178 articles
Unlike John Edwards, who supported the Iraq War when running for president before abandoning his position to cozy-up with the Left, Sen. Joe Lieberman remains a profile in courage. From today's Washington Post: "I'm not surprised that there's a primary challenge," Lieberman conceded. According to a…
It's no secret that Colin Powell clashed with the defense secretary many times while he was running Foggy Bottom. And Powell's recent critical remarks on inadequate troop levels are not a case of Monday morning quarterbacking. He argued for more troops before the invasion, but most importantly,…
The following op-ed by Jay Lefkowitz, the president's special envoy for human rights in North Korea, ran today in the Asian and European editions of the Wall Street Journal: The famous former Soviet dissident, Andrei Sakharov, said it well: "A country that does not respect the rights of its own…
Nearly two years ago I attended a lecture by Samantha Power, author of "A Problem From Hell: America and the Age of Genocide" (a book I highly recommend), at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum. She spoke on the same day the government of Sudan got a seat on the UN Human Rights Commission. On the…
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has evidently been too light in some places. From Stars and Strips: U.S. troops entered Mukhisa and the adjacent town of Abu Kharma on Sunday after hearing that the region is home to foreign fighters, members of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi's group and financiers behind roadside bomb and mortar attacks,…
ALMOST AS MUCH as President Bush's loyalty, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld may owe his job security to the prospect of what would happen if he resigned.
(From today's Boston Globe: "As record oil prices turn attention to the need for renewable fuels, momentum is building in Congress to buck Senator Edward M. Kennedy's bid to block the proposed Cape Cod wind energy project, potentially reviving efforts to construct the sprawling windmill farm in…
IN THE WAKE of two terrorist attacks in Sinai this week, first against the tourist sector in Dahab, then against the Multi-National Peacekeeping Force, some observers have related Mubarak's situation to that of President Anwar al-Sadat in 1981. It's a useful comparison because, like Sadat at the…
Texas shares a lengthy border with Mexico, and, in the last 20 years, the state has absorbed many immigrants. Yet, despite the remarks of Rep. Tom Tancredo and others, I was surprised to learn just how well the Texas economy has performed since President Reagan signed the 1986 immigration bill…
THERE IS A PRETENSE in contemporary assisted suicide advocacy that goes something like this: "Aid in dying" (as it is euphemistically called) is merely to be a safety valve, a last resort only available to imminently dying patients for whom nothing else can be done to alleviate suffering.
Read the comments of New York Times editor Bill Keller here and then read the latest from Max Boot in the Los Angeles Times here (reg. req'd).
TONY SNOW, the former Fox News anchor and talk radio host, has taken one of the toughest jobs in America. As White House press secretary for President Bush, he'll have deal with a press corps that is both out of control and smug in its negative opinion of the both the president and his…
In the past few weeks, a new story line on Iran has gained some currency. It goes something like this. The bluster of the provincial president doesn't truly reflect the mind-set of Iran's senior, grown-up leadership when it comes to acquiring nuclear weapons. If that's the case, someone should let…
Today's Wall Street Journal editorial looks at the "unseemly symbiosis between elements of the press corps and a cabal of partisan bureaucrats at the CIA and elsewhere in the 'intelligence community' who have been trying to undermine the Bush Presidency." The editors also note that there were "many…
Well, they're looking for a new CEO. From TechWeb News: Yoran, CIA's Venture Capital Chief, Resigns The head of the Central Intelligence Agency's venture capital arm, Amit Yoran, has resigned his position after less than four months in the position as chief executive of In-Q-Tel. In a report in the…
Gas prices have skyrocketed and the 36th annual Earth Day just passed. So it's hardly surprising that many Democrats have taken the opportunity to bash the president's environmental and energy policies. Senator Minority Leader Harry Reid has demanded a "bipartisan national energy summit to solve…
Last night, PBS' American Experience chronicled the building of the Alaska Pipeline, which traverses some 800 miles from Prudhoe Bay to the port of Valdez. Planning for the pipeline began in 1968, but a mountain of legal challenges put off construction until 1975. Two years later oil began flowing…
THE MEDIA has been quick to lionize Mary McCarthy, the recently fired 61-year-old CIA analyst who allegedly leaked classified information to the Washington Post's Dana Priest. According to several recent accounts, it is not clear what information McCarthy was accused of leaking. But on Sunday, the…
(From today's Wall Street Journal: "Few things are less becoming in a political party than desperation, as Republicans are now demonstrating as they panic over rising oil and gas prices. If blaming private industry for Congress's own energy mistakes is the best the GOP can do, no wonder its voters…
IN HIS MOST RECENT audio taped message, Osama bin Laden succinctly restated his rationale for international terrorism. This is worth understanding for several reasons, not the least of which being that it provides a much-needed refutation to the often-stated argument that al Qaeda and its…
SOME OF THE FOG that has been making economists' crystal-ball gazing more difficult than usual seems to be lifting, enabling us to sketch what the rest of 2006 might look like.
