Cognitive Dissonance...
I'll never relate in the same way when I hear someone say that they "dissed" someone. A great follow-up to Paul Mirengoff's Forever Young followed earlier here. From Scylla& Charybdis...
Friday, December 30, 2005
Intelligence leaks...
Finally there is movement in securing our intelligence agencies. At least, rooting out the leakers in the agencies. It will be interesting to see where this leads.... read Michelle malkin.
BobPods...
Did you get your BobPod this Christmas/Hanukkah? The iPod, the biggest selling item this season, was made specially useful with the intro of the BobPod...
Cupertino, California
iPod sales and marketing,
Great job guys. We are really excited about the new Signature Series iPods. Our initial offering was the successful black colored U2 and our latest success is the BobPod. We can't put enough in the pipeline to supply our distributors. We can't supply medicare with their orders as well. As you know, the Surgeon General has ordered that every person on Medicare or anyone being cared for by government supplied medical authorities should be issued a BobPod. We've done our job too well. You designed in the complete personal music environment in the iPod and added the (licensed) character of that universally loved Bob. Can you imagine the endless hours afforded people to not only listen to their favorite music but to get their face licked at the same time. A real boon to progressively lonely "Baby Boomers" in their retirement years. Pure genius.
Finally there is movement in securing our intelligence agencies. At least, rooting out the leakers in the agencies. It will be interesting to see where this leads.... read Michelle malkin.
BobPods...
Did you get your BobPod this Christmas/Hanukkah? The iPod, the biggest selling item this season, was made specially useful with the intro of the BobPod...
Cupertino, California
iPod sales and marketing,
Great job guys. We are really excited about the new Signature Series iPods. Our initial offering was the successful black colored U2 and our latest success is the BobPod. We can't put enough in the pipeline to supply our distributors. We can't supply medicare with their orders as well. As you know, the Surgeon General has ordered that every person on Medicare or anyone being cared for by government supplied medical authorities should be issued a BobPod. We've done our job too well. You designed in the complete personal music environment in the iPod and added the (licensed) character of that universally loved Bob. Can you imagine the endless hours afforded people to not only listen to their favorite music but to get their face licked at the same time. A real boon to progressively lonely "Baby Boomers" in their retirement years. Pure genius.
BobKong...
Hollywood, California
Squishy Distribution International
We're proud of Bob's first couple of weeks. He has eclipsed Narnia and that other movie about the monkeys and lizards. The distribution must move to the second tier to capture the audience that wants to escape the bowl/Super Bowl games. BobKong provides the best known actors, of course, Bob, and the classic tale of two of man's best friends. The film must expand to 1156 domestic theatres by December 31. By January 3, we must introduce 2187 international theatres. We have them on the run and Bob is sure to get the Oscar this time around.
Hauntings...
For thirty or more years liberals have gauged the world by their perceptions of Vietnam. Paul Mirengoff discusses that here.
Mired...
A good example of those that have been mired for way too long is Ted Kennedy. His gut reaction is always wrong and his truthfulness tainted.
Media blindness...
When is good news, well, good news? Aren't there any MSM professionals that are not so blinded that they will pursue the truth-in-reporting? Or, are editorial decisions based wholly on election possibilities for 2006. From the GatewayPundit...
Under siege...
How can anyone say that Christianity isn't under siege by the secularists. It is one thing to have a different view and disagree with a person's religion but to mock or attempt to marginalize that belief by another flies in the face of the "politically correct" manifesto... read here.
Wednesday, December 28, 2005
Passed on by Sherman Hawley
Subject: Happy Holidays
For Our Democratic Friends:
"Please accept with no obligation, implied or implicit, our best wishes for an environmentally conscious, socially responsible, low-stress, non-addictive, gender-neutral celebration of the winter solstice holiday, practiced within the most enjoyable traditions of the religious persuasion of your choice, or secular practices of your choice, with respect for the religious/secular persuasion and/or traditions of others, or their choice not to practice religious or secular traditions at all. We also wish you a fiscally successful, personally fulfilling and medically uncomplicated recognition of the onset of the generally accepted calendar year 2006, but not without due respect for the calendars of choice of other cultures whose contributions to society have helped make America great. Not to imply that America is necessarily greater than any other country nor the only America in the Western Hemisphere. And without regard to the race, creed, color, age, physical ability, religious faith or sexual preference of the wishee. By accepting these greetings you are accepting these terms. This greeting is subject to clarification or withdrawal. It is freely transferable with no alteration to the original greeting. It implies no promise by the wisher to actually implement any of the wishes for herself or himself or others, and is void where prohibited by law and is revocable at the sole discretion of the wisher. This wish is warranted to perform as expected within the usual application of good tidings for a period of one year or until the issuance of a subsequent holiday greeting, whichever comes first, and warranty is limited to replacement of this wish or issuance of a new wish at the sole discretion of the wisher."
For Our Republican Friends:
Here's wishing you all a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.
Subject: Happy Holidays
For Our Democratic Friends:
"Please accept with no obligation, implied or implicit, our best wishes for an environmentally conscious, socially responsible, low-stress, non-addictive, gender-neutral celebration of the winter solstice holiday, practiced within the most enjoyable traditions of the religious persuasion of your choice, or secular practices of your choice, with respect for the religious/secular persuasion and/or traditions of others, or their choice not to practice religious or secular traditions at all. We also wish you a fiscally successful, personally fulfilling and medically uncomplicated recognition of the onset of the generally accepted calendar year 2006, but not without due respect for the calendars of choice of other cultures whose contributions to society have helped make America great. Not to imply that America is necessarily greater than any other country nor the only America in the Western Hemisphere. And without regard to the race, creed, color, age, physical ability, religious faith or sexual preference of the wishee. By accepting these greetings you are accepting these terms. This greeting is subject to clarification or withdrawal. It is freely transferable with no alteration to the original greeting. It implies no promise by the wisher to actually implement any of the wishes for herself or himself or others, and is void where prohibited by law and is revocable at the sole discretion of the wisher. This wish is warranted to perform as expected within the usual application of good tidings for a period of one year or until the issuance of a subsequent holiday greeting, whichever comes first, and warranty is limited to replacement of this wish or issuance of a new wish at the sole discretion of the wisher."
For Our Republican Friends:
Here's wishing you all a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.
John Hinderaker, Power Line
Centrist Democrats Fret About National Security
Donald Lambro reports on concerns among "centrist Democrats" that the party's attack on the Patriot Act and on the administration's legal surveillance programs will hurt it at the polls in 2006:
These Democrats say attacks on anti-terrorist intelligence programs will deepen mistrust of their ability to protect the nation's security, a weakness that led in part to the defeat of Sen. John Kerry, the Democratic presidential nominee, last year.
"The Republicans still hold the advantage on every national-security issue we tested," said Mark Penn, a Democratic pollster and former adviser to President Clinton, who co-authored a Democratic Leadership Council (DLC) memo on the party's national-security weaknesses.
Nervousness among Democrats intensified earlier this month after Democrats led a filibuster against the Patriot Act that threatened to block the measure, followed by a victory cry from Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, Nevada Democrat, who declared at a party rally, "We killed the Patriot Act."
Current polls show the Republicans with a ten-point lead on "which party can be trusted more to fight terrorism."
One basic question is how many centrist Democrats still exist. My guess is that most of those who could legitimately be termed centrist, especially on foreign policy, have left the Democratic Party, or at least stopped voting for its candidates. The party's leadership team of Howard Dean, Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi must be the most extreme in modern American history. But I've seen no indication that their extremism hurts them with the party's rank and file. So I don't see much prospect that the Democrats' leftward march will be halted; the question, I think, is whether they are marching off a cliff.
Centrist Democrats Fret About National Security
Donald Lambro reports on concerns among "centrist Democrats" that the party's attack on the Patriot Act and on the administration's legal surveillance programs will hurt it at the polls in 2006:
These Democrats say attacks on anti-terrorist intelligence programs will deepen mistrust of their ability to protect the nation's security, a weakness that led in part to the defeat of Sen. John Kerry, the Democratic presidential nominee, last year.
"The Republicans still hold the advantage on every national-security issue we tested," said Mark Penn, a Democratic pollster and former adviser to President Clinton, who co-authored a Democratic Leadership Council (DLC) memo on the party's national-security weaknesses.
Nervousness among Democrats intensified earlier this month after Democrats led a filibuster against the Patriot Act that threatened to block the measure, followed by a victory cry from Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, Nevada Democrat, who declared at a party rally, "We killed the Patriot Act."
Current polls show the Republicans with a ten-point lead on "which party can be trusted more to fight terrorism."
One basic question is how many centrist Democrats still exist. My guess is that most of those who could legitimately be termed centrist, especially on foreign policy, have left the Democratic Party, or at least stopped voting for its candidates. The party's leadership team of Howard Dean, Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi must be the most extreme in modern American history. But I've seen no indication that their extremism hurts them with the party's rank and file. So I don't see much prospect that the Democrats' leftward march will be halted; the question, I think, is whether they are marching off a cliff.
