  This is due to Iran's nuclear ambition, about which Jim Hoagland, always wise, argues that pure isolation of Iran is counter-productive; exchanges on a cultural level--as with the "ping pong diplomacy" with China during the Nixon years, are worth having.  This is reasonable--PROVIDED we ratchet up the pressure on Iran's nuclear program.  Iranians meeting Americans and vice-versa, is a good thing.  But ONLY if we follow through on the nukes.  Bush's recent actions are hardly reassuring.

So, mushroom clouds may soon be gathering in the Mideast--call it the weather forecast for the next decade.  Makes one long for sandstorms, eh?  Considering how bucolic and idyllic the Mideast has been for the last umpteen decades, as that great foreign policy maven Alfred E. Neumann would say: "What, me worry?"

Palestinian Chivalry in Gaza

Hundreds of Palestinian women shielded their "men" so that terror suspects could escape in Gaza, from an Israeli sweep.  Nice going, guys.  Another triumph for "the religion of peace."  And yet another proof of the pacific nature of the Palestinian people.  Road map, anyone?

Index 11/3/06

One post: Accentuate the Punctuate!--Classics.

Accentuate the Punctuate!

Courtesy of a dearest friend I was given a book that combines three things hard to put together in one volume: one that is informative, delightful and compact--an increasingly rare trifecta in an era of books that are uninformative, boring and as massive as an aircraft carrier.  Author Lynne Truss is aptly named for a "punctuation Nazi": she wraps us up in a stylistic truss the better to support clear writing.  Eats, Shoots and Leaves (Gotham Books 2003) takes its title from a panda joke: a panda enters a bar, eats some victuals, fires a gun and departs.  The joke is that without a comma the panda's meal fare is properly displayed; with it, mayhem results.

We learn that punctuation was invented by the ancient Greeks (who else?) to guide actors in breathing while speaking their lines; credit is given to one Aristophanes of Byzantium, ensconced at the Library of Alexandria, around 200 BC.  For the next 16 centuries or so punctuation rules were virtually non-existent and surely non-standard.  Came along then the author's hero, Venetian printer Aldus Manutius the Elder (1450-1515).  The closest thing to a Punctuation Lawgiver, Aldus gave us the first elegant typeface, italics, and also the semi-colon.  Aldus and his identically-named grandson also reformed the ancient virgule, lowering and curving it to create our modern comma.  But Truss says that the critical change made was put in place by Aldus the Younger in 1566.  As books read by the masses were not training for actors speaking lines, breathing took second place to syntax; punctuation's primary purpose since then has been to clarify syntax.

Truss beings with the "tractable apostrophe."  Exploring its many uses, she gives us the Law of Conservation of Apostrophes:  "For every apostrophe omitted from an "it's'' there is an extra one put into an "its.'"  Thus the number of apostrophes in circulation at any given time is constant.  She introduces us to an English columnist's marvelous fictive creation: the Apostropher Royal (for Queen Elizabeth I),  Comparing the period ("full stop" to the English) to the apostrophe,Truss archly theorizes: "In fact one might dare to say that the full stop is the lumpen male of the punctuation world (do one job at a time; do it well; forget about it instantly) the apostrophe is the frantically multi-tasking female, dotting hither and yon, and succumbing to burnout from all the thankless effort."

We learn that the English rule for non-possessive apostrophes used with calendar decades is not to use one (1980s) while in America the rule is to insert one (1980's); to me the English are right here, as neither possession nor elision (the Greek root of "apostrophe") is needed and hence the apostrophe can be safely omitted--I can do so whilst being secure that somewhere else one is being needlessly inserted to keep the universe total constant.  Possessive case usage of apostrophes does get a tad pedantic, Truss acknowledges, giving us from Fowler's Modern English Usage the serial gem; use ''s" after modern names and also after foreign names which end with an unpronounced final "s"; use "s'" after ancient names, after names ending in "s" whose last syllable is pronounced "iz" and, last but surely not least, after "Jesus."  To which one can only say: "Sweet Jesus!"

