Some Like it Hot: Devil Made Them Do It
Conservatives extol denial, air conditioning, oil stocks

As George W. Bush retreats to hellish Waco, Texas amid yet another national heat wave for yet another recess from the real world, Americans who have seen Al Gore's movie, An Inconvenient Truth, are growing concerned at the nation's extreme weather conditions.

From Bob Herbert's column in today's NY Times (behind subscription wall):

It's certainly true that heat waves in July and August are not unusual. But we need to keep in mind that the first six months of this year were the warmest ever recorded in the United States. And that this summer, according to the National Climatic Data Center, more than 50 cities in the continental U.S. have set records for high temperature.

We should keep in mind, as Al Gore has pointed out, that of the 21 hottest years ever measured, 20 have occurred within the last 25 years. And the hottest year of this recent hottest wave was last year.

[According to] Sunday's San Francisco Chronicle: "In northern California, it was hotter for longer than ever on record, hitting 110 degrees four consecutive days in the nine-county Bay Area."

But thanks in great measure to Bush, who has stubbornly refused to acknowledge the strong scientific consensus that exists on this issue that threatens to significantly alter life as we know it on planet Earth, attitudes toward global warming have become largely a matter of political faith.

To the Bush boosters at NRO's The Corner, for example, concern at the notion of global climate change is by turns absurd and comical. The Corner's Iain Murray wrote yesterday:

The truth is that humans have lived for millennia in really inhospitable climates - think Inuit and Bushmen. Yet modern technology allows us to combine those climates with an industrialized lifestyle. There's no need for siestas or igloos, for the most part. Occasionally, the weather reminds us just how inhospitable it can be, but we have the technology to defeat that, for the most part. Air conditioning makes 100 degree heat bearable (it was 117 degrees in the sun feet from where I am writing this a few minutes ago) and, if it is getting warmer for whatever reasons, more and more of the country and indeed world will adopt the technology. Central heating systems did the same for the icier parts in the past. It is the easy availability of affordable energy that has done that. It's a blow to those of us who rather like the idea of a siesta or a fortifying dram as night falls, but it is vastly increasing our ability to create wealth.

Indeed, you could view the spread of temperature control technologies as the globalization of the working conditions associated with a temperate, maritime climate. It might even be an essential component of successfully adopting that climate's most successful economic framework.

Posted at 3:39 PM

Two weeks ago, during New York City's last 100-degree heat wave, Peggy Noonan floated the notion that global climate change is relatively benign and might actually save her money on her heating bill:

... how sad and frustrating it is that the world's greatest scientists cannot gather, discuss the question of global warming...and come to a believable conclusion on these questions: Is global warming real or not? If it is real, is it necessarily dangerous? What exactly are the dangers? Is global warming as dangerous as, say, global cooling would be? Are we better off with an Earth that is getting hotter or, what with the modern realities of heating homes and offices, and the world energy crisis, and the need to conserve, does global heating have, in fact, some potential side benefits, and can those benefits be broadened and deepened? Also, if global warning is real, what must--must--the inhabitants of the Earth do to meet its challenges? And then what should they do to meet them?

These are the very questions -- the sane ones, anyway -- Gore's movie addresses. But Peggums hasn't seen it, won't see it. Republicans uniformly regard Gore's film as they did Fahrenheit 9/11: as unpatriotic, an affront to the cult of Bush.

Back over at The Corner, within an hour of the earlier piece, Murray receives from "a scientist friend" a 1948 article on "The Present Climatic Fluctuation." It concludes that climatic fluctuation is "actually resulting in an improvement in the climate of our world." So there! Contra Gore, since at least the 1920s, things have been steadily improving here on Earth. Murray closes playfully [as melting glaciers crash playfully into the sea in the background], "How times change!"

A word on Iain Murray. The Corner regular is employed by the Competitive Enterprise Institute, a right-wing think tank with an Orwellian "Control Abuse of Power" project that contests "unaccountable government power" through public relations, opposition to regulation, and litigation -- all on behalf of industry. Among the project's "Power" targets are the 1998 tobacco settlement, which sought to hold tobacco companies to account for some of the death and disease they've spread throughout the nation, and the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board, which was created by the 2002 Sarbanes-Oxley Act to protect US investors from Enron-style accounting practices. Murray's just the person to trust for the straight poop on global climate change.