Tuesday, December 27, 2005
John Hinderaker, from his Power Line blog
Our Advice to Democrats: Cheer Up!
This morning I came across one of the most remarkable pieces of poll data I've seen in a long time, in the Quinnipiac University poll that was released yesterday. The poll has generally been cited for its finding that Americans are highly optimistic about 2006; by a margin of 79% to 10%, respondents say that they expect 2006 to be better for them personally than 2005.
But here is what I found stunning. Respondents were also asked whether 2005 had been better for them personally than 2004. By a 53% to 33% margin, they said it was better rather than worse. But look at the partisan breakdown behind that number:
Q.: Do you think 2005 was better or worse than 2004 for you personally?
Republicans:
Better: 65%
Worse: 22%
Democrats:
Better: 41%
Worse: 45%
Note that the question was not about the direction of the country, or about any aspect of current affairs; respondents were asked how 2005 was for "you personally." It's a generally accepted fact, I think, that Republicans tend to be happier and more optimistic people than Democrats. Still, I find these results astonishing. The only apparent explanation is that Democrats--not just the activists and political junkies, but millions and millions of Democrats--were so depressed over President Bush's re-election that they perceived 2005 as a bad year for them "personally."
This explains, I guess, the venom and persistence with which the Democrats attack the Bush administration. It appears that millions of them really believe that President Bush is ruining their lives! There are lots of Democrats, apparently, who need to take a deep breath, get over the last election, and cheer up.
Our Advice to Democrats: Cheer Up!
This morning I came across one of the most remarkable pieces of poll data I've seen in a long time, in the Quinnipiac University poll that was released yesterday. The poll has generally been cited for its finding that Americans are highly optimistic about 2006; by a margin of 79% to 10%, respondents say that they expect 2006 to be better for them personally than 2005.
But here is what I found stunning. Respondents were also asked whether 2005 had been better for them personally than 2004. By a 53% to 33% margin, they said it was better rather than worse. But look at the partisan breakdown behind that number:
Q.: Do you think 2005 was better or worse than 2004 for you personally?
Republicans:
Better: 65%
Worse: 22%
Democrats:
Better: 41%
Worse: 45%
Note that the question was not about the direction of the country, or about any aspect of current affairs; respondents were asked how 2005 was for "you personally." It's a generally accepted fact, I think, that Republicans tend to be happier and more optimistic people than Democrats. Still, I find these results astonishing. The only apparent explanation is that Democrats--not just the activists and political junkies, but millions and millions of Democrats--were so depressed over President Bush's re-election that they perceived 2005 as a bad year for them "personally."
This explains, I guess, the venom and persistence with which the Democrats attack the Bush administration. It appears that millions of them really believe that President Bush is ruining their lives! There are lots of Democrats, apparently, who need to take a deep breath, get over the last election, and cheer up.
Monday, December 26, 2005
NASA/Jet Propulsion Laboratory/CALTech
The planned trip to Mars of the Colombus Rover and its handpicked crew was delayed yesterday by what some are saying is the biggest scandal that has hit NASA since the blueberry jam hit the windshield. Dan Rather (and you know how concerned and unbiased he is) was first to report that insensitive acts were overtly played out on a daily basis. The target of much of this abuse was directed toward the smallest (isn't it always so) member of the crew, the usually resilient Bob. It seems that among other episodes his year supply of "squishies" were jettisoned from the main vehicle. Contrary to current testimony this was no accident. Rumors have been spread by usually reliable sources that some crew members were not as tolerant of Bob's intense occupation with his beloved toys. Conversations were overheard like, "If that fur-ball floats past me again snapping at that chunk of rubber I'm going to scream!" and " Why should I have to throw that thing?"
The NASA interim Director, Ralph W. Emerson was quick to say that an ongoing investigation was in place and that responsible parties would be dealt with severely. He went on to say that the timing was unfortunate and was quite possibly politically motivated.
Above is a picture taken of Bob retrieving his hoard.
Saturday, December 24, 2005
Merry Christmas from our
family to yours, enjoy every moment!
But, a word of caution...
be careful, they're only little kids...
Don't spill your guts!
Give them time to be kids...
they'll find out everything they
need to know about Santa Claus
and, well, Bob too! You
have a choice. You can either
wind up with a lump of
coal under your pillow, or
wind up the road to Tahoe in
your new Porsche! It's up to you...
What do you want SantaBob to leave you?
The Paranoid Style In American Liberalism
by William Kristol
The Weekly Standard, 01/02/2006, Volume 011, Issue 16
No reasonable American, no decent human being, wants to send up a white flag in the war on terror. But leading spokesmen for American liberalism-hostile beyond reason to the Bush administration, and ready to believe the worst about American public servants-seem to have concluded that the terror threat is mostly imaginary. It is the threat to civil liberties from George W. Bush that is the real danger. These liberals recoil unthinkingly from the obvious fact that our national security requires policies that are a step (but only a careful step) removed from ACLU dogma.
On Monday, December 19, General Michael Hayden, former director of the National Security Agency and now deputy director of national intelligence, briefed journalists. The back--and--forth included this exchange:
Reporter: Have you identified armed enemy combatants, through this program, in the United States?
Gen. Hayden: This program has been successful in detecting and preventing attacks inside the United States.
Reporter: General Hayden, I know you're not going to talk about specifics about that, and you say it's been successful. But would it have been as successful-can you unequivocally say that something has been stopped or there was an imminent attack or you got information through this that you could not have gotten through going to the court?
Gen. Hayden: I can say unequivocally, all right, that we have got information through this program that would not otherwise have been available.
Now, General Hayden is by all accounts a serious, experienced, nonpolitical military officer. You would think that a statement like this, by a man in his position, would at least slow down the glib assertions of politicians, op--ed writers, and journalists that there was no conceivable reason for President Bush to bypass the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) court. As Gary Schmitt and David Tell explain elsewhere in this issue, FISA was broken well before 9/11. Was the president to ignore the evident fact that FISA's procedures and strictures were simply incompatible with dealing with the al Qaeda threat in an expeditious manner? Was the president to ignore the obvious incapacity of any court, operating under any intelligible legal standard, to judge surveillance decisions involving the sweeping of massive numbers of cell phones and emails by high--speed computers in order even to know where to focus resources? Was the president, in the wake of 9/11, and with the threat of imminent new attacks, really supposed to sit on his hands and gamble that Congress might figure out a way to fix FISA, if it could even be fixed? The questions answer themselves.
But the spokesmen for contemporary liberalism didn't pause to even ask these questions. The day after Gen. Hayden's press briefing, the ranking Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee blathered on about "the Constitution in crisis" and "impeachable conduct." Barbara Boxer, a Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, asserted there was "no excuse" for the president's actions. The ranking Democrat on that committee, Joseph Biden, confidently stated that the president's claims were "bizarre" and that "aggrandizement of power" was probably the primary reason for the president's actions, since "there was no need to do any of this." So we are really to believe that President Bush just sat around after 9/11 thinking, "How can I aggrandize my powers?" Or that Gen. Hayden-and his hundreds of nonpolitical subordinates-cheerfully agreed to an obviously crazy, bizarre, and unnecessary project of "domestic spying"?
This is the fever swamp into which American liberalism is on the verge of descending.
Some have already descended. Consider Arlene Getz, senior editorial manager at Newsweek.com. She posted an article Wednesday-also after Gen. Hayden's press briefing-on Newsweek's website ruminating on "the parallels" between Bush's defense of his "spying program" and, yes, "South Africa's apartheid regime."
Back in the 1980s, when I was living in Johannesburg and reporting on apartheid South Africa, a white neighbor proffered a tasteless confession. She was "quite relieved," she told me, that new media restrictions prohibited our reporting on government repression. No matter that Pretoria was detaining tens of thousands of people without real evidence of wrongdoing. No matter that many of them, including children, were being tortured-sometimes to death. No matter that government hit squads were killing political opponents. No matter that police were shooting into crowds of black civilians protesting against their disenfranchisement. "It's so nice," confided my neighbor, "not to open the papers and read all that bad news."
I thought about that neighbor this week, as reports dribbled out about President George W. Bush's sanctioning of warrantless eavesdropping on American conversations. . . . I'm sure there are many well--meaning Americans who agree with their president's explanation that it's all a necessary evil (and that patriotic citizens will not be spied on unless they dial up Osama bin Laden). But the nasty echoes of apartheid South Africa should at least give them pause.
Yup. First the Bush administration will listen in to international communications of a few hundred people in America who seem to have been in touch with terrorists abroad . . . and next thing you know, government hit squads will be killing George W. Bush's political opponents.