"The fun of commas," she writes  "is of course the semantic havoc they can create when either wrongly inserted or carelessly omitted."  She tells of a hapless reader at a Macbeth reading who reads King Duncan's Act I line to a fallen soldier as "Go get him, surgeons!" instead of "Go, get him surgeons."  (Given medical care in Shakespeare's time the reader may have been wiser than Truss thinks.)  An even better example is found in Theodore M. Bernstein's Dos, Don'ts & Maybes of English Usage (Times Books 1977).  There the author cites Professor Maxwell Nurnberg's paired sentences: "What's the latest dope?" and "What's the latest, dope?"  After meandering around the disputations among grammarians concerning spliced comma versus semi-colon and "defining clause" commas Truss adds a simple rule, borne of exasperation: avoid "stupid" use of  commas, by which she means those that confound the meaning.  Of course, there are no less than 17 uses of the infernal squiggles.

A chapter entitled "Air and Graces" covers colons and semi-colons, much of their usage being one of aesthetic judgment.  Some writers hated them; others made promiscuous use of them.  Readers of LFTC know on which side of this argument I stand.  Let a thousand semi-colons bloom!  Re the exclamation point, Truss writes: ""In the family of punctuation, where the full stop is daddy and the comma is mummy, and the semi-colon quietly practises the piano with crossed hands, the exclamation mark (b. 15th c.) is the big attention-deficit brother who gets over-excited and breaks things and laughs too loudly."  To her eagle eye the question mark (b. punctus interrogativus 8th c.; current name given 19th c.) has an "elegant seahorse profile."  Italics are partly "a confession of stylistic failure" (do not tell her about LFTC!).  She blithely instructs us that quotation marks (b. 18th c. as inverted commas) mean that "'double or single' is a question applicable not only to beds, tennis and cream.'"  As for the four types of brackets and the differences between the English and American rules, be grateful you are not studying Arabic.  Saith Truss: " When a bracket opens halfway down a left-hand page and the closing bracket is, giddyingly, nowhere in sight, it's like being in a play by Jean-Paul Sartre."  She terms the ellipsis "the black hole of the universe, surely, into which no right-minded person would willingly be sucked, for three years, with no guarantee of a job at the end."  As for the lowly, perhaps soon-to-be-extinct hyphen (hated by Woodrow Wilson and Winston Churchill, who did not agree on much else), Truss reminds us that extra marital sex is not the same as extra-marital sex.  (Honey!  the hyphen strayed, not me!!)

Truss gives us her take on the impact of the Internet: "[B]y tragic historical coincidence a period of abysmal understanding in literacy has coincided with this unexpected explosion in global self-publishing.  Thus people who don't know their apostrophe from their elbow are positively invited to disseminate their writings to anyone on the planet stupid enough to double-click and scroll."  But she gives the Net some credit, calling the emoticon "the greatest (or most desperate, depending how you look at it) advance in punctuation since the question mark in the reign of Charlemagne."  Truss looks at it this way: She hates emoticons.

At closing, author Truss is passionate in her core conviction: "We have a language that is full of ambiguities; we have a way of expressing ourselves that is often complex and allusive, poetic and modulated; all our thoughts can be rendered with absolute clarity if we bother to put the right dots and squiggles between the words in the right places.  Proper punctuation is both the sign and the cause of clear thinking.  If it goes, the degree of intellectual impoverishment we face is unimaginable."

All of which brings to mind the classic Johnny Mercer lyrics to Accentuate the Positive; with Lynn Truss, writers had best not be Mr. In-Between.  Oh, and junk those stupid commas.

Index 11/2/06

4 posts: (1) Iraq: Army Up, Cops Down, Towel In, '07 Out--Us v. Them; (2) Kerry's Macaca Moment--The Home Front; (3) 2006 E Day Minus 6--The Home Front; (4) 2008: Webb-Footed Mitt?--The Home Front.

Bob Kupperman: A Great Passes On

Friday, November 24 saw the passing, at age 71, illness having long ago cut short his impressive career, of Dr. Robert Kupperman, in Washington, DC.  I first made Bob's acquaintance in 1983, when he directed a terrorism war game at The Georgetown Center for Strategic and International Studies.  By then I had read the first of two prescient books on terrorism that he had co-authored, Terrorism: Threat, Reality, Response (1979), which was the first comprehensive assessment of the gathering threat of terror strikes at the American homeland.   His later effort, Final Warning (1994), came on the heels of the first World Trade Center bombing.  Bob knew the enemy would return.  Tragically, from 1975 to the time that Parkinson's curtailed his ability to pursue his avocation, Bob was often unable to persuade administrations to take his sage advice.  In the conversations I was privileged to have with Bob, he was always a patient teacher, who first listened graciously to what those seeking his wisdom had themselves to say.  One of the wise men of his generation, which came of age during the Korean War, Bob tried to get more attention for his subject.  We paid the price of not taking Bob's advice on 9/11.  It was but the first instalment.

