Saturday, December 9, 2006

09 Dec 2006 10:06 pm

David Kuo

Here's the Busted Halo interview. And here's another link to my CSPAN chat with Jim McGreevey.

09 Dec 2006 08:05 pm

The View From My Window

Washington, DC, 4.30 pm.

09 Dec 2006 07:50 pm

Quote for the Day II

"Now I'd like you to use your imagination for a second. Let's assume the unthinkable: that America had embraced Mr. Bush's "Program" in the Second World War; that German, Italian and Japanese fighters had been waterboarded, subjected to the cold cell and techniques like "long time standing." Do any of you think for even a second that these nations would have been our allies and friends in the following generations? Think of how much darker, colder and more hate-filled our world would be than it is today...

A short time ago, in Germany, I spoke with one of the senior advisors of Chancellor Angela Merkel. I noted that a criminal complaint had been filed against Donald Rumsfeld and a number of others invoking universal jurisdiction for war crimes offenses. How would the chancellor see this, I asked? There was a long pause, and I fully expected to get a brush-off response. But what came was very surprising.

"You must remember," said the advisor, "that my chancellor was born and raised in a totalitarian state. She cannot be indifferent to questions of this sort. In fact, she views them as matters of the utmost gravity and they will be treated that way. The Nuremberg process happened in my country. It was painful for us. But we absorbed it. It became a part of our legacy. An important part of our legacy. We will not forget it. But I have to ask you: why has your country forgotten?" - Scott Horton, in a speech at the New School, on the significance of December 7 in American history.

09 Dec 2006 06:26 pm

Conservatives, Fundamentalists, and Mary

A reader writes:

Thank you for your recent bloggings showing the reaction to Ms. Cheney's pregnancy by some Conservative Christians. While I have conflicting feelings towards gay marraige and adoption, I am a Conservative Christian, I have nothing but anger towards the reaction of some of my so-called "conservative Christian" leaders in how they talk about the mother and the child. It is a hard subject for many as myself trying to see the black and white of scripture against what is occurring in reality, but there is no excuse for degradation of Ms. Cheney nor her child.

I guess that is the difference between Conservative and Fundamentalist. As Christians we should treat all others with the respect as human beings, whether we agree with their lifestyle choices or not (whether divorced, drugs, or gay).  Fundamentalists seem to think that you are not human unless you adhere to all of the Teachings of GOD and Christ. I am sure that the sinners, tax collectors and prostitutes talked to by Jesus are glad that he didn't have a similar opinion.

Thank you for your blog, it gives a different perspective to everyone who reads it whether they like it or not.

09 Dec 2006 05:11 pm

Tough and Tender

Here's a reader review of "The Conservative Soul" I got this morning:

The Conservative Soul got me rather disappointed and irritated initially. There was enough psychobabble in the first few chapters to shame a West Hollywood Marriage and Family Counseling trainee. Honestly, if I had read the word "denial" one more time I would have thrown the book at the first Methodist anti-war activist I saw Sunday morning, but, grimly, I read on. I understood you had to "define your opponent" as the political consultants say it, but I hoped for so much more from a man of your intellect, training and experience. I felt the book growing old and time-bound with every turn of the page.

Then, I got to the latter chapters. This is what I wanted to know, and your love letter to America was thrilling. I felt and respected your authority, as I had needed and expected to, in your definition of a conservative. I will never be as erudite as you in this matter, but I have read enough books and taken enough classes and even distinguished myself, however infinitesimally, in scholarship sufficiently to know the real thing when I see it.

Here you truly excelled, soared even as one of those banned kites in Afghanistan, and I grabbed hold and went along for the ride, avidly and enthusiastically. Thank you for this achievement. I will ponder and use your arguments in my own discussions as I test them against my own experience and others' opinions. I will recommend your book to my friends and family (with a caveat regarding patience until one finally gets to the meat of the matter). I think it's deplorable that the current keepers of the temple of conservative orthodoxy can't see how deeply they are in, er,...denial.  Perhaps someone will throw your book at a few of them.

A friend of mine somewhat surprised me after reading the book when I asked him what he thought of it. He said simply: "It made me feel more patriotic." The book is really a love-letter to my adopted country, what it has taught me, and why I am so passionate about not damaging the core conservative genius of America.

You can buy it here and here; and details for getting a personally signed copy for yourself or as a Christmas gift can be found here.

09 Dec 2006 03:52 pm

Romney

His strong defense of gay rights in the past has now made it to the NYT. Hey - a week behind the blogosphere isn't bad for the Gray Lady.

09 Dec 2006 03:18 pm

Another Glimmer

There are signs of life in Iraq's oil sector and a big windfall for the government which now has a chance to distribute some of the wealth directly to Iraqi citizens. Money quote from Mohammed at Iraq the Model:

Yesterday al-Sabah brought the news that the parliament is discussing a suggestion to set aside 30 percent of oil sales income to distribute among the citizens of Iraq. The draft law sets 3 classes of payments according to age and subsequent needs and responsibilities; from one month to 6 years, from 6 to 18 years and the third one 19 years and older. People who migrated from Iraq, those with salaries higher that 1 million dinars/month and convicted criminals will be excluded from the payment program, the report added.

The people here met the news with some delight, hope and some skepticism too although the announcement came through the government's paper.

If this plan comes to materialize I think it can reflect positively on the security situation to some extent. The economy is part of the problem and also part of the solution and the government should move forward with reforms that involve economy and infrastructure as well as, of course and above all, security.

I feel for the first time in a very long while actually encouraged by some news from Iraq.

09 Dec 2006 02:56 pm

Glimmers

In history, it is always best to be ready to be surprised. In the Middle East, once in a blue moon, the surprises can even be pleasant ones. The news that the Iraqi sectarian factions may be close to a national oil deal is encouraging. It's the first tangible sign or real seriousness in what remains of the Iraqi elite. I have no idea what has hastened the pace of change, but if it is related to the threat of the U.S. to withdraw troops, then it proves that we still have some leverage over the Iraqis, and almost all of it is negative.