What is one to say about these media--Democratic spokesmen for contemporary American liberalism? That they have embarrassed and discredited themselves. That they cannot be taken seriously as critics. It would be good to have a responsible opposition party in the United States today. It would be good to have a serious mainstream media. Too bad we have neither.
by William Kristol
The Weekly Standard, 01/02/2006, Volume 011, Issue 16
No reasonable American, no decent human being, wants to send up a white flag in the war on terror. But leading spokesmen for American liberalism-hostile beyond reason to the Bush administration, and ready to believe the worst about American public servants-seem to have concluded that the terror threat is mostly imaginary. It is the threat to civil liberties from George W. Bush that is the real danger. These liberals recoil unthinkingly from the obvious fact that our national security requires policies that are a step (but only a careful step) removed from ACLU dogma.
On Monday, December 19, General Michael Hayden, former director of the National Security Agency and now deputy director of national intelligence, briefed journalists. The back--and--forth included this exchange:
Reporter: Have you identified armed enemy combatants, through this program, in the United States?
Gen. Hayden: This program has been successful in detecting and preventing attacks inside the United States.
Reporter: General Hayden, I know you're not going to talk about specifics about that, and you say it's been successful. But would it have been as successful-can you unequivocally say that something has been stopped or there was an imminent attack or you got information through this that you could not have gotten through going to the court?
Gen. Hayden: I can say unequivocally, all right, that we have got information through this program that would not otherwise have been available.
Now, General Hayden is by all accounts a serious, experienced, nonpolitical military officer. You would think that a statement like this, by a man in his position, would at least slow down the glib assertions of politicians, op--ed writers, and journalists that there was no conceivable reason for President Bush to bypass the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) court. As Gary Schmitt and David Tell explain elsewhere in this issue, FISA was broken well before 9/11. Was the president to ignore the evident fact that FISA's procedures and strictures were simply incompatible with dealing with the al Qaeda threat in an expeditious manner? Was the president to ignore the obvious incapacity of any court, operating under any intelligible legal standard, to judge surveillance decisions involving the sweeping of massive numbers of cell phones and emails by high--speed computers in order even to know where to focus resources? Was the president, in the wake of 9/11, and with the threat of imminent new attacks, really supposed to sit on his hands and gamble that Congress might figure out a way to fix FISA, if it could even be fixed? The questions answer themselves.
But the spokesmen for contemporary liberalism didn't pause to even ask these questions. The day after Gen. Hayden's press briefing, the ranking Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee blathered on about "the Constitution in crisis" and "impeachable conduct." Barbara Boxer, a Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, asserted there was "no excuse" for the president's actions. The ranking Democrat on that committee, Joseph Biden, confidently stated that the president's claims were "bizarre" and that "aggrandizement of power" was probably the primary reason for the president's actions, since "there was no need to do any of this." So we are really to believe that President Bush just sat around after 9/11 thinking, "How can I aggrandize my powers?" Or that Gen. Hayden-and his hundreds of nonpolitical subordinates-cheerfully agreed to an obviously crazy, bizarre, and unnecessary project of "domestic spying"?
This is the fever swamp into which American liberalism is on the verge of descending.
Some have already descended. Consider Arlene Getz, senior editorial manager at Newsweek.com. She posted an article Wednesday-also after Gen. Hayden's press briefing-on Newsweek's website ruminating on "the parallels" between Bush's defense of his "spying program" and, yes, "South Africa's apartheid regime."
Back in the 1980s, when I was living in Johannesburg and reporting on apartheid South Africa, a white neighbor proffered a tasteless confession. She was "quite relieved," she told me, that new media restrictions prohibited our reporting on government repression. No matter that Pretoria was detaining tens of thousands of people without real evidence of wrongdoing. No matter that many of them, including children, were being tortured-sometimes to death. No matter that government hit squads were killing political opponents. No matter that police were shooting into crowds of black civilians protesting against their disenfranchisement. "It's so nice," confided my neighbor, "not to open the papers and read all that bad news."
I thought about that neighbor this week, as reports dribbled out about President George W. Bush's sanctioning of warrantless eavesdropping on American conversations. . . . I'm sure there are many well--meaning Americans who agree with their president's explanation that it's all a necessary evil (and that patriotic citizens will not be spied on unless they dial up Osama bin Laden). But the nasty echoes of apartheid South Africa should at least give them pause.
Yup. First the Bush administration will listen in to international communications of a few hundred people in America who seem to have been in touch with terrorists abroad . . . and next thing you know, government hit squads will be killing George W. Bush's political opponents.
What is one to say about these media--Democratic spokesmen for contemporary American liberalism? That they have embarrassed and discredited themselves. That they cannot be taken seriously as critics. It would be good to have a responsible opposition party in the United States today. It would be good to have a serious mainstream media. Too bad we have neither.
Thursday, December 22, 2005
BOBelectrical
BoBulbs Division
Sales Memo:
You are all aware of the famously recognizable ad program that we've embarked on that has continued our move forward worldwide in the lighting market. Yes, the world is a brighter place. If we compare the NASA photos taken of the earth at night before BoBulb's introduction just two years ago the impact is dramatic when compared to tonight's glow.
But we do have problems that need to be addressed:
• Our 7 continental teams haven't been getting the same
results.
• What happened to our Canadian sales? Or, do they just
go to bed early?
• Africa's sales have been abysmal, except for Johannesberg.
• Amazon Basin continues to be in the dark.
• Mongolia and central asia are underlit.
• Australia must be using Sylvania.
The management team has been getting pressure from above to get the lead out. Bob has been doing global fly-overs on a regular basis and expects results as you are aware of... Our goal is to generate a 20 percent light gain by the end of 2006.
Wednesday, December 21, 2005
Close the "Trap"
Voters aren't likely to want a Speaker Pelosi or Majority Leader Reid in the midst of the War on Terror.
by Daniel McKivergan
12/20/2005 12:00:00 AM
THE WASHINGTON POST reported last weekendthat strategists at the Democratic Leadership Council fear Democrats could be walking into "a trap" on Iraq. In a strategy memo to Democrats last week, they warned "party leaders not to use Bush's problems as an invitation to call for an immediate U.S. withdrawal from Iraq, or generally to steer a more liberal course that could alienate the middle-of-the-road voters the party needs."
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi evidently got the message. She told the Post on Friday that "there is no one Democratic voice . . . and there is no one Democratic position" on the war. Yet only three weeks ago, Pelosi endorsed Rep. Murtha's immediate "redeployment" plan, and said she believed "that a majority of our caucus clearly supports Mr. Murtha."
Her remarks brought a quick, panicky response from Democrats charged with gaining seats in the midterm election. "Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee Chairman Rahm Emanuel (IL) and Rep. Steny H. Hoyer (MD), the second-ranking House Democratic leader," reported the Post, "have told colleagues that Pelosi's recent endorsement of a speedy withdrawal, combined with her claim that more than half of House Democrats support her position, could backfire on the party . . ."
But while Pelosi's comments weren't welcomed by party strategists, Howard Dean's outburst a few days later was even worse for a party seeking credibility on national security issues. He told a radio audience that American forces can't "win the war in Iraq," that we need to "bring the 80,000 National Guard
and Reserve troops home immediately," and that the remaining force should fight Zarqawi from a "neighboring country." Representative Earl Pomeroy (D-ND) reacted by telling the national Democratic party chairman to "shut up."
What's going on is simple. Strategists looking for big gains in 2006 want to stoke the anti-war base just enough so they show up at the polls but not so much that they become the face of the party. It's easy to understand why. Tucked inside the latest New York Times / CBS poll, released on December 8, are some interesting numbers. In reporting on their poll, the Times wrote:
"[T]here are political risks for Democrats if they move too far toward their base: 36 percent of respondents (including a third of the independents) said they would be less likely to vote for their Congressional representative if he or she advocated an immediate withdrawal, while 21 percent said they would be more likely to vote for that official. Representative Nancy Pelosi of California, the Democratic leader of the House, recently embraced a call for a speedy withdrawal. Moreover, many Americans remain anxious about the impact of withdrawal, with 46 percent saying it would increase the likelihood of violence in Iraq and 40 percent saying it would increase (only 8 percent said decrease) the likelihood of terrorism against the United States."
On the question of whether U.S. action in Iraq has made us more safe or less safe from terrorism or made no difference, 35 percent of the respondents said more safe, 22 percent less, and 41 percent no difference.
These numbers are remarkable considering that the White House has only recently begun to defend itself against the Democratic assault on its Iraq policy. They also present an opportunity for the GOP in 2006.
Republicans should remind people that their votes will determine whether there's a Speaker Pelosi and whether other liberals will gain important committee chairs. At the same time, Republicans shouldn't let a day go by without mentioning the fact that the head of the DNC, the top House Democrat, and major Democratic activist groups such as Moveon.org have called on the president to begin immediately the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq. They should also explain the national security consequences of such a course, and remind voters what Zarqawi and Zawahiri have to say about an American withdrawal.