(Agence France Presse has the latest,"Mogadishu tensions soar as Islamists declare jihad on warlords," from Somalia.) Posted on February 20, 2006: Since the early 1990s, al Qaeda has targeted Somalia. Back then, American forces and U.N peacekeepers were the target. Today, as in other regions of the…
Last night, CBS' 60 Minutes aired a segment on Iraq pre-war intelligence -- focusing on the Niger-Uranium controversy -- that was so slanted I half suspect that Democratic Senator Carl Levin produced it. Here are just a few examples: BRADLEY: (Voiceover) When he returned, Wilson told the CIA what…
THE FIRST CELL PHONE JOKE I ever heard was in fact about car phones. Sophie Ginsberg calls her friend Sylvia Glick from her Mercedes to tell her that she has just acquired a car phone and what a marvelous convenience it is! To keep up with her friend, Sylvia persuades her husband to provide her…
"We're like the Mafia." --Jared Paul Stern I DON'T KNOW JARED PAUL STERN, the New York Post gossip writer accused of blackmailing a billionaire, but over the years I've learned a little about the gamier side of gossip-columning. Stern's self-dealing, unsubtle as it was, is no big surprise.
Minneapolis
THE IMMIGRATION ISSUE HAS FLIPPED in President Bush's favor. The public now firmly supports toughened border enforcement plus--and this is a big plus for the president--a system for letting illegal immigrants already in America earn citizenship. This has been Bush's position all along, though the…
The Rise of American Democracy
Clapton's Guitar
APRIL 26 MARKS THE 20th anniversary of the Chernobyl disaster. There will be articles and reminiscences about this juncture in Soviet history, when the whole, terrible mess began to fall apart. And rightly so: The explosion at the nuclear power plant's No. 4 reactor, and the Kremlin's attempt to…
CONSERVATIVE LEGAL SCHOLARS HAVE LONG warned that judges' reliance on foreign opinions might undermine the mechanism for setting domestic policy under the Constitution. Now, for the second time, a friend of the court brief has been submitted to the Supreme Court by foreign politicians in a case…
Bordering on a Brawl
Divided by a Common Language
A MILITARY OPTION AGAINST Iran's nuclear facilities is feasible. A diplomatic solution to the nuclear crisis is preferable, but without a credible military option and the will to implement it, diplomacy will not succeed. The announcement of uranium enrichment last week by President Mahmoud…
CHANCES ARE, IF YOU'VE heard of Title IX, it is in the context of collegiate athletics, where the law is best known today for strict gender quotas that destroy men's sports like wrestling, under the guise of expanding opportunity for women. But Title IX is in fact a sweeping law that applies to…
BOOKS IN BRIEF
WHEN I WAS RECENTLY in Paris, a French diplomat explained to me why he--and many others in the French foreign ministry--thought the United States would, in the end, bomb Iran's nuclear-weapons facilities. Owing to Chinese and Russian obstreperousness, the United Nations would probably fail to agree…
IN THE SPRING OF 1936--seventy years ago--Hitler's Germany occupied the Rhineland. France's Léon Blum denounced this as "unacceptable." But France did nothing. As did the British. And the United States.
Vanity, Vanity
ON APRIL 18, Chinese president Hu Jintao will begin his first official visit to the United States as head of state of the world's most populous nation. In the weeks preceding his visit, much media attention has focused on trade, including a six-month delay in voting on the Schumer-Graham bill,…
RADICAL MUSLIM CHAPLAINS, trained in a foreign ideology, certified in foreign-financed schools, and acting in coordination to impose an extremist agenda have gained a monopoly over Islamic religious activities in American state, federal, and city prisons and jails.
Mary O. McCarthy has reportedly been fingered for leaking the CIA's secret prisons operation to the Washington Post. She also apparently donated to the Kerry for President campaign and other Democrats as well, which, of course, she is free to do. Today's New York Times also reports that McCarthy…
In the spirit of President Hu's victory lap around the U.S., reader John Manley sends along two interesting links. This one searches for images of Tiananmen on Google.com, while this one does the same search on Google.cn. By the way, no one knows what happened to the man, who Google.cn erases, in…
In the spirit of President Hu's victory lap around the U.S., reader John Manley sends along two interesting links. This one searches for images of Tiananmen on Google.com, while this one does the same search on Google.cn. "China Rocks'!