The other glimmer is the sign of adults pushing back against Ahmadinejad in Iran. This ABC News story is fascinating and suggests that the petite maniac may be about to see his prestige wane. It also suggests to me that the nuclear card is his way of appealing for popular support, and we should do what we can not to allow him to pose as the savior of his nation's pride. Unlike Iraq, Persia is a real country, and will one day be a rightful regional power. Most Persians, especially the next generation, are pro-Western and pro-American. We must not forget that or them. Time may be on our side - hence Ahmadinejad's desperate attempt to jump-start his nuclear program.

Does this mean the costs and benefits shift in our decision about what to do in Iraq? I'd say both developments make the option of recommitting to Iraq with serious manpower more palatable than it was only a week ago. These are fine judgment calls. I'm torn between Double-Down or Full Metal McCain, and leaning toward the former, if only because of the apparent lack of seriousness in the Baghdad elite and the lack of sheer ability in the White House. But the president may benefit from further deliberation, and the Baker-Hamilton report and the polls in the U.S. paradoxically strengthen his negotiating position with Maliki. He can now credibly say, "Look, we're out of here, unless ..." He has a little more time. Just not much. But if there is a glimmer of hope to save the place, we should not be blind to it.

(Photo: Jim Young/Reuters.)

09 Dec 2006 01:11 pm

Best '80s Video Nominee

09 Dec 2006 09:37 am

Disraeli

It's now clear that I'm guilty of one example of sloppy word use in "The Conservative Soul," and I'll correct it in future editions. Here's the paragraph:

One famous example of just such a pursuit of intimations was Tory prime minister Benjamin Disraeli's decision to back universal suffrage in the nineteenth century. "Toryism" if turned into an ideology would have rejected this as a negation of its own identity and meaning. Tories were defined by their adherence to the prerogatives of the monarchy, nobility and rural, landed gentry. The idea of bringing vast masses of untutored and possibly radical working class voters into the political system seemed like socialist revolution.

Disraeli differed. He saw that England was changing, that the industrial revolution was urbanizing Britain at a rapid pace, that the masses were acquiring economic power and leverage, that they were susceptible to being coopted by dangerous and radical forces. He intuited that the job of a conservative was to deal with changing social reality. So he proposed coopting the working classes for Toryism, giving them the vote, appealing to their patriotism and faith, and remaking conservatism in his time.

All of this is true except for the word "universal." Obviously, Disraeli didn't include women, and not all men, in suffrage in the 1867 Reform Act. Wikipedia provides the most concise summary:

The Reform Act 1867 (also known as the Second Reform Act, and formally titled the Representation of the People Act 1867), 30 & 31 Vict. c. 102, was a piece of British legislation that greatly increased the number of men who could vote in elections in the UK. In its final form, the Reform Act 1867 enfranchised all male householders and abolished compounding (the practice of paying rates to a landlord as part of rent). Due to this act working-class men gained suffrage for the first time in Britain.

So you can see my gist was correct, and my point stands, but my wording was sloppy.

09 Dec 2006 08:56 am

Quote for the Day

"The first service that one owes to others in community consists in listening to them. Just as love for God begins with listening to His Word, so the beginning of love for the brethren is learning to listen to them. It is God's love for us that He not only gives His Word but also lends us His ear ... Many people are looking for an ear that will listen. They do not find it among Christians because these Christians are talking where they should be listening. But he who can no longer listen to his brother will soon be no longer listening to God either; he will be doing nothing but prattle in the presence of God. This is the beginning of the death of the spiritual life, and, in the end, there is nothing left but spiritual chatter and clerical condescension arrayed in pious words," - Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Life Together.

09 Dec 2006 02:51 am

The View From Your Window

Tuxedo, New York, 7.20 pm.

Friday, December 8, 2006

08 Dec 2006 10:31 pm

Malkin Award Nominee

"By this selfish action, [Mary] Cheney is not merely disrupting society, she is being cruel to her child ... Her pregnancy is further evidence that participation in homosexual activity distorts value systems, inducing practitioners to harm the commonweal. Our society already has too many children born without the benefits of marriage; Cheney's action is not only a bad example, but poor treatment of an innocent child," - Paul Cameron, of the Family research Institute, on the Christian Newswire.

08 Dec 2006 08:49 pm

Hastert and Trandahl

The Speaker is revealed as at best untruthful by the House Ethics Committee:

Mr. Hastert has said that he was unaware of suspicions surrounding Mr. Foley until he resigned his seat. But the panel found that "the weight of the evidence supports the conclusion that Speaker Hastert was told, at least in passing, about the e-mails" months before the resignation both by his majority leader, Representative John A. Boehner of Ohio, and by Representative Thomas M. Reynolds of New York, who headed the party’s Congressional campaign committee.

Even so, the committee said, "neither the Majority Leader nor Rep. Reynolds asked the Speaker to take any action in response to the information each provided to him, and there is no evidence that the Speaker took any action."

Who did take it seriously? The openly gay Clerk of the House, Jeff Trandahl:

Others familiar with Mr. Foley's actions were keenly aware of the potential for a scandal that could ruin Mr. Foley and cast the House in a bad light, the investigators found. For instance, many months before the scandal erupted, then-House Clerk Jeff Trandahl conferred with Representative John M. Shimkus, the Illinois Republican who was head of the board that oversaw the pages.

Mr. Trandahl testified before the ethics committee that he told Mr. Shimkus that Mr. Foley persisted in his actions despite being warned "multiple times," and that Mr. Foley was "a ticking time bomb."

So the straight Republicans covered up or ignored Foley's grossness and an openly gay man did all he could to stop it.

(Photo: Lauren Victoria Burke/AP.)