In their memo, the DLC advised Democrats against steering a liberal course on Iraq. But the DLC warning comes a bit late. Pelosi and Dean and prominent Senate liberals have already steered Democrats into an election ditch; good luck getting out.
Daniel McKivergan is the online foreign editor of The Weekly Standard and edits the WorldwideStandard.
Voters aren't likely to want a Speaker Pelosi or Majority Leader Reid in the midst of the War on Terror.
by Daniel McKivergan
12/20/2005 12:00:00 AM
THE WASHINGTON POST reported last weekendthat strategists at the Democratic Leadership Council fear Democrats could be walking into "a trap" on Iraq. In a strategy memo to Democrats last week, they warned "party leaders not to use Bush's problems as an invitation to call for an immediate U.S. withdrawal from Iraq, or generally to steer a more liberal course that could alienate the middle-of-the-road voters the party needs."
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi evidently got the message. She told the Post on Friday that "there is no one Democratic voice . . . and there is no one Democratic position" on the war. Yet only three weeks ago, Pelosi endorsed Rep. Murtha's immediate "redeployment" plan, and said she believed "that a majority of our caucus clearly supports Mr. Murtha."
Her remarks brought a quick, panicky response from Democrats charged with gaining seats in the midterm election. "Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee Chairman Rahm Emanuel (IL) and Rep. Steny H. Hoyer (MD), the second-ranking House Democratic leader," reported the Post, "have told colleagues that Pelosi's recent endorsement of a speedy withdrawal, combined with her claim that more than half of House Democrats support her position, could backfire on the party . . ."
But while Pelosi's comments weren't welcomed by party strategists, Howard Dean's outburst a few days later was even worse for a party seeking credibility on national security issues. He told a radio audience that American forces can't "win the war in Iraq," that we need to "bring the 80,000 National Guard
and Reserve troops home immediately," and that the remaining force should fight Zarqawi from a "neighboring country." Representative Earl Pomeroy (D-ND) reacted by telling the national Democratic party chairman to "shut up."
What's going on is simple. Strategists looking for big gains in 2006 want to stoke the anti-war base just enough so they show up at the polls but not so much that they become the face of the party. It's easy to understand why. Tucked inside the latest New York Times / CBS poll, released on December 8, are some interesting numbers. In reporting on their poll, the Times wrote:
"[T]here are political risks for Democrats if they move too far toward their base: 36 percent of respondents (including a third of the independents) said they would be less likely to vote for their Congressional representative if he or she advocated an immediate withdrawal, while 21 percent said they would be more likely to vote for that official. Representative Nancy Pelosi of California, the Democratic leader of the House, recently embraced a call for a speedy withdrawal. Moreover, many Americans remain anxious about the impact of withdrawal, with 46 percent saying it would increase the likelihood of violence in Iraq and 40 percent saying it would increase (only 8 percent said decrease) the likelihood of terrorism against the United States."
On the question of whether U.S. action in Iraq has made us more safe or less safe from terrorism or made no difference, 35 percent of the respondents said more safe, 22 percent less, and 41 percent no difference.
These numbers are remarkable considering that the White House has only recently begun to defend itself against the Democratic assault on its Iraq policy. They also present an opportunity for the GOP in 2006.
Republicans should remind people that their votes will determine whether there's a Speaker Pelosi and whether other liberals will gain important committee chairs. At the same time, Republicans shouldn't let a day go by without mentioning the fact that the head of the DNC, the top House Democrat, and major Democratic activist groups such as Moveon.org have called on the president to begin immediately the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq. They should also explain the national security consequences of such a course, and remind voters what Zarqawi and Zawahiri have to say about an American withdrawal.
In their memo, the DLC advised Democrats against steering a liberal course on Iraq. But the DLC warning comes a bit late. Pelosi and Dean and prominent Senate liberals have already steered Democrats into an election ditch; good luck getting out.
Daniel McKivergan is the online foreign editor of The Weekly Standard and edits the WorldwideStandard.
Ed is one of the sane voices coming from the Democratic party... the rest would rather inflict any type of damage possible politically at the expense of a nation and world that has a proprietary interest in all of us forging ahead in our common defense...
December 21, 2005
The President Is Not the Enemy
By Ed Koch
The media and the Democratic congressional leadership, including Senator Harry Reid and Representative Nancy Pelosi, joined by some other members of Congress, have denounced President Bush for, as The New York Times noted, secretly authorizing the National Security Agency “to intercept the communications of Americans and terrorist suspects inside the Untied States without first obtaining warrants from a secret court that oversees intelligence matters…”
According to The Times, “sometime in 2002, President Bush signed a secret executive order scrapping a painfully reached, 25-year-old national consensus: spying on Americans by their government should generally be prohibited, and when it is allowed, it should be regulated and supervised by the courts. The laws and executive orders governing electronic eavesdropping by the intelligence agency were specifically devised to uphold the Fourth Amendment’s prohibition of unreasonable searches and seizures.”
The Times continues, ““But Mr. Bush secretly decided that he was going to allow the agency to spy on American citizens without obtaining a warrant -- just as he had earlier decided to scrap the Geneva Conventions, American law and Army regulations when it came to handling prisoners in the war on terror.”
As reported by The Times, the President acknowledged Saturday that “he had ordered the National Security Agency to conduct an electronic eavesdropping program in the United States without first obtaining warrants and said he would continue the highly classified program because it was a ‘vital tool in our war against the terrorists.’”
I wish The Times and members of Congress were not so eager to demean the President of the U.S. and his advisers, holding them up to scathing denunciation when we are at war. They should realize that the President feels very strongly his obligation to protect us from terrorists overseas and their supporters in this country -- in World War II, such supporters were called Quislings. The critics have short memories. In the 1993 and 9/11 (2001) attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, the U.S. suffered nearly 3,000 deaths and more than 1,000 injured.
The Times has every right to disagree with the President’s action in dispensing with the court set up for this purpose. But it harms the country when it treats the President unfairly with the language and contemptuous tone it now regularly employs.
The President is not a dictator which, in effect, Congressman Charles Rangel called him when comparing him with disgraced Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos. Nor is he a criminal intentionally violating the U.S. Constitution and the civil liberties of our citizens, subjecting himself to impeachment for “high crimes and misdemeanors.” The President no doubt arrived at his position after being advised by career government lawyers that he is acting within the law. We are at war with millions of adherents of a fundamentalist Islamic creed who believe they have a duty to kill us -- Christians, Jews, Hindus and others -- who do not accept the supremacy of Islam over their own religions.
I agree with those who believe that the President was and is obligated to seek orders from the Federal Intelligence Surveillance Court authorizing the invasions of privacy. If time were of the essence, we are told by the experts that the warrants could have been secured by telephone authorization from that Court. The FISA legislation allows in emergencies for the government to tap phones for 72 hours without a warrant from the court and then seek one retroactively. If the court processes are inadequate, then the President should over the last several years have sought legislation to improve them or give him greater direct authority with the Congress to make that decision.
For several years Republican and Democratic leaders have been briefed on what the President was doing and declined to protest or bring the disputed procedures to the attention of the House and Senate. They could have done so using closed sessions so as not to alert the enemy. Instead, they allowed the President to continue the surveillance.
Now the press and some of those members of Congress by their public revelations have alerted the enemy to the surveillance program. And the media and some members of Congress have forgotten or don’t care that we are at war and their disclosures may have prevented the administration from obtaining information otherwise available that would help military and law enforcement authorities to deter acts of terrorism here and abroad.
I agree with the Times editorial when it points out, “This particular end run around civil liberties is also unnecessary. The intelligence agency already had the capacity to read your mail and your e-mail and listen to your telephone conversations. All it had to do was obtain a warrant from a special court created for this purpose.”
President Bush and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice in their defense have said nothing that justifies the President’s failure to apply to the FISA court.
We are at war. There is a balance to be struck between protecting the security of the country and the personal privacy of individuals. During World War Two all kinds of restrictions were placed on American civil liberties. Most horrendously, Japanese Americans, and some Italian-Americans and German-Americans, were sent to detention camps with the approval of the Supreme Court. But when the war ended, the restrictions ended, and the Congress acknowledged we had gone too far. We returned to our core values.
The lesson is this: the survival of our country is paramount, but that survival must be achieved without destroying our core values as a society. Our Founding Fathers started a revolution in order to achieve “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” These are not just words. They are our fundamental beliefs and must be protected. To see on the other hand the President as the enemy -- which the savage and unfair attacks upon him convey to the world-- is harmful to the security of our country and, therefore, injures us all.
Ed Koch is the former Mayor of New York City.
December 21, 2005
The President Is Not the Enemy
By Ed Koch
The media and the Democratic congressional leadership, including Senator Harry Reid and Representative Nancy Pelosi, joined by some other members of Congress, have denounced President Bush for, as The New York Times noted, secretly authorizing the National Security Agency “to intercept the communications of Americans and terrorist suspects inside the Untied States without first obtaining warrants from a secret court that oversees intelligence matters…”
According to The Times, “sometime in 2002, President Bush signed a secret executive order scrapping a painfully reached, 25-year-old national consensus: spying on Americans by their government should generally be prohibited, and when it is allowed, it should be regulated and supervised by the courts. The laws and executive orders governing electronic eavesdropping by the intelligence agency were specifically devised to uphold the Fourth Amendment’s prohibition of unreasonable searches and seizures.”
