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Jonah Goldberg offers a new and shocking reason to support George Bush:

McCain and Giuliani's endorsements of Bush Monday night reflected that more than anything else. George W. Bush is the best option available in the range of possible options given the fact that we are at war.

When the President sends off troops
Then everyone must jump through hoops,
Although the war is undeclared
We are appropriately scared.
Lock up the Japs, the Jews, et al
If need be we can kill them all.
For this is what the grown-ups do
Because someone has told them to.

Again, for the Nth time, I remind the gentle reader that there is no historical reason whatsoever to believe that a Democrat will not fight a war. Democrats love war, because it's the best excuse to increase the size and scope of government that anyone has come up with yet. The fact that the Democratic party is made up of mindless, treasonous peaceniks no more indicates the probable behavior of a Democratic President than does the fact that the Republican Party is filled with legions of pro-lifers mean that a Republican House, Senate, Supreme Court and President have ended abortion.

If the unwinnable war is your only reason to support Bush, you may well be better off with Kerry. Bush has already proven that he's a wildly incompetent Commander-in-Chief, the jury is still out on Kerry.

LAUER: You said to me a second ago, one of the things you'll lay out in your vision for the next four years is how to go about winning the war on terror. That phrase strikes me a little bit. Do you really think we can win this war of ter--on terror? For example, in the next four years?

Pres. BUSH: I have never said we can win it in four years?

LAUER: No, I'm just saying, can we win it? Do you say that?

Pres. BUSH: I don't--I don't think we can win it. But I think you can create conditions so that the--those who use terror as a tool are less acceptable in part of the world, let's put it that way.

Very Churchillian. The man has a gift. I got shivers just reading it. Why, Churchill's six volumes on WWII are just rife with the same sort of lion-like confidence.

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Losing grip on reality

Not to mention history. Apparently it isn't enough that George Delano is Ronald Reagan, but according to Rudy Giuliani, he's Winston Churchill too. And... and... Cincinnatus and George Washington and Socrates and Paul Bunyan and Julius Caesar and Marius AND Sulla and Frosty the Snowman!

I actually agree that George Bush shows signs of Lincolnhood, but thankfully to a lesser degree. I suppose that calling him a little Lincoln doesn't quite have the same ring as identifying him with the man who decried the Iron Curtain before the Cold War really started.

George Delano won't speak out against the jihad even after he's been fighting it on the periphery for three years, instead of blood, sweat and tears he's offering us a new Medicare entitlement, and instead of V for victory, it's U for unwinnable, but you know, tomato, tomahto.

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Yeah, I see a lot of Lincoln too

Jonah Goldberg quotes a reader, presumably approvingly:

Just wondered, did anyone notice the echoes of Lincoln in McCain's speech? Interesting--

(Lincoln) Now we are engaged in a great civil war,
(McCain) We are engaged in a hard struggle against a cruel and determined adversary.

(L) We are met on a great battlefield of that war.
(M) My friends, we are again met on the field of political competition with our fellow countrymen.

(L) It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do so.
(M) It is more than appropriate, it is necessary that even in times of crisis we have these contests

(L) It is rather for us the living, we here be dedicated to the great task remaining before us--that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they here gave the last full measure of devotion--
(M) It is left to us to keep their generous benefaction alive, and our blessed, beautiful country worthy of their courage.

I note that McCain and Lincoln appear to have a similar regard for the Bill of Rights.

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Sean Hannity says "arf"

Gregg writes in:

I am a student of human nature, and after seeing your article get top billing two weeks in a row on WND I thought I would catch Hannity today (I knew they read it). He had Newt on as a guest, and they were both talking about how they disagree with the president on the 527 ban. I started laughing my ass off; it was just as you said it would be:

"Oh, how glad I am that Rush et al agree with me on the unconstitutionality of the ban, now let's see if they still support the treasonous candidate."

They did, Vox, after admitting as much. I have read Catholic prophets, bud, but you are an intellectual prophet.

I don't know about the prophet bit, it was simply the only logical conclusion. I don't think Sean Hannity would disavow the GOP if it announced it was banning the Lutheran, Methodist and Baptist churches and providing free prostitutes to all high-school students. Because, after all, the Democrats would be worse, since they'd be offering gay prostitutes and banning the Catholic church. And that's why the Irish water poodle gets a chapter....

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George Will refuses to put on a skirt

From the New Deal through the civil rights revolution, liberalism strove to use expanding government to drive the alteration of society. Conservatism's mission was largely restoration -- rolling back big government. Neither persuasion is now plausible.

Kerry insists he is not a ``redistribution Democrat.'' But of course he is. And Bush is a redistribution Republican. There is no ``natural'' distribution of social wealth. Distribution is influenced by many social arrangements, from property laws to tax laws to educational arrangements, all of them political choices. Both parties have redistributionist agendas....

Very few voters care about questions of political process. That is why the political class feels free to act with scandalous impunity, as in this Bush-Kerry collaboration to silence what the political class persistently calls ``outside groups.'' A question: Outside of what?

It's nice to see that Mr. Will isn't interested in waving pom-poms, even in the midst of the Republican convention. He is, as is his custom, genteel but clear in referring to the socialism of both factions as "redistributionist". George Will, more than any other political writer, has been an influence on my interest in editorial commentary and it is good to see that he perceives the same bi-factional ruling party that I do.

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Mailvox: another Republican math whiz

GS woofs like a good little lapdog:

You have joined yourself with the Democrats for a Soviet United States and the candidacy of a treasonous dog. Piss off.

Let's see, you're voting for the guy who's wiped out free speech and is trying to merge the USA with Mexico in imitation of the European Union, but I'm the one supporting a treasonous dog?

*sigh*

Okay, slow learners, it's basic addition time! If George Bush has 39,999,999 votes and John Kerry has 39,999,999 votes and I vote for Michael Badnarik, how many votes does John Kerry have?

a) 39,999,999
b) 40,000,000
c) five

If you answered (a), congratulations, you are capable of passing first-grade math. If you answered (c), you are a rabbit. If, on the other hand, you answered (b), you are clearly arithmetically-challenged like poor GS. Isn't math fun?

All candidates start from zero. The fact that the vast majority of Americans are so short-sighted that they will cheerfully vote for their enslavers does not mean that those individuals who still value freedom and human liberty should follow their example.

"If you continue doing what you've always done, you're going to get what you've always got."


UPDATE: GS eloquently adds:

Like I said, piss off. I have read your stuff for the last time. Oh, yes, and one plus one equals two as in one face plus one face equals what you have.

Hark, what's that I hear? Ah yes, the delicious sound of my readership's average IQ rising....

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Sec. of Defense on the undeclared war

Secretary of State Donald Rumsfeld quoted in a US Department of Defense transcript of an interview conducted on June 30, 2004.

SEC. RUMSFELD: Oh, I do. I think basically what we have is we’ve had over our history since World War II basically an idea that we were either in war or we were in peace and that we were in peacetime constraints. And of course, since we don’t have a declaration of war and we’re not in World War III, all of those peacetime constraints and procedures and auditors and contract rules and competitive bidding, all of that pertains. And the effect of it is that you end up in a war on terror, like we’re in, losing lives and yet you are still required to adhere to the rules of peacetime, because we don’t have gradations of between war and peace and therefore we need to find a way to live in this 21st century where threats can come at you from the shadows and from ungoverned areas in ways that are not predictable, as they were, for example, during World War II or during the Cold War, for that matter.

The matter is not up for debate. It is settled. You cannot argue about Congressional authorizations being virtual declarations and whatnot when the Secretary of Defense himself announces that "we don't have a declaration of war".

Regardless of what you think of their merits, both the Iraqi War and the War on Terror are extra-Constitutional.

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Mailvox: the devil in the details

KC writes to correct me:

Greetings & good morning. I'm a regular poster to your site and think your latest article is great with one exception. Rush *DID* and *HAS* denounced the McCain-Feingold "reform" over and over again since it first came up for a vote. He said then that SCOTUS could not be trusted to strike down unConstitutional things because they seem to be making it up as they go along regardless of the Constitution (ie. Ginsberg's recent references to foreign treaties). He has railed against this over and over as the law empowers "news" organizations (and him) to declare things as "news" and not political commercials/attacks and there's no way for someone else to respond.

He - and I agree with him on this one 100% - believes in complete transparency. Let US Citizens give whatever amount they want to whichever political campaign they want... but EVERY PENNY must be accounted for in a public and timely manner.

If that's the case - and I have no reason to believe it isn't - then I stand corrected, applaud Mr. Limbaugh's stance and will look forward to him criticizing the President's latest attack on free speech this week. Unfortunately, I still expect Mr. Limbaugh to excuse these and many other unconstitutional actions and enthusiastically endorse George Delano on the grounds of there being "a war on".

As for campaign financing, I don't see any need to account for it. Money is fungible, so tracing it is simply an exercise in futility that only creates a need for government bureaucracy. If a politician obeys the Constitution, who cares who's funding him? If a politician doesn't, he should be impeached, removed from office, and if necessary, tried for treason.

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Democrats for Bush

Jeff Jacoby fails to consider all the possibilities:

WHY KOCH IS ON BUSH'S BANDWAGON. Ed Koch identifies himself with pride as a lifelong Democrat. The former New York City councilman, congressman, and three-term mayor says his values have always been those of the broad Democratic center -- the values of FDR and Harry Truman, of Hubert Humphrey and Daniel Patrick Moynihan. He disdains the Republican worldview as cold and unfeeling -- "I made it on my own, and you should too." The Democratic philosophy, by contrast, he sums up as: "If you need a helping hand, we'll provide it." No surprise, then, that Koch disagrees with George W. Bush on just about every domestic issue, from taxes to marriage to prescription drugs. But he's voting for him in November.

I seem to recall someone saying that "Whenever someone is hurting, government has a responsibility to act." That sounds a lot like Mr. Koch's description of the Democratic philosophy: "If you need a helping hand, we'll provide it." Who was it that said that? Oh, that's right, George Delano Bush! Why are Republicans supporting him again? I'm just curious.

Sure, it's possible that Koch is supporting Bush solely because of the war/s, even though Kerry is likely to nuke half the Middle East just to get everyone's mind off Cambodia and prove that he really truly always has been a Total Warrior Hero You Don't Want To Mess With. But it's also quite possible that Koch is supporting Bush because he knows perfectly well that they share the same philosophy.

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A salute to Ramesh

Sometimes NRO reads as if they are nothing but Republican Party cheerleaders, utterly devoid of any principle except party uber alles. But Ramesh Ponnuru is resolute in refusing to put on a skirt and wave pom-poms simply because it's an election year. He provides a brief history of George Bush on campaign finance reform:

1) I'm against it, and you should vote for me over John McCain on this basis.
2) Some campaign-finance reforms amount to a restriction on free speech, and I'll veto them on that basis.
3) I'll sign the bill, let the judges sort it out.
4) The bill I just signed bans all those George Soros ads.
5) I'm going to sue to get those ads all banned.
6) I'm going to support legislation to ban those ads that I already banned, even though they used to be free speech.

Yes, ladies and gentlemen, this man is the man that many conservatives, Christians and Republicans regularly hold up as a model of character and integrity. Which makes me assume that their position on the War on Drugs must be highly, highly hypocritical.

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My letter to the editor

After perusing the deputy editorial editor's response to the second Powerline article tearing apart the increasingly bizarre claims of the Kerry campaign in the Star Tribune, I penned the following letter to the paper's editor:

Dear Mr. Ringham,

I hope, sir, that you are embarrassed and appalled by the complete lack of journalistic integrity and competence demonstrated by Jim Boyd in the Star Tribune today. Do you seriously believe that the following statement passes for a credible response to the second Hinderaker-Johnson piece?

"Now comes their second piece. I could do extensive line-by-line analysis, but I will not. It would take space I do not have."

Considering that the digital bits available at www.startribune.com should be more than adequate to fulfill Mr. Boyd's no doubt copious needs, and to which his piece in the paper could easily refer, this sounds suspiciously like empty words. Also, is "Moonie paper" an acceptable religious slur now? My AP Stylebook wasn't clear on the preferred term.

Mr. Ringham, this is truly pathetic. I have been reading the Star Tribune for 19 years, and I cannot recall a shoddier, more haplessly incompetent editorial. Congratulations on allowing Mr. Boyd to take the paper to depths hitherto unknown.

In disbelief,
Vox Day
Universal Press Syndicate

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Mailvox: character and Constitution

CS objects vociferously:

ANOTHER SKIN-HEAD, AIR-HEAD, SUPERCILIOUS, -- AND, I BELIEVE, COWARDLY --- "INTELLECTUAL" JERK -- OF THE LOST -- FREE-LOVE -- GENERATION -- WITHOUT ANY TRACE OF CHARACTER.
-Retired U.S. Naval Officer (amphibious gunnery)
wounded (I actually bled - and lost consciousness) , but never photographed - never applied for "Hero-First-Class" -- or medals
Retired Corporate President

Some people believe that military veterans are above criticism regardless of the subject. Having grown up with a few highly decorated veterans in the family, I do not share that belief. I sent CS the following email:

Afraid of the facts, are you? There are various types of cowardice, sir, and you are exhibiting the intellectual variety. And it's profoundly silly to attempt to make character judgments on a complete lack of information. Or perhaps you seriously believe that a failure to bow down and lick the jackboot indicates a LACK of character.

There are plenty of veterans who fought, bled, and even lost consciousness who agree with me. They swore to defend the very Constitution on which George Bush now pissing. Didn't you?

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Oh sweet Cthulhu!

The Lonely One types through the tears:

In the last ten years or so, I have actually had several guys ask me directly to be their friend. Hmmmm. To me friendship just becomes...one day you both notice you are friends, and it feels right. Maybe at some point, you make some sort of a commitment, perhaps engage in some sort of bonding event, and you realize you have become more than friends, have become in fact Best Friends. A group of these, hanging together, is a joyous thing. And it has been a very long time since I've experienced such a thing.

No, it has been my experience that a friend is just some guy who will f--- your wife/girlfriend/sister if he gets a snootful and half a chance. Some guy who will borrow your money and your stuff and then balk when the favor needs returning. Some guy who will listen to you drunkenly spill your innermost secrets, and then laugh about them and share them with people you do not like.

It's not easy being green, Kermit. Friendship can be difficult for many men, though it's not really that hard. It's just about having someone you trust watching your back, and watching theirs in return. But to have a friend you must first be a friend.

It's a two-way street. You have to accept the fact that sometimes you have to put them first, whether that involves not hitting on a smoking-hot girlfriend who's good-to-go or listening to the world's most boring soliloquy on the arcane minutae of import-export law for 45 minutes and occasionally asking questions instead of slitting your wrists. And in return, they won't even think twice about rolling you out of the drunken innermost secrets that have risen from the pit of your stomach thanks to the evils of the shot glass*, lying to anyone that needs lying to, and wading in to beat down someone they don't have anything against just because you can't keep your stupid mouth shut.

They'll never once tell you how much they care about you - something on the order of "you're seriously a complete asshole, do you know that?" will instead be heard, and often - but you never doubt, question or even think about it. You know it because they show it.

I don't need to hear my friends making declarations of undying affection. Sweet snow-capped mountains on high, I absolutely don't WANT to hear anything even approaching that and would think less of them if they did.** And I could easily write an encyclopedic chronicle of their flaws, shortcomings and annoying idiosyncracies, seeing that they are respectively a prickly bastard, a latent freak and a mama's boy. But if they say your ass needs kicking, my foot is already on its way. If they need something, the answer is when, not what. That's just how it is.

I know some unfortunate men who are friendless, and it's largely because they expect things to revolve around them. And sometimes things do, but you have to understand that unless you give something back to another person, there will soon be nothing left to take.

And besides, Bane forgets that he's got the whole virtual gang, Nate, Gypsy, Zod et al. It's like having real friends whose favorite sport is shooting the breeze and ragging on each other, with the added benefit that they won't drink your beer.

*That they bought, the bastards. And landed you in jail. On your birthday.
**The correct response to any such mawkish womanly sentiment is, of course, a classic schoolyard standby expressing one's opinion on the speaker's unfortunate lack of heterosexual orientation.

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Discuss amongst yourselves

Sorry about the blogless day. I was a bit pressed for time, wrapping up the first three chapters of Media Whores along with the proposal. So, we'll wait and see if the publisher embraces it or finds it to be completely over the top.

In any case, this is the spot to discuss Monday's column. I imagine we'll have a some interesting responses, as it's not one that pulls its punches. I expect most of the responses will evade the central point, however, as is too often the case.

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The incredible exploding candidate

Former Navy Secretary John Lehman has no idea where a Silver Star citation displayed on Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry's campaign Web site came from, he said Friday. The citation appears over Lehman's signature.

"It is a total mystery to me. I never saw it. I never signed it. I never approved it. And the additional language it contains was not written by me," he said.

The additional language varied from the two previous citations, signed first by Adm. Elmo Zumwalt and then Adm. John Hyland, which themselves differ. The new material added in the Lehman citation reads in part: "By his brave actions, bold initiative, and unwavering devotion to duty, Lieutenant (jg) Kerry reflected great credit upon himself...."

Asked how the citation could have been executed over his signature without his knowledge, Lehman said: "I have no idea. I can only imagine they were signed by an autopen." The autopen is a device often used in the routine execution of executive documents in government.

Perhaps a team of "plumbers" snuck into the Pentagon and signed the citation? Kerry just keeps on looking more and more viable, doesn't he.

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Mailvox: Aussie on a stick

Jamie goes out on a limb:

This is it VD. Get ready to rile up White Buffalo. I'm staking my reputation on this being the last time we'll see these levels for a long time to come. Check out the volume, the resistance lines at this point, the candlestick from yesterday's trade... you can see how they are black (black positive from open, red negative from open), that means traders tried to push it higher at the open and there was simply no volume there (haven't seen volume that low since the Christmas holiday period), but it did close higher than the open - a very bad sign for those who were foolish enough to go long. The short little wick at the top on the candlestick means even the small gang of buyers met some small early sellers at the resistance line, and they couldn't even push back. The big shorters will play their hand now, it appears to me that they've decided to wait on the buyers exhausting themselves... not only that, but the oil price hit on support at $42.50, and appears to be heading back up. Ooh, this is going to be good!

This is a top, I'm telling you, I'm calling it this time. This is a top! A top!!!!!!!

I have only one question. What reputation? Regardless of what happens in the markets, you'll still be Tha Freak From Down Under.

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You call that evidence?

One of two Russian airliners that crashed nearly simultaneously was brought down by a terrorist act, officials said Friday, after finding traces of explosives in the plane's wreckage. A Web site connected to Islamic militants claimed the action was connected to Russia's fight against Chechen separatists.

Ah, but the Russians have clearly failed to account for the probability that the traces were placed there previously as part of a dog-sniffing exercise. After all, traces of explosive were found in the wreckage of TWA 800, and we all know that that was just, um, a randomly exploding fuel tank, right?

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Will wonders never cease?

The White House has drafted executive orders aimed at implementing the Sept. 11 commission's recommendations for a more powerful intelligence director and a new national counterterrorism center. Bush administration and congressional officials said Thursday drafts of executive orders are circulating among an interagency group for approval. One of the officials said the White House is floating three proposals, and asking for feedback by Friday. The orders would:

- Enhance the powers of the government's intelligence chief and create a national intelligence director.

- Form a national counterterrorism center, putting that office under the new intelligence director and giving the director the power to decide who runs it.

- Form a national counterterrorism center, putting that office under the new intelligence director and giving the director the power to decide who runs it.

- Improve information sharing with directions aimed at facilitating the exchange information among intelligence agencies.

George Delano, expanding and centralizing the Federal government again. Who would have thunk it? Yes, he's really the heir to Reagan, isn't he. I can just hear Ronnie's voice now: "there you go again...."

I imagine this will sound pretty good to Bane and company, until they think about it and realize that the next Democrat in the White House is going to be using this new and improved and empowered organization against freaks like them. Never give any power to government that you wouldn't want your worst enemy to wield. Because eventually, he will.

There is only one solution
To a problem you consider
You must always make it bigger
And forget the Constitution.

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Defender of the First

President Bush yesterday joined forces with Sen. John McCain, Arizona Republican, to mount legal and legislative challenges to third-party attack ads, including those that question Sen. John Kerry's Vietnam record.

The move came as new polls by Gallup, the Los Angeles Times and Rasmussen showed Mr. Bush edging ahead of the Massachusetts Democrat in advance of next week's Republican National Convention. The first two polls attributed the shift to a series of anti-Kerry ads by Swift Boat Veterans for Truth. But the president wants to stop the ads, along with other spots by third-party groups, known as 527s because of their tax designation. Yesterday, he telephoned Mr. McCain, a former Vietnam prisoner of war, from Air Force One and enlisted him in a planned lawsuit to force the Federal Elections Commission (FEC) to quash the ads.

"Since the FEC failed to act, we would now be asking the courts to force the FEC to act to shut down all this activity," White House press secretary Scott McClellan said. "There would be a lawsuit. The president said if the court action doesn't work, then he would be willing to pursue legislative action and work with Senator McCain on that."

What was that about "Congress shall make no law?" I never believed that George Bush signed the violation of free speech known as "campaign-finance reform" into law hoping that it would be rejected as Constitutional. His marked enthusiasm for curbing free speech, even that which assists him, seems to support my initial skepticism.

I can just hear the Republican media whores now. "Sure, he's eradicating free speech, but don't you know there's a war on!" Yeah, no one's ever used that excuse before.

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Brave Sir William runs away... again

Lisa emails:

A Muslim-American, Dr. Imad-ad Dean Ahmad, was invited to appear on Bill O'Reilly's TV show tonight to take "the anti-Bush stance" against a Muslim-American supporter of Bush. A few hours ago, Dr. Ahmad publicly stated, "I was actually in the car being driven to the show when his deputy called me and informed me that although they would identify me as a Muslim supporter of [Michael] Badnarik, that I was not allowed to mention Michael's name on the show! I declined to accept those terms and they had the driver bring me back."

This is the third time since June that Mr. O'Reilly's "no spin zone" show has done something like this to either Badnarik or a supporter. Mr. O'Reilly seems to be free with mentioning Ralph Nader's name quite often on his show, but he seems to be terrified to mention either Mr. Badnarik's name or the Libertarian Party on his show.

A replacement for Dr. Ahmad was found, Khalid Turaani, the founder of Arab-American Republicans Against Bush, but it seems that despite the Factor's best laid plans, things went agley.

They called him 30 minutes before taping and asked him if he would take the anti-Bush position on the show. He agreed and they rushed him down to the studio. They kept pressing him as to whom he would vote for and he kept dodging the question, saying he would say that on the show. Kerry? No, he said, I'm a conservative, I would never vote for Kerry. At the studio they pressed real hard and he admitted that he planned to vote for Badnarik. When he say the panic in their eyes he realized that despite their "fair and balanced" claims, they were Bush supporters. They tried to dissuade him from mentioning it on air, but by then it was too late to do to him what they did to me. He went on the air and said that a vote against Bush need not be a vote for Kerry and that he would vote for Badnarik, the Libertarian.

Mr Turaani's actual words were: "I don't want to cut off my nose to spite my face by not liking Bush and jumping in the lap of Kerry. No - I will vote Libertarian and I think Badnarik is going to be a good choice for people who don't like Bush."

Horror of horrors, both the L and the B word were mentioned! But what does Brave Sir William care? After all, he is an independent, right? Or perhaps he's just another carrier of water for the Big Government Republicans. Keep this in mind when you complain about liberal media bias. It's not really a liberal vs. conservative thing, it's more truly a big government vs. freedom thing.

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Meanwhile, back on Planet Earth

Cindy Adams makes use of the Number of the Beast:

I HATE that Maureen Dowd is maybe the sharpest and — here's the part I hate most — best-looking columnist in the business. I also hate that her new Putnam book "BushWorld: Enter at Your Own Risk," with smarmy writing like, how "the black sheep usurps the dutiful brother," and how "the bag emperor calls me 'Cobra' ," made the best-seller list. I also hate that she's slim, red-haired and sports industrial-strength mascara.

I grew up in Minnesota, the home away from home of the Scandinavian ice princess. One thing I learned in going to school out East is that the East Coast is not exactly a haven for beautiful women... and I went to a school that had a plethora compared to the others I visited. Check out the picture, and realize that those are supposed to be unusually attractive women. What's scary is that for their social circle, they probably are. For Pete's sake, put me in a wig and a dress and I'd be prettier. Come to think of it, White Buffalo probably has the pictures... no, that was Big Chilly.