08 Dec 2006 07:46 pm

Deaths in US Custody

A new study clarifies things a little. It's firewalled but the data reveal 112 deaths of prisoners in U.S. custody from 2002 to 2005 in Iraq and Afghanistan. Money quote:

Forty-three detainees reportedly died as a result of homicide (37 in Iraq and 6 in Afghanistan). Homicide is defined by the Army's Criminal Investigation Division as "death resulting from the intentional (explicit or implied) or grossly reckless behavior of another person or persons." Homicide for the purposes of death classification is a neutral term that neither indicates nor implies criminal intent. Of the Iraq homicides, 22 detainees reportedly died of gunshot injuries. Fifteen of those were shot during riots or attempted escapes, and 2 expired in detention from gunshot injuries sustained during fire fights in the field prior to being taken into custody.

Among all homicides, at least 11 involved blunt trauma or asphyxiation. At least 3 homicide cases have resulted in murder charges and 3 resulted in voluntary manslaughter charges.

For the 12 homicide cases for which final autopsy reports are available, gunshot wounds accounted for 4 of the deaths. The remaining 8 homicides were due to: (1) pulmonary embolism due to blunt trauma; (2) blunt force injuries complicating coronary disease; (3) strangulation; (4) blunt force with rhabdomyolysis; (5) cortical brain contusion and subdural hematoma; (6) blunt force with compromised respiration; (7) asphyxia due to chest compression and smothering; and (8) asphyxia due to occlusion of the airway and blunt force injuries...

According to a review conducted by Human Rights First, at least 11 detainee deaths may have been due in part or in whole to physical abuse or harsh conditions of confinement. They further concluded that at least 8 detainees in US custody were tortured to death. Steven Miles, reporting in this journal, put the number of deaths due to torture at 17, with 11 cases occurring in Iraq and 6 occurring in Afghanistan. Many of these deaths involved torture or abuse related to harsh interrogations of the detainees by US personnel.

43 homicides in U.S. military custody need the context of a brutal conflict during which the president and defense secretary essentially suspended the Geneva Conventions. Given the signals from the top, it is perhaps surprising that more prisoners weren't killed or tortured to death. It should be noted that 43 homicides is, at this point in time, one night in Baghdad. 36 were killed by insurgent mortar attacks on military prisons. I post this for the historical record.

08 Dec 2006 06:48 pm

Another Victory

 

The attempt to reverse Canada's decision to allow gay couples the same rights as straight ones just collapsed. The Tory prime minister, Stephen Harper, has declared the issue closed for good. I repeat: the Tory prime minister. David Frum must be weeping somewhere. Money quote:

Nova Scotia MP Gerald Keddy, one of the few Conservatives who last year voted in favour of the bill that redefined marriage to include gays and lesbians, said he firmly believes this is the last time the matter will come before Parliament.

But Mr. Keddy, who has been targeted for political attack by groups that object to his pro-same-sex stand, said those battles may not be over.

"I expect there will be a bit of that that will go on," he said.

"But we will march ahead and we will cross that bridge when we come to it," Mr. Keddy said.

In Britain, the new Tory leader actually boasts of gay equality as a political principle, celebrating civil partnerships in his annual speech to his party. Such partnerships are legally identical to civil marriage, and now a year old in the UK.  Only America's South really remains in bitter opposition - and the Republican party that is now increasingly a hostage of its own base. But this debate is now over in the West as a whole. Except in the heads of the far right. On this, as on so many other matters, they live now only in the bubble of their own delusions.

08 Dec 2006 05:22 pm

The Thing About Mary

A reader writes:

My sister is not gay, but she did have a child without the benefit of a father (through artificial insemination by an anonymous sperm donor, as I assume Mary probably did). I remember raising some concerns with my brother, who has 4 children while I have none. His response was basically this. There are so many children conceived unintentionally and born to parents who really don't want them, here at least is one conceived intentionally to someone who wants nothing more in this world than to do everything possible to make that child happy. I thought he had a good point and have never questioned my sister's decision since.

My point is not to compare having and raising a child in some optimum environment, but to the real world fact that few children have anything close to that. After all, there is more to an optimum child-raising environment than just having two parents of the opposite sex. What about having the resources to raise a child properly? What about having two people to love a child a care for it in a world with so many single parents? Isn’t two better than one? I think these are things that those who advocate a traditional family structure always overlook. It's ultimately a question of balance and comparing a situation to what is often the case and not some optimum that seldom exists.

All of this is obvious to anyone but a fanatic. But fanaticism is what we're dealing with. When I hear people on cable news reiterate that a child is best brought up with a mother and a father and cite studies showing the toll that fatherlessness takes on mainly black urban kids, all I can say is: yes. Yes. YES. YES. But so what? What's the relevance of that to Mary Cheney? Is she to be forbidden to have a child? Is Virginia about to pass a law not only shredding gay couples of any legal protections but threatening to take their children away from them as well? Is it not enough that one mother will have no legal rights over her child?

Here are the only relevant questions. Should it be illegal for lesbian or single women to get artificially inseminated? If artificial insemination is legal, is it better for the child to have a stable, two-person home or not? That's it. What's the Christianist answer? I heard it on O'Reilly Wednesday night when he had one of the Foxbot women on to tell him what he already thinks. He ended his "fair and balanced" segment by asking her if a husband should be "mandatory" for lesbian or single moms. The answer was yes. What does he mean by "mandatory"? I assume making it illegal for lesbians to have their own children. If that's what they want, they should say so.

Reality-based conservative Robert A. George has more thoughts here.

08 Dec 2006 04:26 pm

Quote for the Day III

"Some general, and even systematical, idea of the perfection of policy and law, may no doubt be necessary for directing the views of the statesman. But to insist upon establishing, and upon establishing all at once, and in spite of all opposition, every thing which that idea may seem to require, must often be the highest degree of arrogance. It is to erect his own judgment into the supreme standard of right and wrong. It is to fancy himself the only wise and worthy man in the commonwealth, and that his fellow-citizens should accommodate themselves to him and not he to them. It is upon this account, that of all political speculators, sovereign princes are by far the most dangerous.