The Times continues, ““But Mr. Bush secretly decided that he was going to allow the agency to spy on American citizens without obtaining a warrant -- just as he had earlier decided to scrap the Geneva Conventions, American law and Army regulations when it came to handling prisoners in the war on terror.”
As reported by The Times, the President acknowledged Saturday that “he had ordered the National Security Agency to conduct an electronic eavesdropping program in the United States without first obtaining warrants and said he would continue the highly classified program because it was a ‘vital tool in our war against the terrorists.’”
I wish The Times and members of Congress were not so eager to demean the President of the U.S. and his advisers, holding them up to scathing denunciation when we are at war. They should realize that the President feels very strongly his obligation to protect us from terrorists overseas and their supporters in this country -- in World War II, such supporters were called Quislings. The critics have short memories. In the 1993 and 9/11 (2001) attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, the U.S. suffered nearly 3,000 deaths and more than 1,000 injured.
The Times has every right to disagree with the President’s action in dispensing with the court set up for this purpose. But it harms the country when it treats the President unfairly with the language and contemptuous tone it now regularly employs.
The President is not a dictator which, in effect, Congressman Charles Rangel called him when comparing him with disgraced Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos. Nor is he a criminal intentionally violating the U.S. Constitution and the civil liberties of our citizens, subjecting himself to impeachment for “high crimes and misdemeanors.” The President no doubt arrived at his position after being advised by career government lawyers that he is acting within the law. We are at war with millions of adherents of a fundamentalist Islamic creed who believe they have a duty to kill us -- Christians, Jews, Hindus and others -- who do not accept the supremacy of Islam over their own religions.
I agree with those who believe that the President was and is obligated to seek orders from the Federal Intelligence Surveillance Court authorizing the invasions of privacy. If time were of the essence, we are told by the experts that the warrants could have been secured by telephone authorization from that Court. The FISA legislation allows in emergencies for the government to tap phones for 72 hours without a warrant from the court and then seek one retroactively. If the court processes are inadequate, then the President should over the last several years have sought legislation to improve them or give him greater direct authority with the Congress to make that decision.
For several years Republican and Democratic leaders have been briefed on what the President was doing and declined to protest or bring the disputed procedures to the attention of the House and Senate. They could have done so using closed sessions so as not to alert the enemy. Instead, they allowed the President to continue the surveillance.
Now the press and some of those members of Congress by their public revelations have alerted the enemy to the surveillance program. And the media and some members of Congress have forgotten or don’t care that we are at war and their disclosures may have prevented the administration from obtaining information otherwise available that would help military and law enforcement authorities to deter acts of terrorism here and abroad.
I agree with the Times editorial when it points out, “This particular end run around civil liberties is also unnecessary. The intelligence agency already had the capacity to read your mail and your e-mail and listen to your telephone conversations. All it had to do was obtain a warrant from a special court created for this purpose.”
President Bush and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice in their defense have said nothing that justifies the President’s failure to apply to the FISA court.
We are at war. There is a balance to be struck between protecting the security of the country and the personal privacy of individuals. During World War Two all kinds of restrictions were placed on American civil liberties. Most horrendously, Japanese Americans, and some Italian-Americans and German-Americans, were sent to detention camps with the approval of the Supreme Court. But when the war ended, the restrictions ended, and the Congress acknowledged we had gone too far. We returned to our core values.
The lesson is this: the survival of our country is paramount, but that survival must be achieved without destroying our core values as a society. Our Founding Fathers started a revolution in order to achieve “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” These are not just words. They are our fundamental beliefs and must be protected. To see on the other hand the President as the enemy -- which the savage and unfair attacks upon him convey to the world-- is harmful to the security of our country and, therefore, injures us all.
Ed Koch is the former Mayor of New York City.
From Hugh Hewitt...
University of Chicago Law School Professor Cass Sunstein backs up the Adminsitration's claim athat the AUMF buttresses the inherent power of the president in a time of war to conduct surveillance of foreign powers communicating with their agents in America who are American citizens.
Professor Sunstein...
Presidential Wiretaps
The discussion of wiretapping by the President, without court approval, raises a number of important and interesting legal issues. According to CNN, Attorney General Gonzales recently said, "There were many people, many lawyers within the administration who advised the president that he had an inherent authority as commander in chief under the Constitution to engage in" this kind of "signal intelligence of our enemy." The Attorney General added, "We also believe that the authorization to use force, which was passed by the Congress in the days following the attacks of September 11, constituted additional authorization for the president to engage in this kind of signal intelligence."
I want to suggest here that this last statement is more plausible than it might seem at first glance. If the statement is indeed correct, some legal questions certainly remain, but at least we will have made progress.
The authorization for the use of military force (AUMF) says, "the President is authorized to use all necessary and appropriate force against those nations, organizations, or persons he determines planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001, or harbored such organizations or persons, in order to prevent any future acts of international terrorism against the United States by such nations, organizations or persons."
This authorization clearly supported the war in Afghanistan. It also clearly justifies the use of force against Al Qaeda. In the Hamdi case, the Supreme Court added that the AUMF authorizes the detention of enemy combatants -- notwithstanding 18 USC 4001(a), which requires an Act of Congress to support executive detention. In the Court's view, the AUMF stands as the relevant Act of Congress, authorizing detention. It is therefore reasonable to say that the AUMF, by authorizing the use of "all necessary and appropriate force," also authorizes surveillance of those associated with Al Qaeda or any other organizations that "planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks" of September 11.
The reason is that surveillance, including wiretapping, is reasonably believed to be an incident of the use of force. It standardly occurs during war. If the President's wiretapping has been limited to those reasonably believed to be associated with Al Qaeda and its affiliates -- as indeed he has said -- then the Attorney General's argument is entirely plausible. (The AUMF would not permit wiretapping of those without any connection to nations, organizations, and persons associated with the September 11 attacks.)
This brief statement does not answer several other questions, including (a) whether, as the Attorney General also contends, the President has inherent constitutional authority to engage in this kind of wiretapping (authority he does not need if the AUMF is sufficient), (b) whether specific statutes negate the authority that the AUMF appears to give (as Senator Feingold has argued -- an argument that in some tension with Hamdi), and (c) whether there might be a possible Fourth Amendment barrier to these wiretaps (a barrier that might remain even if the AUMF provides authorization, see Hamdi on due process limits on the power to detain).
University of Chicago Law School Professor Cass Sunstein backs up the Adminsitration's claim athat the AUMF buttresses the inherent power of the president in a time of war to conduct surveillance of foreign powers communicating with their agents in America who are American citizens.
Professor Sunstein...
Presidential Wiretaps
The discussion of wiretapping by the President, without court approval, raises a number of important and interesting legal issues. According to CNN, Attorney General Gonzales recently said, "There were many people, many lawyers within the administration who advised the president that he had an inherent authority as commander in chief under the Constitution to engage in" this kind of "signal intelligence of our enemy." The Attorney General added, "We also believe that the authorization to use force, which was passed by the Congress in the days following the attacks of September 11, constituted additional authorization for the president to engage in this kind of signal intelligence."
I want to suggest here that this last statement is more plausible than it might seem at first glance. If the statement is indeed correct, some legal questions certainly remain, but at least we will have made progress.
The authorization for the use of military force (AUMF) says, "the President is authorized to use all necessary and appropriate force against those nations, organizations, or persons he determines planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001, or harbored such organizations or persons, in order to prevent any future acts of international terrorism against the United States by such nations, organizations or persons."
This authorization clearly supported the war in Afghanistan. It also clearly justifies the use of force against Al Qaeda. In the Hamdi case, the Supreme Court added that the AUMF authorizes the detention of enemy combatants -- notwithstanding 18 USC 4001(a), which requires an Act of Congress to support executive detention. In the Court's view, the AUMF stands as the relevant Act of Congress, authorizing detention. It is therefore reasonable to say that the AUMF, by authorizing the use of "all necessary and appropriate force," also authorizes surveillance of those associated with Al Qaeda or any other organizations that "planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks" of September 11.
The reason is that surveillance, including wiretapping, is reasonably believed to be an incident of the use of force. It standardly occurs during war. If the President's wiretapping has been limited to those reasonably believed to be associated with Al Qaeda and its affiliates -- as indeed he has said -- then the Attorney General's argument is entirely plausible. (The AUMF would not permit wiretapping of those without any connection to nations, organizations, and persons associated with the September 11 attacks.)