I'm not ragging on older women either. There are plenty of very attractive older women at the Galleria in Edina, or roaming through the bookstores down in Naples.

And Maureen Dowd isn't even close to "sharp". Superficial and consistently clueless would be a far more accurate description. Remember what I said about confusing verbal facility with other, more useful attributes....

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43!

Brian Clough, on Arsenal's breaking his Nottingham Forest team's record of 42 games without defeat with a 3-0 victory over Blackburn Rovers:

“There is a tinge of sadness on my behalf because nobody likes to see themselves overtaken in the record books. But sadness will soon be replaced with sheer pleasure that it has taken such a brilliant and beautiful team to beat us. What more can I say about Arsenal? Well, even as an old codger, they take me back to my younger days. They caress a football the way I dreamed of caressing Marilyn Monroe. They treat a ball not only with respect but with reverence. They don’t try to knock the leather off it. Everything they do is as if they are trying to do the ball a favour."

One thing the Premiership definitely has over the NFL is a unique sense of the game's poetic significance. Then again, there is something endearing about Mike Tice's guttural "huh huh huh".

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Mailvox: just wait, you'll see

WB wonders:

Dow back to almost 10,200. What happened to the slide to 6,500?

I did say it would take until July 2006 to get there, didn't I? This should put the recent movements in perspective.

NASDAQ-100 from June 30 (1516) to August 26 (1385)

1 215 1301 30 days
2 090 1391 10 days

This bounce is getting old and has another week left in it at most, from the looks of it. A 50 percent retracement would take us to 1410, before another decline that should run to around 1200 or so. The Elliott Wave experts would no doubt have more precise targets and better reasoning, but I'm no expert.

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I told you they're stupid

Jim Boyd of the Star & Sickle gets his head handed to him again:

In "Boydot's epistemology," we noted that the cowardly lion of Portland Avenue issued a challenge to our friends over at Fraters Libertas. Reader Richard Jahnke takes it from there.

You quote Jim Boyd of the Star Tribune issuing the following challenge:

"I served for a year with an Army outfit named U.S. Army Field Activities Command in Washington. I'll give you a week to find ANY mention of it anywhere. I'll give you two weeks to find out what it really was." Well here's a link. See page 52, second paragraph from the bottom.

The link above was the first return on the search "Army Field Activies Command" in Google. Took about 30 seconds, to get Google up, copy the phrase, get the return and click on the page. Most of the week is left. Here's another link that suggests that the Army Field Activities Command ran Army Intelligence agents overseas.

As to the second part of Boyd's challenge -- what his old outfit really was -- it appears, based on the material in the second link, to have been involved in internal security within the military, defense department and affiliated organizations.

Obviously, Boyd is lacking in Internet skills or he wouldn't have issued this challenge without Googling it first.

You thought I was kidding when I told you how dumb the average paperboy is, didn't you. And most - not all - of the television talking heads are worse. Never confuse verbal facility with intelligence, the two can coincide but they are not the same.

I assumed that Vicki Gowler of the Pioneer Press were dissembling when they couldn't find Kerry's 1971 testimony before Congress. But incredibly, despite my general scorn for their competence, I appear to have overestimated them nonetheless.

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Even the blind can see it

Randi Rhodes is interviewed by Buzzflash:

Sometimes I wonder if there are two distinct parties anymore. I know that the Bush administration is about as Republican as I am. Seriously, they are not Republicans. They are globalists. I wish more Republicans realized that. The Bush Boys, The Cheneys, The Rumsfelds, well they are as comfortably at home in Riyadh as they are in Crawford or Cheyenne.

Keep in mind, this is coming from someone who hates Republicans and republican ideals. It never ceases to puzzle me that so many Republican commentators will go to the mat for a group of individuals who were betraying them and the nation from the start.

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More tales of the White Buffalo

I was thinking about how the various talking heads all have their little media schtick and what mine would be. I was debating the various merits of narcolepsy vs Tourette's Syndrome, which had the effect of reminding me of one of the most debilitating impressions I have ever seen in my life.

We were at the Digital Ghetto, playing NBA Live on the Playstation upstairs on the rattiest old yellow couch you can possibly imagine. The White Buffalo had the Denver Nuggets, for some reason that I can't possibly explain, and I was up by six points or so when he passed the ball to his guard, Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf.

I made the mistake of saying "hey, isn't he the guy with Tourette's?" The WB simply nodded and knocked down a two-pointer. However, the next time Abdul-Rauf touched the ball, he barked this explosive obscenity combined with an spastic jerk of his head and an immediate launch of the basketball. I started cracking up, and every time I'd get it under control, he'd pass the ball to Abdul-Rauf again, who was knocking down threes even as his Tourette's was getting increasingly out of hand.

By the end of the game, I was collapsed on the couch, laughing helplessly, as the White Buffalo was swearing up a storm and driving Mahmoud in for uncontested layups. Needless to say, I got crushed.

I wonder if the folks at Unity would find this story endearing? Okay, probably not. Maybe I'll just make a practice of telling the host I'm not wearing any underwear. That went over pretty well at the party the Perfect Aryan Male's law firm held to welcome him to the firm... but that's a story for another time.

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Mailvox: he's not supporting himself

An officer in Iraq writes:

I hadn't heard of OpenOffice until you recently mentioned it in your blog. Thanks for bringing it up. I installed it and it works great. I also read in your blog the entry entitled The Darkness Spawns More Evil regarding Windows XP and Linux. How user friendly is Linux for a home system belonging to someone that is not a computer expert (such as myself)? For the average home computer user, is it worth the switch?

On a different subject, I wanted to let you know that I tune in daily to the blogspot. Out here in the desert I've got a lot of time on my hands to read, and your site is one of my favorites. Count me, as well as a few fellow officers that will listen to me, in as converts to libertarian principles. I can't believe I was blinded for so long. By the way, that Marine Major's statement about supporting the troops equals supporting the mission is totally absurd. Obviously, some of us know better. We are the ones who get out of the service as soon as our commitment ends (if they let us re: stop loss orders) I and several other officers in our battalion, are headed for the door.

Linux, as in Fedora Core 2, works very well as a home system except for its home networking capabilities. I haven't been able to get it working at all; it's even less functional than Fedora Core 1, with which I could at least access my Windows machines via SMBCLIENT. Big Chilly reports that Mandrake does a very nice job with setting up all the networking stuff, though, and I'm planning to check it out once I wrap up a few more pressing projects.

I'm not in the least bit surprised to hear this officer ridicule the major's statement, as I've heard from plenty of Marines, soldiers and sailors who have their doubts about the mission. Their professionalism allows them to get the job done and get it done right, but they do not make the mistake of confusing themselves with the mission. After all, their oath is to the Constitution, not to the whims of the Commander-in-Chief.

The fact that high-ranking career officers would rather retire than continue serving at the beck and call of the present administration is one of the more damning cases that one can make against the manner in which George Bush has handled his responsibilities as their commmander. No doubt they were expecting much better after being forced to suffer through Bill Clinton's stewardship.

On a tangential note, does it amaze anyone else that our soldiers are able to remain in such close contact with the home front? I mean, one of my friends in my fantasy football league is back in Iraq again! Not that that will stop us from questioning his manhood and mocking him mercilessly whenever he loses, of course, although we have reluctantly agreed to cut him some slack on roster deadlines and so forth if his commanding officer will provide him with a signed note that he was too busy shooting at people to get his lineups straight.

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Kerry to quit

I don't have any evidence for this, it's just a feeling I have as the Vietnam evidence against him snowballs. Krazy John wasn't able to respond effectively to the first Swiftvet charges, and that's turned out to be just an opening jab that prepared the public for what will likely be a knockout punch, his baseless testimony on war atrocities that was used against US POWS by the North Vietnamese. As more and more people discover the particulars of his meeting with the North Vietnamese and Viet Cong in 1970 as part of his protest effort, even die-hard Democrats will abandon him.

Democrats, more than most, love front-runners. Once Kerry starts to visibly slip, they will turn on him with all the ferocity of the unthinking rodents that they are at heart. They don't actually like Kerry, and remember, another Massachusetts liberal was leading another Bush by 17 points prior to the Republican coronation. By November, he was absolutely destroyed in a historic rout. And Willie Horton and the infamous tank-driving episode don't pack one-tenth the punch that Kerry's cumulative Vietnam debacle will.

Remember, too, that Whackjob is an exceptionally and unusually proud man. He doesn't fall, he assures us even as we see him getting up from the snow. He doesn't fail. He is too proud to be willing to get crushed - crushed - by a mediocrity such as George W. Bush, and too self-centered to give a damn about what his late pull-out will do to his party. The only way that Kerry can salvage his bizarre view of himself is to declare himself too noble for the dirtiness of modern politics and end his campaign. He won't have failed, it was the system, the vets, the Republican attack dogs, etc, anyone but him.

Edwards would cheerfully leap in and play sacrificial lamb, in order to give himself a leg up for the nomination in 2008. But as one veteran trader, who was the first to suggest this possibility to me, has pointed out, Kerry will have to quit in mid-September for Edwards to participate in the first debate. Interestingly enough, the POW documentary starts in two weeks....

It's just speculation at this point, but there is a certain compelling logic to the concept.

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Mailvox: Vox for President

Linda sees some eerie parallels:

It's clear that you're not concerned with anybody's opinion but yours. All too typical of an arrogant, self-absorbed, immature person who thinks he/she knows more than he/she actually knows.

Just be careful of the words you write and say. Watch carefully what's happening to Kerry. He was an arrogant, self-absorbed, immature, opportunist thirty years ago, just like yourself, and now his words and actions are coming back to haunt him.

Erm... what's that you were saying? I was just filming the recreation of my epic smackdown of Me So Michelle.

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Mailvox: the philosopher-generals

Steve barks on command:

I think that the point that the marine was trying to make is that the troops and the mission are united. You cannot support one and not the other. The "folks back home" should understand this and have the courage to face up to all its implications. If you want our troops to win then you are on their side and are supporting them. If you want the enemy to win (it doesn't matter if you want the enemy to win by killing all of our troops or just win becase we quit the field and bring all our guys home, the end result is the same)then you are on their side and are the enemy of our troops.

This is the most specious reasoning in defense of unquestioning obedience I've ever heard. First, it is very easy to oppose the mission and support the troops. Only someone without friends or family in the military could possibly fail to understand the concept.

Would one argue that Saddam would win if US troops were pulled out today? Wasn't that who we were fighting? Wasn't the war fought to ensure that Iraq had no WMD? Then by Steve's reasoning either the mission has been accomplished, the war has already been won and the troops can come home, or Saddam, sitting under the guard of US troops, has won the most Phyrric of Phyrric victories.

Not only is this a foolish and illogical argument, but it is a stupid one. Calling people traitors is hardly a good way to convince them to come around to your way of thinking, it is instead a very good way of convincing them that you have a complete lack of confidence in your case. Steve apparently thinks we should cheer unchecked mission creep until American troops occupy every single country in the world. Anything less would be unpatriotic!

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The mistaken military mind

The New York Times quotes a Marine Major:

When critics of the war say their advocacy is on behalf of those of us risking our lives here, it's a type of false patriotism. I believe that when Americans say they "support our troops," it should include supporting our mission, not just sending us care packages. They don't have to believe in the cause as I do; but they should not denigrate it. That only aids the enemy in defeating us strategically.

So, if the President decides to aid the Sudanese government in committing genocide, the American public should simply keep its collective mouth shut and support the mission? That's ridiculous. Remember, most of the great atrocities committed by dozens of governments around the world have been committed by the militaries of those countries in obedience to their legitimate leaders.

One of the most common failings of the military mind is to believe that because unquestioning obedience is a military virtue, it is a civic virtue as well. Quite the opposite is true. And to argue that one is aiding the enemy simply by exercising one's Constitutional rights to criticize one's government is not only incorrect it is downright shameful. In fact, this is why it is unwise for the President to make use of our armed forces without first ensuring that he has gained the consent of the people by a Congressional declaration of war.

I am sure there are those who will be aghast that I should dare to criticize the words of a Marine risking his life in service to the country. To them, I must point out that the mere fact that one is fighting for one's country does not automatically make one's opinions correct, nor render them above all criticism.

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Brave Sir William bleg

I need - soon - five to ten quality demonstrations of vintage O'Reilly being O'Reilly. Apparently there's enough interest in Media Whores that they want to look at it next week, so I want to wrap up Brave Sir Bill's chapter for the submission. I don't want stupid nitpicky stuff, I want egregious government bootlicking or direct backing down from previous assertions like he did with the Patriot Act.

I can look up the transcripts, so just a brief description will do, although if you have more, that would be great.

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Blogslap!

Hindrocket makes the Star & Sickle's Jim Boyd his bitch:

To sum up: Jim Boyd does not even attempt to deny any of the significant points we made. He simply assumes as true John Kerry's revised version of his Cambodian fable, without acknowledging the contradictions among the various versions of Kerry's story, and without noting that there is no support for the proposition that Kerry was ever in Cambodia, except for his own ever-shifting word. And where he challenges us on specific facts, Boyd is flatly wrong.

That's a mighty weak basis on which to call us frauds, liars, and smear merchants. The hysterical tone of Boyd's tirade shows, I guess, the desperation that has seized the Kerry campaign as the truth about their candidate finally begins to come out.

ONE MORE THING: If you think that the Star Tribune should run our response to Jim Boyd's vicious, mean-spirited attack on us next Sunday, you can send a polite email to the editor of the Star Tribune's editorial section, Eric Ringham, at eringham@startribune.com. If you would like to encourage Jim Boyd to act like a man and debate us face to face at the Minnesota State Fair next Saturday, you could make that polite suggestion to Mr. Boyd at boyd@startribune.com. Just a thought.

I happened to send Mr. Boyd the following email yesterday evening, entitled "Are you going to show?"

Dear Mr. Boyd,

I look forward to hearing your defense of Senator John Kerry's account of his military service in Cambodia on the Northern Alliance Radio Show.

Best regards,

Vox Day
Universal Press Syndicate

Let's just say I'm not holding my breath. Paperboys are hothouse flowers, with lousy educations consisting mostly of journalism classes in the place of actual subjects, accustomed to one-way debates where the only microphone is in their possession.

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Mailvox: educated by E

Kody puts on white armor and rides to the rescue of his helpless lady-love:

Who the hell do you people think you are. I don't know much about politics, nor do I. I just wanted to write you and let you know I don't get you people. What does everybody have against
Janeane Garofalo? Why is she such a bad person? So what if you don't agree with her or think she's wrong. You all say the same thing too, how you believe in free speech or whatever but then go on and on about how Ms. Garofalo is wrong. Leave her alone for fuck sakes! Voice your own opinion, do whatever the hell you want, nobody cares! Just stop bad mouthing celebrities because they want to speak their minds too. Sure it's okay for all you shit heads with a website to talk smack about everyhting and anything, but when an intelligent woman who just happens to have television access tries to tell people what she thinks about a certain subject, you all of a sudden have a problem with her. I hate all you bastards who have nothing better to do than write all kinds of shit telling how some celebrity is wrong, or stupid, or fat. You're a very un-christian asshole, you know that VoxDay? I'm sure that god character get's a good laugh out of reading your stupid column too. Yup, he loves it when people treat other people like shit.

Yes, I understand that God was so upset with Jesus Christ for using physical violence on the temple moneychangers that He had him killed. And Jesus never called people names; sons of vipers is actually a compliment in the original Hebrew, is it not? Kody, darling, if no one cares about this, then why are you writing to me weeks after the fact?

The case against Janeane Garofalo is based on the grounds that she is a demonstrably clueless and ignorant individual who not only thinks she's intelligent, but thinks she's wiser and more intelligent than those she's criticizing. Unlike you, she doesn't realize that she knows nothing about politics, she fails to comprehend that she's nothing more than another poorly educated celebrity who doesn't know the first thing about the subjects she's attempting to address. Furthermore, freedom of speech does not mean that one has the right to speak without expecting criticism, it simply means one has the right to speak. She does, so do I and so do you.

It seems that you feel Janeane can't handle the heat, and indeed, if her pathetic and racist performance subsequent to her appearance on Larry Elder's show was any indication, she can't. As is the case with Krazy John Kerry, she can deal it out but she can't take it. Run away, little girl, run away.

Anyone else have the feeling that all of this will fly completely over Kody's empty little head?

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I don't know about you

... but I'm a little concerned about this Republican plan to get rid of the CIA and replace it with a national intelligence organization. I'm not saying that the Republican leadership is politically tone-deaf or anything, but I heard that Geheime Staatspolizei was one of the names they were considering.

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More on Krazy John

If you just can't get enough of the madness, stop by the Captain's Quarters, as Captain Ed shows every sign of beating Krazy John like a Vice City hooker until he cries like a little girl, checks himself into Liars Anonymous and ends his campaign.

Which, judging from the Hero of the Mekong's reaction to the two little Swift ads, should take about ten days.

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Pat Buchanan's new book

Drudge drops some quotes from "Where the Right Went Wrong":

“There is no conservative party left in Washington. Conservative thinkers and writers who were to be the watchdogs of orthodoxy have been as vigilant in policing party deviations from principle as was Cardinal Law in collaring the predator-priests of the Boston archdiocese.” (Page 9)

“The Beltway Right has entered into a civil union with Big Brother.” (176)

“Under the rubric of conservatism, the Republican party of Bush I and II has been reinventing itself into what conservatives would have once recognized as a Rockefeller party reciting Reaganite rhetoric.” (234)

“[A] civil war is going to break out inside the Republican Party along the old trench lines of the Goldwater-Rockefeller wars of the 1960s, a war for the heart and soul and future of the party for the new century.” (234)

On the Neoconservatives:

“Kristol’s warning that neoconservatives could go to Kerry was an admission of what many have long recognized. The neoconservatives are not really conservatives at all. They are impostors and opportunists.” (250)

“Nine days after an attack on the United States, this tiny clique of intellectuals was telling the President of the United States...that if he did not follow their war plans, he would be charged publicly with a ‘decisive surrender’ to terrorism.” (48)

The man knows what he's talking about. I'm going to see if he's amenable to an interview; it's interesting to see him pointing out what I've been writing for the last two years as well. There is no conservative party in Washington.

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He won't show

After the Star and Sickle ran a hit piece defending Krazy John against the Powerline duo of Hindrocket and the Big Trunk, the boys have called BS on Eric Ringham and Jim Boyd.

Jim, this morning you launched a vicious personal attack on Scott Johnson and me, apparently on behalf of the Strib's editorial board. As usual with those who try to defend the indefensible, your vicious personal tirade was almost completely fact-free, and you didn't even attempt to deny the central point of our piece, which was that Kerry's now-retracted Christmas in Cambodia fable was a lie.

As it happens, we have a radio show, and we would like to debate you on this issue so that the public can be advised of all of the relevant facts--not just those that can be squeezed into a 750-word op ed. We hereby invite you to join us for a debate on our show, the Northern Alliance Radio Network, at 2:00 p.m. on Saturday, where we will be broadcasting live from the State Fairgrounds. You can present your case before a large live audience, an audience of many thousands on the radio, and an untold world-wide audience that will be listening via our internet stream. If you really think you can sustain the claim that John Kerry undertook secret missions to Cambodia, you will be there. We will debate this issue: "Kerry's Christmas in Cambodia: An Innocent Mistake, or a Decades-long Pattern of Deception?"

Please confirm that we can look forward to debating you at 2:00 p.m. on Saturday, at the State Fairgrounds.

This should be fun to follow over the next few weeks, as the Northern Alliance guys pound the helpless paper boys and their failure to respond. Clearly, the Old Media is pulling out its hair at their inability to exercise their former monopoly over what news is permitted to reach the public. McCain-Feingold won't do them any good now; everyone with half a brain is getting their news from the Internet already.

So, put on the steel-toed boots and kick some ass, gentlemen. But if you ever want to argue invasion probabilities, you know I won't duck it.

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This seems hard to believe

From Rose Lear's blog:

What an eye awakening day this was. I thought that I had seen it all having been involved from Viet Nam to the beginning of Desert Storm in my military and civilian law enforcement career, but
today I learned about a new part of the shame game.

For those who won't bother to read all this report, let me spell out the body counts that 6 of us (all retired military and/or law enforcement) went out to confirm today in different areas. These
are confirmed bodies in the trucks, restaurant refers, or refer vans, and they are NOT "missing persons" or animals:

Charlotte Harbor areas - 58 dead as of 5pm today;
Fort Myers & the barrier islands - 21 deaths as of 3pm today;
Punta Gorda - 275+ deaths and escalating each hour;
Desoto County - 36 deaths, expected to increase;

These figures came from our own eyes, medical personnel, various county sheriff's deputies, and eye witnesses or residents from the worst devastated areas. CNN and the rest of the world biased
and controlled media are fooling none of us who live here. The current CONFIRMED body count in our 3 county area on the west coast of Florida is near 400 as I write this....

There are staging areas for FEMA (with their red and white signs to let you know they are "there"), et al, that we could not openly enter into with photo and movie cameras having been
"discovered" in our vehicles... our cars and pick-ups were searched in the "sensitive" areas where the worst devastation took place and where we were then refused entry. None-the-less, we still walked into most of these "off limits" areas at waterfront motels, I-75 restaurant/commercial areas, destroyed mobile home parks, and the temporary Charlotte morgue... to name a few. This is how we came up with the above figures for body counts. We spoke with
medical personnel who have come from Miami to work triage and other temporary facilities, ambulance drivers (a special thanks to the Ambutrans people), homeless residents, and deputies from many different counties.

Obviously, I have no way of knowing if this is true. It could be a self-dramatizing hoax, or it could be the truth. But if the official body count suddenly changes dramatically sometime down the road after everyone has forgotten about the hurricane, it will be one more piece of evidence to keep in mind.

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The hereditary oligarchy

Paul Jacobs demonstrates that we live in a hereditary oligarchy:

Here's how it works. Bill Lipinski, the 22-year career congressman, faces no competition. That's par for the course with incumbents in Congress, 98 percent of whom are re-elected cycle after cycle. Lipinski was unopposed in both the primary and general election in 2002. In 2000, his challenger raised less than $20,000 and Lipinski won with 76 percent of the vote.

At least a year ago, Lipinski decides that he wants to retire. However, he does not announce that this will be his last term, which would truly open up the seat and allow the election process to take place in a manner available to all candidates and voters. He keeps his intentions to himself, and to his favored replacement.

Lipinski also does not resign his seat and trigger a special election, even though in so doing he would still be able to time his departure to allow his favored replacement a head start in organizing a campaign. Instead, Lipinski runs unopposed, yet again, for the Democratic nomination in this rock-solid Democratic district.

Then, a mere two months before this November's general election, Congressman Bill Lipinski [of Illinois] suddenly withdraws and orchestrates the awarding of the Democratic Party's nomination for Congress, like a crown on a royal pillow, to . . . guess who?

This coronation is for Bill Lipinski's son, Daniel.

Perhaps Daniel Lipinski would make a fine congressman. But even if he would, shouldn't he represent Knoxville, Tennessee, where he has lived for the last 15 years? But no, that's not how the divine right of hereditary succession works in modern times. And besides, Pop has no power of incumbency in Tennessee. (You know, like the Wicked Witch of the West in the Wizard of Oz had no power in the East. If only voters could click their heels together and say three times, "There's nothing like term limits.")

Now, after 22 years of his father, third district citizens have 38-year-old Daniel Lipinski to look forward to term after term for how many more decades? This is "representative government"? These are "free elections"?

And you think the Presidential primary selections are any more open? The American people don't select a President, they are simply permitted to choose between the two men the oligarchy has selected for them. Perhaps people will begin to wake up to this reality when George Bush IV is running against yet another Massachusetts Democrat in 2040.

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Thoughtless defense

Hindrocket writes on Powerline:

On our show this afternoon, Michelle referred admiringly to Deacon's post. My sense is that she generally agrees with Deacon's conclusion, as do I. I would only add that it is easy for us to see, with hindsight, that there wasn't much danger of a Japanese invasion of the West Coast. This wasn't obvious in the aftermath of Pearl Harbor. And while there is no doubt that the vast majority of Japanese Americans were loyal, there is equally no doubt that some were not. It is impossible to know what injury to our war effort may have been prevented by the relocation. Having said that, I don't think the evidence of danger was sufficient to justify the measures taken. But that is a judgment call on which reasonable minds can differ.