This arrogance is perfectly familiar to them. They entertain no doubt of the immense superiority of their own judgment. When such imperial and royal reformers, therefore, condescend to contemplate the constitution of the country which is committed to their government, they seldom see any thing so wrong in it as the obstructions which it may sometimes oppose to the execution of their own will. They hold in contempt the divine maxim of Plato, and consider the state as made for themselves, not themselves for the state. The great object of their reformation, therefore, is to remove those obstructions; to reduce the authority of the nobility; to take away the privileges of cities and provinces, and to render both the greatest individuals and the greatest orders of the state, as incapable of opposing their commands, as the weakest and most insignificant," - Adam Smith, a conservative of doubt, "Theory of Moral Sentiments."

(Photo: Nell Redmond/Landov.)

08 Dec 2006 03:36 pm

Quote for the Day II

"There's something to be said for having a Republican who supports civil rights in this broader context, including sexual orientation. When Ted Kennedy speaks on gay rights, he's seen as an extremist. When Mitt Romney speaks on gay rights he’s seen as a centrist and a moderate. It's a little like if Eugene McCarthy was arguing in favor of recognizing China, people would have called him a nut. But when Richard Nixon does it, it becomes reasonable. When Ted says it, it's extreme; when I say it, it's mainstream. I think the gay community needs more support from the Republican Party and I would be a voice in the Republican Party to foster anti-discrimination efforts.

The other thing I should say is that the gay community and the members of it that are friends of mine that I've talked to don't vote solely on the basis of gay rights issues. They're also very concerned about a $4 trillion national debt, a failing school system, a welfare system that’s out of whack and a criminal justice system that isn't working. I believe that while I would further the efforts Ted Kennedy has led, I would also lead the country in new and far more positive ways in taxing and spending, welfare reform, criminal justice and education. That's why I believe many gay and lesbian individuals will support my candidacy and do support my candidacy," - Mitt Romney to the Boston gay paper, Bay Windows, in 1994.

Romney is on record supporting the federal Employment Non-Discrimination Act for gay and lesbian workplace protection. He is on record supporting leaving the question of marriage to the states. He is on record supporting an aggressive outreach to gay and lesbian voters and is on record speaking of sexual orientation in the clear context of civil rights. How can he therefore be favored by the Christianist wing of the GOP? Can Hugh Hewitt support a candidate with these positions, which are diametrically opposed to his own? And if Romney has reversed himself on all this, is it not appropriate to ask: why? Was he lying then or is he lying now? What does he really believe? Or is he prepared to say anything that serves his career interests at any given time?

More analysis here.

(Photo: Paul Sancya/AP.)

08 Dec 2006 02:33 pm

Lopez on Cheney

Theocon Kathryn-Jean Lopez writes the following about Mary Cheney:

Unless Mary Cheney asks to be part of a political debate about this, there is no need to have a public discussion about her life. The New York Times raises the question of how/who, etc. That just seems outrageous to me. She is not the vice president. She is not the president. That's just uncalled for from anyone in the media/commentariat. I could be wrong but the media/commentators seem to be making it — Mary Cheney's pregnancy — a political issue, not the Cheneys.

Yes, I think fatherhood is crucial and am opposed to redefining marriage and all the rest. And my "deafening silence" on the Mary Cheney "issue" (what nonsense) doesn't change that. But unless Mary Cheney asks to be a spokeswoman on this issue, folks ought to leave her alone.

It's a fascinating post, as is the self-imposed silence at the Corner and elsewhere on the social right. So let's unpack it, shall we? Lopez frames the issue as an egregious media seeking who the father is. I see very, very little of this, since almost everyone assumes it's an anonymous sperm donor. Then the following:

Yes, I think fatherhood is crucial and am opposed to redefining marriage and all the rest. And my "deafening silence" on the Mary Cheney "issue" (what nonsense) doesn't change that.

But this is absurd. Lopez aggressively favors all efforts to strip the Cheney grandchild of two mothers. Lopez has politicized this family's personal life, and attacked it viciously. Lopez supported the Virginia state constitutional amendment that will mean that the Cheney grandchild will only ever have one secure parent. Lopez favors adding this terrible insecurity to the Cheney-Poe child's life. And she wants it not to be personal. Sorry, but it is personal.

National Review institutionally believes that what Cheney's family is doing is evil. Some have the integrity to keep saying so even when their actual impact on an actual human being they actually care about is at stake. Lopez, Podhoretz and Goldberg do not have that much integrity. Remember: David Frum once threatened to make Mary Cheney a criminal for her committed relationship of a decade and a half. Remember also: these people wanted to declare this family illegitimate in the very Constitution of the United States, declaring that one group of Americans do not belong in their own country. And now they find themselves demonizing and marginalizing and discriminating against one of their own. Stupid poetic justice, as Homer Simpson would say.

So what do they do? They are forced to be silent, or to blame others for bringing it up. Their double standards and intellectual dishonesty are now up there in neon lights. Where is Stanley "Slippery Slope" Kurtz? Cat got your tongue? Thousands of words to demonize abstract others. Sudden silence when he has to cast out one of his own. These people do not even have the courage of their own prejudices.

As for Mary Cheney not seeking to make this a political issue, that is not true. In her book, Cheney quite clearly takes a stand. She opposes the federal constitutional amendment; and she opposes the amendment because it removes the woman she loves and is mothering a child with from the realm of legality, decency and humanity. Kathryn-Jean Lopez has spent the past several years directly attacking the Cheney family. She just doesn't have the integrity to continue the attack when its real nature is fully revealed.

08 Dec 2006 02:00 pm

How Gay Is The Vatican?

Or am I not allowed to ask? Someone else is.

08 Dec 2006 01:21 pm

Googlefreude

Or should it be Googleschaden?

08 Dec 2006 12:50 pm

Quote for the Day

"Quod vides perisse perditum ducas" - Catullus.