This brief statement does not answer several other questions, including (a) whether, as the Attorney General also contends, the President has inherent constitutional authority to engage in this kind of wiretapping (authority he does not need if the AUMF is sufficient), (b) whether specific statutes negate the authority that the AUMF appears to give (as Senator Feingold has argued -- an argument that in some tension with Hamdi), and (c) whether there might be a possible Fourth Amendment barrier to these wiretaps (a barrier that might remain even if the AUMF provides authorization, see Hamdi on due process limits on the power to detain).
A Lesson in “Judicial Activism”
Posted by Cam Edwards at his blog on December 21, 2005 - 10:41 am
The Brady Center came out (shockingly, I know) in opposition to the nomination of Samuel Alito yesterday. And in typical fashion, the anti-gun group manages to combine skillful hyperbole with a refusal to acknowledge the facts. Here’s what they wrote in their press release.
Dennis Henigan, Director of the Brady Center’s Legal Action Project, remarked, “Judge Alito’s conclusion that the federal machine gun ban is unconstitutional is right-wing judicial activism at its worst. He demonstrated no respect for the judgment of Congress in seeking to protect the public from the grave dangers of fully automatic weapons.”
And there in a nutshell is the Left’s definition of judicial activism. They believe when a judge strikes down a law, it’s judicial activism. That’s not activism, that’s being a judge. I don’t want Samuel Alito or any other judge to show more respect for the “judgment of Congress” than the Constitution.
Compare what Samuel Alito did in this case (determining that Congress was using the Commerce Clause to prohibit “possession” of an item) versus what Judge Colleen Kotar-Kelley did with McCain/Feingold campaign finance “reform”. The original law was passed without any mention of regulating political speech on the internet, yet Kotar-Kelley ordered the FEC to regulate political speech on the internet regardless of what the original legislation said. That’s not interpreting a law… that’s rewriting it. And that’s judicial activism.
Oh, as to the substance of Judge Alito’s ruling: The Brady folks got that wrong as well.
Posted by Cam Edwards at his blog on December 21, 2005 - 10:41 am
The Brady Center came out (shockingly, I know) in opposition to the nomination of Samuel Alito yesterday. And in typical fashion, the anti-gun group manages to combine skillful hyperbole with a refusal to acknowledge the facts. Here’s what they wrote in their press release.
Dennis Henigan, Director of the Brady Center’s Legal Action Project, remarked, “Judge Alito’s conclusion that the federal machine gun ban is unconstitutional is right-wing judicial activism at its worst. He demonstrated no respect for the judgment of Congress in seeking to protect the public from the grave dangers of fully automatic weapons.”
And there in a nutshell is the Left’s definition of judicial activism. They believe when a judge strikes down a law, it’s judicial activism. That’s not activism, that’s being a judge. I don’t want Samuel Alito or any other judge to show more respect for the “judgment of Congress” than the Constitution.
Compare what Samuel Alito did in this case (determining that Congress was using the Commerce Clause to prohibit “possession” of an item) versus what Judge Colleen Kotar-Kelley did with McCain/Feingold campaign finance “reform”. The original law was passed without any mention of regulating political speech on the internet, yet Kotar-Kelley ordered the FEC to regulate political speech on the internet regardless of what the original legislation said. That’s not interpreting a law… that’s rewriting it. And that’s judicial activism.
Oh, as to the substance of Judge Alito’s ruling: The Brady folks got that wrong as well.
Tuesday, December 20, 2005
Blogger... John McIntyre... The RCP Blog
Jonathan Alter & The Ghost of Nixon
Jonathan Alter provides a classic liberal misreading of the political dynamics at play in the leaked story on the NSA’s covert spy program. Alter reports that President Bush called in both the publisher and the executive editor of the New York Times on December 6 in a “futile attempt to talk them out of running the story…..one can only imagine the president’s desperation.”
Alter ridicules the idea that Bush’s concern in seeing the story published was U.S. national security.
No, Bush was desperate to keep the Times from running this important story…..because he knew that it would reveal him as a law-breaker…..the president knew publication would cause him great embarrassment and trouble for the rest of his presidency. It was for that reason—and less out of genuine concern about national security—that George W. Bush tried so hard to kill the New York Times story.
Yeah, Bush looked real desperate yesterday at the press conference when he was defending his decision to authorize the NSA to monitor those communications. The left-wing mind is so warped by the prism of Vietnam, Nixon, and Watergate they seem utterly incapable of any type of objective political analysis.
First, there is a complete misconception about the politics of the late 60’s and 70’s due to the glorification of the hippie, anti-government culture by the press and Hollywood. A student of history who only watched American TV and movies and read The Washington Post and The New York Times wouldn’t understand the four presidential results between 1968-1980.
Just to recount the facts: in 1968, Richard Nixon and the virulently anti-hippie George Wallace got 57% of the vote. In 1972, Nixon received over 60% of the vote. In 1976, with Republicans utterly on the ropes after Nixon’s disgrace and impeachment, Jimmy Carter barely beat that political powerhouse Gerald Ford. The public put a final punctuation point on the era in 1980 with Reagan’s 489 electoral vote wipeout of Carter.
But to someone like Alter, the late 60’s and 70’s were the penultimate halcyon days for the press and politics. It was when the “good guys” in the liberal press took out the “bad guys” in the Republican party. The mindset survives among many to this day who constantly see the ghost of Nixon around every corner.
Alter is clueless when it comes to the political ramifications of this story. Politically, the White House loves this story. As I mentioned in my column yesterday, it dovetails nicely with the debate over the Patriot Act, Iraq and works to reinforce the existing image of the Democratic party as just not serious when it comes to the nation’s security.
Monitoring phone calls between al-Qaeda operatives in Afghanistan or Pakistan and individuals in the United States when the there is a gray area when it comes to the legal issues is not going to incite a public rage against the president. To repeat, this is a political loser for Democrats.
Alter and his ideological colleagues are the real ones in a bubble.
Jonathan Alter & The Ghost of Nixon
Jonathan Alter provides a classic liberal misreading of the political dynamics at play in the leaked story on the NSA’s covert spy program. Alter reports that President Bush called in both the publisher and the executive editor of the New York Times on December 6 in a “futile attempt to talk them out of running the story…..one can only imagine the president’s desperation.”
Alter ridicules the idea that Bush’s concern in seeing the story published was U.S. national security.
No, Bush was desperate to keep the Times from running this important story…..because he knew that it would reveal him as a law-breaker…..the president knew publication would cause him great embarrassment and trouble for the rest of his presidency. It was for that reason—and less out of genuine concern about national security—that George W. Bush tried so hard to kill the New York Times story.
Yeah, Bush looked real desperate yesterday at the press conference when he was defending his decision to authorize the NSA to monitor those communications. The left-wing mind is so warped by the prism of Vietnam, Nixon, and Watergate they seem utterly incapable of any type of objective political analysis.
First, there is a complete misconception about the politics of the late 60’s and 70’s due to the glorification of the hippie, anti-government culture by the press and Hollywood. A student of history who only watched American TV and movies and read The Washington Post and The New York Times wouldn’t understand the four presidential results between 1968-1980.
Just to recount the facts: in 1968, Richard Nixon and the virulently anti-hippie George Wallace got 57% of the vote. In 1972, Nixon received over 60% of the vote. In 1976, with Republicans utterly on the ropes after Nixon’s disgrace and impeachment, Jimmy Carter barely beat that political powerhouse Gerald Ford. The public put a final punctuation point on the era in 1980 with Reagan’s 489 electoral vote wipeout of Carter.
But to someone like Alter, the late 60’s and 70’s were the penultimate halcyon days for the press and politics. It was when the “good guys” in the liberal press took out the “bad guys” in the Republican party. The mindset survives among many to this day who constantly see the ghost of Nixon around every corner.
Alter is clueless when it comes to the political ramifications of this story. Politically, the White House loves this story. As I mentioned in my column yesterday, it dovetails nicely with the debate over the Patriot Act, Iraq and works to reinforce the existing image of the Democratic party as just not serious when it comes to the nation’s security.
Monitoring phone calls between al-Qaeda operatives in Afghanistan or Pakistan and individuals in the United States when the there is a gray area when it comes to the legal issues is not going to incite a public rage against the president. To repeat, this is a political loser for Democrats.
Alter and his ideological colleagues are the real ones in a bubble.
Sunday, December 18, 2005
A few thoughts about the President's address this evening...December 18
I am unashamedly proud of the President, his resolve, and the team that surrounds him both military and civilian. He and they have not wavered in the established missions thrust on us all after 911.
This is a dangerous world. There are movements within various cultures that are a clear and present danger to us and to generations of those that follow us. There are also dangerous movements within our own country, and it isn't from a source that would seem to pose a threat. It is difficult then to see various individuals jockeying and positioning themselves before the camera denouncing every actual or preceived act involving our efforts in Iraq. This positoning, preening, and showboating coming from members of what is supposed to be our national leadership. It is obvious that there are individuals that through their actions strengthen and embolden the enemy. They are not realistically concerned with our well being or the "big picture", but they do want to score points. Nancy Pelosi, John Kerry, Chuck Shumer, Harry Reid, and even John McCann will one day be seen as the "enablers" that they are. If they had a national conscience they would drop their line of rhetoric and back our national efforts.