From Yesterday's New York Times: Alan R. Mulally, president of Boeing's commercial aircraft division, introduced Mr. Hu to a group of 5,000 Boeing workers in an event that had the aura of a pep rally. After Mr. Hu made a glowing tribute to Boeing's tradition of innovation, Mr. Mulally said simply,…
From Monday's The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer: LEHRER: In Washington, a White House spokesman condemned the attack and said it was the Palestinian Authority's responsibility to stop such attacks. .... In Iraq today,.... Witnesses for Zacarias Moussaoui gave details of his instability today.... Jurors…
IF YOU CAN STILL TELL the difference between any of the reality shows on television, you have noticed that they are invariably about one of three things: (1) good-looking people melodramatically debasing themselves in contrived contests for a sum of money between $50,000 and $1,000,000 (or the…
IN A NEW YORK TIMES OP-ED this past Sunday, former National Security Council staffers Richard Clarke and Steven Simon lamented the possibility of a military strike on Iran. They warned, "a conflict with Iran could be even more damaging to our interests than the current struggle in Iraq has been."
Yesterday, in an interview with Chicago-area newspapers, Secretary of State Rice made a point that Richard Clarke didn't find time to address in his recent New York Times op-ed. QUESTION: And because you also know that any armed intervention would inflame things throughout the Muslim world?…
From the Associated Press: Moderate leftist prepares to challenge Hugo Chávez CARACAS - Venezuelan opposition leader and newspaper editor Teodoro Petkoff will launch his presidential bid this week to run against President Hugo Chávez, a campaign organizer said Wednesday. Petkoff will make the…
The counterattack by Secretary Rumsfeld and his staff against his critics has been impressive. The Secretary defended himself at length during a recent press conference. Senior active and retired officers defended him on television and in print. His office sent out fact sheets and called…
When Americans learned that 41-year-old Afghan citizen Abdul Rahman could be put to death for converting to Christianity, they were outraged. Chuck Colson spoke for many when he wrote, "Is this the fruit of democracy? Is this why we have shed American blood and invested American treasure to set a…
NO ONE KNOWS whether or not an Operation Iranian Freedom is in the cards. A good deal of focus is already being placed on military planning. But it is also worth asking what America is doing to prepare for the trove of documents and other media that a newly liberated Iran could produce.
THE MAINSTREAM MEDIA may have trouble resisting the temptation to declare that Karl Rove has been demoted, but the truth is quite the contrary. By giving up his role as deputy White House chief of staff, Rove has been freed to do what he does best: shape big issues and develop strategies to win…
Since Jonathan Chait and others have turned their focus to Sen. McCain the last few days I'd like to add one point -- for now at least -- going back to 2001. (In the spirit of full disclosure, I was his legislative director back then.) Yes, McCain voted against the 2001 tax cut. But his collective…
AS CHINESE PRESIDENT HU JINTAO sits down with President Bush at the White House this week, much of the discussion will focus on economic developments, international relations, human rights, and the global war on terrorism. But as China's economy continues its booming growth and modernization, a…
The new and improved UN Human Rights Council will likely include Fidel Castro, that great defender of human rights, as one of its members. From the Miami Herald: The new Human Rights Council replaced the previous Commission on Human Rights, where countries accused of rights abuses such as Cuba,…
Max Boot has an interesting take on the Rumsfeld v. Generals flare up in today's Los Angeles Times (reg. req'd): The retired generals, who claim to speak for their active-duty brethren, premise their uprising on two complaints. First, many (though not all) say we should not have gone into Iraq in…
Why? She explained last night on CNN's Larry King: "I don't want to give the right wing media and the right wing warmongers an ability to distract from the basic issue, which is that most Americans are opposed to the war and want to bring the troops home." With any luck, Moveon.org will put Fonda…
While Chinese President Hu Jintao prepares to face the White House this week on issues ranging from the bilateral trade deficit to China's role in resolving the North Korean and Iranian nuclear crises, Representative Chris Smith (R-NJ) is planning to slam the Chinese regime for its political…
THE DOG LEAPT FOR JOY, scratching the corrugated steel with his front paws, tail wagging wildly. Then, remembering the protocol, the dog--mostly German shepherd, but maybe some lab thrown in--dutifully lowered itself to its haunches and stared fixedly at the steel container's doors.