"What you see is lost, set down as lost."

(Photo: Hadim Izban/AP.)

08 Dec 2006 12:13 pm

Hope for Habeas Corpus

Specter says he's open to new legislation restoring the most basic of individual liberties. If the Democrats have the balls to restore our constitutional order, I may have to stop being an independent for a while. 

08 Dec 2006 11:30 am

The Liberal-Libertarian Alliance?

Julian Sanchez scans the reactions to Brink Lindsey's recent TNR essay. Bummer.

08 Dec 2006 10:40 am

Kagan and Kristol

Here's their view:

So let's add up the "realist" proposals: We must retreat from Iraq, and thus abandon all those Iraqis - Shiite, Sunni, Kurd, and others - who have depended on the United States for safety and the promise of a better future. We must abandon our allies in Lebanon and the very idea of an independent Lebanon in order to win Syria's support for our retreat from Iraq. We must abandon our opposition to Iran's nuclear program in order to convince Iran to help us abandon Iraq. And we must pressure our ally, Israel, to accommodate a violent Hamas in order to gain radical Arab support for our retreat from Iraq.

A little melodramatic but: Yep. That's what Kagan's and Kristol's beloved administration has brought us to. And by supporting it so ferociously for so long, it is what Kagan and Kristol have also helped bring us to. Do they have any serious alternative? More troops. And if Bush won't send or the US cannot find or America will not support more troops? What will K&K say then?

Here's what they will never say: that they bear serious responsibility for this foreign policy catastrophe. In the world of the Bushies, it is always, always, always someone else's fault.

08 Dec 2006 06:10 am

The View From Your Window

Manhattan, 3 am, jackhammers at full volume.

08 Dec 2006 05:38 am

Email of the Day

A reader writes:

Thanks for your post regarding Ann Althouse and her Grand Blinking Conspiracy and the death of habeas corpus. Isn't it just fabulous watching 800 years of jurisprudence and a cornerstone of Western civilization get treated like so much birdcage liner?

This shouldn't be a surprise though. Where communism is the endpoint of leftist extremism, fascism is the endpoint of the extremist right. In either case, the State is all and the individual but a footnote. I think the Founders must be crying in Heaven right now.

I do think Godwin's rule needs to be amended somewhat in the age of Cheney and Bush. And I do think the logical consequence of the denialist far right at the moment is indeed closer to Schmitt than to Burke.

08 Dec 2006 12:44 am

Leaving

A reader writes:

If a European superpower had invaded the United States after the first battle of Bull Run, determined to save us from our own Civil War, what could the superpower have done? How would Americans of the North and South have responded? If we can't answer those questions satisfactorily even with the benefit of 160 years of hindsight and a clear understanding of our own history and culture, I see no chance - none - that we can make it up as we go along in Iraq.

Chuck Hagel and others are correct: there is no military solution to Iraq. At the most basic level we can't even identify an "enemy" against whom the fresh troops wold be engaged. The lure of adding more troops is twofold: it is the simplest option available to us, at least in the short term; and it offers those who supported the invasion in 2003 the hope of being vindicated in some way. The drawback is that, like everything we have done in Iraq, it has no basis in reality. The ISG report is a good starting point for tugging the American government back to a reality-based view of the world. Let's not go backward.

Another reader grinds the point home:

You wrote:

"He needs to embrace much of Baker-Hamilton and add more than 50,000 and probably closer to 75,000 new troops into the theater - in the next three or four months."

Madness. Shinseki said it would take 500,000 troops to do what you and McCain want to do. Nothing has changed since he said that. (Actually, things have changed: more troops might be needed now than were needed three years ago).  75,000 would bring us to less than half that total. Unless the U.S. wants to re-invade Iraq with a grand coalition and half a million men, it should leave.  All the evidence is in. Unless we are prepared to follow the original, accurate recommendation, then we should bite the bullet and get out.

I see no other viable option at this point. Our goal must be to take measures to save those few Iraqis who can be saved.

(Photo: Mohammed Ameen/Reuters.)

Thursday, December 7, 2006

07 Dec 2006 10:46 pm

Double-Down

Fred Kagan at least has a sharp critique of the ISG's unrealistic realism:

Some of the most important training Iraqi Army units get today comes from operating side-by-side with American combat units in clear-and-hold missions, searches and raids. It is one thing to have trainers tell you what to do and watch you do it. It is another to participate in well-planned and skillfully-executed operations. Ironically, pulling American forces back from combat missions will actually remove one of the most important elements of training Iraqi forces.

A serious strategy to help the Iraqis establish security now would not only embed more American troops with Iraqi forces but increase the number of U.S. combat troops in Baghdad - and work with the Iraqis not just to clear insurgent areas, but to hold them once they've been cleared.

But do we have enough troops to do this? And why was this not done years ago? Oh, forget that last question, but rephrase it: given the level of talent in the White House, what are the chances of getting it right this time?

07 Dec 2006 10:17 pm

Quote for the Day

"Some reports are issued and just gather dust. And truth of the matter is, a lot of reports in Washington are never read by anybody. To show you how important this one is, I read it," - George W. Bush today.

Does he have to make Jon Stewart's job that easy?

07 Dec 2006 09:54 pm

Past Predictions

Here's another one from December 7, 2001. I wonder if Garry Trudeau believed then, as I naively did, that this was impossible in America. Or whether he was just more prescient than I was. (Click to enlarge.)

07 Dec 2006 08:50 pm

On VDH

A reader writes:

You missed the biggest flaw in Victor Davis Hanson's statement, which is its historical inaccuracy. This country did not fight and defeat Germany, Italy and Japan all at once. We defeated Japan with some help from the British Empire and Commonwealth, and China; we defeated Italy with substantial help from the British Empire and Commonwealth, as well as Free French, Polish, Czech and other forces; the Soviet Union defeated Germany, with major help from us as well as the British Empire and Commonwealth, as well as Free French, Polish, Czech and other forces.