With all due respect to Hindrocket and Deacon, that's a massive, stinking load of elephant dung worthy of a knowledge-free moral relativist at university. It is not only obvious now, it was obvious at the time that there was ZERO danger of a Japanese invasion of the West Coast. The facts and the actions of the US military at the time entirel support this. Would Hindrocket also say that it was "a judgment call" to say that reasonable minds could differ on the possibility of a German invasion of the East Coast?

The Germans had 2,000 fewer ocean miles to cross. The Kriegsmarine was of similar size to the Japanese Navy. (It may have lacked aircraft carriers, but its 1,170 U-boats alone could have landed more troops than Japan's entire 176-ship Imperial navy) And yet the notion is entirely absurd! How much more ludicrous is the idea of a 5,500 mile trans-Pacific invasion?

The Germans couldn't cross 21 miles of the English Channel with air equivalence. The Allies required air supremacy and 4,600 ships to invade Normandy, on a French coastline that is not, as one of the Northern Alliance gang weirdly asserted last week, smaller than the American West Coast. (France's Atlantic coastline alone is 1875 miles compared to the 1359 miles of the American West Coast, and if we're dealing in unlikely hypotheticals here, the Germans would also have had to worry about guarding against an invasion from the Mediterranean or the North Sea as well. The entire French coastline is 3437 miles in all, 2.5 times larger than the American West Coast.) An invasion isn't a simple matter of landing troops, it's also about arranging for supply, support and reinforcement, none of which was even remotely possible for Japan.

To highlight the absurdity of the pro-internment case, Germany was not only far more active on the East Coast - 27 merchant ships were sunk on the West Coast, compared to 397 on the East Coast Atlantic, Gulf, and Caribbean - but furthermore, as Japan was wholly dependent on raw materials imported by sea, any invasion would have been nothing but a large-scale suicide mission, with no possibility of reinforcement or supply, that would have instantly doomed the island empire.

One cannot be an expert on everything. But any defense of internment based on the notion of genuine military danger to the United States of America requires a combination of logical failure and near-complete ignorance of military history and strategic realities.

In fact, if we were to accept this very poor reasoning, then Malkin and her ilk would be more than justified in calling for throwing out the Constitution and locking up every American of Arab descent or Islamic creed, as the danger from them and their nations of origin, however slight, is far more serious than that posed by the Nisei and Imperial Japan. The fact that she denies any intent to make such a case only shows that she is either a) full of it, b) clueless, or c) disingenuous.

In any case, color me seriously unimpressed. I'm a Powerline fan and I think they're doing fantastic work on the ongoing rout that is the Kerry campaign v. Swift Vet clash, but I suspect they'll look back on this apology for Ms Malkin's absurd case with more than a little embarassment.

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Blog search

Blogger has done a rather decent thing, in replacing the ads at the top with a search toolbar. Enter a word or two, click search, and it will find the most recent entry containing those words. Unfortunately, it doesn't work very well, as if you happen to know, for example, how many times I've mentioned Daunte Culpepper over the last ten months, it's quite clear that the search tool is not finding all of them.

Still, it beats ads for Bill Clinton's book or whatever. And I'm sure they'll improve it soon; Blogger has been very good about continuing to improve its product.

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Just a conduit

Chris Adamo passes on an email from a Canadian acquaintance:

Thought I'd let you know that the battle lines are drawn even here in Canada for U.S. Presidential elections.. A local paper had a article by a Dual citizen pushing liberal agenda and was eager to sign up other dual citizens for absentee ballots and the Democratic party. There are approximately 700,000 Americans living in Canada.

I sent him a short and sweet reply saying that Mr. Kerry was not fit to be a commander in Chief of anything. You can smell how desperate the liberals are to get to power, and God help us and others if they do. I got my absentee ballot card and will be voting accordingly in November.

While I rather doubt that his idea of "accordingly" would parallel mine, it's interesting to note that the election campaign appears to be active outside American borders. You'd think that there'd be rampant opportunity for voter fraud here as well.

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Mailvox: I don't think so

PRG gang agley:

For someone who's current kick is pointing fingers at "media whores", Vox sure enjoys name-dropping and career-pimping (the rest of us aren't exactly boasting of hanging out with rock stars while authoring best-selling novels and creating million-dollar software).

Career-pimping? Name-dropping? Okay, PRG, what do I do? What industry am I in? There would seem to be a shocking lack of information out there; if I'm doing as you say, I appear to be doing a terrible job of it.

As for best-selling novels, I certainly haven't boasted of that, seeing as I haven't written any. It would sure be nice to have the ability to do so, though. Maybe one day.

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Mailvox: caught, can I get a witness?

Waterboy refuses to carry water:

Vox: "In unrelated news, in light of our recent discussion on what makes a media whore, this post of hers did make me laugh"

Waitaminute, holdonhere.

You link to MM's post about where she'll be appearing, alluding to her "whoreness", yet you do the same here and here and here

You don't see any difference between appearing on one local radio show a month and (at least) three television shows in two days? Which, in your opinion, would be more accurately described as chasing cameras? I am invited onto a show where the hosts read my column and with whom I have regular interaction, Ms Malkin has her agent trying to put her on as many shows as possible regardless of who they are. I'm expecting her to show up on Wayne's World any day now.

There's nothing wrong with telling people where you'll be on, in case they're interested, it was simply the sheer volume I was pointing out.

Ironically, Saint Paul asked me to be on the Northern Alliance show with Ms Malkin later today, but I declined because I am more interested in an outing with Space Bunny. I'll take a pretty blonde over a camera or microphone every single time. The defense rests.

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Deranged and derailed

From Drudge:

KERRY CAMPAIGN CALLS FOR BOOK BAN. The Kerry campaign calls on a publisher to 'withdraw book' written by group of veterans, claiming veterans are lying about Kerry's service in Vietnam and operating as a front organization for Bush. Kerry campaign has told Salon.com that the publisher of UNFIT FOR COMMAND is 'retailing a hoax'... 'No publisher should want to be selling books with proven falsehoods in them,' Kerry campaign spokesman Chad Clanton tells the online mag.

So much for the fantasy genre. And Star Trek is right out! But at least we know Kerry's position on the First Amendment. I'm struck by the thought that my title for next week's column was bloody prescient.

I'm honestly beginning to think that Kerry won't even make it to November. Seriously, if Kerry had any sort of case at all, he'd go on one of the big shows, invite four or five of his fellow vets and throw down. That would put an immediate end to the story and probably hand him the election, as he would walk away looking like Duke Nukem, kicking ass and chewing gum, except he's all out of gum. But he won't do that because he can't. He can't because he, more than anyone else, knows that he's full of merde

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In defense of Me So Michelle

I'll cheerfully slash Ms Malkin to shreds all day long on her newfound love for the G, not to mention her defense of FDR, but she definitely didn't deserve the rude mistreatment she received at the hands of Chris Matthews.

This foaming jerk Matthews, who called me irresponsible and kicked me off the show admitted that a) he himself had not read the damned book, b) he was not interested in asking Kerry about the specific doubts raised by vets about his wounds, and c) he had not and would not question Kerry about these specific allegations.

"Are you saying he shot himself on purpose?" Matthews hammered. I repeated myself again clearly that I was referring to the allegations about self-inflicted wounds in the book. When I tried to explain that the vets who were with Kerry had cast a lot of doubt on whether enemy fire occurred during the first two incidents, Matthews cut me off again. "Why did you say that?" he badgered. Because, I said, I was talking about what was in the book, which he had admitted he hadn't read.

"Don't you wonder?" I asked.

"No, I don't," he bellowed. "It's never occurred to me."

With that, I was kicked off the second segment.

As the show broke for commercials, Matthews scrambled for his producers to see if what he said was true. And I'm irresponsible? One staffer ran to the office where I had left my copy of the book, and handed it to Matthews, who--for the first time, apparently--started flipping through it. I asked for my book back and politely said thank you. After I left, he trashed me again on the air and his scurrilous charges were repeated by his MSNBC colleague Keith Olbermann, who called me an "idiot."

Of course, had Michelle simply pointed out that it was John Kerry who stated that he had wounded himself in his much-abused tushy in Tour of Duty, she could have easily trounced Matthews. Got to be quicker on your feet, Ms Malkin.

In unrelated news, in light of our recent discussion on what makes a media whore, this post of hers did make me laugh.

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Anyone up for a research project?

I would like to know precisely how many car chases, missing children stories and murder trials the Fox News Channel has covered since 1996. I'm not a Fox junkie, so I'm not really up on this, but if anyone happens to know, let me know. Thanks.

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Mailvox: what makes a media whore?

JJ poses a question:

I'm just curious, Vox - who would NOT count as a media whore? Is it possible for someone who is a member of the media full time not to be a media whore?

The criteria are three. To three, thou shalt count, and the number of the counting shall be three. Thou shalt not count to five, neither shall thou count to two, excepting in that thou then proceedeth to three.

1. Are they camera hungry? Do they give off an air of wishing that this brief shining moment when the eyes (or ears) of the world are upon them could go on forever? Do they show up despite having nothing to add to the conversation? Do they allow others to speak, or do they try to monopolize the microphone.

2. Do they suck up to the host? Conversely, if they are hosts, do they suck up to their guests? Do they pretend to be friend, pals and buddies when they don't even know the other person and clearly don't get along with them?

3. Are they willing to abandon their principles any time anyone calls them on it? Do they even have any discernable principles? Do they always seek to please the powerful? Does the end of being on the show appear to justify the means?

I haven't worked out a formal definition yet, but this should indicate what I'm thinking.

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Una domanda, per chi sa latina

I'm looking for a good Latin term for "media whore". How does Adlatus Prostostarus strike you? Got any better suggestions? I spoke to the publisher, by the way, and they agreed that "Media Whores" was much more marketable than "History's Lies", although they say that their publicist would probably, and I quote, "have kittens."

I pointed out that I'm the perfect man to write this book, since I have absolutely no desire to go on TV promoting it and I could not care less if Eric Alterman or Brave Sir William don't want to be my best friend and invite me over for slumber parties. So, we'll see. I'm already having a good time writing the first chapter, though.

This second generation brought to the forefront men with chiseled jaws and names like porn stars, and bleached blondes with journalism-free backgrounds consisting of acting school diplomas and tasteful nude photographs. This model quickly became de riguer for the local news format, which is now such a matter of rote that one cannot easily distinguish between the ABC affiliate's newscast in Minneapolis and the CBS affiliate's newscast in Albequrque.

Who was it that first hired Deborah Norville, by the way? Anyone remember? Was it CNN or CBS? I'm also wondering when the media whore phenomenon really kicked off... sure, Barbara Walters was a precursor, but I'm thinking it really exploded with Clinton's Lewinsky scandal, since you had all kinds of people going off and having to fill the void of an almost complete lack of information.

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Desperately seeking closure

The Washington Post reported that the citation for a Bronze Star awarded to Mr. Thurlow for heroism in the incident refers to "enemy small arms and automatic weapons fire," contradicting his account and bearing out Mr. Kerry's. The Kerry campaign posted the article from The Post on its Web site, and sent an e-mail to supporters saying the article "completely discredited" Mr. Thurlow and "marks the end of the dishonest and disgusting smear campaign against John Kerry and his crew mates from Vietnam."

Now that's funny! As I posted yesterday, the article not only doesn't "complete discredit" Thurlow, it only highlights that Thurlow and Kerry contradict each other, which we already knew. Thurlow is not his citation, and since he did not apply for a medal or write an AAR, there is no self-contradiction there. Furthermore, the vast majority of men who were there on the river support Thurlow's version.

Kerry, by his own admission, ran away - as one of his own crewmen says was his wont - so he was not there for Thurlow's most dangerous action, trying to board an out-of-control boat. This action, suspiciously enough, is not described in Thurlow's citation. Logic suggests that is because Kerry wrote the AAR that supported his application for a medal.

The fact that the Kerry campaign is desperately clutching at this wholly inadequate straw demonstrates how weak they know John Kerry's case is.

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Kerry is dead in the water

From "Unfit For Command", via the Washington Times:

None of these Swiftees recognized the incident as described by Kerry in his report, by Brinkley in "Tour of Duty" [in which, after the mine exploded under PCF 3 on his port side, Kerry recalls his right arm being "smashed" against a bulkhead when "another explosion went off right beside us"] or on Kerry's Web site. They were furious when they realized Kerry's fraudulent account.

In reality, Kerry's boat, PCF 94, was on the right side of the river when a mine went off on the opposite side under PCF 3. The boat's crewmen were thrown into the water. The officers suffered concussions. A Viet Cong sympathizer in an adjoining bunker had touched off the mine. There was no other hostile fire and no other mines, according to Chenoweth, Odell, Pease and Thurlow. The boats had begun firing after the mine exploded, but ceased after a short time because of the lack of hostile fire.

Kerry's PCF 94 fled the scene. The remaining three PCFs, in accord with standard doctrine, stood to defend the disabled PCF 3 and its crewmen in the water. Kerry and PCF 94 disappeared several hundred yards away, returning only when it was clear there was no return fire. Chenoweth (who received no medal) picked up the PCF 3 crewmen from the water. PCF 3's engines were knocked out on one side and frozen on 500 rpm on the other side. The boat weaved dangerously, hitting sandbars, dazed or unconscious crew members aboard.

Thurlow, commanding his own boat, sought a secure hold so he could jump across and board PCF 3. However, he was thrown into the water in his first attempt to board, and the boat hit the sandbars. Later, Thurlow brought PCF 3 to a stop, and the boat slowly began to sink. Rassmann had fallen or been knocked off either Kerry's boat or the fifth boat, PCF 35. When Rassmann was spotted in the water, Chenoweth's PCF 23, with the PCF 3 crew aboard, went to pick him up.

Kerry's PCF 94, returning to the scene after its flight, reached Rassmann about 20 yards ahead of Chenoweth's boat. Kerry did the decent thing by going to pick up Rassmann, justifiably earning his gratitude. However, the claim that Kerry returned to a hostile fire zone is a lie, according to Chenoweth, Thurlow and others. Meanwhile, the serious work of saving PCF 3 continued.

Kerry's false after-action report, prepared to justify his Purple Heart and Bronze Star, reports "5,000 meters" of heavy fire — about 2½ miles, the same distance as a large Civil War battlefield. Not a shot of this fire was heard by Chenoweth, Thurlow, Odell or Pease. Kerry's after-action report ignores Chenoweth's heroic action in rescuing PCF 3 survivors and Thurlow's action in saving PCF 3, while highlighting his own routine pickup of Rassmann and PCF 94's minor role in saving PCF 3.

Make that Swift vets 4, Kerry 0. The Swift vets say that he wasn't wounded on the river, and it turns out that one of the sources reporting that Kerry wounded himself earlier that day... is John Kerry. "On page 313 of "Tour of Duty," and evidently in Kerry's secret journal written on or about March 13, 1969, quoted in that book, Kerry relates his injury from the rice stock explosion." So, if John Kerry is to be believed, he received two wounds in exactly the same place on the same day, one self-inflicted, one not.

Regardless of what the veterans motivations are - and the fact that so many of them think so little of John Kerry after all these years tends to support the truth of what they are saying, in my opinion - it is becoming more and more clear that John Kerry is a borderline whack job who is totally unfit for any sort of command.

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Mailvox: ask and you shall receive

Hank has his doubts about the Swift vets:

Of course it still doesn't explain any of the contradictions with Thurlow's story. I'd say it's his excuse for having botched his story. Still not willing to explain Rassmann's account or why all those other boats couldn't pick him up when they were not under fire?

That's a reasonable question. It seems Larry Thurlow has a rather cogent explanation.

I submitted no paperwork for a medal nor did I file an after action report describing the incident. [Thus, while his current version of the story contradicts his citation, it cannot be considered self-contradictory as some have tried to portray it.] To my knowledge, John Kerry was the only officer who filed a report describing his version of the incidents that occurred on the river that day. It was not until I had left the Navy—approximately three months after I left the service—that I was notified that I was to receive a citation for my actions on that day. I believed then as I believe now that I received my Bronze Star for my efforts to rescue the injured crewmen from swift boat number three and to conduct damage control to prevent that boat from sinking.

My boat and several other swift boats went to the aid of our fellow swift boat sailors whose craft was adrift and taking on water. We provided immediate rescue and damage control to prevent boat three from sinking and to offer immediate protection and comfort to the injured crew.

After the mine exploded, leaving swift boat three dead in the water, John Kerry’s boat, which was on the opposite side of the river, fled the scene. US Army Special Forces officer Jim Rassmann, who was on Kerry’s boat at the time, fell off the boat and into the water. Kerry’s boat returned several minutes later—under no hail of enemy gunfire—to retrieve Rassmann from the river only seconds before another boat was going to pick him up.

I believe that's another round to the Swift Vets. So far, we have Swift Vets 3, Kerry 0.

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Who do we hate today?

Stow the lectures, I'm paraphrasing Helen Thomas. I was just thinking, who ARE the biggest media whores of Left, Right and squishy middle today? Hank, Pete and ihateShrub, go to town, gentlemen, I want to get your perspective on this too. Please note that media whore, as I define it, is a combination of a ravenous hunger for the camera and a certain lack of ideological principle. It doesn't necessarily mean that I have it in for the individual, although that always adds a bit of zest to the endeavor.

On the Right, I'm thinking Brave Sir William, Me So Michelle and possibly Rx Limbaugh. I'm not quite as sure about Ann, but I'm certainly open to hearing the case for her. I quite like Jonah Goldberg, but I can see where one might be able to argue in favor of him.

On the Left, Maureen Dowd has to lead the way. I'd love to go after Paul Krugman, but he is such a defenseless little mouse and Donald Luskin and the Krugman Truth Squad have demolished him so completely that I don't know if he's got enough posterior left to peddle.

I'm a little handicapped in that I don't watch enough Fox News or CNN to be up-to-date on who the most serious camera chasers are of late. So pity the poor blind cobra....

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No book for you!

I just sent a publisher an email withdrawing my proposed book on History's Lies from consideration prior to submission. Why? Because a glance at the bestseller lists demonstrates that it's the sort of thing that no one particularly wants to read, and it would harm the publisher to waste resources pushing something that is inadequately marketable.

Based on current non-fiction trends, it seems my two best options are as follows:

A) HEIL HILLARY: The secret life of a Nazi lesbian
B) MEDIA WHORES: Courtesans and Charlatans of the American Commentariat

Which one sounds like the more entertaining read to you? Anyhow, I'll probably turn the chapters on the Spanish Inquisition and the Left-Wing Nazis into columns in the future. Researching the Inquisition was quite interesting, actually. I stole Robert Anton Wilson's rather innovative footnoting approach, which allowed me to work in tangential material, such as Siegfried and Roy and other things that don't actually have anything to do with the Spanish Inquisition, but make for a read that's a little less dry.

It's RAW who produced the funniest line in the history of literature, subsequent to a lengthy discussion of an infinty of Nietzsches contemplating an infinity of spiders in the moonlight: "Nietzsche masturbates too much."

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Speaking of Japan

DNG unleashes a long rant in defense of Asian women:

...a lot of white American women here in Japan are very bitter. They're really bitter in Taiwan as well. They look at the foreign men around them who have extremely beautiful Asian girlfriends and get mad. They say to themselves: 'He's pathetic! If we were back home, I wouldn't give him the time of day! I can't compete here because Asian women are submissive!!' That's the attitude: Japanese women spoil everything by being submissive slaves, they upstage the Great White Gaijin Chick who rightfully belongs at the center of the universe. It certainly isn't because white American women are paunchy and sexist and act like bulldozers. And it's not because they're vain and hypocritical and they look like land-bound dugongs, no sir. A white chick could never look in the mirror and reach the most obvious conclusions, could she? No, western men want to oppress somebody and Asian women are easily-oppressed whores....

I've never thought that Asian women are naturally slutty or weak-minded or whatever. No damned way. It's a slur! It's a totally racist idea and it angers me to no end to hear it, but you will seriously find a huge number of white women who actually make accusations like that. In the U.S. I've met white women with PhDs who express disbelief when I say that most Asian women I've met are tough and independent-minded. I'm convinced that these stereotypes about Asians keep circulating because they reinforce the prejudices of white women. Seriously, in all my experience it's been almost exclusively the white women who make these kinds of snide insults. Probably 95% of it comes from white chicks, I don't think I've met any other group of people in the world who have such an extreme and perverse relish for bashing Asian women. It's disgraceful.

I tend to find this oft-virulent racism more amusingly ironic, as men of every culture, European, Asian, African and Arabic, know very well that American women are the most sexually available on the planet. This should be obvious to anyone who considers the matter, as it is simply the logical result of the United States being Ground Zero for the Sexual Revolution. Even in notorious Thailand, you usually have to pay to play; only in America can one reasonably expect sex on the first date, assuming that one even bothers with a date in the first place. I understand that England has loosened up considerably in this regard in the last 15 years, but it is still playing catch-up.

Asian cultures may be more exotically erotic, as it wasn't the Anglo-Saxons who came up with the Kama Sutra, after all, and one has difficulty imagining the concept of a young Thai wife having to be told to close her eyes and think of Thailand, but for the most part there is still an element of propriety that is now absent in America. When studying in Tokyo, I once committed the faux pas of inviting a Japanese girl over to my host-family's place for dinner; both she and my host family were very amused and did not tell me until halfway through dinner that I had basically proposed, and in coming over, she had accepted.

Fortunately, they all simply saw it as a joke at the expense of the clueless gaijin. That would have been a tough one to explain to Mom and Dad.

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Guns-n-Poses

Nate carries water for Axl Rose on his blog:

Say you don't like them. Say you hate the music and what they stood for. But don't call them posers. They don't come more real than GnR.

It depends which GnR you're talking about. I happened to spend two evenings partying with the original five in Tokyo not long after the release of Appetite for Destruction. I got along quite well with Steve, the drummer, and Duff, the bassist. They were both good guys, friendly and pretty much up for anything. We killed more than a few beers together that weekend. Snake was a complete bore, as he sat in the corner, hid behind his hair and didn't talk to anyone or do anything for two solid evenings. I don't remember what was going on with Axl - but I nearly got in a fight with Izzy Stradlin the second night, as he was trying to physically drag a girl with whom I'd had dinner that night out of the bar with him. She didn't want to go, but he wouldn't release her, so I had to grab her arm and cuss him out before he finally let her alone.

I remember thinking at the time that I was probably going to have to pop him one in the face and wondered a) what Japanese jails were like, and b) if the altercation would make MTV News. But when she started screaming, Stradlin let her go before I decided to risk it and let loose on him. A few months later, Axl started dating another friend of mine from my Tokyo dayz; she's in the Patience video, if I recall correctly.

GnR were real rockers, sure enough, but the band was a complete fraud in at least one sense. Their "independent" label was a fake; there never was any Uzi Suicide label. It was just a packaging deal dreamed up by their record label to give them more "cred". Apparently that seems to have worked in Nate's case.

I'll take Metallica, Soundgarden or Nirvana over them any day. I was more of an industrial guy, though, and although they weren't really rockers, for my money, there was no band that brought the Apocalypse better than Ministry.

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The ever-changing story

So, John Kerry spent Christmas 1968 in Cambodia on the orders of President Nixon. Except Nixon wasn't President in 1968. John Kerry's Silver Star citation from 1969 is signed by Secretary of the Navy John Lehman, who was the Secretary of the Navy from 1981 to 1987. Mmm-kay....

While his media defenders embarrass themselves with their ignorance of East Asian geography, (no the Mekong Delta isn't in Cambodia), his befuddled defenders in blogworld base their arguments on the "fact" that no one on Kerry's boat agrees with the 250+ Swift Boat veterans who think John Kerry is a total fraud. Unfortunately for them, this "fact" is an incorrect assertion which doesn't hold up any better than those haunting and fictional memories that are seared - seared - into John Kerry's imaginative mind.

Steve Gardner is the sole crewman not swayed by Kerry during his many post-Vietnam years of solicitation aimed at gaining the support of his own crew. Today, Gardner asks: "How can Kerry possibly be commander in chief when he couldn't competently command a six-man crew?" Gardner, a two-tour Swift Boat sailor who sat five feet behind Kerry in Vietnam and who saw many officers during his two years, judges Kerry to be by far the worst.

"Kerry was erratic," Gardner said in an interview June 19. "He hardly ever did what he was supposed to do. His command decisions put us in more peril then he should have. But mostly he just ran. When John Kerry looked out the bow of the boat and he saw tracer fire coming after him, he'd turn and run." Gardner added: "When he should have been fighting, calling in air support, he was hightailing it. That's always been my bone of contention with Kerry — his decision-making capabilities. That's what takes him out of contention as far as I'm concerned."