Get ready for another round of "Impeach Bush" talk. The deeply partisan Carl Bernstein has a new piece up on the Vanity Fair web site. Guess what? He's not a fan of the Bush Administration and like many others on the Left is doing his best to criminalize policy disputes. The ranking member on the…
As you've probably guessed, it isn't Sen. Christopher Dodd -- see here.
Gas prices are way up and it's not just because of soaring oil prices on the world market that are beyond our control. Under the GOP's watch and pushed farm state legislators, Congress mandated more ethanol use in our gasoline. The net result, as Irwin Stelzer explains, is tighter gas supplies and…
Britain's Daily Telegraph writes on the terrorist (or "militant" if you work at the BBC) suicide bombing in Tel Aviv: Ultimately, however, the weasel words of Hamas remind us of how right America and the EU were to cut off funding to the Authority. Hamas apologises for terrorism because, ceasefire…
SUDDENLY, several policy issues that have until now been swept under the rug are being brought into the open:
Though it hasn't garnered much media attention, there has been an interesting fight brewing within the political Left. Britain's Oliver Kamm got the ball rolling by writing a provocative piece in Progess, a journal published by British Labour Party members, arguing that the Left has abandoned its…
This is the first time I've read such a categorical statement from a senior U.S. commander. From the Washington Times: Al Qaeda in Iraq and its presumed leader, Abu Musab Zarqawi, have conceded strategic defeat and are on their way out of the country, a top U.S. military official contended…
(This NYT piece, "New Worry Rises After Iran Claims Nuclear Steps," is not good news if true. "The assertion involves Iran's claim that even while it begins to enrich small amounts of uranium, it is pursuing a far more sophisticated way of making atomic fuel that American officials and inspectors…
American Vertigo
THE BUSH ADMINISTRATION HAS DECIDED not to run for a seat on the new U.N. Human Rights Council. The election, scheduled to take place in New York on May 9, is shaping up to be a nightmare for the United Nations, so there was good reason not to lend it credibility. But the real question is not…
AMID FESTERING CONCERNS ABOUT CHINA'S burgeoning global power, Beijing has set its sights on expanding its influence in Africa. In a throwback to the Maoist revolutionary days of the 1960s and '70s, Beijing has once again identified the 53-nation African continent as an area of strategic interest.…
Leo Strauss and the Theologico-Political Problem
AT THE OUTSET OF Samuel Alito's confirmation hearings, Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter asked a series of questions about the rather arcane subject of stare decisis, which is the judicial practice of following prior decisions. Eventually the questions took an odd turn, with Specter asking…
I AM FACING A CRISIS in my marriage. When I came to work at The Weekly Standard, a little more than a year ago, one of the perquisites of the job was a parking space in the building garage. To anyone who commutes to work in a city of a certain size, I need not explain what this privilege means. For…
THE LEGAL CASE OF ZACARIAS MOUSSAOUI, the so-called "twentieth hijacker" and the only person hauled into U.S. criminal court for playing a direct role in the September 11 attacks, has been a morass from the beginning. Prosecutors have struggled to shove the square peg of international terrorism…
Pétain
Samuel Menashe New and Selected Poems Edited by Christopher Ricks Library of America, 200 pp., $20
Fight over Gunfight
Mexico City
WHEN CHIDED for a sharp or acerbic remark, Pat Moynihan used to invoke an old aphorism: "This animal is vicious; when he's attacked, he bites back." Moynihan would quote the French verse, which made the point seem more elegant (cet animal est très méchant; quand on l'attaque, il se défend). We…
Every member of this House knows how important it is to have good staff. These are the people who run this institution from day to day. They are the people who do the grunt work, draft the bills, work long nights--all in service of the American people. And we, as Members of Congress, place our…
The Armenian Genocide
But Is It Good for Harvard (cont.)