Had the Soviet Union not broken the back of the German Wehrmacht and its allies before Moscow, at Stalingrad and at Kursk, and thereafter, there is serious doubt whether even the combined forces of the U.S., the British Empire and Commonwealth, and their allies, could have defeated Germany in northwest Europe. Read Max Hastings.

This is an example of the pride and hubris in an all-powerful U.S. that does not have to resort to mere diplomacy and alliance building as it goes boldly forth to impose its military will abroad - pride and hubris that directly led us to the dire circumstances in which we now find ourselves in Iraq.

07 Dec 2006 08:08 pm

Military Arab Linguists

A reader writes:

Having been an army linguist, allow me to set the record straight:

1) There is no shortage of individuals who want to become linguists. Linguists are better paid (we got an extra $100+ a month per language for being linguists).  We had far better living conditions, and were generally treated as mini-officers in many circles, as most of us were highly skilled, educated, and generally quite intelligent.  Furthermore, linguists are given Top Secret clearances, which do wonders for post-service employment potential.  The life style and perks for linguists in the army can't be beat.

2) Depending on one's DLAB score (Defense Language Aptitude Battery), one is thrown into a suitable language program. Languages come in five levels with languages such as Swahili in level I, Chinese, Arabic, Russian in level IV, with English being the only level V language.  All candidates for the linguist program are sent to DLI (the Defense Language Institute) in Monterey California for six to fourteen months depending on the difficulty of their language. Arabic linguists take about twelve months to train.  To be fair to Snow, the fail rate at DLI is about 50 to 75% per class, so one really can't claim that they program can be sped up.  And the student to teacher ratio is about one to eight, so it's well staffed.  After DLI, graduates of the language portion of training are sent to Goodfellow Airforce Base (a joint service base) where they spend three months learning the secret side of their craft.  In total, we're talking about 15 months to train an Arabic linguist.  That is, if the military really wanted to, they could have flooded the streets of Iraq with Arabic linguists by 2004.

That is: if we had had a halfway competent defense secretary and halfway competent president. We had neither. You want to know who lost Iraq? Bush. Period.

07 Dec 2006 07:06 pm

"Blinking in Code"?

I missed this gem. Ann Althouse speculates that they put U.S. citizen Jose Padilla in blackout goggles and sound-proof ear-muffs to prevent him "blinking in code" in a walk outside his cell. Blinking to whom? After four years in total isolation? This is from his lawyer's brief:

Mr. Padilla was often put in stress positions for hours at a time. He would be shackled and manacled, with a belly chain, for hours in his cell. Noxious fumes would be introduced to his room causing his eyes and nose to run. The temperature of his cell would be manipulated, making his cell extremely cold for long stretches of time. Mr. Padilla was denied even the smallest, and most personal shreds of human dignity by being deprived of showering for weeks at a time, yet having to endure forced grooming at the whim of his captors...

He was threatened with being cut with a knife and having alcohol poured on the wounds. He was also threatened with imminent execution. He was hooded and forced to stand in stress positions for long durations of time. He was forced to endure exceedingly long interrogation sessions, without adequate sleep, wherein he would be confronted with false information, scenarios, and documents to further disorient him. Often he had to endure multiple interrogators who would scream, shake, and otherwise assault Mr. Padilla.

All of the original headline accusations against Padilla have been dropped. There are no charges of "dirty bomb plots" any more. The indictment is vague about his connections to global jihad, and if this president had had his way, there would never have even been an indictment. The worst he is accused of is being recruited to an Islamist cell linked to conflict in Bosnia and Chechnya. Maybe Padilla is guilty. But nothing he is now charged with can justify either the length of his detention or the sadism meted out to him. After all these years, you think he has anything more to say? You think this defenseless, bare-footed, manacled, disoriented shell still represents a threat so dire he requires three riot police to escort him blind and deaf down a corridor? In the end, as Orwell noted, the point of torture is torture.

As for "blinking in code," Padilla is so traumatized that he no longer fully controls his eye movements or body:

"During questioning, he often exhibits facial tics, unusual eye movements and contortions of his body," Mr. Patel said. "The contortions are particularly poignant since he is usually manacled and bound by a belly chain when he has meetings with counsel."

But let me say this in defense of Althouse. She is at least conceding that the shameful treatment of Padilla is worth discussing. And her defense of the sadism is about as plausible as it will ever get. She sees there is an important principle here - something we once knew as habeas corpus. Here you have a U.S. citizen detained on American soil, kept without charges for 3 and a half years, accused of plotting a dirty bomb attack (an accusation never substantiated in any way), tortured until he may be mentally incapable of standing trial ... and the conservative blogosphere is completely, utterly silent. Habeas corpus disappears not with a bang, and not even with a whimper, but with deathly quiet. Well, we know what American conservatism now stands for. You can see the visual above.

07 Dec 2006 06:15 pm

The Burial of Neoconservatism

Bush's apparent acceptance of the Blair-Baker position that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is central to resolving Iraq is the end of neoconservatism in the Bush administration. But the new realism is utterly unrealistic, as George Will eloquently explains today. Double-down or get out. Those remain the only real options, in my view. Increasingly, I lean toward getting out completely, and finally giving the region the civil and religious war it so obviously and deeply wants. We had our chance; and we blew it. Bush doesn't or won't get this; and it's pretty clear he has little or no grip on reality. The terrible costs of our withdrawal are primarily on his hands; but they are also on the hands of the Iraqi factions who prefer tearing each other apart to dealing with the modern world.

He may continue - forcing America into a brutal period of political civil war to save his own face. He won't save his own face - it's too late for that. And my bet is he will do nothing on the scale necessary to save Iraq. This is the consequence of re-electing a patent incompetent, who is now reduced to enforcing the policies of the man he defeated in 2004, with none of the advantages Kerry would have had. If Bush finds 50,000 to 75,000 troops, we'll know he's serious. But I suspect he isn't. He never has been, has he?