My question is this: where's Limahl when you need him?

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The cracking dam

The Libertarian slate includes nearly two dozen legislative candidates, including former gubernatorial candidate Tom Cox, who won almost 5 percent of the vote when Democrat Ted Kulongoski defeated Republican Kevin Mannix in 2002. This time, Cox hopes to defeat Rep. Mary Gallegos, R-Cornelius, one of 11 House Republicans who voted for the tax increase that voters ultimately rejected.....

Libertarians also could play a role in several other House races that have no incumbent, such as House District 54, which Rep. Tim Knopp, R-Bend, will exit. Libertarian Tristan Reisfar is taking on Democrat Judy Stiegler and Republican Chuck Burley, both of whom he says support tax and fees increases.

Mannix, the Oregon Republican Party chairman, said he’s telling members to “stop paying any attention” to Libertarian candidates, who he says have little in common with Republicans.

But the tax issue is important enough that some Republicans wouldn’t mind seeing a Democrat defeat a Republican. Tax activist Don McIntire said that the Executive Club, a decades-old conservative group to which he belongs, voted to back Cox against Gallegos. “There’s a chance his entry into the race could deliver the votes for the Democrat, but on balance, we’ve decided that’s better than continuing with somebody who’s a lousy Republican,” McIntire said.

"Stop paying any attention!" That's the most that the Republican leadership can say about the Libertarian Party. Why? Because when Republicans do pay attention and honestly weigh it as an alternative, the Libertarians easily prove to be the superior choice for most republicans, conservatives, and even small-d democrats.

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Mailvox: To PC or not PC

Unc D can't stop himself:

"I LOATHE political correctness. However, while I agree with your assesment of that piece on MM's blog, that's an obnoxious way to start off your post. If MM was black, I doubt you would have written: "Michelle says 'Yes Massa' to the Feds?""

You don't think so? O ye of little faith! And for one who reportedly loathes political correctness, you seem to be focused like a laser on the PC aspect, considering that I've already a) labled her a media whore, b) called her a bootlicker, and c) implied that she is committing adultery with a Philippino terrorist. That's all fine, apparently, but a dismissive reference to Ms Malkin being Asian and female suddenly gets your panties in a bunch. That PC sensitivity just sneaks in there, doesn't it.

Was it obnoxious? Sure. But obviously you're mistaking me for someone who gives a flying rat's posterior. Ideas are what they are, equally valid regardless of how they're couched. If I say "Peter Jennings, you handsome hunk of Canadian salt pork, 2+2=4" it is no more or less valid than "Peter Jennings, you loathesome Canadian cretin, 2+2=4". I often express myself in terms of venomous contempt because that is how I view the ideas being expressed by many of the charlatans infesting the commentary pages like rats infected with lethal intellectual buboes.

No matter what the issue might be, the answer is always the same. Trust Big Brother and love Him, and then you will be safe. THAT IS A LIE AND IT HAS ALWAYS BEEN A LIE.

If my words weren't dripping with venom, I'd be frothing at the mouth like Mogambo. Wake up, you cretins! This country, the noblest political experiment in the history of Mankind, belongs to you, and you are pissing away your birthright for nothing but empty words and false promises.

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Mailvox: the craven always fear the lesser danger

Rich unwisely plays with metaphor:

So, Suicide is a requirement of being an American. Interesting

The only form of national suicide is the one in which we are gradually engaging, sacrificing our liberties and Constitutional safeguards in favor of a security that will prove to be a mirage, dangled as false bait in front of frightened fools. Our demise will prove to be entirely of our own doing.

Rich's comparison is particularly nonsensical, as even the most pacifist society falling to the force exerted by another would be more accurately equated with murder.

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Why we must drug test

Speaking of fantasy football and attack dogs, I have to complain about the complete madhouse that is my fantasy football league. During this year's draft last weekend, I took some merciless ribbing for my misplaced affection for Kelly Holcomb. Hey, the guy plays great, gets injured, comes back for the AFC playoffs and throws five touchdowns. What's not to like?

Sure, he turned out to be a disaster, which is why Garcia is now starting for Cleveland, but it was a reasonable mistake. This didn't prevent numerous cracks about my inability to judge QB talent, my drafting incompetence, etc. But here's the point which demonstrates that my fellow GM's are, without any doubt whatsoever, complete idiots. I NOT ONLY NEVER DRAFTED KELLY HOLCOMB, I NEVER HAD HIM!

I drafted two quarterbacks last year. Peyton Manning and Matt Hasselbeck. That's two of the league's top five QBs last year. The year before that, Brett Favre was my starter. The year before that, Donovan McNabb in his one great fantasy year. The year before that, I was alternating Daunte Culpepper and Jeff Garcia to overwhelming E-F-F-E-C-T otherwise known as effect.

It was the White Buffalo who drafted Kurt Warner and Kelly Holcomb last year, two misjudgements of stunning magnitude, only a few short years after DRAFTING RANDALL CUNNINGHAM #1 OVERALL in 1999 when his wheels were obviously about to fall off. And I'm the one who can't judge QB talent? I am reluctantly forced to conclude that next year, we're going to have to institute pre-draft drug-testing.

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Mailvox: Vox le volt!

BT brings up the only subject that matters right now:

You and I differ politically but... who are your sleepers and guys poised for breakout years? I've got my own thoughts...Chris Brown, Thomas Jones, David Carr, Joey Harrington, and Carson Palmer.

Also, my general strategy is RB in the first & second round then best available in rd. 3. Share your strategical insights as I need all the help I can get.

Lastly...I disagree with 95% of what you say but you make me think and you're firm in your beliefs. Too many people just regurgitate the crap spoon fed to them by the politicians and talking heads. You don't and I respect that. I love reading your blogs and WND columns. Thanks and keep up the good work.

Yes, BT's missive demonstrates why I really prefer to consider myself a healer and a uniter, crossing the vast chasm of America's ideological differences and joining hands together in those small, but vital points of commonality, blah frickin' blah. I can't even write that without my stomach getting queasy. If I was Pope - don't shoot, ET - I think I'd call for a Albigsenian-style Crusade against Unitarians. They just sit around looking all innocent and harmless, with their obese women pastors and "blessed bes"; if that's not grounds for a good auto-da-fe or three, well, I'm not Pope John al-Mansur the Victorious.

Sorry, got a little off track there. Anyhow, strategies... mine is twofold. If you analyze the numbers, there are two to four players at each position that seriously outperform their peers. It's more important to get as many of these overperformers as possible, which trumps the position concept BT mentioned. So, I took Ahman Green, (#3 RB) with my first pick, then grabbed Daunte Culpepper (#2 QB) with my second even though a number of very good RB and WR were available, because none of the RB and WR left were overperformers. I drafted Mike Vanderjagt (#1 kicker) a little early as well.

The other part might well be called the Schadenfreude strategy, (just to continue a theme), as I will not only be enjoying, but celebrating the pain of others when Marshall Faulk and Stephen Davis go down with injuries. Why? Because I picked up Stephen Jackson and DeShaun Foster late in the draft, both of whom are reasonably likely to see serious playing time this season.

As for your sleepers, I very much like Chris Brown and am very annoyed with my brother for snagging him first. Thomas Jones, it's hard to say. The Bears will be better, of course, if only because it's hard to gain yards or points with Mr. INT always turning the ball over at the first opportunity. I like David Carr, but don't see him breaking out and I think Harrington will disappoint. Yes, he's got weapons but I don't think he's got what it takes to get it to them. Of course, I could be bitter about picking him up as a third QB instead of Bulger last year and essentially handing the title to the Wheeler Dealer. I debated that one for ten minutes, going back and forth and back and forth, and I still rue the day.

I am optimistic about Carson Palmer, which is why he's backing up Daunte. Kitna was more than solid last year, and one hopes that Cincy knows what it's doing in promoting Palmer over him. And I need him to perform even if he never starts a game for me, since Chad Johnson is my #1 receiver. That darned White Buffalo snatched Randy Moss right from under my nose; I was forced to make do with CJ and Marcus Robinson. I did get McCardell late, for a nice value pick if he gets his contract worked out soon, and Jerry Porter could work out very well indeed now that Brown is gone if Gannon comes back to form.

The best thing about our league this year is that last year's champion and the most serious player couldn't get online until the third round. So much for months of pre-planning! He got stuck with the most fragile backfield in the history of fantasy football, Marshall Faulk and Fred Taylor. It couldn't happen to a nicer guy... heh heh heh.

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Licking the jackboots

Michelle love the FBI long time:

Oh, give me a break. Getting shocked with cattle prods for practicing one's faith is the "stuff of totalitarian regimes." Getting locked up in an iron maiden for losing a soccer match is the "stuff of totalitarian regimes." Answering a few questions about possible domestic terrorism is the stuff of responsible citizenship....

Some of those who have been questioned by the FBI say they were "harassed" and scared by armed agents who visited their homes. Boo hoo. What do they want the agents to do? Would showing up in clown suits with squirt guns in their holsters make them feel less frightened? These are serious men and women doing serious jobs in serious times. Grow up.

Is shooting an unarmed woman in the head the stuff of totalitarian regimes? I'm just looking for clarification here. And did she actually say "grow up"? I know some lefties have made the comparison, but I tell you the truth, Michelle Malkin isn't fit to replace the color cartridge in Ann Coulter's inkjet. Be responsible, comrade, and answer the questions. Er, that is to say, citizen. Interesting to see how quickly the Federal focus has insensibly shifted from foreign terrorists to suspected domestic troublemakers... never forget that in the government's eyes, we are all potential terrorists and those who are committed to freedom are considered more potential than most.

Anyone who's had an encounter with the FBI, the DEA, the ATF or the IRS and the way they throw their thuggish weight around knows that Michelle has no idea what she's talking about here. Who wants to further her education in matters of federal comportment by placing an anonymous call to the DEA and informing them of the meth lab in her basement? And is it not imperative that the FBI learn of her intimate relationship with an Abu Sayyaf leader?

Smile when you answer those questions, Ms Responsible Citizen.

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Mailvox: ourobos

ihatedaShrub practices what passes for liberal logic:

if the 240+ Vietnam vets are so ardent in their opposition of Kerry why did they wait until a scant 3 1/2 months before a presidential election to release their greivances.... A couple of these vets have been very dogged and very public in their three decade long pursuit of Kerry.

So, the Swift vets are damned if they opposed John Kerry from the start, and also damned if they didn't? That's an interesting defense. Also a completely circular and implausible one. When would have been the appropriate moment for them to publicly oppose Kerry, exactly 15 years ago?

Applying Occam's Razor would suggest that they all saw him as a fraud from the start, but most of them didn't bother worrying about it. That's the normal human reaction to someone with whom you had a brief and unpleasant contact once they are no longer a factor in your life. But once the previously indifferent veterans realized that their former companion might become the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces and their president, they decided it was necessary to get involved.

Also, Kerry's defenders are significantly less credible than his attackers, as Captain Ed demonstrates in a manner most devastating. As for Rassmann, I'm curious to know if anyone is paying for his appearances with John Kerry. Is he being paid for his story and staunch support? His story is critical, as simply pulling someone from the water isn't all that heroic if you're not under fire. Heck, by that standard, the Perfect Aryan Male and the Terminator would seem to have a Bronze Star due them for pulling me out when I had a bad wipeout and injured myself waterskiing a few summers back.

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Mailvox: he cannot lie

JC lays down the word:

I know you are extremely busy so let me get right to the point.

1. I am a black guy, and we black men find Jennifer Lopez attractive not because she's opposite of what MAXIM and those type of magazines say, but because she's got nice big buttocks. That's what our culture finds attractive. You need to wise up by looking at KING, Smooth and For Black Men magazine will show plenty of women who are in Jennifer Lopez' league and women like Melyssa Ford and Gloria Glory Velez who blow Jennifer out of the water. The MAXIM, FHM, STUFF, etc. . . skinny females with large shapely breasts don't appeal to us, well most of us. (and definitely not me).

2. I agree with the over all tone of the article, and what the article says, you are by far one of the true Conservative geniuses, your knowledge is even beyond that of Rush Limbaugh.

3. You were right about Bill O' Reilly, I love his show, but more for shock and entertainment value not for any true substance.

This is, without a doubt, the email of the day. Nothing like getting directly to the point... and no, JC is not JC Watts.... I freely admit to being ignorant of much of what JC says in such succinct and inimitable fashion, so in the interest of wising up, I will be sure to ask Space Bunny for a subscription to Smooth and for Christmas. As for me, I quite like skinny females with large shapely breasts, but hey, we are libertarians here, are we not? To each his own, my brother.

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Schadenfreude

This should illustrate my point about the pleasure we derive from the suffering of others. I don't think JB is feeling this woman's pain, and if he is, let's face it, he's getting off on it. And rightly so, I say.

"Light rail? Why, yes, I do indeed support it. I mean, I'll be able to WALK from my house to the stop and ride to my little urban heart's delight. As a strong supporter of the community's diversity, I imagine I will take it downtown to experience all the city has to offer.--just make sure it doesn't affect me negatively in any way, matter or form."

That pretty much sums up the attitude of the losers who are incensed that people they don't know are parking on their streets to take the light rail.

The boondoggle isn't working out as publicized? I'm shocked.

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Mailvox: Maybe on Planet Teletubby

Rhone writes:

FACTS, not personal attacks, should be the basis for any 'argument'.This is why i objected to Coulter [at the risk of offending Vox regarding one of his personal icons] because she wastes so much time on them.... Pointing out shortcomings in arguments, or going completely overboard like Mogambo Guru did today is one thing: personal attacks for personal attacks sake turns thinking people off.

Right, that's why Ann Coulter is the most popular, best-known political commentator in the country. That's why polemicists like Al Franken, who don't harbor a single original thought and whose works consist of nothing but ad hominem insults and pointing out trivial objections, are best-selling authors. This is what I consider to be the Coulter Myth, which is that Ann would be "more effective" if only she wouldn't [fill-in-the blank]. And of course, if Ann had been dumb enough to take the advice, no one would ever have heard of her. I will grant you, however, that the unrelenting nature of the single-minded attacks on the same targets can get just a smidgeon tiresome from time to time.

Facts should be the basis for any argument. I try to use them as a basis for mine whenever they are available, with logic as a strong alternative. Ironically, Rhone is stating this in defense of O'Reilly, whose argument can be accurately summed up as the notion that it is the facts that should be off limits in any discussion of Kerry's military record.

Furthermore, the facts are that people love personal attacks, people love insults, people love cruelty and watching the suffering of others. All humor, it is said, is based on pain. Why do you think women indulge in the emotional pornography of Oprah and Jerry Springer? Why do you think men bet on everything from crickets to pit bulls to human beings tearing each other apart? We love blood sports, intellectual and physical. So much so that the concept of inhuman as the word is commonly used is inherently oxymoronic.

I also reject Rhone's theory that the purpose of attacking people is to demonstrate my intelligence. I daresay that those esoteric columns that cause a good part of my readership to give up halfway through do a much better job of that, not that it's the point in either case. The purpose of attacking people is to destroy the credibility of those who repeatedly make false arguments and ludicrous assertions. Some commentators deserve credibility, many, in my opinion, don't. As to my own credibility, I have no problem leaving that for others to decide.

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Brave Sir Bill splits the difference

Bill O'Reilly proves that he's not only a coward, but synaptically-challenged to boot:

What should we on the sidelines make of all this? Well, it's a judgment call. It is absolutely wrong for Americans to condemn Kerry's war record because he demonstrated provable valor. However, those who distrust him do deserve to be heard, although facts, not emotion, should be demanded.

I think the Swift boat political advertisement calling Kerry a charlatan is in poor taste, and if this kind of thing continues, it might well backfire on the Kerry haters. Most Americans are fair-minded, and bitter personal attacks do not go down well with folks who are not driven by partisanship.

So, it is wrong to condemn Kerry's war record... how could it possibly be wrong to condemn something that shows every indication of being largely fictional? Kerry is a proven liar, he has a few sycophants supporting his story versus hundreds who dispute it - including some veterans that Kerry was using as part of his campaign until very recently - and if he's the officer who wrote himself up for some of those awards, as has been alleged, then the war record should not only be condemned, but corrected as Kerry is made the national laughingstock that he so richly deserves to be.

And as for Mr. O'Reilly, we are once more inspired to burst into song:

Bravely Bold Sir William did pucker up his lips
He was not at all afraid to bend over at the hips
He was not in the least bit scared to kiss John Kerry's ass
Brave, brave brave Sir Bill won the Brownnoser First Class.

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Best blogs nomination

The Washington Post is running a little competition. I won't be nominating any, since registration is required and you probably know that I am little inclined to voluntarily submit to data-mining. But for those of you less registration-averse, you can submit nominations here.

Notice, by the way, that the link is under a marketing directory. In other words, don't use your real email address.

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Slashdot on Stross

You have to read any discussion that starts off with a mention of a Matrioshka Brain in the header. The man has a gift, a gift, I tell you!

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Elliott Waves and the Prechter interview

Elliott Wave theory states that financial markets move in identifiable patterns, driven by waves of cumulative human emotion. It is utilized in both market analysis and socionomics, a new analytical concept conceived by Bob Prechter, which suggests that a) if the patterns are identifiable and somewhat predictable, and b) if the markets can be used as a measure for the mass social mood, that the markets can be used to broadly predict the probabilities of general future events.

The correlation of skirt length and stock market performance is well-known. Women's skirts tend to be short when the market is doing well, and long when it is doing poorly. But there is also a large degree of historical correlation between bear markets and war and a host of other social ills, even disease; whereas explanative causality tends to say that the market fell because bad thing X happened, socionomics turns this causality on its head and states that because the social mood is deteriorating, the market fell and bad thing X happened. In other words, there is no causal link between X and the market, they are occurring in tandem. This latter assertion is largely supported by historical research, as even the movement of oil prices and interest rates can't be demonstrated to affect the markets in a reliable manner.

As for the Elliott Waves themselves, the theory states that mass human emotion, and therefore trends, move in five-wave motions, with odd-numbered waves moving with the trend and even-numbered waves running countertrend. Countertrend movements tend to have three-wave patterns, usually noted as A-B-C, where A and C are trend and B countertrend.

These waves are thought to operate at all levels. The Primary waves span years, while the minute waves span only hours. To put this in more familiar terms, the market movement that is now known as the dot com bubble of 2000 is identified as a bullish Primary Wave 5, while the bear market decline from 2000 to Oct 2002 is identified as a trend shift into Primary Wave 1. The Iraqi war rally from March 2003 to early 2004 is seen as Primary Wave 2. Prechter and the theorists at Elliott Wave International now assert that we are in the first leg of Primary Wave 3, which will take the markets down for the next year or two.

Q: The Nasdaq-100 fell 83 percent in the Primary Wave 1 bear. It has dropped 19.5 percent since the end of the Wave 2 bull in January. How far do you expect the Wave 3 bear to extend downward?

A: Sometimes first waves can be extended. That may be the case here. Wave 3 will never be the shortest, so you're certainly talking somewhere in the 60 percent range minimum, assuming a mild third wave. Otherwise, 80 percent is possible.

Q: The Dow has held up pretty well compared to the SPX and the NDX. Do you expect that to continue?

A: No, definitely not. The blue chips usually give way last in a bear market. A classic example is the first half of the 1970s. The overall decline started in 1966 but the blue chips held up and even made a new high in January 1973. Then, in two short years, they dropped 45%. The Dow Industrials will eventually catch up to the S&P 500, but not the Nasdaq. The Nasdaq is in a class by itself.

Q: What are the implications for the housing market? It seems to have shaken off Wave 1 rather nicely.

A: Yes, and that's also typical. Pete Kendall studied the coincidence of real estate and stock market tops going back 200 years and found that there tended to be a lag, typically about two years between the two peaks. This lag has now been four years, which fits our thesis that the top is of larger degree than anything we've seen in the past 200 years. What we're seeing is how people give up on one [investment class] and say the other will save us.

Q: I understand your currency analyst did rather well in a competition recently.

A: Yes, Peter Rehmer. He won a currency competition. Reuters, I think it was. You can read more about it at Elliott Wave International.

Q: Some people believe that diversifying into foreign markets will protect them. Do you think that's a viable strategy?

A: No. It's a very bad idea. One of the things I discussed in “Conquer the Crash” is what a burden foreign diverification can be when it's time to get out of your positions. All equity markets will suffer, but North America and Europe will get hit most severely.

Q: What do you think of bear funds such as RYVNX and BEARX? They did pretty well from 2000 to 2002. Would you expect them to do well in 2005 and 2006?

A: Definitely. I think for the average investor, those are excellent ways to make money in the bear market. You avoid the time decay of options as well as the open-ended risk of being short an individual stock.

Q: Mainstream commentators often mention the election cycle as a means of assuring that the markets will go up. That hasn't played out too well this year, do you expect a significant move upwards into November?

A: Quite the opposite. I'm looking for a down into the election, probably a downward acceleration into the election.

Q: Is it possible that the market tanking will actually support the dollar, as foreigners want to get out of equities but will be reluctant to change out their currency holdings?

A: I'm not sure I agree with the logic of that, but I certainly think it's probable that as the markets go down, the dollar will strengthen. I think we are about to enter a deflation of historic magnitude which equates to a contraction in the overall supply of dollar-denominated credit. What do you do when you have to pay off your credit cards or can't make your mortgage? Right, you sell whatever investments you've got. As people have to pay off their debts, they'll be selling everything.

Q: What's to keep the Fed from just inflating? They don't need to print it anymore, they can just stick a billion dollars in everyone's bank account?

A: Whose bank account? Yours? Mine? And what do bond holders do the second they catch wind of that? Right, they sell. That would destroy the credit markets faster than anything. The Fed can't print faster than people can sell.

Q: What are some of the more unexpected socionomics trends that you expect to reveal themselves as Wave 3 plays out?

A: A lot of them have already begun. We told people several years ago that there would be religious conflicts and foreign attacks on US soil in At the Crest of the Tidal Wave. That's old news now, but it wasn't then. As for things that haven't happened yet, two things I expect to see are secession movements and labor strikes.

Q: FDR seized the nation's private gold in 1933. Do you expect similar behavior from the federal government by the time Wave 5 of (3) hits bottom?

A: Let me answer that in a more general way. Do you remember how you felt on Sep. 11, 2001? That was a level of fear that you felt on a first wave. Third waves and fifth waves bring about higher levels of fear. We will feel less secure in 3 and 5 than we did in 1.

Q: How are you attempting to improve the art/science of assigning wavecounts and making socionomic predictions?

A: The biggest step towards increasing our accuracy is the work I did for “Beautiful Pictures”. Anectodally, we've always seen more Fibonacci relationships than you would expect by chance, both by time and price. But I decided to give it a much deeper investigation, and the most interesting thing about it is that Fibonacci relationships appear in places that require some work to discern. Most people try to take the easy road and apply them to retracements, but that only tends to work within corrections. Still, there are other places that they do work unexpectedly well. Even in “The Elliott Wave Principle”, chapter 4, we steered people in the right direction, but here I think I've demonstrated it.

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Gutting the Kerry campaign

Instapundit notes that the media wall defending Jean-Francois' bizarre alternate history from public view is cracking:

Kerry himself bestowed immense credibility on his "Band of Brothers" when he used a picture of some of them in his campaign ad titled "Lifetime." Essentially, Kerry made Vietnam, and these men, the centerpiece of his campaign. Of course, that was when he thought they'd support his candidacy. No matter that he'd never bothered to ask their permission to use them to promote his political career.

Now, however, the Kerry campaign is on a search-and-destroy mission to attack the credibility of these same men -- calling them liars, all 60 of them, and saying they didn't serve in the military with him. Really? Then why'd Kerry use their pictures in his ad campaign?

These are the same men who Kerry hailed as his "Band of Brothers," who he implied knew him well and could vouch for him as a wonderful soldier and man. These men, who Kerry inferred that we, the American people, could trust to tell us that he would make a great president, are suddenly liars. And why? Because they aren't saying what Kerry wants them to say. Because they aren't puppets. Because they're insisting on speaking the truth, a concept with which Kerry obviously isn't familiar.

Could this attack on their credibility be related to the fact that they've announced that he's unfit to serve as president? Looks to me like he wrote the wrong names down in the reference column of his resume.