AS HOUSE MAJORITY LEADER, Tom DeLay had a crisp and clear style. He coupled an agenda with an unwillingness to compromise and an iron resolve to produce narrow victories based entirely on Republican votes. At the moment, his successor, John Boehner, is working on a mission statement--an official…
THE COLOSSAL FAILURE of the sequel to the mammoth 1992 hit Basic Instinct is primarily due to the new movie's colossal wretchedness. Jonathan Yardley once said of a book he disliked that it was "so bad that it adds whole new universes of meaning to 'bad.'" Basic Instinct 2 doesn't quite sink to…
IMAGINE a Republican congressman defending traditional marriage by saying, "I am inspired in my public service by St. Paul's admonition against sodomy in his first letter to the Corinthians." Surely, many liberals would raise the alarm of impending theocracy. But House minority leader Nancy…
In today's New York Times, Richard Clarke and his Clinton-era NSC colleague Steven Simon write 856 words on why the U.S. should not use force, if necessary, against Iran's nuclear program. Though they raise very legitimate issues that should be virgorously debated, nowhere in the piece do they take…
From Reuters: A German court sentenced a man of Turkish origin to more than nine years in prison on Thursday for the so-called "honor killing" of his sister but found two other brothers not guilty of conspiring in the murder. The murder of 23-year-old Hatun Surucu, who was shot while standing at a…
From the (London) Telegraph: 'Islamic terrorism' is too emotive a phrase, says EU European governments should shun the phrase "Islamic terrorism" in favour of "terrorists who abusively invoke Islam", say guidelines from EU officials. Backed by diplomats and civil servants from the 25 EU members,…
The fact that the Democratic Party's base is firmly against the Iraq war has put its leading presidential candidate in a tough spot on Iran. Will Senator Clinton continue to embrace a hawkish position on Iran or adopt a softer line? She voted for the Iraq war but, unlike Kerry and Edwards, hasn't…
(The New York Times follows up their recent Iran editorial with a front-page piece today quoting nuclear analysts who say "nothing had changed to alter current estimates of when Iran might be able to make a single nuclear weapon, assuming that is its ultimate goal. The United States government has…
Wade Zirkle, executive director of Vets for Freedom and Iraq combat vet, writes in today's Washington Post: Earlier this year there was a town hall meeting on the Iraq war, sponsored by Rep. Jim Moran (D-Va.), with the participation of such antiwar organizations as CodePink and MoveOn.org. The…
The regime may be more vulnerable to comprehensive sanctions than many realize. Despite high oil prices, the mullahs are running an economy with little job growth and high unemployment. Radio Free Europe reports that Iran's president has been traveling around the country reassuring people on the…
Agence France Presse reports that, Saudi Arabia will exert all efforts to fight terrorism and its financiers, the kingdom's crown prince said, calling it a "disease" that threatens the whole world. Crown Prince Sultan bin Abdul Aziz, who is also deputy prime minister and defence minister, said…
Some Republicans continue to whine that Democrats didn't allow them to take out the felony provision contained in the House-passed immigration bill. But why would Democrats help Republicans out? They want to retake the House and believe the felony language helps them in swing districts. House…
A PROMINENT HAMAS member of parliament has explained why most American Christians support Israel. The churches are run by "converted" Jews who are exploiting Christians for Zionist purposes. "Even the churches where the Americans pray are led by Jews who were converted to Christianity, but they…
Will the New York Times run a front-page correction for what they reported in this piece based on information that federal prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald now says is incorrect? National Review's Byron York points out that earlier today Fitzgerald sent the following to the judge in the Libby case: We…
(A reader emails on my April 9 "Joe Wilson's Forgetfulness" post: This is largely forgotten now but Joe Wilson initially misled the public on a key question when the story first broke in the summer 2003: Did the former Niger prime minister, Ibrahim Assane Mayaki, meet with any Iraqi officials in…
GARRY WILLS, the twinkling intellect of a twilight liberalism, has once again taken to the op-ed pages of the New York Times. His tone has softened a bit since his last apearance; two days after the 2004 presidential election, he summoned a righteous indignation and railed against America's…
(From Reuters: "France's students and trade unions prepared a victory parade [today] to mark the demise of a hated youth jobs law, with politicians and analysts split over whether the hope of labour market reform was dead too.... 'Alas, the hope for reform has been buried with them,' [the business…
The editors at the paper have weighed in on what to do about Iran's quest for nuclear weapons -- in two words, not much. Their argument boils down to this: Tehran is a decade away from a bomb, so all the "saber rattling" is unnecessary and counterproductive. We should encourage Iran's political…
Taiwanese President Chen Shui-bian takes a shot at Google and Yahoo for kowtowing to Beijing. From ComputerWorld: Taiwan President pans Google, Yahoo on free speech Strong criticisms on anniversary of activist's death In a speech commemorating a local human rights activist, Taiwan President Chen…
ROB PORTMAN has a tough job. As United States Trade Representative he does have the rank of ambassador and a staff of over 200 (considered tiny by the standards of Washington's bloated agencies). That, and the fact that he is siding with the angels by fighting for freer trade, must be a comfort on…
From the Associated Press: WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Bush administration may severely restrict the movements of Venezuela's ambassador if pro-government activists in Venezuela engage in any more ''thuggish'' activities against U.S. Ambassador William Brownfield, a spokesman said Monday. Meanwhile,…
Schwarzenegger talks sense on immigration in today's Wall Street Journal: President Reagan memorably described his "shining city on a hill" as a place that "hummed with commerce and creativity, and if there had to be city walls, the walls had doors and the doors were open to anyone with the will…
With the Iraq nuclear issue back in the news, here's some background information that didn't make it into yesterday's New York Times piece that readers may have found of interest. Kenneth Pollack, former National Security Council official in the Clinton administration, commented in the…
The Electronic Frontier Foundation, co-founded by former Grateful Dead lyricist John Perry Barlow, makes a contribution to U.S. National Security -- specifically the NSA's al Qaeda spying operation.