Late this afternoon, Murray and his patrons had their world rocked by the Rev. Pat Robertson:

Strange Bedfellows [Iain Murray]
Pat Robertson joins Al Gore:

The Rev. Pat Robertson said he hasn't been a believer in global warming in the past, but this summer's record-breaking heat is "making a convert out of me."

On his "700 Club" broadcast, Robertson said, "It is getting hotter, and the icecaps are melting and there is a buildup of carbon dioxide in the air."

Switching sides on an issue that divides evangelical Christians, Robertson said, "We really need to address the burning of fossil fuels."

The religious broadcaster told viewers, "If we are contributing to the destruction of this planet, we need to dosomething about it."

I hope they'll be very happy together.

Posted at 2:00 pm

Outflanked on the left by a guy who talks to God. That's gotta hurt. No report was available on whether Robertson has seen Gore's movie.

Update: Iain Murray reports today that it's currently not hot in Alaska and the wintry parts of the Southern Hemisphere. Nor, presumably, in his refrigerator.

SHORTER JONAH GOLDBERG:

Dairy states are liberal because dairy farmers are big softies.


Yeah, I can really picture this guy doing farm chores in Vermont on a January morning at 20 below.

Shortest Summer Vacation Ever for Bush-league!

He's only going to have nine days off. The poor guy.

Shorter David Broder: "Bush has gambled and lost in Iraq (and driven reactionary views in this column within parenthesis), but maybe history will spin him (and me) out of it."

Shorter Peggy Noonan: "Purchase Cuba. Overpay. Then grant amnesty absolution and a path to the Republican Party to Cubans."

Rumsfeld: Iraq Isn't In "A Classic Civil War At This Stage...Certainly Isn't Like Our Civil War"...
(via the Huffington Post)

That's right Don, and do you know why? No good songs!! That's right, WHAT are the Gulf War II renacters going to sing as they recreate the grand battle of Falujah? We've got to right this immediately:

I-I wish I wuz in the land of petrol
Where the damage is co-lateral
Fire away, fire away, fire away
Syraqiran*!
There's IRE's and SAMs abounding
Oh to see a Blackhawk grounding
Fire away, fire away fire away
Syraqiran

*Since Michael Ledeen referred to Syria and Iran as "Syran", I figure why leave Iraq out of the fun. Besides, it scans better.

Add your verses in the comments

"...Allow the Secretary of Defense to Add Crimes At Will to Those Under the Military Court's Jurisdiction..."

The Washington Post reports today:

A draft Bush administration plan for special military courts seeks to expand the reach and authority of such "commissions" to include trials, for the first time, of people who are not members of al-Qaeda or the Taliban and are not directly involved in acts of international terrorism, according to officials familiar with the proposal.

The plan, which would replace a military trial system ruled illegal by the Supreme Court in June, would also allow the secretary of defense to add crimes at will to those under the military court's jurisdiction. The two provisions would be likely to put more individuals than previously expected before military juries, officials and independent experts said.

So who are these people not directly involved in international terrorism? Jouralists? Opposition politicians? Protesters? Me? You?

And what crimes do you think Rumsfeld might come up with to add to the cases against such people? Jay-walking? Protesting? Writing a critical letter to the President? Treason?

The proposal denies defendants such basic rights as the right to confront their accuser(s), to exclude hearsay, to bar evidence obtained with torture, to get a speedy trial and to choose their counsel. Their military lawyers would not have the same access to evidence as prosecutors. Sounds just like America!

Detainees would also not be guaranteed the right to be present at their own trials, if their absence is deemed necessary to protect national security or individuals.

So, you could sitting in your cell at Gitmo for years, then one day have someone come in and tell you you have been found guilty and are now going to be punished... some more. Or, as "...John D. Hutson, the Navy's top uniformed lawyer from 1997 to 2000..," puts it:

"We know you're guilty. We can't tell you why, but there's a guy, we can't tell you who, who told us something. We can't tell you what, but you're guilty."

Yep. Just like America!

[Military lawyers] objected in particular to the provision allowing defendants to be tried in absentia, said the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to describe the deliberations. Another source in contact with top military lawyers said, "Their initial impression is that the draft was unacceptable and sloppy." [emphasis mine] The source added that "it did not have enough due-process rights" and could further tarnish America's image.

Heck of a job, Bush-league administration!


Hat tip to Americablog.