I don't think it will be necessary for the neocon Busheviks (love that word, EN) to cancel the election. I'm beginning to suspect that Kerry will be forced to step aside, as 25 years worth of well-documented and self-serving lies are going to finish him. Bill Clinton has the charm to get away with lying. Jesse Jackson has the complete lack of shame to get away with lying. An arrogant and eminently unlikeable jerk like Kerry not only doesn't have what it takes to get away with lying, but is going to have people tearing into him like starved wolves piling on a hamstrung moose - and that's just the Democrats!

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Discuss amongst yourselves

As you like....

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On the radio

I'm sorry about the bad stream link yesterday; according to Space Bunny, it didn't work and you had to go directly to the Patriot 1280 site in order to find the correct one. The link posted was the one I was given and I simply passed it along without verifying it.

The show went well and St. Paul even said that he thought it was the best one we'd done yet as there were definitely some differing opinions being discussed this time around. I think I made some coherent points - that or they were simply being polite and pretending to concede that there are genuine threats within as without - and it's always good to have the chance to chat with genuinely intelligent and informed individuals. Time flies when you're having fun, though, and we didn't even manage to get to our second topic despite having an hour to do so. So, the outraged suffragettes will just have to wait to get their knickers in a twist.

As it stands, I'll be visiting the Northern Alliance again in September, if not sooner, and hopefully I'll have the correct link for the live streaming next time.

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That devious little minx

Space Bunny flawlessly put one over on me today. We went to church this morning, as we generally do, and I had no idea anything was going on behind those deceptively guileless blue eyes. After the service was over and we walked out, she told me that the pastor had told her that he needed to see me about something. I went back in and the pastor explained that he wanted me to meet someone.

He led me over to a tall blond man who was standing with his back towards me, and my jaw just about hit the floor when the man turned around, as the Perfect Aryan Male, seeking refuge from the hurricane, had flown in from out of town for an unexpected visit. Space Bunny had arranged the whole surprise of course, and although I'd noticed she'd disappeared for a while during the service, I hadn't really thought anything of it. It turns out that she'd run out to pick up our friend, who arrived at the airport this morning.

So, the lesson for today is: watch out for the pretty blonde ones. Notice how they always laugh at the dumb blonde jokes? The truth is that they're not laughing at the jokes, they're laughing at you, because you're buying into the picture they're painting for you.

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No contributions, just cash

I made the mistake of turning on Fox News for a few minutes and heard the hostess saying that the Red Cross would prefer that people not donate supplies, just cash, and that donating supplies would be "causing a problem". What kind of scam are they running there? Based on some of the things I've heard of how the Red Cross abuses those it purports to help, I'm wondering if the organization has outlived its usefulness.

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Suspicions aroused

Mr. McGreevey was introduced to Mr. Cipel at a reception during a trip to Israel in 2000 when he was running for governor. The married American politician and the young Israeli poet were introduced at a wine-and-cheese reception and hit it off immediately.

Soon, Mr. McGreevey paved the way for Mr. Cipel to come to the United States. Six months later, Mr. Cipel was working on Mr. McGreevey's campaign, having obtained a visa in which he listed Mr. McGreevey and Mr. Kushner as sponsors on his visa application and then taking up residence in an apartment less than a mile from Mr. McGreevey. Working first in a $30,000-a-year public relations job arranged by Mr. Kushner, Mr. Cipel was named to head the state Office of Homeland Security in February 2002.

Mr. McGreevey said he did not think a background check was necessary for Mr. Cipel, who also had worked as a public relations officer in the Israeli Consulate in New York and achieved the rank of lieutenant in the Israeli Navy.

Emphasis mine. Worked in a consulate, just happened to hit it off with a secretly homosexual politician.... I wouldn't be surprised if we eventually learn that Cipel is an Israeli spy.

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There will be more in 2004

From the Washington Times:

Who are the dormant voters? Democrats are looking to Hispanics, unmarried women or people ages 18 to 25, while Republican strategists note that 4 million evangelical Christians — reliable Republican voters — did not vote in the presidential election in 2000.

Those 4 million evangelical Christians who didn't like Bush enough to vote for him have probably doubled thanks to his presidency. I imagine more than a few of them will be voting Constitution Party. I was one of the non-voters in the last go-round, I'll be voting Libertarian this time and I won't be the only one.

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Annoying non-sports writers

Is there anything more annoying that sportswriters who won't stick to sports? Sports Illustrated has long been populated by squishy left-liberals, but old-timers like Dr. Z and Peter King usually keep their politics to themselves. But the new generation, all feelings and no brain, can't resist sharing their horror when Terrell Owens essentially calls Jeff Garcia a fag, in one case because his Daddy left his Mommy for another man. Then another new SI-nik idiotically gives "props" to the first guy for condemning Owens' "Neolithic comments" while simultaneously defending Carlos Delgado's decision to make a point of not singing God Bless America, apparently during the seventh-inning stretch. (They do that? Why? And who knew?)

When another sportswriter points out that the fans booing Delgado have the same right to get on his case that Delgado has to make his little protest, the loser considers this an "overly generous" interpretation of the First Amendment. So it's good for Delgado to stand up for his beliefs, but bad for Owens to do so? And I can't help but notice that Owens' belief in the undesirability of homosexuality is not only Neolithic, but Victorian, Edwardian, medieval, feudal, Renaissance, Enlightenment, 18th Century, 19th Century, 20th Century, Stone Age, Iron Age, Industrial Age and Information Age, spanning every time and culture with the exception of the media elite during our own little corner of the early 21st century and a few creaky historical societies nearing the final stages of collapse.

Gentlemen, for the love of the NFL, please stick to sports. You are embarrassing yourselves to the point that if it weren't for the old school, I wouldn't even bother reading.

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The darkness spawns more evil

RM learns not to put his trust in Microsoft:

I thought you might be interested to hear my little incident with Microsoft's new SP2 for Windows XP...

SP2 seemed to be working fine for the last 2 days since I installed it on my home computer running Windows XP Professional . Then came Friday the 13th. I started up my computer after getting home from being out, and Windows froze on startup, apparently while loading the latest edition of Zone Alarm. (Remember now. I am an IT Technician. I keep a lean, mean computer free of viruses, spyware, and the like.) This was the first time that Windows XP has ever frozen on my home computer to the point where I had to shut down with the power button.

Upon restart, the new Windows Firewall came up with a warning telling me that Messenger was trying to access the Internet and asked if I wanted to give it permission. Thinking this was odd, considering that I had the Messenger service disabled and had opted to turn the Windows Firewall off since I am running Zone Alarm, I went ahead and clicked yes. Once everything loaded, I checked the Services under Administrative Tools in the Control Panel too see Messenger's status, thinking that Microsoft must have turned these services back on. Lo and behold! Messenger was disabled. I then checked on the status of the Windows Firewall, and it said that it was turned off!! #$*@^(#!!!!!

Microsoft said that they spent $1 billion on SP2!!! What the hell is this? Some big prank that they are playing on the public and the business communities? Is this sheer incompetence, or has Microsoft totally lied to the public and "upgraded" XP into some Big Brother tool that runs processes despite the fact that the user completely disables them as services? If things continue in this direction, I can expect to be a Linux expert in about 4 years.

Never trust anyone who always insist that they know what's best for you. The main impetus for my switch to Linux was an early version of Microsoft Messenger, which kept popping up messages giving me the option to (a) upgrade now, or (b) upgrade later. There was no option for (c) shut the hell up and leave me alone. I saw the writing on the wall, and now I barely use any Microsoft product at all. I'm forced to run a dual-boot system just to run our new software - yes, of course we'll be porting it to Linux in the future - and to sync my Alphasmart Dana, but that's about it.

You can always count on Microsoft to screw things up. Always. Big Chilly and I once made over a million dollars precisely because we knew that. We were developing a program for a very large technology company, but as small and insignificant fish, we were the last and least-important backup for a diamond-hard delivery date on a major project. It was the sort where if you miss by an hour, you're out. All of our competitors were banking on Microsoft's release of a certain toolkit, but when Big Chilly and I discussed whether we should trust their cross-my-heart-thrice promised delivery date or make use of an older, less flashy but still-usable DOS toolkit, this was the entirety of our high level technical discussion:

BC: "The Windows stuff is much better, but waiting for them would make the timeline so tight it worries me. I'm thinking it's safer to go with DOS. What do you think?"
Vox: "When has Microsoft ever not been full of shit on their dates?"
BC: "Never... okay, it's definitely DOS.

Six months later, Microsoft still hadn't delivered, all of our competitors missed and we got the big check. Know who to trust, and more importantly, know who not to trust. I have a largely unused partition of XP Pro sitting on my new MTech machine - review to come shortly - and I never considered upgrading to SP2 for a second. I mean, it literally never even crossed my mind. Live free or else! Ride the tank. Be the Penguin.

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Media moronics

Powerline sums up Chris Matthews' questioning of a Swift boat vet:

Matthews' main arguments were that the Navy gave Kerry medals, the people on his boat backed Kerry, and Kerry showed more courage than most. The first argument was not responsive to O'Neill's central thesis that Kerry obtained the medals fraudulently by making false claims. The second argument was irrelevant with respect to those medals awarded to Kerry based on events that did not occur on his swift boat. The third argument was irrelevant to the central issue of Kerry's credibility, a point that Matthews willingfully refused to grasp. Matthews seemed to become particularly upset when, in response to his browbeating style questions, O'Neill calmly conceded that Kerry had shown some courage in shooting "the Viet Cong kid in the back," but not enough to deserve a medal. At that point, Matthews resorted to accusing O'Neill of being a Republican. But he couldn't even make that stick. In response to questions about his past voting, O'Neill said he voted for Perot in 1992 and 1996 and Gore in 2000, and supported a Democrat for mayor of Houston, Texas, his hometown.

How stupid do you have to be to make an assumption about someone with whom you are going to be arguing on national television when it's a matter of asking a simple question before taking the risk of making an ass of yourself. One of the reasons that the media is so bad is that people continue to watch, follow and believe them even after they've repeatedly demonstrated that they can't be trusted in any way, shape or form. This summation of Hardball also summarizes why I don't watch the mainstream news anymore, as it simply has no credibility with me.

The bulldozer style of debate is so difficult to defend against; I had it ground into my brain from years of living with two devil's advocates, Big Chilly and the White Buffalo. Seriously, you couldn't say that the sky is blue without finding yourself launched into a discussion of light, color, perception and ancient linguistics. As a result, I will seldom open my mouth to express an opinion on a subject without having at least a few solid supporting facts or intellectual references at my immediate recall. Assumptions and tangential hypotheses only get you in trouble. This doesn't mean you'll always be right, of course, as there may be facts of which you are unaware or complications you cannot unravel, but you'll seldom make a fool out of yourself and your case will always be perceived as reasonable and defensible, even if other's privately consider it to be outrageous.

I think at this point, I can safely say that Kerry is the worst candidate I've seen in my lifetime. The real race now is between John Kerry and the stock market, and the fate of the president's reelection will rest upon whether Kerry or the social mood self-destruct faster.

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I just love random geekery

Star Wars, in ASCII.

Freaks.

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Badnarik on open borders

AFP: The unspoken issues of the 2004 presidential elections are the antiquated and useless policies of the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service. Most Americans believe both major political parties are pandering for future Hispanic votes while avoiding the politically sensitive issues of immigration. If homeland security and the threat of foreign terrorists are such a major concern, why can't we control immigration on the Mexican-U.S. border?

Badnarik: "Let's be realistic: The U.S. has more than 95,000 miles of border and coastline, and the current immigration regime encourages people to slip through without the formalities. With millions of immigrants dodging our Border Patrol every year, it's time to say 'enough - this isn't working.'

"My goal is to encourage legitimate immigration - people coming to the United States to live free and work hard - while defending the nation against enemies who come here to harm it and parasites who come here to live on government largesse.

"I advocate open immigration for individuals who are willing to enter at a Customs and Immigration station and submit to a quick background check to ensure that they aren't criminals or terrorists. And except for extreme cases such as Cuban and Haitian boat refugees who don't have much control over where they land, I advocate treating people who cross the borders elsewhere as what they are: invaders.

"A more open immigration regime, coupled with the elimination of welfare incentives, would greatly reduce the resources needed to provide real border security. And the proper agency for that security is the armed forces - once we've brought them home from Japan, Korea, Germany, Iraq, Afghanistan ..."

Interesting. The Libertarian Party presidential candidate is for harsher border control than either the Republican or the Democratic candidate, neither of whom dare to mention the issue, still less do anything about it. Badnarik's position is certainly not what most people imagine when they hear that libertarians support open borders.

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Northern Alliance tomorrow

In case you're interested, I'll be on with Northern Alliance crew again on the Patriot 1280 at 2 PM Central this Saturday. The good news is that if you're so inclined, you can listen now to the audio stream at:
http://mainstreamnetwork.com/listen/?station=taxpayersleague. We may throw down on Newt as per the previous post, but we'll probably spend a good bit of time talking about the gender gap and why it exists in politics as well.

If you enjoy it, don't hesitate to send the Fraters gang a thank-you note.

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Some Republicans ARE Nazis

From the Fraters Libertas:

At one point the issue of circumscribed civil liberties came up and Gingrich's response was that it had to be a balancing act. He rhetorically posed the question, if there were reliable information that a terrorist nuclear strike on Washington DC was scheduled for inauguration day next January, would he favor the temporary retraction of all civil liberties in the country. Given the threat to the survival of the US government and the loss of over a million people, his answer was "unquestionably, yes".

Since Gingrich believes the war on method will last until 2070, this definition of "temporary" is apparently a Clintonesque one meaning "longer than you will likely live." In other words, once gone, they're gone forever. I would rather lose a city or three than sacrifice "all civil liberties" and live in a military dictatorship - I thought the whole point of being Americans was that we were willing to make sacrifices for freedom, not of it. Isn't sacrificing the nation's freedom in order to save the nation tantamount to burning the village in order to save it? What are we hoping to save? A nation of frightened serfs slavishly grateful to their feudal protectors? Bah - what are sheep if not for slaughter?

As for saving the government, this country would be much better off if Congress and the White House both disappeared in a big bang. The scene in Independence Day, you may recall, was greeted with cheers across the country. We'd be faced with governing ourselves for a change - oh, the horror! And where is the limit drawn? We now know that a million lives justifies throwing out the Constitution in Gingrich's opinion, (we'll skip over the fact that this begs the question of whether it would do any good at all), where, precisely, does he draw the line. Do we throw out our supposedly unalienable rights and call in Marius to save us if 100,000 are at risk? 1,000? Ten? What if one little girl in New York City has a tummy ache, should we declare martial law then?

The rampant idiocy of this is the notion that embracing serfdom will protect us from anything. It won't. I absolutely guarantee that, and I assure you that if we go down this path, the most that Gingrich and his poisonous ilk will ever be able to say is to make a baseless assertion that whatever ends up happening could have been worse. Even now, the central goverment is ENSURING that the situation is more dangerous than it need be - you don't think NWA would ban Arabs in a heartbeat and advertise that fact if the Feds would let them? - and even if Gingrich is correct about the threats he cites, the centralized autocracy he advocates will cripple the economy and stifle individual initiative as it always does, making any future war harder to win, not easier. History is littered with centralized military dictatorships that have lost wars, whereas decentralized free nations are usually victorious. And no government, once having expanded its reach, can be expected to voluntarily give up the new powers it has claimed for itself.

We already knew the Democratic leadership is treasonous, but with their recent words and actions, the Republican leadership seems hell-bent on proving that they, too, are traitors to the republic.

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More strange synchronicities

Perhaps this is the apocalypse of which Dark Window is the harbinger. I've been tracking the decline of the market during what appears to be beginning of Primary Wave 3, and interestingly enough, as of the close yesterday, the percentage of the S&P 500 decline over the percentage of trading days/640 (the length of Primary Wave 1) came to a perfect 1. Seriously, the decline from 1163.89 in the 110 trading days since March 5, 2004 was 17.19 percent at yesterday's close of 1063.23. 110/640 also equals 17.19 percent.

I'd say that's about as close to being on schedule as you can get. Coincidence? As Big Chilly says, there are no coincidences.

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Mailvox: the Dark Secret

A Vox nemesis expresses a desire:

If we keep saying such nice things about each other, people are going to start talking. I wouldn't be surprised if we're already being compared to Carville and Matalin. Uh...you can be Carville.

Look, Pete, if you want to slip on Victoria's Secret because it makes you feel pretty, no one's stopping you, least of all me. I fully support your right to wear women's clothing and call yourself Mary. I'm a libertarian, after all.

Oh, don't be embarrassed, here, take this Cuddle certificate and you'll be feeling more secure about your new identity in no time. Sure, I think the sheer pink chiffon would go over great with the Cuddlers. Just remember Rule Number 7!

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Mekong moronics

From Instapundit:

The Kerry campaign responded, initially, that Mr Kerry had always said he was "near" Cambodia. Then a campaign aide said Mr Kerry had been in the Mekong Delta "between" Vietnam and next-door Cambodia - a geographical zone not found on maps, which show the Mekong river running from Cambodia to Vietnam.

Michael Meehan, a Kerry campaign adviser, told ABC Television: "The Mekong Delta consists of the border between Cambodia and Vietnam, so on Christmas Eve in 1968, he was in fact on patrol . . . in the Mekong Delta between Cambodia and Vietnam. He was ambushed, they fired back, he was fired upon from both sides, from the Cambodian side of the border and the Vietnam side during that day in 1968."

This is like saying that because the Mississippi River runs south from Minnesota, you can say that you're in Mississippi when you cross the river to go to a Vikings game at the Hump. I know Kerry voters, excepting the corrupt elite hoping to ride the gravy train, are generally low-IQ, but this defense doesn't even rise to the level of pathetic.

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We apologize for the delay

We were a little busy playing Doctor Kervorkian on the market, among other things. Got to make hay while the sun is shining, don't you know. Can't BELIEVE we forgot to nail CSCO yesterday. Bloody bloody bloody bloody heck! Oh well, can't win them all.

I love the smell of a 200 percent short in the morning. And the Vorpal Blade went snicker-snack....

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Expecting unreason

One of the most difficult myths to shake in dealing with people is the idea that people are rational. No matter how many times we see people behaving in a manner that is obviously contrary to their self-interest, we find it difficult to imagine that anyone would knowingly do so. And yet, they do, again and again.

I'm working on a project right now, and I decided that from the start, I wouldn't worry about whether it made sense to anyone. I tried to do the same thing six years ago and was tremendously frustrated when people simply would not see or accept the obvious. Now that I've learned to expect irrational behavior, I've taken precisely the identical product but have designed an approach to appeal to the customer's instincts instead of his reason.

Needless to say, the level of interest is now off the charts. I was badly misled by my father, I think, who was always telling me that I needed to be less contemptous of people. In day-to-day relations, I now accept that is true, but it is precisely the opposite in business. In business, no matter how low your opinion of the average individual, you will usually be surprised by the blind greed, incompetence, inability to project the future and total incapacity for logical thinking with which you must deal.

Think about it for a second. If people were rational creatures, how many would purchase Microsoft Office, considering the alternative? And yet Microsoft Office XP Pro ranks #390 on Amazon. It retails for $499, but you can find copies of it for about $140. Its functional equivalent, OpenOffice, which is 95 percent equivalent to Office - in the sense that only 5 percent of Office users need features that are not in OpenOffice - is infinitely cheaper. Seriously, it's free, you only have to go to openoffice.org and download it. If you install Linux, you don't even have to do that.

And yet every single person that I've ever spoken with about this specific issue, who did not need any of those Office-specific features, has gone out and bought MS Office anyhow. This isn't reason, this is herd mentality. So, the trick to convincing an individual of something is to make sure that the solution you are offering him lies in the direction that his herd mentality is already driving him. This isn't a new concept, but it's harder to force yourself to think this way than you'd imagine. I'm constantly wrestling with the urge to make a rational case, but in truth, logic often only gets in the way. People will almost always do what they want in the end.

Once you learn to put forth your ideas and proposals in a manner which deals with people as they are instead of how you think they should be, you'll be amazed at how much easier it is to deal with them.

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The passion of the President

President Bush said on Tuesday that abolishing the U.S. income tax system and replacing it with a national sales tax was an idea worth considering. "It's an interesting idea," Bush told an "Ask President Bush" campaign forum here. "You know, I'm not exactly sure how big the national sales tax is going to have to be, but it's the kind of interesting idea that we ought to explore seriously."

Yes, he sounds completely committed to tax reform, doesn't he? Isn't "interesting" the sort of thing you say when you think something is outrageously stupid, but don't want to say so in public? I suspect the five or six people who are still very excited about the possibility of George Bush making the abolition of the income tax the priority of his super-secret second-term agenda are going to be sadly disappointed.

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This week's sign of the Apocalypse

Dark Window sets aside the mushrooms long enough to hit it out of the park with a much-needed smackdown of the latest neoconservative insanity:

Here is the proposed Lucom Plan to End Terrorism (subject to modification):

That "subject to modification" means he'll change it a little and write another column about it next month. Here are a couple of his latest ideas:

1. All terrorists are declared criminals, subject to arrest on sight for the act of being terrorists. Due process, of course, must be observed.

Hmmmm...Something sounds fishy here...The "act" of "being." Well, anyway, as long as it's "on sight" I think we'll be okay. Too bad Annie Jacobson didn't have the Lucom Plan on her Terroristic Flight of Doom.

3. A $250,000 reward is payable by the State Department for information leading to the arrest and conviction of individual terrorists, in accordance with its reward program, to assist in preventing acts of national and international terrorism and other related criminal acts. A $1 billion reward is posted for the capture of Osama bin Laden.

That really big reward is the hallmark of the Lucom plan. It has graced every iteration I've read so far.

4. Any nation willfully and deliberately violating this United Nations resolution will be fined $5 billion for each violation. The U.N. or U.S. armed forces will enter the non-cooperating country to eliminate the terrorists and any terrorist training camps. Nuclear weapons can be used if considered necessary to save the lives of U.N. or U.S. troops, as President Truman used nuclear weapons in Japan. (This point expressly subject to modification.)

You know, on the off chance that people might actually object to having their country nuked.

This is so profoundly stupid that it practically strikes one dumb with awe at the sight of its towering idiocy. How is a terrorist defined, the same way that the FBI defined the 19 9/11 hijackers, seven of whom are still living after supposedly having crashed a 757 into the WTC? Isn't there already a plethora of fines being offered for various undesirables? Note the now-obligatory neoconservative Republican kowtowing to the UN, as Wilson advocates nuclear attack in defense of UN resolutions. And on what basis is the UN fining these nations? Who collects and receives the fines... the same entity that hands them out? Hmmm, I wonder how that will work out.

I recently wrote that if you scare a woman enough, she'll embrace death camps. Scare a crazy man and he'll embrace indiscriminate nuclear attacks. When I read this sort of lunacy, I begin to understand the global elitist's burden.

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Where angels fear to tread

I have nothing against Rebecca Hagelin, who is almost certainly a very nice woman, except for the fact that she titles her column "Heartbeat", which with its cloying suggestion of just how much she cares about life, the universe and everything makes me want to set her hair on fire. But the notion that this woman should be discussing "what constitutes cool", in any context, is as fundamentally wrong as your average liberal journalist even mentioning the word "economics".

I am, beyond any shadow of a doubt, one of ten coolest nationally syndicated columnists at this particular juncture in the space-time continuum.* This isn't saying much - just look at the Creators lineup; ye cats! - and I take no pride in this, it is simply the inevitable result of my encyclopedic knowledge of Public Enemy, post-cyberpunk fiction and techno-industrial music. And, of course, I ride the tank, which counts for something in shadowy, but significant circles. But the concept of cool morphs so quickly that I would not even think to pontificate on the matter, as the notion of paying any attention whatsoever to what is current among the latest angst-laden posings of over-fed, hormone-enslaved adolescents appalls me.

Look to Rebecca, then, all you who would be cool! Thus spake Vox.

*I haven't actually considered a top ten list of cool columnists. Maybe we should do that. I'll have to give the matter some thought. Goldberg's got to be on the list, he's got class clown all wrapped up. Coulter too, just because she'll bring the smokes. Derbyshire? Definitely.

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Hari-Kerry

If Bill Clinton is, as once said of him, an unusually good liar, John Kerry is an unusually bad one. Everything about him speaks of his being full to the rim with the rich smell of fecal matter. I've considered him to be a quasi-psychotic piece of work ever since first hearing of his "Band of Brothers" which, in its overt attempt to draw attention to itself, rang false in light of the experience I've had in close relationships with three generations of warriors.