THE NEWS THAT, DESPITE the Afghan parliament's last-minute attempts to prevent him from leaving, Abdul Rahman has been given asylum in Italy has drawn a global sigh of relief. But now is not the time to forget the issue. The case of Rahman--an Afghan Christian tried for the capital crime of…
FEBRUARY'S COMMENTARY has one of the most frightening essays of recent years, in which James Q. Wilson makes the case that Americans are polarized to an unprecedented extent; bitterly divided. Responsible conservatives should confront this problem and show the country how to solve it. Not to solve…
Manliness
PRESUMABLY, IT WAS NOT quite the debate Justice Ginsburg had in mind. But then, it's not clear that what she really wanted was a debate. Maybe we should have one, anyway.
IN HIS LAST AND MOST important public service, Caspar W. Weinberger, Ronald Reagan's secretary of defense, was at his best. People who didn't understand him were puzzled that the budget-cutting, streamlining manager, who had come to be known as "Cap the Knife," could shovel money for national…
WHAT ARE THE ODDS that President Bush will succeed in his full-blown campaign to recover from a second-term swoon? Not good, if you consider the records of second-term presidents over the past 70 years.
My Fundamentalist Education
"If something can't go on forever, it won't." --Herb Stein WITH NEW HOME SALES DOWN 10.5 percent in February, and with home prices declining for the fourth month in a row, it's high time for a sober look at the consequences of a major housing correction. The Federal Reserve, Wall Street economists,…
ON FEBRUARY 20, AN Austrian court sentenced the notorious British writer David Irving to three years in prison for denying in a 1989 speech that Auschwitz contained gas chambers. Many American observers had mixed reactions. They saw Irving as a loathsome anti-Semite but were uncomfortable with the…
The Carter Diaries
DISCUSSING THE LATEST SIGHTING of a dimly remembered sixties pop star, my local paper cautioned: "Make no mistake. Lesley Gore's certainly no kid anymore."
AMERICA'S LEGISLATIVE LEADERS SPENT a good deal of time last week discussing what to do about "undesirable" foreigners. Illegal immigrants were the main target. The Senate and House so far are diverging widely on whether it is best to keep them in or throw them out. Since doing the first defies…
Judicious Judges
LAST WEEK I CAUGHT UP with my old college housemates. It had been several months since I'd spoken with them, and, as it turns out, much is going on in their lives. One is dating a girl he plans to marry. The wife of another is about to give birth to their second child. And a third just got engaged…
The Case for Goliath
On Matters Southern
THE WRITER WIRT WILLIAMS HAD a theory that novelists--"like quarterbacks," he would add--were most likely to flourish if they were reasonably intelligent but not off-the-scale brainy. ("Look at Terry Bradshaw!") Too much intellection, Williams thought, tended to gum up the works in one way or…
Newark
IT'S A GUESS, but about now I imagine Lyn Nofziger may be regaling St. Peter with some of his best puns. He certainly had a great store of them and was always adding to it. It may come as a surprise to political opponents who thought of him as a fierce conservative, but mirth was a large component…
THE HOUSE CAUCUS TO RETURN THE REPUBLICAN PARTY TO MINORITY STATUS--also known as the House Immigration Reform Caucus--held a press conference Thursday. The GOP solons were upset. The Senate Judiciary Committee had not followed the lead of the House in adopting an "enforcement only" immigration…
I'VE TAKEN TO GIVING MY KIDS haircuts at home lately, but I think that's rapidly coming to an end. Not because my reasons for doing it have changed, but because the kids hate it, my wife hates it, and--Well, that about tells the tale right there, doesn't it?