Iraq: Army Up, Cops Down, Towel In, '07 Out

Ralph Peters, continuing his "Arabs not ready for democracy prime time" says that the US should: (a) give up on the current, pro-Iran PM; (b) give up on the irremediably corrupt cops, who kill the honest ones and subvert our efforts; (c)take one last stab at upgrading the Army, taking care to groom officers for a possible coup; (d) if by next fall things are not straight, engineer the coup and withdraw US troops to Kurdistan.  Peters places nearly all the blame on the Iraqis, but this exonerates the civilian side of the American operation, whose blunders clearly were a major factor, as well as Rumsfeld's failure to shoot looters right after Baghdad fell.  Yet for the most part Peters is right: too many Arabs ain't ready for democracy yet.

Michael Gordon has a superb NY Times front-pager that details how a classified military briefing shows that the military command thinks Iraq is spiraling out of control; the article includes a single PowerPoint chart that is revealing, showing the spectrum of actions moving toward anarchy.  Fareed Zakhaira proposes retreat to protect Kurdistan; he adopts the Korea analogy, too.  He cites one poll that show 61 percent of Iraqis approving of attacks on US troops.

Pull the plug by late-'07.  Then go after Iran, once and for all.  Mike Ledeen speculates that the President plans, eventually, to do something, but fears too much time is being lost.  There is another reason to go after Iran: When you are losing on the battlefield, change the battlefield to one where you can win, taking the fight directly to the enemy's heartland.

Kerry's Macaca Moment

Game time for the mainstream media (MSM), which pounced on George Allen for a fortnight after Allen's distasteful "macaca" harangue directed at a junior staffer of James Webb's campaign, who was videotaping Allen at a rally, a perfectly routine operation these days.  The New York Sun reports the details of Kerry's pre-Halloween macaca moment:

"You know, education, if you make the most of it, you study hard, you do your homework, and you make an effort to be smart, you can do well. If you don't, you get stuck in Iraq."

So John Kerry, having "reported for duty" in 2004, running in part on his war decorations, disses GIs in the midst of a war in Iraq that already has claimed 2,500 US military lives and 20,000 wounded, about one-third seriously wounded.  Sound worse than childish heckling of a campaign staffer?

Let's see how much is made of the Democrats most recent Presidential candidate, who is mulling a possible second shot in 2008, as compared to that made in a Virginia Senatorial race by a Republican (no longer) hopeful.  Recall Dan Quayle getting nailed for "potatoe" while Al Gore got an MSM pass for translating e pluribus unum as "out of one, many"?

2006 E-Day Minus 6

LFTC has resolutely avoided covering election polls because (a) races that are close change often daily and (b) most polls are B.S. anyway.  Only "likely voter" polls have any chance to be accurate, especially as off-year elections typically are "base" elections with independents staying home and turnout under 40 percent (2004 turnout was 60 percent; 2000 - 50 percent).  Another intriguing factor re polls: pollsters do not have cell-phone numbers, and as landline use declines their samples will become yet more skewed.

But Congressional Qaurterly, a sober weekly if ever there is one, published on 10/31 its final pre-election poll: House: Ds 210, Rs 207, 18 undecided (Rs need 11 of the 18); Senate: Rs 49, Ds 48, 3 undecided (Missouri, New Jersey, Tennessee).

2008: Webb-Footed Mitt?

George Will handicaps the Republican field in 2008 and narrows it down to a pair: John McCain and Mitt Romney.  Will believes two things that seem universally shared among pundits: (1) Rudy Giuliani will not run, or if he does he is toast in the Republican primaries; (b) George Allen's making hash of his senatorial re-election campaign against James Webb has trashed his 2008 hopes for higher office.

Will, ever ready with intriguing political facts, notes: (1) 2008 is the first election since 1952 in which no serious effort was made by either party's sitting President or Vice-President: (b) it is the first election since 1928, if the 1952 abortive efforts of Truman and V-P Alben Barkley are discounted as insignificant, when a serious bid is not being made by the holder of either office; (30 it is the first election since 1824 to come after back-to-back eight-year Presidencies (the earlier duo were the two "James" guys: Madison and Monroe).