07 Dec 2006 05:52 pm

Apologies

I set up a bunch of posts to self-publish while I went to the shrink and had lunch. Typepad malfunctioned, hence the gap and now the glut. No idea when future publishing will work again - so I'm glued to the laptop.

07 Dec 2006 04:30 pm

Conservative Degeneracy Watch

"In point of fact, we strap people to wooden boards and make them feel like they're drowning all the time in this country. Mostly at theme parks like Six Flags," - Ann Coulter, Townhall.com.

07 Dec 2006 04:19 pm

Quote for the Day

"I mention this only to show that the Iraq adventure has made fools of many of us bystanders. That is not of much consequence by comparison with the fools it has made of Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Powell, Rice, and the rest; and that is not of much consequence when set against the brave Americans maimed and killed in this war, and the stupendous waste of national resources and prestige the war has involved. As we bloviators fret over our wounded egos, we should remember that a wounded ego is utterly nothing by comparison with an actual wound, let alone a death, or the humiliating of a great nation in the eyes of her enemies," - John Derbyshire, NRO.

07 Dec 2006 03:42 pm

The View From Your Window

Baghdad, 2.20 pm.

07 Dec 2006 02:53 pm

Closet Tolerant Watch

Jake Tapper ponders some lessons learned from covering the Mary Cheney story. Money quote:

This is what we got out of the White House when we asked, over and over, if the President, as he declared in 1999, still opposed same sex couples adopting children. Our intrepid White House off-air reporter, Karen Travers, asked if that position still stood.

"When Vice President Cheney told President Bush that his daughter was pregnant, the President congratulated him," the White House spokesman said. "President Bush is happy for the Cheney family."

Right. Okay. Travers tried again: does he still oppose same sex adoptions?

"In 2005, the President said he believes the ideal is for a child to be raised by a man and a woman, but children can receive love from gay couples and private adoption firms can make their own decisions," said the spokesman.

Jake thinks that means Bush is still opposed. I'm not so sure. I don't think the president has the slightest problem with his veep's daughter having a committed relationship and having a child. It's just that he cannot say that in public. Hypocrisy is now hardwired into sustaining the Republican coalition.

(More criticism for the vice-president's daughter from anti-gay activist Peter LaBarbera here and the Christianist group, Concerned Women for America, here.)

07 Dec 2006 01:01 pm

The ISG

I'm reading and absorbing it. I hope to have something more detailed to write when I'm done. Here's my first basic impression. It's absolutely not more of the same. It's a a clear declaration that we're leaving. Money quote from Lee Hamilton to ABC News:

"We did not find one single person, and we interviewed over 200 people, who thought we should stay the course ...  The Iraqis must be under no misapprehension here. We are going to pull out our combat troops out of Iraq in a responsible way over a period of time and they have to begin to accept the new mission and we have to begin to accept the primary mission of training and embedding troops."

But it's also a very realist "Hail Mary" which involves so many simultaneous things to happen right that its chance of success, even using the Baker-Hamilton premises, can only be in the 20 percent range. Overhaul Iraqi army training to wean it from sectarian loyalties and give it a capacity to enforce peace on the whole country? Get Iran and Syria to back off? Do all this while we've declared we have no intention of sticking around for much longer than a year in any real force strength? And do it all while civil war spirals further? Yeah, right.

But the key claim of the ISG is that the only alternative to this - the current strategy with the current force levels, however massaged - has a zero percent chance of success. And the other claim is that any alternative to this - all of this, including the Israeli-Palestine issue - will fail to get actual bipartisan support at home. You can see why Bush looked yesterday like a dog being given a bath.

The only truly new aspect of the report, apart from its insistence that we are absolutely leaving soon, is the notion that Iran has an interest in stabilizing Iraq and that we have leverage in that respect. Many neoconservatives argue that Iran has precisely the opposite intention, and so we have no leverage; and even if we did, Ahmadinejad is not someone any rational actor can negotiate with. I don't want to go all Baker-Hamilton on you, but both sides may have captured parts of the truth. Let's assume the neocons are right (and I think they are) about the nature of the Tehran regime. Is there a point at which civil war in Iraq really does threaten the mullahs in Tehran? And if there is, are we there yet?

I don't know. Perhaps it's unknowable in the time and place such decisions have to be made. But I do think we can over-estimate the stability of the Tehran regime, and that revolutionary unrest and disintegration in its neighbor might rattle the forces in Iran's leadership that are halfway sane. Think of hundreds of thousands of restive Shiite refugees pouring over the border. Think of growing ethnic unrest within Iran. Think violence spreading in from the Kurdish region. So Baker may be right: we may have more leverage than we think. But we may not yet have enough to get Iran to back off in any meaningful sense.

So we have two awful options, it seems to me. First: throw everything we've got at this thing, do all the Baker-Hamilton commission wants (including the Iran and Syria gambits) except withdraw troops. But merely maintaining current force levels is, as Baker argues, a non-starter. If Bush wants to pursue something called "victory" in his head, then the acid test will be his troop commitment. He needs to embrace much of Baker-Hamilton and add more than 50,000 and probably closer to 75,000 new troops into the theater - in the next three or four months. And why not talk to the regimes in Syria and Iran? If they are what the Bush administration says they are, the diplomacy will go nowhere, and we can then be seen to have at least tried. The new troops should then be used to prop up Maliki, train the Iraqi army, and finally police the borders. No timelines. Full Metal McCain.

If we don't do that, we should leave - rapidly, and let the real war begin. It may already have. I don't see a third way working, especially given the incompetence in the White House, the profound weakness of Maliki, and the complete lack of domestic confidence in this administration's conduct of the war. Asking young Americans to die for a slower, longer civil war between Sunnis and Shia is, at this point, the real non-starter. In fact, a third way may make us even more complicit in the conflict we will eventually have to escape from. That's my first take, open to revision and correction. Double down and deal; or get out in a matter of months.

(Photo: Haraz Ghanbari/AP.)