You've got to hand it to Joe Wilson. He has certainly cashed in on his celebrity as he tours college campuses making ludicrous statements. Wilson is also someone who is curiously forgetful about facts that involve his behavior and those surrounding his trip to Niger. ''It seems to me that first and…
The enemy. From Reuters: MILAN - An Egyptian accused of helping plan the Madrid train bombings in 2004 indoctrinated young people in Spain and advocated martyrdom, an Italian investigator told a court on Friday.... Standing trial with Ahmed was his suspected protege, an Arab man named as Yahia.…
From the Globe and Mail: Senior federal cabinet ministers will be handed a "snapshot" today of how terrorists have dramatically increased their Internet presence during the past year to create a "virtual university of terrorism." The [Simon Wiesenthal Center] report documents how terrorists are…
AUTHOR'S NOTE: This review makes frequent use of The Film Snob*s Dictionary. The footnotes below are just a small sample of definitions taken from this deliciously mean book. Buy it today and you'll wonder how you ever watched a Sharon Stone movie without it. -SB
IN JULY 2004, DURING THE COURSE of a little-publicized event while on a visit to Kazakhstan, Russian President Vladimir Putin made some unusual remarks:
"ENTITLEMENT REFORM." Few words in the English language make readers turn the page faster.
on this report from the Associated Press: Britain Nixes Argentina's Falklands Claim UNITED NATIONS (AP) -- Britain reiterated its sovereignty over the Falkland Islands and rejected Argentina's claims in a letter to Secretary-General Kofi Annan circulated Wednesday. The letter from Britain's U.N.…
See here and here.
Ireland, Hungary and Slovakia are doing something wrong. They enjoy healthy economic growth rates, attract new businesses, and --- gasp -- have low corporate tax rates. Today's Wall Street Journal reports that several European Union nations are "moving ahead with the long-taboo subject of creating…
THE SOLDIER LAY ON THE GROUND, his cheek pressed into the dirt. Thick ropes of fog hid the low trees and scrub brush and the dangers on the ridge ahead. No matter how he squinted, he couldn't see through the blind white. The soldier's name was Henry Gunther, and he was from Baltimore.
Saddam Hussein has adopted a clear strategy for his trial on charges of crimes against humanity stemming from his decades-long rule of Iraq. He planned on diverting attention from the crimes and the evidence of them by focusing the world's attention on his political rants from the dock. Perhaps…
Opponents of President Bush's immigration position like to claim the high ground on national security. They rightly claim that we must secure our border, especially in a post 9/11 world. But at the same time many also contend that a guest-worker program would weaken U.S. security. Well, Mayor…
It's not hard to find comparisons between President Bush and Hitler on anti-war web sites or on signs carried in anti-war marches. But this may be the first time I've read a comparison of Bush's thinking to Tojo's from a well-known politician. In reviewing an upcoming book by Sen. Ted Kennedy on…
The news from Sen. Kerry's op-ed today in the New York Times isn't his call to cut and run from Iraq. He's held that position for a while. The big question is whether Sen. Clinton will abandoned her position against setting troop withdrawal timetables. Anti-war Democrats have been pressuring her to…
(Interesting twist in the immigration debate among evangelicals reported in today's Washington Post.) Social conservatives couldn't have a better friend on Capitol Hill than the Senator from Kansas. On the cultural divide, he stands as far away from Sen. Kennedy as Pluto is from Mars. Yet,…
(Florida Gov. Jeb Bush weighs in on the immigration debate.) Posted on March 31, 2006: Jerry Kilgore lost his bid to succeed the prospective 2008 Democratic presidential candidate Mark Warner. Though as Election Day drew near, the Kilgore camp believed they had an issue that would put them over the…
IN NOVEMBER 2005, Azerbaijan held parliamentary elections. Voter participation was down 20 percent from the 2000 elections, and President Ilham Aliev's party won overwhelmingly in what was regarded by international observers as a questionable, if not fraudulent, election. The small but increasingly…
That's how the Democratic Leadership Council's Marshall Wittmann characterized the Left's campaign to take down the Connecticut Senator in the August primary. Unlike Senators Kerry and Edwards, who long ago rolled over for the anti-war folks, Lieberman has stood his ground on the Iraq War. A while…
From the Telegraph: Iran has set up a sophisticated intelligence gathering operation in southern Lebanon to identify targets in northern Israel in the event of a military confrontation over its controversial nuclear programme. Senior Israeli military commanders say Iran has spent tens of millions…
TOM DELAY wants you to know that his decision to stand down for reelection and resign from Congress by summer has nothing, absolutely nothing, to do with the investigation into the business practices of Jack Abramoff, the lobbyist who pleaded guilty to corruption, bribery, and wire fraud charges…
The BBC reports that Iraqi prosecutors will formerly charge Saddam Hussein with "genocide over a 1980s campaign against the Kurds." Saddam's forces killed about 180,000 in the "Anfal" campaign, which made worldwide headlines after the poison gas attack on Halabja. The BBC also reports that…
LAST WEEK MUCH OF THE WORLD learned of the plight of a lone convert to Christianity, Abdul Rahman, on trial for his life in Afghanistan. Jailed on charges of apostasy, Rahman was released on a technicality and spirited off to asylum in Italy--only after Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice pressed…
WHERE ARE THE AMERICANS? United Kingdom companies, once the special targets of America's acquisition-minded executives, who believed they spoke the same language as the Brits and whose wives hankered after frequent visits to Harrod's, are falling to acquirers almost every day--but American firms…
(According to the Associated Press, Hans Blix says don't sweat it. Iran is at least five years from getting a nuke.) Posted on March 25, 2006: From today's Los Angeles Times: Iran's Nuclear Steps Quicken, Diplomats Say VIENNA - With efforts to halt its nuclear program at an impasse, Iran is moving…
The vast ZOG conspiracy grows. You may want to incorporate this into your truly original study, "The Israel Lobby and American Foreign Policy."