I remain more sanguine about Giuliani's chances, should he decide to run, than most pundits.  He polls better than McCain among independents.  But Will closes with an interesting conclusion:  The big winner for 2008 out of the 2006 election cycle is Mitt Romney,and the big loser is McCain.  Even if Allen squeaks in, his stinker campaign and the need to raise $60 million from scratch make 2008 a dim prospect for him.  Romney emerges as the candidate closest to the Republican base, as Allen recedes.  And in new Hampshire the independents who gave McCain victory over Bush in 2000 will be drawn to the more exciting race, on the Democratic side, rather than vote in the Republican primary.

Index 11/1/06

3 posts: (1) America's Churchill--The Home Front; (2) The UN's Nuclear Inspector Clouseau--Turtle Bay Tortoise; (3) France: A "Rudy" in Their Future?--Weenie Watch; (4) Iraq: Will Says "Win We Won't"--Us v. Them.

America's Churchill

The man who is by far the best Senator in America among those facing re-election, and is arguably the best of the entire 100, Pennsylvania Republican two-termer Rick Santorum, has become America's Churchill.  Santorum has read Churchill's great volume, The Gathering Storm, which recounts how Britain, France and other free countries ignoring signs of Hitler's aggression and thus led Hitler to launch World War II.  Trailing in the polls, some showing him way behind, Santorum is ignoring hot-button issues and sounding instead the tocsin on Iran's nuclear threat and the need to move decisively to stop it.  It is not a message a war-weary public wants to hear--in Pennsylvania or, in all probability, anywhere else.  But with even the Administration talking baby-chatter on the issue, it is nice to see one politician talking realistically and soberly about Iran.

The UN's Nuclear Inspector Clouseau

Anne Bayevsky, Hudson Institute's peerless UN watcher,  gives us in a Washington Times op-ed the wit and wisdom, such as it is, of IAEA chief inspector Muhammad el-Baradei.  He explains to Ms. Bayevsky (and the rest of us) that the Iran and North Korean nuke quest are "not really leader-specific. It is country-specific: a country feeling insecure. And if it sees that the people in the major leagues are relying on nuclear weapons, it will at the very least be tempted to do the same."  His second pearl of wisdom: "The second myth is that nuclear weapons are OK in the hands of 'the good guys' and not OK in the hands of 'the bad guys' ... We need to have a system that is not based on subjective considerations."  How does one spell "imbecile" in Arabic?

So, in Inspector Clouseau's world, the difference is "subjective," as between liberal Western democracies, and: (a) a Stalinist terror state that starves its people to produce a hundred pounds of plutonium; and (b) a revolutionary Islamic regime that wishes to wipe out 5 million Jews in Israel--and hopes all the world's Jew congregate there, so as to save the Iranians from having to chase down Jews. elsewhere on the planet.

Meanwhile, WSJ editor Bret Stephens explains why Iran can likely make an A-bomb by the end of 2007.  Ten years after the project started, Russia's gift to Iran, Bushehr I, is well on the way to October 2007 full operation.  By March 2007 Iran will have 3,000 centrifuges.  Within a year of Bushehr I going full tilt, 300 kilograms of plutonium--enough for 55 Nagasaki nukes--could be made.  The waste material generated out of the first months will enable Iran to make a few bombs as a 2007 XMAS present to the West. (Meanwhile, our CIA cruises along, predicting 2010 to 2015 as the time frame for an Iranian bomb.)   And thus render the most important issue for the 2008 campaign moot before the first primary.

Earth to Bush & Condi: time to cut out the baby talk about the UN--and about Iran, and have a serious private chat with our "allies" in Europe.

France: A "Rudy" In their Future?

Urban super-historian Fred Siegel has an NY Post op-ed on the Muslim problem in France.  Seems that on the anniversary of last year's outbreak of Muslim rioting only 277 cars were torched.  But this year's attacks, writes Siegel, were (a) better organized and (b) targeted people outside the Muslim suburbs--in Paris proper.  Among France's politicians, as the 2009 election looms, only Interior Minister Nicholas Sarkozy seems prepared to do a "Rudy Giuliani" and confront the Muslim crime wave.  The survival of the Fifth Republic (established 1958 by Charles DeGaulle) is in doubt.

Iraq: Will Says "Win We Won't"

George Will, in tart form, says Iraq is lost and only the Administration does not know it.  The vignettes he gives in support of his proposition are worth reading.