I am unashamedly proud of the President, his resolve, and the team that surrounds him both military and civilian. He and they have not wavered in the established missions thrust on us all after 911.
This is a dangerous world. There are movements within various cultures that are a clear and present danger to us and to generations of those that follow us. There are also dangerous movements within our own country, and it isn't from a source that would seem to pose a threat. It is difficult then to see various individuals jockeying and positioning themselves before the camera denouncing every actual or preceived act involving our efforts in Iraq. This positoning, preening, and showboating coming from members of what is supposed to be our national leadership. It is obvious that there are individuals that through their actions strengthen and embolden the enemy. They are not realistically concerned with our well being or the "big picture", but they do want to score points. Nancy Pelosi, John Kerry, Chuck Shumer, Harry Reid, and even John McCann will one day be seen as the "enablers" that they are. If they had a national conscience they would drop their line of rhetoric and back our national efforts.
From the Strategy Page...
Blame the Americans and Praise the Result
December 18, 2005: Arguably, the best outcome for the December 15th parliamentary elections in Iraq would be for no “party” or coalition of two parties to secure the 2/3rds majority of delegates necessary to permit it to form a government. This would force a broader coalition, which would permit an opening for Sunni “accomodationist” participation. Sunni leaders are aware that they made a serious political blunder by boycotting the January elections for the provisional parliament that wrote the new Constitution. As a result of the boycott, there was relatively little the Sunni input in the framing of the Constitution, and Sunni representation in parliament will be on the low side. As a result, Sunni accomodationists are likely to welcome a niche if a coalition has to be formed.
Toward this end, it was interesting to note that some Sunni insurgent groups declared a “cease fire” during the election, and others declared that they would attack anyone attempting to interfere in the voting. While some extremists among the Shia Iraqis would undoubtedly prefer to exclude the Sunni Arabs totally from government – feeling that after generations of Sunni Arab domination of Iraq “it’s payback time” – the chances of establishing a relatively stable government are likely to be dim unless there’s significant Sunni Arab acquiescence.
Al Qaeda was humiliated during the elections, after having proclaimed that voting was against Islam, and that good Moslems should rise up and prevent this abomination. About 70 percent of eligible voters turned out, and there were few incidents of violence. The word on the street was that al Qaeda had called off its anti-democracy campaign. This bothered al Qaeda so much that they issued a statement denouncing it. But al Qaeda claims that they did attack the voters rang hollow. The Sunni Arab community had decided to either vote, or not try and fight those who were. In areas where al Qaeda still has a presence, local tribal or Mosque based militias put out armed guards to keep al Qaeda away from the polling places. These guys are usually shooting at government or American troops. But on election day, they were left alone by Iraqi troops, as everyone turned out to protect the voters from Islamic terrorists.
This relentless progress of democracy is causing quite a commotion throughout the Arab world. While it is fashionable to denounce the American presence in Iraq, and what the Americans were doing, the Arab language buzz on the net is going in unexpected directions. Because of al Jazeera and the Internet, young Arabs everywhere are not only able to observe what it happening in Iraq, but to discuss it with young Iraqis. These discussions are not noted much in the West, because they generally take place in Arabic, and often via email and listservs. The non-Iraqi Arabs are impressed at the proliferation of media in Iraq, and the eagerness of Iraqis to vote, and make democracy work. The economic growth in Iraq is admired, and is already attracting entrepreneurs from other Arab countries. The more cynical non-Iraqis believe that it will all come to nothing, and that another Saddam will eventually emerge and shut down all this democratic nonsense, as is the case in most of the Arab world. But the pessimists appear to be in the minority. Arabs are tired of dictators, economic stagnation, the corruption and living in a police state. Moreover, there’s a nimble quality in Arab thinking that allows them to simultaneously blame the Americans for going into Iraq, and praising the result.
Blame the Americans and Praise the Result
December 18, 2005: Arguably, the best outcome for the December 15th parliamentary elections in Iraq would be for no “party” or coalition of two parties to secure the 2/3rds majority of delegates necessary to permit it to form a government. This would force a broader coalition, which would permit an opening for Sunni “accomodationist” participation. Sunni leaders are aware that they made a serious political blunder by boycotting the January elections for the provisional parliament that wrote the new Constitution. As a result of the boycott, there was relatively little the Sunni input in the framing of the Constitution, and Sunni representation in parliament will be on the low side. As a result, Sunni accomodationists are likely to welcome a niche if a coalition has to be formed.
Toward this end, it was interesting to note that some Sunni insurgent groups declared a “cease fire” during the election, and others declared that they would attack anyone attempting to interfere in the voting. While some extremists among the Shia Iraqis would undoubtedly prefer to exclude the Sunni Arabs totally from government – feeling that after generations of Sunni Arab domination of Iraq “it’s payback time” – the chances of establishing a relatively stable government are likely to be dim unless there’s significant Sunni Arab acquiescence.
Al Qaeda was humiliated during the elections, after having proclaimed that voting was against Islam, and that good Moslems should rise up and prevent this abomination. About 70 percent of eligible voters turned out, and there were few incidents of violence. The word on the street was that al Qaeda had called off its anti-democracy campaign. This bothered al Qaeda so much that they issued a statement denouncing it. But al Qaeda claims that they did attack the voters rang hollow. The Sunni Arab community had decided to either vote, or not try and fight those who were. In areas where al Qaeda still has a presence, local tribal or Mosque based militias put out armed guards to keep al Qaeda away from the polling places. These guys are usually shooting at government or American troops. But on election day, they were left alone by Iraqi troops, as everyone turned out to protect the voters from Islamic terrorists.
This relentless progress of democracy is causing quite a commotion throughout the Arab world. While it is fashionable to denounce the American presence in Iraq, and what the Americans were doing, the Arab language buzz on the net is going in unexpected directions. Because of al Jazeera and the Internet, young Arabs everywhere are not only able to observe what it happening in Iraq, but to discuss it with young Iraqis. These discussions are not noted much in the West, because they generally take place in Arabic, and often via email and listservs. The non-Iraqi Arabs are impressed at the proliferation of media in Iraq, and the eagerness of Iraqis to vote, and make democracy work. The economic growth in Iraq is admired, and is already attracting entrepreneurs from other Arab countries. The more cynical non-Iraqis believe that it will all come to nothing, and that another Saddam will eventually emerge and shut down all this democratic nonsense, as is the case in most of the Arab world. But the pessimists appear to be in the minority. Arabs are tired of dictators, economic stagnation, the corruption and living in a police state. Moreover, there’s a nimble quality in Arab thinking that allows them to simultaneously blame the Americans for going into Iraq, and praising the result.
Saturday, December 17, 2005
House Congratulates Iraqis, Votes Down Timetables...Power Line
Yesterday, the House of Representatives adopted a Republican-sponsored resolution that congratulated the Iraqis on their election and put the House on record opposing any fixed timetables for withdrawal, which the resolution termed "fundamentally inconsistent with achieving victory in Iraq."
The Democrats tried to offer an alternative version that congratulated the Iraqis but punted on withdrawal. Perhaps the most significant difference between the two resolutions, though, was that the Republican resolution mentioned "victory" seven times, the Democrat one not at all.
As always when the Republicans get specific on Iraq policy, the Democrats cried foul. A few days ago, Nancy Pelosi announced that the Democrats will take no unified position on Iraq for the 2006 elections. Pelosi credited this to a diversity of opinions within her caucus, and termed the issue of Iraq a matter of individual conscience. Fine; but when the Democrats are asked to state what those individual positions might be, she howls with outrage:
"Once again the Republican majority brings to the House floor a divisive resolution to denounce those who disagree," said Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, California Democrat.
Got that? It's bad for the Republicans to pass a resolution saying that timetables are a bad idea, because some Democrats disagree with that proposition; and letting the voters know which representatives hold which opinion is "divisive."
Most Democrats are defeatist on Iraq, but they don't seem to be very confident of their defeatism. They still fear that the President's Iraq policy will turn out to be a great success--which is looking ever more likely--and that their defeatism will be discredited.
For the record, the Republican-sponsored resolution passed 279-109, with 59 Democrats voting for it. 108 Democrats and a Socialist voted against the resolution, and 32 Democrats and two Republicans voted "present." Now, that's what I call political courage!
Yesterday, the House of Representatives adopted a Republican-sponsored resolution that congratulated the Iraqis on their election and put the House on record opposing any fixed timetables for withdrawal, which the resolution termed "fundamentally inconsistent with achieving victory in Iraq."
The Democrats tried to offer an alternative version that congratulated the Iraqis but punted on withdrawal. Perhaps the most significant difference between the two resolutions, though, was that the Republican resolution mentioned "victory" seven times, the Democrat one not at all.