Reuel Marc Gerecht, a former case officer in the CIA's clandestine service and current resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, offers his assessment on Iraq and US political/military strategy in today's Wall Street Journal: Americans aside, the attack in Samarra didn't blow apart the…
Here's an interesting New York Times piece on how China's growing labor shortage will impact the world economy and swell the ranks of China's middle class: Persistent labor shortages at hundreds of Chinese factories have led experts to conclude that the economy is undergoing a profound change that…
A NEW THRILLER CALLED Inside Man is getting the best press of any movie so far this year, which at first seems almost as absurdly implausible as the film itself.
TWILIGHT IS HASTENING FOR TONY Blair. Though British prime ministers face no term limits, few can withstand the swelling tide of public boredom and familiarity's contempt. Margaret Thatcher set a peacetime record of 11 years in office before she succumbed; Blair, elected in 1997, will have clocked…
REPRESENTATIVE John Murtha, a Democrat from Pennsylvania, appeared on NBC's Meet the Press on Sunday, March 19, to evaluate the war in Iraq on its third anniversary. Murtha, a decorated veteran and longtime hawk, has become a leading spokesman for his party on the war. And on the show, he spoke of…
Father Abraham
Selected Poems
But Is It Good for Harvard?
LAST WEEK, one of the world's deadliest terrorist organizations--the Islamic Resistance Movement, aka Hamas--announced that it has formed a cabinet and is now poised to take effective control of the Palestinian Authority, which governs Gaza and the Palestinian population of the West Bank. This…
Gentle Regrets
JACK ABRAMOFF NEEDS MY HELP. Facing a March 29 sentencing deadline for fraud, tax evasion, and conspiring to bribe public officials, the disgraced lobbyist sent out a blast email, which says, "My attorneys have advised me to seek help from friends in the form of letters to the judge on my behalf."…
I Spy a Terrorist
Last Child in the Woods
WITHIN HOURS OF THE BOMBING of the al-Askariya shrine in Samarra on February 22, the media were filled with warnings that Iraq is sinking into civil war. Of course, almost any insurgency is, in a sense, a civil war, and sectarian violence has marked this insurgency from the very beginning. But the…
THIS IS A DOG STORY. You're not required to be a dog lover or a mystic to understand it. But it'll help if you at least like dogs and don't dismiss mystical occurrences out of hand.
California
LOWELL WEICKER PUT HIS CANE aside and thrust his heavy 6'6" frame up the stairs. Now 74, the former senator had a knee replacement last year, but as he stepped up to the pulpit at the First Congregational Church of Old Lyme, Connecticut, one Sunday afternoon in late January, he seemed anything but…
BOOKS IN BRIEF
THE CURRENT WAVE OF PROTESTS in France is regularly misportrayed as a pale remake of the 1968 student revolt that brought down Charles de Gaulle. The comparison gets it awfully wrong.
Copenhagen
ON SATURDAY, the day before the first games of the 2006 season--and somehow two days before Opening Day--the Baltimore Orioles hosted the Washington Nationals for an exhibition game at Camden Yards. Sitting seven rows off the field, midway between home plate and the visiting team's dugout, I…
(From Reuters: "TEHRAN -Iran said it would test fire a powerful torpedo on Monday and more missiles on Tuesday as part of a week of wargames in the Gulf, a senior naval officer told state television.") If this piece is an accurate assessment of Iran's terror response should we hit its nuclear…
Today, in a joint press conference with British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw, Secretary of State Rice was asked about how many "mistakes" she believed the U.S. has made in Iraq. In answering, Rice admitted mistakes were made but also stressed an extremely important point that Republicans on Capitol…