Veterans with real experience of war, real military heroes, don't talk about it in public at the drop of a hat. Everyone with a grandfather who fought in WWII or a father who fought in Vietnam knows that it's like pulling teeth to get them to talk about it, even in private. It's only those who never served and what the front-line fighters call REMFs who boast about their bold and fearless exploits.

This is why Kerry was considered sketchy from the start by so many who otherwise mindlessly laud anyone who ever served in the military. Now that facts of his pathetic four-month service are coming out - like the patently false claims to have spent Christmas in Cambodia in 1968 that he has repeatedly and publicly made - these suspicions are being shown to have had strong foundation.

It still amazes me that the Democrats nominated this utter charlatan. Senators have a horrible Presidential track record, and Massachusetts liberals haven't exactly distinguished themselves either. The Democrats would surely have avoided this debacle if they'd only had a few people familiar with the military - besides political officers like Wes Clark - in a position to influence the decision-making back when the DNC leadership decided to trash Howard Dean in favor of Kerry. But then, I suppose it's hard to identify one specific stink when you're wallowing in sewage.

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Mailvox: channel zero

I noticed this in Joani's missive:

Some men can't stand when a woman wants to better herself, improve her education, fulfill her purposes in life other than domestic duties.

I daresay that there's not a single man on the planet who cares at all if she does this, as long as she doesn't do it after telling him that she wants bear his children and stay home and take care of them. There are few things more obnoxious than the individual who suddenly changes his or her mind after someone else has made a commitment to them based on all the available information. This holds true for both sexes.

But I marvel at the women who seem to think that education and fulfillment can only come outside the house. The former is especially ridiculous in the age of the Internet. Domestic work is easy, if time-consuming, and perhaps if a woman did not sit down in front of the television for the 4.5 hours that are the reported daily average, she'd have more than enough time to educate herself. I found it interesting that one study reported that men have 30 more minutes of free time a day than women, which, strangely enough, corresponded rather closely with the 30 minutes less daily television watching reported by the first study. (Four hours a day is still ridiculous, by the way. Go read a book or something. Learn your culture. You're blind from the facts on who ya are cos you're watching that garbage.)

Of course, this requires personal discipline, something that is in obviously short supply among men and women today, who can't even control what they put in their mouths, let alone their minds.

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Bias in your face

Rod Dreher patiently explains:

My editorial board colleague Ruben Navarrette, who is Latino, returned from the UNITY conference of minority journalists appalled by the naked partisanship his 5,000 fellow minority journalists displayed in the way they treated John Kerry, versus the way they treated President Bush. And he wrote a staff editorial about it. Here's the first sentence: "Anyone who has ever harbored suspicions that there's such a thing as a liberal media need only to have been in Washington last week to observe how thousands of minority journalists treated the two headliners to their conference: President George Bush and Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry."

What's ironic is that these idiot journalists seriously believe the President is conservative. People don't realize that most journalists aren't very smart or well-educated, and the affirmative action babies are sub the low par. They're ignorant too - I once spoke with an editor at a major newspaper, who is responsible for covering tax-related issues, and he had no idea that the state's revenue court judges were employees of the state's revenue agency despite the fact that they had been so for more than 25 years.

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Survey said

39% - (R) George Bush (183 votes)
5% - (D) John Kerry (22 votes)
39% - (L) Michael Badnarik (184 votes)
18% - (C) Michael Peroutka (86 votes)

The extremely close results would cause me to conclude that two of you were clicking on (L) and (R) in an attempt to one-up each other, except that the number of votes is about what I would expect given the traffic. So... I just don't know. Blog traffic today was a little higher than normal, but that may have simply been the excitement caused by the discussion of a cuddle party. MOOOOOOO!

Anyhow, it's nice to see that Dark Window and a few of his friends stopped by, and I'm a little surprised that Peroutka wasn't closer to Badnarik. Still, a pretty solid showing for the Constitution Party here in this little corner of the extreme right wing. Interesting, too, that George Bush has solid electoral support even if he doesn't have a lot of vocal defenders posting here on the blog.

And yet I doubt that the November elections will look anything like this, unless those Swift boat vets really manage to tattoo their version of events on the nation's consciousness.

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Why we can't possibly win in Iraq

"It started out as a joke," said Baczynski. "Now we talk about cuddling all the time. It's just been amazing."

MOOOOO!

Curiosity is a big driver for people who attend cuddle parties, and it is a better way to meet people than going to a bar, getting drunk and spending the night with someone just because of the need for some affection, she said. A cuddle party is really about communication and not therapy, say the organizers.

Before any touching begins, participants gather in a circle to hear the rules and voice any questions or concerns. The first rule is that the event is not clothing optional, pajamas must stay on and sex is not permitted. Participants team up into pairs and to ensure the boundaries of what is permissible are clear, they practice saying "no" to the question, "May I kiss you?" An introduction to cuddling ensues, first by hugging three people. People then get in a circle on their hands and knees, rub shoulders and moo like cows. After a bit of swaying, everyone falls to their side, which puts them into an easy cuddling position.

Cuddle parties are intended for people who are emotionally sound.

Emotionally sound? Sounds like that's water under the bridge, about three states up. This has to be a con. Please, tell me someone was just messing with the reporter.

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I'm just curious

POLLS CLOSED

I wish I'd done this a few months back, so we'd have some basis of comparison. Anyhow, please don't try to mess around with this by voting more than once. I think it will be interesting to see if the Republicans outnumber the two third parties or not. I don't think so, but it's also possible that the third party types are more prone to post here.

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Ursine utterances

The Truth Laid Bear isn't afraid to predict the future:

I'm going to go on record and predict that the Swift Boat Veterans kerfuffle won't just be a major negative for Kerry: it will be a campaign-killer. One thing that those of us who spend far too much time hyperanalyzing politics and world events tend to forget is that for the general public, stories like this are absorbed only as vague and general impressions.

Up until now, Kerry has gotten a pass on his Vietnam time: the general impression has been "He talks about it too much, but he was some kind of war hero back in Vietnam". Now, there's an alternate perspective: "Not only does he talk about it too much, but he's actually a liar." From the 10,000 foot view of the average voter, the Swifties don't have to prove their case in a court of law for Kerry to take damage: they just have to throw a bit of doubt onto the lily-white image he's portrayed thus far. In that, they've already succeeded.

But it's not that bad: it's actually much worse. The biggest problem for Kerry is that the Swifties' attacks confirm what we really want to believe about him anyway. He's been so damned annoying about his Vietnam record that we secretly want to think the worst of him, and now the Swifties have provided a rational basis for that gut-level irritation that Kerry inspires when he blathers on about his war record.

That's my instinct too, but then, I've thought that Kerry was toast ever since the Massachusetts Supreme Court made homogamy an issue. The inimitable strategerist Bush failed to take advantage of that, but he doesn't need to do anything about this huge hole in the prow of the Kerry campaign. Hitting a mine indeed.

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The voracious maw

Federal prosecutors in Seattle have charged 15 people involved in a marijuana smuggling operation with violations of the Patriot Act, the bill hastily passed by Congress in the wake of the 9-11 attacks to protect the US from foreign terror attacks. That's a first, at least for the Seattle office, one government lawyer told the Seattle Times.

And no, clarified Assistant US Attorney Todd Greenberg, the Canadians and Americans under arrest were not sending their proceeds to Al Qaeda. They were indicted for conspiring with a Canadian marijuana-smuggling operation to deliver $3.4 million in profits from Washington state back
to British Columbia.

Still, all 15 were charged with one count of "bulk-cash smuggling," a Patriot Act offense. For years, federal law has made it a criminal offense to take more than $10,000 out of the country without reporting it, but the Patriot Act changed that from a mere reporting violation to a felony punishable by up to five years in prison and the forfeiture of the cash in question.

And although there was no terror connection, invoking the Patriot Act was still appropriate, said Greenberg. "They're trying to get money from here to support crime somewhere else, so it's a way to crack down on that," he remarked cryptically.

That certainly didn't take long. The Patriot Act hasn't even been around for three years, and already it's being used for other purposes. A nice conflation with the equally fraudulent War on Drugs here. I note in passing that no country that bans the unreported transport of personal wealth can reasonably consider itself to be free.

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Police state USA

Ron Paul writes:

To understand the nature of our domestic response to the September 11th, 2001 attacks, we must understand the nature of government. Government naturally expands, and any crises- whether real or manufactured- serve to justify more and more government power over our lives. Bureaucrats have used the tragedy of 9-11 as an excuse to seize police powers sought for decades, such as warrantless searches, internet monitoring, and access to bank records. It should be no surprise that the recently released report of the 9-11 Commission has but one central recommendation: bigger government and more spending at home and abroad....

Every generation must resist the temptation to believe that it lives in the most dangerous time in American history. The threat of Islamic terrorism is real, but it is not the greatest danger ever faced by our nation. This is not to dismiss the threat of terrorism, but rather to put it in perspective. Those who seek to whip the nation into a frenzy of fear do a disservice to a country that expelled the British, fought two world wars, and stared down the Soviet empire.

Liberty is lost through complacency and a subservient mindset. When we accept or even welcome automobile checkpoints, random searches, mandatory identification cards, and paramilitary police in our streets, we have lost a vital part of our American heritage. America was born of protest, revolution, and mistrust of government. Subservient societies neither maintain nor deserve freedom for long.

Offering protection in exchange for power is older than prostitution. If you value security over freedom, you are a slave at heart and you deserve to be treated like one.

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Mailvox: how slow can you go?

Leo fails to grasp basic addition:

Vox, You miss the point and fall victim to faulty math! For Example, Bush has 40 votes, Kerry has 30 votes, and there are 100 votes out there that haven't been voted or counted. Assume 30 of these votes are voted for a third party candidate. The reamining votes break 50 break for Kerry, and the remaining 20 for Bush. Kerry wins by 20 votes, BECAUSE, if the 30 voted for the third party were cast for Bush he would have won!

I can't believe that some people are actually arguing that a vote for candidate Not-Kerry is a vote for Kerry after I demonstrated how it is MATHEMATICALLY IMPOSSIBLE to make this case. Leo's logic here is simply insane. Yes, if the 30 that voted for the third party were cast for Bush he would have won, but then, if the 50 that were cast for Kerry were instead cast for Bush, he would have won too. All Leo has proved here is that a vote for Bush is a vote for Bush. Brilliant.

And if we further examine the logic laid out here, not voting at all is a vote for Bush. Therefore, I recommend that all of you who were going to vote for Bush simply not vote, as you are assured that your non-participation is a vote for Bush by a Bush supporter.

The GOP holds no claim on anyone's vote. A vote for Michael Badnarik is just that, a vote for the Libertarian Party candidate. The same holds true for votes in favor of the Constitution, Republican and Democratic candidates. Anything else is just twisted and dishonest semantics. If the majority want Kerry, let them have him. They'll get what they deserve, just as those who supported Bush in 2000 already have.

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New reader blogs

tz, High King Frog and Dr. Black have all started blogs of late. Scan the Reader Blogroll to your right and check them out. If you can't figure out which one is High King Frog's, well, you don't deserve to get your passport stamped.

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Mailvox: one has one's standards

craigp wonders:

man, vox don't like RUsh either? Ever since Rush lost weight he seems to just get better and better as far as I am concerned. A metaphor for the new leaner meaner fitter conservative. Vox besides Coulter and P.J. O ROurke what conservative pundits do you like?

I like plenty of political pundits. I like Jonah Goldberg, Thomas Sowell and Rod Dreher, I like Victor Davis Hanson, John Derbyshire, Ramesh Ponnuru and Jay Nordlinger at NRO. I like Bob Novak, Mike Adams, Doug Giles, Larry Elder and Michael Massie.

If you notice, most of the above names are not TV and radio people, or at least don't see themselves that way first. TV and radio folks tend to write poorly and to think in rather superficial terms. Neal Cavuto is a nice guy, but I'd rather read the complete works of Mercedes Lacky AND Robert Jordan than one of his dreadful columns, and as for the purple pen of Brave Sir William, well, you already know what I think of that. I suspect that it's partly a matter of ego and preference for fame over knowledge, and partly that the mediums foster quick but shallow thinking. It's more important to get a zinger over than actually make an incisive point in a talking-head fest - the White Buffalo would not only rule, but absolutely DOMINATE on a Fox News show.

One thing I absolutely love about the blogs is that I will not only get called on my assertions, but that people have time to prepare their best shot. I can either respond off the top of my head or sit back and think the matter through for a while. And while I can more than hold my own in any verbal slangfest sans intellectual content, when I want to do that I hang out with tha boyz in my fantasy football league.

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Mailvox: take away his dating card

TS shares a horror story:

Very good article - more like this please! I especially like the Fred Reed quote, as I married a child support bomb who eventually exploded with no visitation, and found out the child wasn't even mine (that doesn't matter at all in most states, and not very much in all of them). Tomorrow marks three years since I've seen my children, because even though she is a child molester she is still of the superior race, I mean sex, I mean "gender". The hundred pounds of irrational anger is a bit light though, because once they have a successful child support career locked up, it usually runs more like 150, 160, 175, to 200 pounds.

Sounds like TS picked a real winner. This is the sort of story that causes men to put off proposing marriage even after they've bought the ring. Not that TS sounds especially inclined to date these days, but in the future, I would suggest that he have his sister or someone who cares about him do the selecting.

Some people can't be trusted to handle their own dating decisions, and if something like this ever happens to you, you should probably assume that you're one of them. In such cases, outsourcing is vastly preferable.

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Mailvox: why men don't watch TV anymore

BC writes:

I am a 60 year old female who enjoyed (and agreed with) your column. When I was growing up in the 50's, women were women and men were men. The feminist movement did more damage than good. Have you noticed that every single TV commercial makes the woman look smart, smug, superior, and sarcastic. Males are portrayed as dumb nitwits that are dependent on woman to make even the simplest decision. Why are men putting up with this? Where's the outrage? Women in movies and TV shows are portrayed the same way. It's sickening. Are women taking their queue from this propaganda? I have been disappointed to observe little girls as young as 5 acting the same way. Even the cartoons give little girls the stronger role and the poor helpless little boys are at their mercy.

Who said men are putting up with this? They're not, and the television industry is panicking because the all-important 18-34 segment refuses to watch anything but sports anymore. And why should they, considering the choices are between playing Doom 3 and committing mass virtual mayhem or watching supercilious actresses spouting off unwitty dialogue written by self-loathing homosexuals to mock the poor helpless male characters.

Television is a weird little universe where a man will always lose a sports competition to a woman, where a woman always gets the last word and where she will always be loved for herself no matter what an unpleasant, unbalanced lunatic she is. The bizarre problem is that a young boy reading a Conan novel generally recognizes that it is not real, but a woman watching Allie McBeal, Sex in the City or whatever shows have replaced them in the female pantheon is all too prone to not only take it seriously, but to actually identify herself with and model her behavior on one of these fictional, fantastic characters.

If you ever hear a woman saying "I am SOOO [fill in the blank with fictional TV character here]", run. I mean, it's not like women take men who attempt to act like James Bond seriously either.

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One stock I'd consider

Okay, not at this down wave, no way. But I do admire Google for their willingness to take on the Wamphyri of Wall Street and their monopoly on access to the markets.

Why Wall Street wants Google to fail.... If Google’s offering works for the company -- that is, if it raises money at a good price and at a low commission to boot -- then this IPO would legitimize an alternative to the traditional IPO that will diminish the power of Wall Street investment banks. Other companies, companies with lower profiles than Google, will have a new alternative for raising money. Wall Street doesn’t even like to think about that possibility.

If, on the other hand, Google’s IPO fails -- if not enough investors bid, or if the price is too low, or if the IPO sinks, leaving hordes of angry individual investors and the company with egg on its face -- then the auction model will go back on the shelf and Wall Street investment banking will go back to business as usual.

That’s why I don’t think you can trust anything Wall Street says about the Google IPO: The investment banking establishment has too much at stake and too many institutional conflicts of interest to make them credible on this offering.

It's the wrong time, an incredibly bad time for this. Google would have had a very successful launch if they'd done it nine months ago, now, it's probably too late. But if it fails, it won't be because the concept was faulty, only the timing. It's a pity, but then, the return of the roaring bear will do more to put Wall Street back in its place than a newfangled IPO possibly could.

Don't ever make the mistake of confusing Wall Street with capitalism. Wall Street is designed specifically to limit capitalism as per government regulations; it contradicts the activities of a genuinely free market.

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Arithmetic-retarded Republicans

"Another vote for Kerry" was one reaction to an ex-Republican writing to say that he's voting for Badnarik this November. Let's analyze this from a mathematical perspective.

Bush has zero votes. Kerry has zero votes. Badnarik has zero votes. Voter X votes for Badnarik. How many votes does Kerry have? A) one vote, B) ten votes, C) zero votes?

Let's try it using some different numbers. Bush has 39,999,999 votes. Kerry has 39,999,999 votes. Voter X votes for Badnarik. How many votes does Kerry have? A) 40,000,000, B) 39,999,999, C) Five.

Alternatively, we can look at it from an ideological perspective. Kerry favors bigger government. Bush favors bigger government. Badnarik favors smaller government. Voter X, who favors smaller government, votes for Badnarik. This is a vote for A) bigger government, or B) smaller government?

There's simply no reasonable way that you can claim a vote for a third party candidate is a vote for anyone but that third party candidate. To assume that any such votes would have gone to one of the two bifactional candidates is to make the same fallacy that the RIAA makes when people copy a CD - a willingness to copy a CD is not equivalent to a willingness to purchase a CD. If I didn't vote for Badnarik, (or Peroutka), I simply wouldn't vote. I would NEVER vote for either Bush or Kerry. If there's no one to whom you can consent, then withdrawing your consent is the only option.

If you simply want to vote for a winner, then vote for whoever is leading in the polls the day before the election. That's essentially what the Republican cheerleaders are urging others to do. But don't pretend you have any principles beyond bandwagon-jumping. And for the love of all that's good and holy, stop embarrassing yourself with your apparent inability to fathom basic addition.

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The speedy sellout

Michelle Malkin advocates Newspeak:

As for the term "concentration camps," it is very misleading. It is true that many politicians and public officials, including President Roosevelt himself, used this term to describe the relocation centers. But it wasn't until the liberation of the Nazi death camps beginning in 1945 that the phrase took on the popular meaning that it retains today--that is, places of barbaric cruelty and torture on the order of what the Jews and others suffered under Hitler. To compare American's internment and relocation centers to the Third Reich's extermination camps is to recklessly distort history and to trivialize the experience of Holocaust victims. Even the Commission acknowledged that, "the phrase 'concentration camps' summons up images and ideas which are inaccurate and unfair."

Please, the term not only isn't misleading at all, it is entirely accurate! No one has ever claimed that the US WWII-era concentration camps - camps designed to concentrate a group of individuals ill-favored by the federal government - were labor and death camps such as Auschwitz. But since Ms Malkin wants to convince us that these concentration camps were good, right and proper, it doesn't serve her purpose to call these camps by their linguistically precise and historically accurate name. It's fitting that she should be so indifferent as to history, considering her inability to learn from it.

Historically, civil rights have often yielded to security in times of crisis. During the Civil War, Abraham Lincoln suspended habeas corpus, which enabled him to detain thousands of rebels and subversives without access to judges. In defying a Supreme Court order to restore habeas corpus, Lincoln refused to let "the government itself go to pieces" for the sake of a single law.

Order out of chaos. There's a new one. Malkin is tearing down her own case here by appealing to the example of Lincoln. Malkin may still be under the illusion that she values freedom, but she is simply attempting to rationalize the female instinct of Sicherheit uber alles. This is why the Fascist Party made the women's right to vote a priority in its manifesto. Scare a woman enough, and she'll enthusiastically embrace disarming the populace, martial law and death camps.

It's always interesting to see a media whore transform into a big government whore. The camera lovers just can't seem to keep themselves from "growing", as they call it in Washington. Rush Limbaugh's done it, but it took him years to devolve from a conservative into a Republican. I don't know if anyone keeps track of these things, but Ms Malkin may now hold the speed record.

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Mailvox: where's Poirot when you need him?

RT laments:

I am very feminine. I never have any luck with guys. I wear pink a lot. I wear skirts a lot. I wear heels a lot. I never say I don't like fishing or camping, but I actually have guys say I'm "high-maintenance" and they are sure I would never go fishing or camping or something. Well, they never asked me. I don't have a problem with either. They are always going out with women who ask them out or asking out women who put out so much they could make a fortune if they charged. I am always careful never to say ANYTHING negative around a guy now ABOUT ANYTHING, especially about him. I never hardly even get asked out. And I'm definitely not ugly or fat. Definitely not. However, I am told I don't talk enough. I talk to my friends. I just don't go up to guys and ask them out. I was told by one guy I'm not confident enough to date him. Well, I never spend any time thinking about what other people think about me anymore, and I'm confident enought that I've delivered Shakespeare on stage and gotten after show compliments. Men ought to work on keeping their pants zipped and being interested in quiet, nice women. Because they're not. They're just not. They act like jackasses, like Scott Peterson.

Let's see. In the course of a single paragraph - okay, in fairness it really should be two - RT manages to expose that she's a high-maintenance women and thinks that men act like jackasses, are unfaithful and probably murderers to boot. Men may not be complex, but neither are we stupid, and we're surprisingly good at picking up on this sort of hatred bubbling under the surface.

It is true that many young men without much experience of women think that they want a confident, independent woman who doesn't need them, but these are mostly younger guys who just want to make sure a girlfriend won't interfere with playing Doom 3 for six hours a night. That sort of guy usually isn't looking for a long-term relationship, he's looking for someone to provide friendship with favors and will otherwise stay out of his life.

One thing women who don't get asked out might want to consider is to try to be more responsive. If a man looks at you, then don't immediately look away if you want him to approach you. You don't have to ask him out or run up to him and start humping his leg like a dog - although I've seen that work with a guy who's got a sense of humor - but the usual routine is this:

1. Man looks.
2. Woman looks back.
3. Man smiles.
4. Woman smiles back.

This informs the man that he has the woman's approval to approach her. Non-verbal communication is often more important than verbal communication at this stage. And whatever you do, don't pull your friends into the conversation, as men know that women use their friends as a shield against those they aren't interested in. If you start doing that, a man might easily conclude you've got no interest and that he might as well look elsewhere.

A very good friend of mine had a philosophy to go out once with everyone who asked her out. She doesn't do that anymore, now being married with child - but some of her good male friends are men that she knew from the beginning weren't terribly interesting to her from a romantic point of view, but that she took the time to get to know anyhow. She met some real losers too, but that's the risk you take, because no one can always tell the difference between a winner and a loser at first glance.

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Discuss amongst yourselves

This is for the early birds to hop in and start making comments, as per Res's request.

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And you worry about Jean-Francois

When 13 Democratic members of the U.S. Congress asked United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan to send election monitors to the U.S. this fall, the move outraged many Republicans and other proponents of national sovereignty.

When those same 13 Democratic members of Congress were turned down by Annan, they took their request to Secretary of State Colin Powell – again to the shock of many Republicans and those who warn about foreign entanglements.

Yesterday, those 13 Democratic House members got their surprising answer from the State Department – the administration will indeed invite foreign election monitors to observe the U.S. elections in November.

It always amazes me how those who warn about how awful John Kerry might be pay no attention to how awful George Bush actually is. He is every bit the traitorous sell-out of national sovereignty that Bill Clinton was. The fact that he can't speak without mangling his words doesn't make him a good man any more than Bill Clinton's quick wit made him a wise one.

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Kumbaya

Ladies and gentlemen, without further ado, Ms Theresa Heinz Kerry:

You cannot solve problems by throwing stones, and you cannot solve problems by telling lies, and you cannot solve problems by wishing ill to other people," she said. "The only way you solve problems is by holding hands and talking about it....

Oh sweet Moses! There are times when I think it's possible to be an adult and a Democrat. This isn't one of them.

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Beside the point

Michelle Malkin thinks she can simultaneously play and referee:

Taken in totality, rather than in selective slivers, my defense of Roosevelt’s homeland security measures remains unrefuted.

Next, please.

Malkin skips over the point that her entire thesis is utterly absurd! The totality of all the minor dangers Malkin cites doesn't come close to that posed by the British Army in the War of 1812 - when British troops actually invaded the American homeland, burned the White House, etc. and yet the Commander-in-Chief did not then feel the need to completely shred the Constitution as did FDR with his executive order to intern and relocate American citizens of Japanese descent.