07 Dec 2006 11:50 am

Scalia or Breyer?

Dahlia Lithwick reminds me how effortlessly she brings legal and constitutional writing to vivid, insightful life:

When you're sitting close enough to see that Supreme Court justices actually wear socks, their differences are stark. From the moment he takes the stage, Justice Breyer looks outward. He shifts in his seat constantly to catch the eye of the moderator, ABC's Jan Crawford Greenburg, and then to make eye contact with individual audience members. When Scalia speaks, Breyer nods and bobs. Justice Scalia turns inward, folding up his arms and gazing raptly into the middle distance. As Breyer speaks, Scalia first smirks, then giggles, then sort of erupts with a rebuttal, usually aimed right at the tips of his shoes. Where Breyer is ever striving to connect to the world, Scalia is happiest in his head. Throughout the debate, Breyer continues to measure, aloud, whether he and Scalia are "making progress." Scalia laughs that Breyer's hopes for the evening are too high.

Scalia is charming and—as ever—riotously funny. For each time Breyer says his own constitutional approach is "complicated" or "hard," Scalia retorts that his is "easy as pie" and a "piece of cake." And if this debate mirrors a marketplace of ideas, Breyer will make the sale through the earnest personal connection of a Wal-Mart greeter, while Scalia opts for the aloof certainty of the Tiffany's salesman: "Sure, you can buy some other, cheaper constitutional theory, but really. Ew."

07 Dec 2006 09:42 am

The Logic of Prejudice

A reader writes:

Robert Knight describes Mary Cheney's child as being conceived "With the express purpose of denying it a father"?

MARY CHENEY:  So would you like to have a child?

HEATHER POE:  No, not really.

MC:  Neither would I.

They continue watching Seinfeld. Mary's Partner frowns.

HP:  Wait, I just thought of something.

MC:  What?

HP:  If we did have a child, we could deny it a father.

MC:  Wow, I never thought of it that way before. What should we name it?

Wednesday, December 6, 2006

06 Dec 2006 11:49 pm

Back Off Dargis

A reader writes:

She's probably the most literate film critic out there. I don't agree with her much of the time, but at least she is willing to see films as an art form, as a form of literature, and not as a disposable product.

Think about it. If you are a film critic, what the f*** are you supposed to write when reviewing dreck like "Happy Feet"? So a David Lynch movie comes along - pretentious, self-indulgent, natch - and she's now able show off her years of film knowledge, her ideas and theories, while, perhaps, overwriting and extending metaphors here and there. So f***ing what. If you read her regularly, you'll learn that she will tackle almost any movie in any genre and, for the most part, review 'em on their own terms. She appreciates both David Lynch and George Romero.

And talk about overwrought. You might be the most melodramatic queen east of the Mississippi. Look in the mirror. So go back to your sermonizing and hand wringing, but, from now on, back off Dargis, punk.

06 Dec 2006 11:31 pm

Pure Baker

This quote is a classic:

"We felt it was extraordinarily important to try and keep this process out of politics if we could."

Because politics is not about how to fight and win wars? Or because the people are not be trusted to make such decisions? And Baker is.

06 Dec 2006 08:31 pm

Denialist Watch

One wants to admire Victor Davis Hanson. And then he says something like this:

They're talking about a country that once fought Italy, Japan and Germany all at once, defeated them, and then turned around and started the Cold War ... I mean, the Cold War resistance of the Soviet Union, and they're saying that this same country, now twice the size, with much more material and military wealth, can't fight in Afghanistan and Iraq at once. That's sort of the poverty of their imagination, that we've taken our eye off the ball in Afghanistan, got bogged down in Iraq, and now we're helpless. We need Jim Baker to come in, we need Syria to come in, we need Iran to come in to help us. It's absurd, but it seems to be the prevailing opinion now.

An obvious point: all those wars cited by VDH were classic armed combat, not intractable insurgencies. The most recent such insurgency dealt with by American military - Vietnam - was also a failure. Another obvious point: the Cold War was won in part by containment, not pre-emption. But the larger issue is this: Does VDH seriously believe that the problem in Iraq is insufficient support from the American public? This president got all he wanted and more - for a longer period than World War II. He assumed total power and control, by-passed even the Republican Congress when he felt like it, ripped up the Geneva Conventions, got to decide everything in Iraq for three and a half years ... and it's now the public's fault and the press's fault that almost every sane analysis concludes it has been botched beyond belief?

I might add that continuing bromides by VDH in which no serious criticism of the Bush administration was entertained did indeed contribute to the failure. He enabled failure rather than confronting it. If there are any members of the American public who bear responsibility for the debacle in Iraq it is those of us who passionately supported the war in the first place - and above all, those who refused to criticize its conduct once the failures became manifest. About a month after the invasion.

06 Dec 2006 08:21 pm

Quote for the Day II

"In all my time in Washington I've never seen such smugness, arrogance, or such insufferable moral superiority. Self-congratulatory. Full of itself. Horrible," - Bill Bennett on the ISG report, with little apparent self-awareness.

06 Dec 2006 08:00 pm

Arab Linguists

This is Tony Snow's response to the dearth of Arabic-speaking military in Iraq and elsewhere:

"You don't snap your fingers and have the Arabic speakers you need overnight."

How about after five years' notice that we desperately need better intelligence in the Arab world?

06 Dec 2006 07:47 pm

Britney or Mary?

A reader writes:

I do agree that this child will do just fine when it comes to male role models. My sister is recently divorced with a 5 year old son. My grandfather, who lives a few blocks away, plays a major role in his life. Regardless of what you think of VP Cheney, he does seem to truly love his daughter and to fully accept her lesbian relationship. I have a feeling he'll be a great grandfather.

As an evangelical who believes that fatherless homes are a very serious matter that's killing our country, I do believe that Mary Cheney and her partner will make much better parents than most of the heterosexual couples in today’s America.

Britney Spears or Mary Cheney? Who would you want watching your child?