As always when the Republicans get specific on Iraq policy, the Democrats cried foul. A few days ago, Nancy Pelosi announced that the Democrats will take no unified position on Iraq for the 2006 elections. Pelosi credited this to a diversity of opinions within her caucus, and termed the issue of Iraq a matter of individual conscience. Fine; but when the Democrats are asked to state what those individual positions might be, she howls with outrage:
"Once again the Republican majority brings to the House floor a divisive resolution to denounce those who disagree," said Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, California Democrat.
Got that? It's bad for the Republicans to pass a resolution saying that timetables are a bad idea, because some Democrats disagree with that proposition; and letting the voters know which representatives hold which opinion is "divisive."
Most Democrats are defeatist on Iraq, but they don't seem to be very confident of their defeatism. They still fear that the President's Iraq policy will turn out to be a great success--which is looking ever more likely--and that their defeatism will be discredited.
For the record, the Republican-sponsored resolution passed 279-109, with 59 Democrats voting for it. 108 Democrats and a Socialist voted against the resolution, and 32 Democrats and two Republicans voted "present." Now, that's what I call political courage!
The New York Times portrays President Bush as a viscious violator of our rights to privacy. You would think that after he signed John McCain's "Al Quaida Bill of Rights" bill, the press would have been happy and given him some slack. But alas, the positive info about the Iraqi voter turnout required them to divert attention from this good news by attacking him, claiming he secretly authorized illegal surveillance of U.S. citizens.
Here is his response: (I have no way of knowing if it is true or not, but at least it offers some perspective) (I also tend to believe that anyone associated, affiliated or connected to terrorist cells in the United States, should have their rights violated at least 10 times a day and maybe tortured every other Thursday until they decide to return to the Middle East and become useful citizens.)SH
JENNIFER LOVEN
Associated Press Writer
WASHINGTON - President Bush said Saturday he personally has authorized a secret eavesdropping program in the U.S. more than 30 times since the Sept. 11 attacks and he lashed out at those involved in publicly revealing the program. "This is a highly classified program that is crucial to our national security," he said in a radio address delivered live from the White House's Roosevelt Room.
"This authorization is a vital tool in our war against the terrorists. It is critical to saving American lives. The American people expect me to do everything in my power, under our laws and Constitution, to protect them and their civil liberties and that is exactly what I will continue to do as long as I am president of the United States," Bush said.
Angry members of Congress have demanded an explanation of the program, first revealed in Friday's New York Times and whether the monitoring by the National Security Agency violates civil liberties.
Defending the program, Bush said in his address that it is used only to intercept the international communications of people inside the United States who have been determined to have "a clear link" to al- Qaida or related terrorist organizations.
He said the program is reviewed every 45 days, using fresh threat assessments, legal reviews by the Justice Department, White House counsel and others, and information from previous activities under the program.
Without identifying specific lawmakers, Bush said congressional leaders have been briefed more than a dozen times on the program's activities.
The president also said the intelligence officials involved in the monitoring receive extensive training to make sure civil liberties are not violated.
Appearing angry at times during his eight-minute address, Bush left no doubt that he will continue authorizing the program.
"I intend to do so for as long as our nation faces a continuing threat from al-Qaida and related groups," he said
Here is his response: (I have no way of knowing if it is true or not, but at least it offers some perspective) (I also tend to believe that anyone associated, affiliated or connected to terrorist cells in the United States, should have their rights violated at least 10 times a day and maybe tortured every other Thursday until they decide to return to the Middle East and become useful citizens.)SH
JENNIFER LOVEN
Associated Press Writer
WASHINGTON - President Bush said Saturday he personally has authorized a secret eavesdropping program in the U.S. more than 30 times since the Sept. 11 attacks and he lashed out at those involved in publicly revealing the program. "This is a highly classified program that is crucial to our national security," he said in a radio address delivered live from the White House's Roosevelt Room.
"This authorization is a vital tool in our war against the terrorists. It is critical to saving American lives. The American people expect me to do everything in my power, under our laws and Constitution, to protect them and their civil liberties and that is exactly what I will continue to do as long as I am president of the United States," Bush said.
Angry members of Congress have demanded an explanation of the program, first revealed in Friday's New York Times and whether the monitoring by the National Security Agency violates civil liberties.
Defending the program, Bush said in his address that it is used only to intercept the international communications of people inside the United States who have been determined to have "a clear link" to al- Qaida or related terrorist organizations.
He said the program is reviewed every 45 days, using fresh threat assessments, legal reviews by the Justice Department, White House counsel and others, and information from previous activities under the program.
Without identifying specific lawmakers, Bush said congressional leaders have been briefed more than a dozen times on the program's activities.
The president also said the intelligence officials involved in the monitoring receive extensive training to make sure civil liberties are not violated.
Appearing angry at times during his eight-minute address, Bush left no doubt that he will continue authorizing the program.
"I intend to do so for as long as our nation faces a continuing threat from al-Qaida and related groups," he said
Friday, December 16, 2005
From Power Line....
SENATOR REID TELLS A LIE
Harry Reid, who once called President Bush a liar and then famously refused to take the charge back, told a lie about the president yesterday. The Washington Post reports that Reid made this statement:
The president of the United States said a jury does not need to assemble, that Tom DeLay is innocent.
The problem is that the president never said that a jury should not assemble. He did say that, in his view, DeLay is innocent. However, that's a far cry from suggesting that a jury should not decide the question. Indeed, Bush he made it clear in his comments to Brit Hume that the case should proceed to trial. Declining to criticize prosecutor Ronnie Earle, Bush stated, "I want this trial to be conducted as fairly as possible." Thus, Reid simply lied when he claimed that the president thinks a jury need not assemble.
Senator Schumer did only a little better. His argument was that, because Bush commented about the merits of the DeLay case, he is obligated to comment on Patrick Fitzgerald's investigation of the Valarie Plame affair. But there is no pending investigation of DeLay. The indictment already has been handed down. Fitzgerald's investigation, by contrast, is ongoing. Moreover, the administration is the subject of the investigation, making it especially inappropriate for the president to discuss the case.
Harry Reid understands the distinction between believing that a defendant is innocent and believing that a jury should not decide the issue. Chuck Schumer understands the distinction between a case that's ready to be tried and a case that's still being investigated. But both are irresponsible and dishonest men who will say anything in the hope of gaining cheap partisan advantage or, in Schumer's case, a moment on television.
SENATOR REID TELLS A LIE
Harry Reid, who once called President Bush a liar and then famously refused to take the charge back, told a lie about the president yesterday. The Washington Post reports that Reid made this statement:
The president of the United States said a jury does not need to assemble, that Tom DeLay is innocent.
The problem is that the president never said that a jury should not assemble. He did say that, in his view, DeLay is innocent. However, that's a far cry from suggesting that a jury should not decide the question. Indeed, Bush he made it clear in his comments to Brit Hume that the case should proceed to trial. Declining to criticize prosecutor Ronnie Earle, Bush stated, "I want this trial to be conducted as fairly as possible." Thus, Reid simply lied when he claimed that the president thinks a jury need not assemble.
Senator Schumer did only a little better. His argument was that, because Bush commented about the merits of the DeLay case, he is obligated to comment on Patrick Fitzgerald's investigation of the Valarie Plame affair. But there is no pending investigation of DeLay. The indictment already has been handed down. Fitzgerald's investigation, by contrast, is ongoing. Moreover, the administration is the subject of the investigation, making it especially inappropriate for the president to discuss the case.
Harry Reid understands the distinction between believing that a defendant is innocent and believing that a jury should not decide the issue. Chuck Schumer understands the distinction between a case that's ready to be tried and a case that's still being investigated. But both are irresponsible and dishonest men who will say anything in the hope of gaining cheap partisan advantage or, in Schumer's case, a moment on television.
Monday, December 12, 2005
If its about numbers...
I hope Mr. Dean and John Kerry read this note making the email rounds…
• If you consider that there have been an average of 160,000 troops in the Iraqi theater during the last 22 months, that gives a firearm death ratio of 60 per 100,000. • The firearm death ratio in DC is 80.6 per 100,000. That means that you are more likely to be shot and killed in our Nation’s Capitol, which has some of the strictest gun control laws in the nation, than you are in Iraq. Conclusion: We should immediately pull out of WASHINGTON, DC!
I hope Mr. Dean and John Kerry read this note making the email rounds…
• If you consider that there have been an average of 160,000 troops in the Iraqi theater during the last 22 months, that gives a firearm death ratio of 60 per 100,000. • The firearm death ratio in DC is 80.6 per 100,000. That means that you are more likely to be shot and killed in our Nation’s Capitol, which has some of the strictest gun control laws in the nation, than you are in Iraq. Conclusion: We should immediately pull out of WASHINGTON, DC!
Sunday, December 11, 2005
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