There was never any serious danger to the West Coast. Even if a factory or two was sabotaged, even if a military base or two was spied upon, even if a submarine lobbed a few shells at Los Angeles, it was not going to have any effect on the war effort whatsoever, as US industrial capacity absolutely dwarfed that of Germany and Japan combined. Since Malkin apparently knows nothing about military history, she rests her case on posterior-covering reports which consist of little more than what-ifs and just-maybes. Not having read the book, I don't know if she's actually foolish enough to claim that the West Coast was under the threat of invasion, but from the sound of her defense, I don't think she was quite that detached from the history of this space-time continuum.

As for the protective aspects of the interment, if Malkin's book causes her to become insufficiently popular with enough people, shall we lock her up against her will? For her own protection of course.

With Michelle's support for the Patriot Act and now this boot-licking justification of State muscle-flexing, it seems she is as naive as she is lovely. Would-be dictators always promise protection from incipient danger, if only they can set themselves above the law. That hoary old trick was ancient when Marius was pulling it on the Conscript Fathers.

UPDATE: Here's some information on the man that Ms Malkin is defending. It's particularly interesting to hear that he bragged he had "committed enough illegal acts to be impeached and jailed for 999 years" even before he was seizing the nation's gold and forcing American citizens out of their homes.

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MarketVox: catching up

A week or two ago, I mentioned that if Wave 3 began in Feb-March, that it could be expected to run downhill until July 2006. One thing interesting about yesterday's swoon was that in addition to breaking the important supports at 1080 and 1074, the SPX actually managed to get ahead of the schedule I proposed for it.

With 16.56 percent of the estimated 640 days to the next major bottom, the SPX has fallen 17.06 percent. The NDX, on the other hand, has only fallen 18.63 percent since its top, in 21.25 percent of the time. (The NDX usually tops differently than the SPX and DOW, although they bottom together at the big turns. In this case, it came 30 trading days earlier.)

Since the market never moves in straight lines, we'll probably see a mini-rally soon, but I wouldn't start looking for a multi-day one until the NDX falls another 5 percent or so. The last two short term moves were (i) down 10.86 percent and (ii) up 3.89 percent, so 6.87 percent in five trading days would seem too little movement in too short a time to mark the end of (iii).

All of this assumes, of course, that the wave patterns are meaningful. Always take it with a grain of salt.

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You're going to get what you deserve

MEXICO CITY - The US drugs czar has admitted that Washington's anti-narcotics policy in Latin America has so far failed.

Mr John Walters, who heads the US Office of National Drug Control Policy, acknowledged that billions of dollars of investment over many years have failed to dent the flow of Latin American cocaine onto US streets, but he predicted progress would be seen soon.

It's not working, so of course, efforts will be redoubled. After almost 25 years of the War on Drugs, with nothing to show for it except hundreds of thousands of innocent people in jail and numerous American liberties destroyed, you'd think pro-drug war conservatives would consider pulling their heads out of their posteriors and wake up to how they've been helping destroy America.

"But what if we legalized drugs," they gasp in horror. "Surely the country will collapse in a maelstrom of crack whores and coke fiends!" Well, Mr. Historical Ignoramus, seeing as how society and individual rights were in better shape back when the government was less powerful, rope was made of hemp and cocaine was legal, I don't think we have a whole lot to fear, not from drugs, anyhow.

Using the power of the central state to control human behavior is always a mistake. As with the Patriot Act, the War on Drugs was designed as a weapon to be used against the American people. Don't believe me? Fine, email me your telephone number and I'll phone in an anonymous tip about the meth lab in your garage. Then you can discover firsthand just how well your Constitutional rights protect you.

Are you noticing a pattern here? We must throw out the Constitution because the Japanese are going to invade across 5500 miles of ocean! We must throw out the Constitution because Billy might smoke pot! We must throw out the Constitution because someone might send money to their bank in the Caymans! We must throw out the Constitution because someone is killing someone else in Iraq! We must throw out the Constitution because someone blew up two buildings in New York! We must throw out the Constitution because we need to promote economic growth!

Americans deserve precisely what they're getting, which is to say a nation sans Constitution and individual rights. Ben Franklin warned us from the start, but no, we knew better! Things are different now, in this, the modern age. Sure, there may have been conspiracies in Rome, Byzantium, China, Greece, France, Spain, Germany, Russia and every other state power in the history of the world, but you'd have to be a crazy wearer of tinfoil hats if you think anyone would conspire after power in America! Why would anyone want to control the richest, most militarily powerful nation the world has ever known?

So, vote for Bush or vote for Kerry if you like, it makes no difference. Truly, it doesn't. The die is cast and it has been for some time, probably since 1971 and Bretton Woods. I'm voting Libertarian because I believe there is value in acts of defiance, and because it is better to grasp at the slimmest of slim chances than to lend my hand and my consent to the devastation.

Politicians like to say they're bullish on America. But odds are high that it's those who short it that will reap the profits. In forty years, when the United States abandons its sovereignty to become a state of the American Union, (as the Free Trade Area of the Americas will likely be known as it follows the model of the European Economic Community), you will not be able to say that you weren't warned.

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Slothful atheists

But perhaps the most striking of all the differences between American and European working patterns, however, relates to working hours. In 1999, according to figures from the OECD, the average American in employment worked just under 2,000 hours a year (1,976). The average German worked 1,535 - 22 per cent less.

According to a recent American study, the average Frenchman works a staggering 32 per cent less. The journalist Madeleine Bunting has recently lamented that British workers are being pushed towards the American model, but the British worker is still working 12 per cent less than his American counterpart. This gap between American and European working hours is of surprisingly recent origin; 25 years ago, it didn't exist. Between 1979 and 1999, the average US working year lengthened by 50 hours, nearly four per cent. But the average German working year shrank by 12 per cent. The same was true elsewhere in Europe.

How are we to explain this divergence? The obvious answer is European legislation such as the French 35-hour week or the recent British reduction of the hours worked by junior doctors. Another theory points to differences in marginal rates of taxation. But I cannot resist suggesting another possible explanation - one that owes a debt to Weber's famous essay The Protestant Work Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, which he wrote almost exactly a century ago.

Weber believed he had identified a link between the rise of Protestantism and the development of what he called "the spirit of capitalism". I would like to propose a modern version of Weber's theory, namely "The Atheist Sloth Ethic and the Spirit of Collectivism".

Interesting concept. It makes sense that atheists would be less inclined to work hard, since if this life is all they've got before vanishing into oblivion, there's no point in slaving away instead of devoting oneself to an Epicurean philosophy of eat, drink and be merry. Oh, sure, some misguided non-souls among the godless might be inclined to work hard to make a better life for their children or something, but in general, it would be logical for the soulless to employ the same parasitic attitude towards societal wealth that they do towards societal mores.

I can't say I entirely disagree, either. As I've written previously, I don't think anyone ever went to his Maker - or into the dark bowels of oblivion - wishing he'd spent more time at the office.

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It's a mystery

Rich Lowry scratches his head:

It's always a kick to speak at a YAF events. Any eye-batting aside, what was most notable about this year was just how many smart young conservatives out there seem to think that there are no important differences between Bush and Kerry--whether this election really matters was a question that came up repeatedly. I find it hard to fathom how someone can think that, but there you are...

Gee, I have no idea. Perhaps it's because they're the smart ones.

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One at a time

JS sends a timely email:

My change-of-party form is now making its way through the bureaucracy. As soon as they process it, I'll be officially registered Libertarian. Ironically, it appears the government has trouble even processing a simple form. I got a call saying the processing was delayed because the portion of the form which had my address on it had been "cut off by their letter opening machine".

Anyway, I wanted to thank you for the part your blog and columns have had in helping me make this decision. Six months ago I fretted over the decision to leave the Republican party. However, given impetus to think it through, I realized I had always preferred George Washington's America over George Bush's. The final "decision" was no decision at all, with little fretting necessary. I'm less a "convert" to the Libertarian Party than one who simply (and finally) noticed which party walked the walk instead of just talking the talk.

This is by no means the first email of this sort that I've received, but I thought it was worth posting considering the recent conversation about what libertarians are doing. The most important things don't involve getting involved in formal party politics, but in convincing those around you that principle matters.

And JS, you are very welcome. The battle won't be won, tomorrow, November or the next election cycle, but it isn't lost until the last man quits.

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Strong, educated women

Fred praises the Mexicanas:

Now, young and beautiful has its charm. Men do not, as a rule, seek out withered crones. But—and I know many of these men well—what draws them is the warmth and womanliness of the Mexicana. In Mexico you don’t marry one of the guys. You don’t marry a child-support bomb waiting to explode without visitation. You don’t marry a hundred pounds of irrational anger looking for an excuse. You marry a woman. The difference…my God, the difference.... Yes, money is the only effective aphrodisiac, anywhere, as any man knows who has been in the Philippines with a paycheck. Drive a flashy car in Washington and leave hundred-dollar tips and you will have women all over you....

Violeta was suddenly, utterly, and in the short term irremediably without work or money. She also had a daughter of nine to care for. For a long time it was beans, tortillas, and water. Mexico does not have the social safety net that Americans rely on. So they stayed home and read. Violeta got through the Decameron and four volumes of Borges.

While I don't even know that I've ever met a Mexicana, I can't help but wonder how many of the self-professed strong, educated American women, who require intense therapy and Prozac the first time someone dares to disagree with them, have even heard of Boccaccio, still less the Chinese Encyclopedia.

A word of advice. If men tend to smile nervously and back away from you on a regular basis, it doesn't mean that they're intimidated by your stupendous brain, it means they think you're a lunatic.

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The anti-Patriot Act

As one reader here recently noted, cheerleaders of the Bush administration defend the Patriot Act even though they admit that they have neither read it or know what it contains. They presume that it is good because it is against terrorism. I'd be interested to know how they defend the following provisions, which have nothing to do with terrorism:

Several provisions of the USAPA have no apparent connection to preventing terrorism. These include:

Government spying on suspected computer trespassers with no need for court order. Sec. 217.

Adding samples to DNA database for those convicted of "any crime of violence." Sec. 503. The provision adds collection of DNA for terrorists, but then inexplicably also adds collection for the broad, non-terrorist category of "any crime of violence."

Wiretaps now allowed for suspected violations of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act. This includes anyone suspected of "exceeding the authority" of a computer used in interstate commerce, causing over $5000 worth of combined damage.

Dramatic increases to the scope and penalties of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act. This includes: 1) raising the maximum penalty for violations to 10 years (from 5) for a first offense and 20 years (from 10) for a second offense; 2) ensuring that violators only need to intend to cause damage generally, not intend to cause damage or other specified harm over the $5,000 statutory damage threshold; 3) allows aggregation of damages to different computers over a year to reach the $5,000 threshold; 4) enhance punishment for violations involving any (not just $5,000) damage to a government computer involved in criminal justice or the military; 5) include damage to foreign computers involved in US interstate commerce; 6) include state law offenses as priors for sentencing; 7) expand definition of loss to expressly include time spent investigating, responding, for damage assessment and for restoration.

As was the case with the War on Drugs, the Patriot Act means that simply redefining things, like website graffiti, as terrorism, the government now has another weapon in its arsenal which will be used to assault American liberties.

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Mailvox: the elephant stops smiling

Laughing Elephant writes:

If I did see more LP and CP voters like that, maybe I'd have more confidence in the LP and CP and would be inclined to join your lot. Perhaps I just haven't met the right members yet. Thanks for articulating a coherent argument in favor of voting with the LP & CP parties. Almost everything else I've heard here these past few days has been the case about why not to vote for Bush, which is entirely different.

I don't see how that last statement can possibly be true. I've repeatedly stated that people should always vote their principles. The Libertarian Party is the only party with an ideological dedication to small and limited government. The Constitution Party is ideologically dedicated to the U.S. Constitution, (also good, but one step removed from ideal, in my opinion), whereas the Republican Party has an ideological dedication to strong interventionist government that dates back to its founding, the brief shining moment of the Goldwater-Reagan years notwithstanding.

That is a broad point which has next to nothing to do with Bush, except in that Bush's governance has been a reflection of the GOP's historical ideology.

Perhaps you still remain unconvinced, but judging from the emails I've received, there are hundreds of Republicans who are planning to vote for the LP and CP for the first time this November. Change will never come from those who are unwilling to abandon the status quo.

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Mailvox: selling safety

ZT questions the timing:

My biggest problem with the Interment issue is the US military is guided, or a better word would be hampered, but US public opinion. Fear of Japan hitting American soil was the root cause of the Japanese internment. It doesn't matter what the General or Admiral's knew. The Political powers that be caved to the fears of the populace. The population had no idea of what the Japanese military was capable of even if the US military did....

Feb 19, 1942 the Order 9066 was given creating the internment camps. March 1942 the Japanese had conquered many place in the Pacific leaving only the Philippines fighting for its life. It isn't until Midway, which was after the start of the Interment camps, that the US force begin to have a hope of stopping the Japanese advance. So my question to VD is which point in time did the US military know the Japanese fleets abilities and when did they think they could stop them? Was it before Feb 19, 1942 or after?

Let's look at the facts. To invade a much smaller country, the USA and Britain required 5,000 ships and 4,000 landing craft to cross 21 miles of sea in the D-Day landings. The Japanese never possessed a tenth that many ships and they had almost the entire Pacific Ocean to cross. Nor did they have the industry to even think about building such a fleet. Their top naval priority after Midway was to replace the carriers they lost, but throughout the course of the war they managed to produce only 10. In the same period, the US produced 150.

But let's pretend that a general with no clue about supply lines and whatnot seriously believed that the Japanese were going to roll the dice and throw their entire Navy into a wildly risky invasion of California. While the internment order went out before the Battle of Midway ended on June 7, 1942, at which point the Japanese lost their offensive ability. The internments and relocations had barely begun in May, even so, the last internment camp was not closed until August 1948, although all Japanese were cleared [to return to the West Coast] sometime in 1945.

An encyclopedia entry - with which I don't always agree, as they use a statement of the Secretary of War to offer support of the policy even though he opposed it - states "Japanese Americans in Hawaii were not subject to the internment policy, despite the fact that they were closer to essential military facilities than most of the Japanese Americans in the western states. The main reason for this was the territory was already virtually under martial law. Also, given that about a third of the population of Hawaii was Japanese American, it is likely that wholesale detention of Japanese Americans in Hawaii would have crippled the local economy."

So, the military situation was so dire that the local economy of Hawaii took precedence? That's interesting. Even more damning is the fact that unlike the English and French coastlines, the American coast was never prepared to resist an invasion, because the military strategists knew one would never come. A raid, a submarine lobbing a few shells, sure, but an invasion? Never.

The politicians didn't give in to popular fears. Instead, as has always been the case, the government simply used the fear of the public to throw off its restrictions. It worked in 1942, and judging by the attitudes of those supporting past violations as well as current abominations such as the Patriot Act - as if the name itself isn't a giveaway - it will work equally well in the future.

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Mailvox: Now I see!

AJW explains patiently:

As I understand it, the Japanese-Americans weren't rounded up till Midway. It wasn't a kneejerk reaction, it took time. Things that take time usually have a plan or logical reason. What happened behind the scenes that lead to the Battle of Midway? We broke the Japanes Naval Code.

Hmmm? I wonder, does breaking the code, learning the enemies secrets, have any thing to do with this. Would our counterintelligence agencie(s?) have used this information to identify Japanes agents operating in California? You bet they would have. Now we have a delimma. How do you isolate the enemy agents operating on American soil without giving away the fact that you can read the enemies code? You round them all up.

I see, it was necessary to put aside the Constitution and the rights of the American citizens involved because this was in the military interests of the government. Now I understand. And since warfare and communication codes are modern inventions, it's pretty easy to see why the Founding Fathers never considered that it might be necessary to fight a war or deal with spies, otherwise they surely would have made sure that the government had this ability to suspend habeas corpus and whatnot in time of military conflict.

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Not the debate he wanted

From Matt Drudge's report on UNFIT FOR COMMAND, a book by Swift boat veterans opposed to the bemedaled Jean-Francois.

According to Kerry's Silver Star citation, Kerry was in command of a three-boat mission on the Dong Cung River. As the boats approached the target area, they came under intense enemy fire. Kerry ordered his boat to attack and all boats opened fire. He then beached directly in front of the enemy ambushers. In the battle that followed, the crews captured enemy weapons. His boat then moved further up the river to suppress more enemy fire. A rocket exploded near Kerry's boat, and he ordered to charge the enemy. Kerry beached his boat 10 feet from the rocket position and led a landing party ashore to pursue the enemy.

Kerry' citation reads: "The extraordinary daring and personal courage of Lt. Kerry in attacking a numerically superior force in the face of intense fire were responsible for the highly successful mission."

Here's what O'Neill and the Swiftees say: "According to Kerry's crewman Michael Madeiros, Kerry had an agreement with him to turn the boat in and onto the beach if fired upon. Each of the three boats involved in the operation was involved in the agreement." O'Neill writes that one crewman even recalls a discussion of probable medals.

Doug Reese, a pro Kerry Army veteran, recounted what happened that day to O'Neill, "Far from being alone, the boats were loaded with many soldiers commanded by Reese and two other advisors. When fired at, Reese's boat--not Kerry's--was the first to beach in the ambush zone. Then Reese and other troops and advisors (not Kerry) disembarked, killing a number of Viet Cong and capturing a number of weapons. None of the participants from Reese's boat received Silver Stars.

O'Neill continues: "Kerry's boat moved slightly downstream and was struck by a rocket-propelled grenade. . . .A young Viet Cong in a loincloth popped out of a hole, clutching a grenade launcher, which may or may not have been loaded. . . Tom Belodeau, a forward gunner, shot the Viet Cong with an M-60 machine gun in the leg as he fled. . . . Kerry and Medeiros (who had many troops in their boat) took off, perhaps with others, and followed the young Viet Cong and shot him in the back, behind a lean to."

O'Neill concludes "Whether Kerry's dispatching of a fleeing, wounded, armed or unarmed teenage enemy was in accordance with the customs of war, it is very clear that many Vietnam veterans and most Swiftees do not consider this action to be the stuff of which medals of any kind are awarded; nor would it even be a good story if told in the cold details of reality. There is no indication that Kerry ever reported that the Viet Cong was wounded and fleeing when dispatched. Likewise, the citation simply ignores the presence of the soldiers and advisors who actually 'captured the enemy weapons' and routed the Viet Cong. . . . [and] that Kerry attacked a 'numerically superior force in the face of intense fire' is simply false. There was little or no fire after Kerry followed the plan. . . . The lone, wounded, fleeing young Viet Cong in a loincloth was hardly a force superior to the heavily armed Swift Boat and its crew and the soldiers carried aboard."

"Admiral Roy Hoffmann, who sent a Bravo Zulu (meaning "good work"), to Kerry upon learning of the incident, was very surprised to discover in 2004 what had actually occurred. Hoffmann had been told that Kerry had spontaneously beached next to the bunker and almost single-handedly routed a bunkered force in Viet Cong. He was shocked to find out that Kerry had beached his boat second in a preplanned operation, and that he had killed a single, wounded teenage foe as he fled."

"Commander Geoge Elliott, who wrote up the initial draft of Kerry's Silver Star citation, confirms that neither he, nor anyone else in the Silver Star process that he knows, realized before 1996 that Kerry was facing a single, wounded young Viet Cong fleeing in a loincloth. While Commander Elliott and many other Swiftees believe that Kerry committed no crime in killing the fleeing, wounded enemy (with a loaded or empty launcher), others feel differently. Commander Elliott indicates that a Silver Star recommendation would not have been made by him had he been aware of the actual facts."

This could finish Kerry off. He already looks like a self-serving quasi-psycho with his self-directed home movie heroics. If it's the word of Monsieur Flip-Flop against veterans who were on the scene, Kerry is pain grillé

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Mailvox: maybe I'm crying on the inside

TH writes belatedly:

Let me begin this note by saying that although the American political scene is interesting (and many times amusing) I do not spend a great deal of time reading the newest latest political doctrine nor do I spend hours and hours of my time pouring over the Internet doing research on each issue like many of my politically minded friends. However, this may soon change due to your article "Janeane Garafolo is a short, fat idiot." And, by the way, Ms. Garafolo should thank you for that, as it is your article and others like it that have made me turn away from the GOP in disgust.

Tito, get me a hanky!

I have no intention of arguing each tiny issue point by point, as I admit that I am not an expert on each issue nor do I wish to be. But you do have to respect the person, be they Democrat or Republican or even Ms. Garafolo, that actually takes the time to read and digest the issues. And you especially have to respect Ms. Garafolo for having the courage to be willing to make herself a media target by publicly standing for her beliefs. (After all, there are those that may call her unflattering names simply because she speaks her mind politically as she is guaranteed by her American birthright. Can you imagine that?) I respect open discussion of valid, relevant issues. It's difficult to believe that you would support that viewpoint when those who do not agree with you are termed as "short, fat idiots."

One is wise not to argue on matters of which one is ignorant. But I call someone short when they are short. Fat when they are overweight. Idiots when they demonstrate that they have not only failed to digest the issues, but don't have a clue of what they are talking about. In JG's case, the title happened to fit very nicely. Perhaps you dole out your respect with all the reluctance of an intoxicated Tri-Delt, but mine must be earned; it is not freely given.

I realize that a title like "Janeane Garafolo is a short, fat idiot" brings the reader's attention to your article; sure that tactic works, but it's still a cheap shot. And in my opinion, undermines the more serious messages your article attempts to address.

Yes, this is the school of thought that suggests Ann Coulter would have more of an impact if she would only comport herself in a manner that would ensure no one read her books and columns. And what serious message? I wrote that article in 15 minutes. I can't be forcing esoteric eschatology and economics down everyone's throats every week.

Recently, in the midst of the Democratic National Convention, I have heard a lot of rhetoric and read a lot of articles about the Bush campaign and found that they operate like you; cheap shot name-calling tactics aimed at anyone who isn't "one of them" as a substitute for valid discussion. In my opinion, these cheap tactics work best for politicians that have nothing to say and nothing to boast. They cannot champion their own ideals or successes because they have none. I've heard enough bashing by Bush, and I am waiting for substance..........and I'm still waiting..........

Yeah, well, don't hold your breath. Even the platform will be substance-free, from what I hear - not that George Dole will read it. You're not seriously suggesting that there was any substance at the Democratic convention, though, I hope. That wasn't so much a lack of substance as it was anti-substance, which is to say, complete dishonesty. Whatever happened to that whole Senate career anyway, Jean-Francois?

Now, I'm always happy to discuss ideas, of course, the problem is that it's a little difficult to discuss the impact of inflation with someone who's never heard of the CPI, much less hedonic adjustment or the history of fiat money in France. But go ahead and throw down if you've got something to bring. If I wasn't afraid to go head-to-head with the economist that Nelson Mandela flew in to advise him on the current South African constitution or to smack down the professor who wrote the Econ 101 book we were using my freshman year, I'm certainly not worried about you.

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Michelle goes Monica for FDR

I skipped reading Powerline for a few days and was a few sentences into this post when I realized that far from being an indictment, Michelle Malkin was apparently defending FDR's internment of Japanese-Americans during WWII in her new book. Scrolling down to the previous Powerline post revealed that the title: In Defense of Internment is not a sarcastic appellation in the Erasmian mode, but a straightforward justification of American concentration camps.

Needless to say, I haven't read the book yet, but once I get my hands on one I will review it here. I very much doubt I'll find her case convincing, as no amount of clear and present danger justifies the complete abrogation of the U.S. Constitution, much less the farcical possibility of a serious Japanese threat to the U.S. mainland. As one Powerline reader wrote in to comment:

"It amazes me that self-professed conservatives still insist on carrying water for the greatest American icon of the left, FDR, on the issue of WWII internments. The internments were morally wrong, practically unnecessary, and unconstitutional. As far as its unconstitutionality, I know that Justice Scalia ranks the [Korematsu] decision as one of the worst in American jurisprudence (I take Scalia over Malkin). As for its necessity, J. Edgar Hoover reported to FDR that the FBI had found no evidence for even a single act of espionage or sabotage amongst Japanese-Americans and Japanese nationals. It was immoral because it deprived tens of thousands of people (including tens of thousands of American citizens) of their unalienable right to liberty (as well as effectively depriving them of most of their property) without anything close to due process. FDR's attorney general was against it, as was the rest of his cabinet (the closest one of them came to concurring was Sec. Of War Stimson who believed that Japanese nationals, but not American citizens, should be interned).

Nor is there a direct correlation between mass internments and the use of profiling in law enforcement/homeland security. The one deals only with a temporary administrative inconvenience versus the violation of fundamental rights. I'm for the use of profiling, but I don't see how Malkin's quixotic effort to justify the historical side issue of WWII internments will do much if anything to further that cause.

"Self-professed" being the key word. I'd previously thought that Malkin was nothing more than another cute Republican media whore, but apparently she's something worse, a strong government "conservative" in the Bush mode. Conservatives really need to be a little bit more aware of who is climbing into their beds and who they embrace as their intellectual champions. What's next, the conservative case for Stalin's socialism in one country? Or perhaps for a sequel, Malkin can champion FDR's seizure of the nation's gold and his attempt to pack the Supreme Court.

I have no problem whatsoever with private companies being allowed to profile and discriminate to their hearts' content. I have no problem with the states closing the national borders to immigrants. I do, however, have a massive problem with those who defend the federal government's right to put American citizens in concentration camps. To paraphrase the words of a true conservative, PJ O'Rourke, advocating the expansion of central state power isn't just treason to conservativism, it is treason to the human race.

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Janeane Garofalo is a short fat pussy

Larry Elder has a run-in with the pasty-faced wonder:

When Garofalo agreed to a sit-down, she clearly knew nothing about me. When I defended the administration on the War on Terror, a frustrated Garofalo started to get up and leave, muttering, "This show sucks." After I called her a coward, however, she sat back down and finished the segment.

After our interview, Garofalo began broadcasting her radio show on "Air America." Several of my callers – I was still on the air at the time – said that Garofalo called me a "house Negro" and a "fascist." Then something interesting happened. Garofalo's people asked me to appear on her show. Would I agree?

I promptly said yes, after which I was informed that, no, they really had no time for an interview. What? After all, they asked me to appear, and when I promptly accepted, Garofalo's people suddenly decided they could not fit me into their schedule! Here's my speculation: Garofalo assumed that I feared appearing on her show. She extended an invitation in hopes that I would refuse. She then would go on the air, call me a coward and accuse me of fear in the face of hostility. Well, I called her bluff, and somebody backed down.

And yes, Garofalo is still a short fat idiot, as I wrote back in March 2003. I'm even more dubious about the war on method than she is, but the dim bulb wouldn't know what a fascist was if one bit her on her oversized and appropriately named gluteus maximus. Now, there are without a doubt some fascist strains in the present Bush administration, but they are the same strains that were present in the Clinton administration and would be present in a theoretical Kerry administration as well. Fascism is simply another movement for expanding the power of the central state, something that Garofalo herself advocates on a regular basis.

She's not equipped for educated debate, though, so it's probably best that she run away as fast as those stumpy little legs will carry her.

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Whose side are they on?

Ramesh Ponnuru writes in NRO's Corner

This is the third time in a row that the national Republican party has intervened in the primary for the third district in the House on the losing side. It managed to be against Adam Taff when he won the primary (in 2002), and with him when he lost it (as he appears to have lost yesterday). Every time I asked a party operative about the support this year for Taff over conservative Kris Kobach, I was told that Taff was going to win the primary going away. I figure that Kobach will now get party support; the incumbent Democrat, Dennis Moore, is one of the GOP's top targets. But winning the race is going to be difficult, and the NRCC, by supporting a primary campaign that harshly attacked Kobach and depleted his funds, has made it harder. I'm not against national-party intervention in principle. Given this awful track record, maybe next time around the D.C. party should let Kansans choose their own candidate without the benefit of its expertise.

As is often the case, the national Republican leadership opposed the more conservative candidate in the party primary. Who needs them, when it's clear that the NRCC sees its job as preventing the Republican Party from moving to the right? I note that Alan Keyes, despite his credentials, only appears to have become acceptable as a candidate for the Senate in Illinois since the candidates preferred by the state party leadership have dropped out. Keyes looks like a sacrificial lamb at the moment, but he's a bright man and perhaps he can turn it around.

He's one Republican candidate for whom I would vote, along with Ron Paul.

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Mailvox: Skool daze

The White Buffalo bellows:

Do you have any stats on how private vs public schooled perform?

The only thing that I've ever seen is a comprehensive study based on the standardized achievement tests. It was mostly billed as a homeschool report, since it was the first study to look at a large number of homeschoolers but it also had the results of the public school kids as well as the privately school students taking the IOWA as well. Unfortunately, the private school data appears to have been left out of this particular citation.

However, I remember reading this study, which I first saw mentioned in the Washington Post a few years back, and I recall clearly that the conclusion was that the homeschooled kids were reaching in nine years the level that private school kids reached in eleven and public school kids reached in twelve. If one were to consider the tests to be reasonable approximations of academic achievement, (and they are almost certainly more credible than the inflated grades now being handed out at most schools and colleges around the country), then private school would appear to add approximately a year's worth of schooling over public school.

There must be other studies out there, but that's the only one that springs immediately to mind.

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Growing fast and furious

Almost 1.1 million students were homeschooled in 2003, according to the Education Department's National Center for Education Statistics (NCES). The NCES says the number of students taught at home in 1999 was 850,000.

7.4 percent annual growth in homeschooling? That's great news. If there's one thing that makes me feel any sense of optimism about the nation's future, it is that statistic.

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Mailvox: word games

BG writes of the Oshkosh gun seizures:

My friend BW doubted the story and tells me he called the assistant editor. This is what emailed me.

"This is the story reported on the news of the shooting and gun confiscating. It appears two search warrants were issued and the rest consented to the searches. The guns were returned to the citizens after ballistic test were performed to compare to the bullet when found. This I got from the city assistant editor of the Northwestern newpaper, yes I called and talked to her. The story was on the front page, but not the lead story. According to the police department, news channel and newspaper, the wisconsin gun owners assc. used this incident to boost membership and contributions. Looking at their play on words I would tend to agree. "

Why wouldn't the WGO use the incident to boost membership? The actions of the police department were outrageous and make very clear why the WGO is needed. The only play on words being performed here is by BW, who confuses a consent to a SEARCH with a consent to a SEIZURE. This is why the Constitution bans illegal searches AND seizures; if the two were identical, only illegal searches would need be banned. The two actions are completely different. When a policeman asks to search your car and you consent, you are not granting him permission to take your girlfriend's purse or to remove the spare tire from the trunk.

The newspaper itself wrote: He [Police captain Jay Puestohl] acknowledged consent to search does “not necessarily” mean officers have consent to remove property. Puestohl also said nothing illegal was done by removing the firearms and that investigators needed to examine them. He declined to say on what grounds officers had the right to remove the firearms, though.

Puestohl's wrong, of course, and it would have been more accurate for him to say "not" instead of "not necessarily". It's good that the police apparently had the good sense to eventually return the gun owners' property - which is not reported in the original article, by the way - but just as a bank robber is still prosecuted even if he returns the money he stole, the policemen responsible should be prosecuted for theft.

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Told you so

House Speaker Dennis Hastert says he's committed to abolishing the Internal Revenue Service, but he does not expect President Bush to make it a campaign issue.... In an interview with the Associated Press, Hastert said he had talked in general terms with President Bush about his proposals.

"I think he's on board on the litigation issue and the regulation issue," he said. As for the tax proposals, however, Hastert said, "I think that's a piece they don't want to bite off in the campaign. They have other things they want to talk about."

Clearly, this is a major priority for the President. It must be part of that super-secret second-term plan. Why talk about something that would be massively popular with the American people in an election campaign? Either Bush does not support the idea or he's even more strategically incompetent than I'd imagined.

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War is a racket

David Hackworth writes on WND:

For example, the CPA paid 74,000 guards even though the actual number of guards couldn't be validated. On one site alone, 8,206 guards were on the payroll, but only 603 warm bodies could be counted. Elsewhere, more than $17 million was allocated to guards and the Iraqi army without one piece of backup paper. Pals in Iraq say this has been standard drill since the birth of "a very dysfunctional" CPA.

The report cites, "An improper $120 million disbursement was made in May 2004 because of miscommunication between CPA-OMB and Comptroller's office." In other words, $120 million went south, but was blithely rationalized as some clerks getting their wires crossed!

Well, what's a missing $8.8 billion dollars anyhow.... This episode brought to you by the Coalition of the Willing and the taxpayers of the United States of America.

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Mailvox: on voting your conscience

WA asks me to respond to David Kupelian's article on the November election:

Christians, conservatives, Republicans, libertarians, constitutionalists, patriotic independents and other traditionalists: When you look at George W. Bush today and are dissatisfied – dissatisfied that he raised the federal budget sky-high, that he granted de facto amnesty to millions of illegal aliens, that he doesn't always follow the Constitution, that he invaded Iraq, that he hasn't done enough to fight abortion and gay rights, that whatever ...

What conclusion do you draw?

One conclusion is that Bush is a globalist, money-grubbing elitist Bonesman conspirator, or at best a clueless, sold-out puppet.

Another interpretation at the opposite end is that Bush is a general at war – a general who knows more than you do, who sees the lay of the land, who comprehends the odds, who knows what troops he's got, and determines which battles he can and must win and which ones he has to concede, at least temporarily – even if it looks bad to his supporters.

As there is a plethora of information in support of the former which is also backed by the history of the ruling parties two factions, while there is absolutely nothing but blind trust supporting the latter assertion, I don't see how any thinking being can possible conclude the latter. Every argument for President Bush's re-election posits that he is a good and decent man, primarily because he claims to be a Christian. Well, so do the Archbishop of Canterbury and the gay Episcopalian priests, and I don't hear any conservatives asserting that they are therefore genuinely good leaders worthy of support.

I pay very little attention to words and a lot of attention to actions. The irony of the pro-Bush conservative's position is that he is forced to argue that the president does not have the political capital to enact policies that have far more popular support than the war on Iraq upon which he spent it all. If nothing else, this makes him at best a lousy political general in whom to place one's trust. But I don't think that's the case, as I'm quite confident that he's nothing more or less than a globalist tool, functionally identical to Jean-Francois and almost every other politician in the ruling party.

One aspect of Europe that I found markedly superior to the USA when living there was the far more astute attitude of the populace towards the politicians. They know the politicians are all corrupt, whereas in the United States we insist on excusing them on the basis of "stupidity". When individuals and institutions succeed repeatedly at achieving what they set themselves, for good or for ill, stupidity is unlikely to be involved.

Kerry would betray the unborn, betray our youth, betray both the haves and the have-nots, betray us all. With inspiring rhetoric and fanfare, he would unravel what remains of our national sovereignty, leading us down the road to servitude, poverty and insecurity in a thousand smothering ways – all the while piously thinking he was ushering in a new era of peace.

And this is different from George Bush in precisely what way? If you want to vote for a winner, go ahead, vote for whoever is ahead in the polls on November third. But don't try to pretend to me or anyone else that principle is involved. If your strongest argument after four years of governance is "don't think, just close your eyes and trust", you don't have a leg to stand on.

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I'd rather switch than fight

Several of you have asked what I would do, if faced with a situation like the one in Oshkosh. I think it's important to first understand that everything, literally everything, takes longer than those who see what is coming expects, and so it is a huge mistake to overreact directly to a simple probe and confuse it with the real thing.

It is wise, however, to use it as a warning and begin to prepare for the less desirable eventualities. My personal preference, as modeled by some of my intellectual heroes like Ludwig von Mises, is to simply leave. Anywhere is preferable to a society in the process of radical transformation - see South Africa and Russia for details. At no point in history has a society ever successfully resisted the suicidal urge to drown itself in chaos, and while there is one factor operating in America's behalf - never before has a population been so well armed - it's not difficult to envision an event that would lead the public to clamor for its own disarmament. If it is not too bizarre to apply a principle of socionomics here, I would not be surprised to see just such an event sometime before July 2006.

Of course, it's not possible for many people to leave, nor are many who could leave inclined to do so. To those who stay, the principle of misdirection in all things is key. As it relates to the current subject, if they want guns, make sure you have some openly purchased guns for them to seize. Let them have them, behave in an appropriately servile manner, and take any action you deem appropriate later.

What most people don't understand is that the police and government are terrified of the public. They know they are massively outnumbered. That is why they behave so arrogantly, like teenagers working themselves up to spray paint a street sign. And they are right to be afraid - in Peru, the police were afraid to even leave their homes as the initiation rite for the Shining Path was to shoot dead a uniformed policeman on the front steps of his house. It is not mass riots and demonstrations that they fear, for those can never be so large that they cannot be controlled one way or another.

What they fear is the quiet, invisible violence of places like Northern Ireland, where the entire British Army was finally forced to agree to a truce that was a de facto victory for the IRA. This is why the Bush administration is secretly trying to negotiate a deal with the Ba'ath and Sunni leaders, as they know that the foreign jihadists can be defeated with Iraqi help, but that the indigenous resistance will never be overcome now that the hearts-and-minds campaign has clearly failed. Government, however totalitarian, always depends on the consent of the governed, regardless of whether that consent is given freely or fearfully.

Perhaps these concerns are unfounded. I admit to the possibility that they are. However, I've never found it helpful to assume the innocence of government actors in any situation. Their interests seldom align with mine, and when they not only fail to answer my questions honestly but seek to evade them, well, I consider that sort of thing to be a red flag. It never hurts to be prepared.

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Testing, testing

And the gun seizure tests begin:

Police evacuated citizens from their homes within a quarantined area near Smith Elementary School Saturday night (July 17, 2004) to conduct a broad gun sweep of the neighborhood following the shooting of Oshkosh police officer Nate Gallagher. Residents reported returning home from area shelters -- where they were herded by police -- to find their guns gone. Others watched in awe as police took their firearms after giving police consent to search. Some were told by police their firearms would be subjected to ballistics tests, and would be returned.

"However, the bullet that hit officer Gallagher was not found," said Corey Graff, executive director of Wisconsin Gun Owners Inc. "So how can police conduct ballistics tests if there's no bullet with which to match the results? It defies logic." Graff said the biggest issue is what he calls the department's "Guilty-until-proven-innocent" posture towards citizens....

Warrants for searches were issued for at least two homes, (perhaps more) but homeowners in the area reported having all their firearms taken by police. Some witnesses said the whole neighborhood was evacuated by force and citizens were being told – not asked, but told – to hand over their guns. Some weren’t even asked.

What I'm wondering is if this little incident was ordered by the Oshkosh police, or if it was ordered by others interested in learning just how willing Americans are to submit to having their weapons seized.

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Mailvox: discuss amongst yourselves

Res Ispa puckers up:

How about timing your blog to post a thread about the Monday article at 12 eastern when WND updates to the Monday edition? Being in the mountain-time zone I generally read the Monday WND before going to bed Sunday night. I would love to have the opportunity to make acclamation, glorify and pay homage to your superior abilities as a wordsmith and ingratiate myself to the genius that you are.

It is my sincere desire to osculate your gluteus maximus until you achieve a Limbaugh-sized ego and you obtain your own radio show challenging him for superiority of all things conservative. This is a two part strategy:

1. establish the Vox Day pundit groupie fan club
2. get a guy with a Minnesotan accent nationally syndicated

Hey if they’ll put Don Cherry on the air why not you?

That last bit would have been more meaningful to me if I had any idea who Don Cherry is. Anyhow, that's not a problem, assuming that I don't forget. So, we'll see. As I've repeatedly stated, I have no desire for a radio show - those little MP3 experiments taught me that - although I might be interested in some sort of Internet broadcast thing once that technology becomes feasible.

I don't really have any more to say about immigration at the moment, but in case anyone is interested in harping on today's column or slapping my wrist with a "bad libertarian, bad!" this would be the place.

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Too good to be true

A domestic centerpiece of the Bush/GOP agenda for a second Bush term is getting rid of the Internal Revenue Service, the DRUDGE REPORT has learned. The Speaker of the House will push for replacing the nation's current tax system with a national sales tax or a value added tax, Hill sources tell DRUDGE.

"People ask me if I’m really calling for the elimination of the IRS, and I say I think that’s a great thing to do for future generations of Americans," Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert explains in his new book, to be released on Wednesday.

"Pushing reform legislation will be difficult. Change of any sort seldom comes easy. But these changes are critical to our economic vitality and our economic security abroad," Hastert declares in SPEAKER: LESSONS FROM FORTY YEARS IN COACHING AND POLITICS.... "By adopting a VAT, sales tax, or some other alternative, we could begin to change productivity. If you can do that, you can change gross national product and start growing the economy. You could double the economy over the next fifteen years. All of a sudden, the problem of what future generations owe in Social Security and Medicare won’t be so daunting anymore. The answer is to grow the economy, and the key to doing that is making sure we have a tax system that attracts capital and builds incentives to keep it here instead of forcing it out to other nations."

It would be delightful to see the income tax fraud shut down and the IRS banned, except that few government agencies are ever closed, and in any case, some agency will be assigned to see that businesses are collecting the sales tax. Still, that would be far less intrusive than the current system of enforced financial nudity. However, this theoretical second-term policy will be opposed by Republican and Democratic state leaderships alike, as it would play havoc on many state revenue systems that piggyback off the Federal income tax.

The fact that this is coming from a Republican leader with a book to sell in an election year makes it more than a little dubious. Sure, it's remotely possible that someone in the Republican leadership has looked into the issue and been convinced that the present tax system is wholly indefensible in both legal and Constitutional terms - I think there's now six former IRS agents, (who know a lot more about the realities of the situation than the pro-tax idiots on the Internet), who have switched sides and joined the tax honesty movement - but this would hardly mark the first time that Republicans have pulled a bait-and-switch on the public.

Since the IRS is an executive branch agency, the President could shut it down tomorrow with an executive order. It's his call. As for the income tax, the law doesn't require filing it anyhow, it requires nothing more than "voluntary compliance". (Granted, the IRS will try to steal your bank account and garnish your wages if you don't comply voluntarily, but that doesn't mean their actions are legal. Quite the opposite.) If the President does something in that vein, I'll take this seriously, otherwise, it should be taken no more seriously than that old vow to shut down the Department of Education and the National Endowment for the Arts. Having failed to deliver time and time again, Republican promises no longer bear serious consideration.

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Pro-democracy terrorists

Rainer gets it backwards:

I agree with you on this, [the mistake of nation building] and I think that it is going to be very difficult to establish a democracy here. However, I don't think that it is a matter to be thrown away. Just because some terrorists don't want it doesn't mean that nobody should get it.

The problem isn't that the terrorists and their allies don't want democracy, it's the US administration and their appointed puppet Allawi that don't want democracy. A free and open vote in Iraq would likely elect the more radical Islamic elements which are currently allied with the foreign al Qaeda fighters. In fact, Debka is reporting that the US administration is now in secret negotiations to bring the Ba'ath back into government, along with the Sunni leaders, in order to split them from the foreign jihadists:

Since the first week of July, the Bush administration has been immersed in a secret, high-wire diplomatic exercise aimed at bringing down the level of Iraqi insurgent attacks on US troops, or perhaps halting the violence altogether, by coming to terms with the enemy. DEBKA-Net-Weekly’s intelligence sources report exclusively that the initiative is being carried forward by a prominent non-Iraq Arab figure as intermediary on behalf of the highest White House echelons. His identity is top secret for reasons of security. (Our editors have his name but promised to preserve his anonymity in return for this exclusive).

All that can be said at this time is that the intermediary is not based in Iraq; he goes over for delicate negotiating sessions in the Bush administration’s name with Baath guerrilla leaders, militia commanders and heads of the great Sunni Muslim tribes and clans. At all times, he is in direct communication with the White House.

The only three Americans in Iraq privy to this negotiating track are Robert Blackwill, the president’s senior adviser on Iraq, US ambassador John Negroponte who is not personally involved, and the commander of American forces in Iraq, General David Casey, who is in charge of security arrangements and any changes on the ground arising from progress in the talks. The only two Iraqis kept informed are prime minister Iyad Allawi and deputy prime minister for security Salih Barham.

DEBKAfile adds: the negotiating track began with a preliminary condition: Baath and Sunni leaders must undertake to disengage from al Qaeda and other foreign Arab fighters.

Still think that we're on the side of freedom and democracy in Iraq? I don't think so. I'm not sure precisely what model George Bush and company are hoping to construct but they're not even pretending to create a constitutional representative democracy, much less a true government by, of and for the people over there.

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Out of LUC

This, again, brought to you by the Coalition of the Willing and the Law of Unintended Consequences:

BAGHDAD, Aug. 1 -- Car bombs exploded outside at least five Christian churches in two Iraqi cities during Sunday evening services in coordinated attacks that sent terrified and bleeding worshipers fleeing into the streets as stained-glass windows shattered and flames engulfed the buildings. More than a dozen people were killed and scores injured in the assaults, the first mass violence against minority Christians who have long coexisted peacefully with Iraqi Muslims.

See, there's a small problem when you bring freedom to people who want to kill lots of other people. As every great philosopher of liberty has pointed out, freedom and liberty require a certain something - Tocqueville called it goodness - in order to prevent them from being abused to harm others. Freedom is self-limiting in this regard, as those who wish to run amok will soon find themselves clamped down upon in one way or another.

The notion that democracy is possible, much less desirable, in Arabic Islamic culture was always ridiculous. Sure, a barely recognizable form of it works, at the point of a whole lot of guns, in Turkey, but the very protest proves the point. After eighteen months, this nation-building is looking more viable by the day. Of course, the administration's cheerleaders will no doubt point out that these latest bombings only shows how desperate the terrorists have become, although I have to say it is getting is harder and harder to distinguish between the many examples of their supposed desperation.

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Bane-spotting

The Dread Lord spots me floating around the Internet.

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Sweet home Alabama

Isn't it interesting that no matter what wrongdoing or incompetence is exposed, government employees never experience the consequences of their actions. In Alabama, an IT employee responsible for confirming and documenting the misuse of government computers was fired after he installed spyware on his supervisor's computer which demonstrated that the supervisor spent 70 percent of his time playing solitaire and another 20 percent surfing the stock market.

(Actually, this supervisor sounds pretty harmless. If all government employees would confine themselves to similar activities, we'd be in good shape.)

The IT guy installed the spyware only after first submitting several complaints about the supervisor's activity. Of course, government being government, the supervisor received a reprimand while the IT guy was terminated. After all, they can hardly keep people around who insist on letting the taxpayers know on what their tax dollars are being spent, can they?

If you don't mind a bit of a tangent, I'm reminded of Carroll Quigley's prediction that technology will eventually even out the playing field between individual and state. There is hope, always. In twenty, fifty or one hundred years, when a single individual will be able to hold the mightiest national government hostage with a pocket nuclear device or nanotech weapon, even the most die-hard central statists may be forced to admit that a voluntary system of government is the only viable option. Perhaps that will be the silver lining in the dark cloud of fifth-generation warfare.

For who will want to seize the reins of power if that is equivalent to painting a big red glowing target on your forehead. Or, as is more likely to be the case, on your DNA.

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Mailvox: see Spot read

Spot is underwhelmed with WND's science correspondent:

Also, it usually takes 9-12 months for papers to be published in specialized journals, and new ideas are always subjected to rigorous peer review processes. WND's assertion that this demonstrates hostility on the part of dogmatic scientists is just silly.

I am not qualified to address Spot's points with regards to the possible ramifications of the theory of a non-constant speed of light, so I shall leave that to the more scientifically interested. I have no reason to doubt that he's correct, except for what appears to be his poor reading comprehension. First, Chris Bennett makes the assertion, not WND, and if WND has a "science correspondent" it would be Dr. Kelly Hollowell, who is a scientist, PhD and weekend columnist. Chris Bennett would appear to be an engineer at a technology firm in California, he is not a WND correspondent, columnist or even regular contributor as far as I am aware.

Second, Bennett clearly states that the peer review treatment of these particular scientists was both unusual and hostile. He writes: "Setterfield, Dr. Tifft, Dr. Paul Davis, Dr. John Barrow and others have been subjected to peer review which borders on ridicule." Here, the phrase "which borders on ridicule" modifies the preceding noun "peer review". It is not so much the assertion which is silly, but Spot's attempt to dismiss it.

WND is by no means perfect. Dark Window, among others, rightly flogs it for its tendency to link to National Enquiresque "interest" stories such as the cringe-inducing Iranian frog-birth story. But then, it's hard to argue with results that have a) produced nationally syndicated columnists and national radio shows, b) a monthly readership that blows away better-known names like Slate and Salon, and c) allows almost complete editorial freedom. Can you imagine the Atlanta Journal Constitution letting its headline columnists translate the Fascist manifesto or waste precious column space on Tolstoy and weird trend theories? WND is dedicated to freedom of all kinds, and intellectual freedom not only permits but downright requires the possibility, even the likelihood, of occasionally making a complete ass of yourself.

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