Jean Schmidt Explains A Mideast Challenges [sic]

Schmidt is the new Ohio Congresscritter who last year called John Murtha a coward on the floor of the House... or rather conveyed a message from a 'friend' who said of Murtha, "...cowards cut and run". That little speech was so bad that she was booed soundly, forced to issue an apology and made to beg for her remarks be stricken from the Federal Register. Now, she explains the Mideast to us.

Why Do They Hate Us?

The Middle East has been a synonym for diplomatic challenges our whole lives. I hope that our children one day can tell their children it is the home of the Holy Land and no further explanation is needed.

"...a synonym for... challenges"?! Man, Mr. Johnson* would so bust her for that one!

..Some people are oppressed by dictators, some by Mother Nature, others by disease, still more by economics. Regardless of the cause, the oppressed all share the same misery, tears, and despair.

She forgot to mention the oppressed who are oppressed by oppression!

...The United States is the kindest, most generous country to ever exist on this planet. We spend billions all over the world feeding, caring, protecting, and building.

I guess Jean hasn't read the memo comparing our aid spending to that of other countries. And I guess she forgot we own about 45% of the world's armaments and most of its nuclear weapons. And I guess she might not have known about that little conflict we started in Iraq which has kindly killed up to 100,000 people.

It is easy to understand that when you know your liberator and he does not come, it must mean he doesn't care. Hearts begin to fill with hate. Evil takes root. Soon all of your problems only exist because the United States failed to solve them.

How about when you know your oppressor and he won't leave? Does that mean he cares? And what about when your problems only exist because the United States has caused them - in addition to because it has failed to solve them?

...The Iraqi's perception is that we are all powerful. We watch them from space with technology they cannot even imagine. Surely if we wanted to turn on [some complaining young man** from the Mideast's] electricity we could do so. He has no idea how large the problem is but he knows we can do anything. He was angry. Eventually his air conditioning began running and his anger cooled.

Air conditioners for the world!! (and no, I've already done one grammar flame. We shall leave the obvious grammatical error unremarked... well except for the remark I just made). But honestly, this is the first time the roots of extremism have been revealed to be lack of a.c. Who knew?

My point is the hatred towards America isn't always based on what we did but often simply not living up to the beliefs of what the oppressed think we are capable of doing.

But what if the hatred is based on what we did? Such as, oh, shipping tons of missiles to Israel so they could bomb more civilians. Or, say, virtually leveling the town of Fallujah so that only 10% of the buildings were habitable? Or, oh, putting a hotheaded asshole in the United Nations so he can veto and block measures which benefit people throughout the world?

Some are angry because in the past we made mistakes that compounded or even extended their misery. Many are angry because we fail to live up to their expectations. Ronald Reagan once said that our opposition is not ignorant it is just that so much of what they believe is just not true.

And here's the irony! Schmidt uses a snotty Reagan quote whose wrong-headedness illustrates why 'they' hate 'us' better than her entire essay does, yet she doesn't even realize it!

And the exciting conclusion?

For the United States the lesson must be -- as we head down a different path of foreign diplomacy - Evil that is ignored is indeed Evil that is assisted. The oppressed will always remember.

Absolutely! And not just because we didn't fix their air conditioners, but because we killed and maimed their children, raped them, tortured them, destroyed their infrastructure and imposed policies on them that are not in their best interests. Oh, and because we supported other countries who did the same.

*My high school English teacher, junior year.

**Jean was told about this angry young man by a young Iraqi soldier in Baghdad.

Lefty bloggers: Can we please just fucking stop with the blackface?

(That used to be here.)

Think of it as a new corollary to Godwin's Law: Any use of blackface, like any use of the word "Nazi," automatically makes further reasoned discussion impossible.

I don't care if it's fair. I don't care if the use of blackface is clever or ironic; I don't care if the blogger or the Photoshopper is African-American. Posting blackface is handing the other side a huge fucking trump card, one they can (and will) run gleefully off to the mainstream media with. It's just never worth it.

Weigh costs and benefits, for crissakes.

The Things That Matter Most

Dastardly Syrians and Iranians Helping Insurgents in Iraq! Outright War in Lebanon! Soldiers Getting Killed in Iraq and Afghanistan! Massive Cost Overruns and Corruption in Iraq Reconstruction! Record Trade Deficits! New Orleans' Still Not Fixed! Seniors Falling into the Medicare Doughnut Hole!

The Bush-league White House is focusing on the things that matter:

Next up: a renovation of the [White House] briefing room, likely with a video wall that could display everything from "flags waving in the breeze [to] detailed charts and graphs," according to a senior White House official working on the project. For TV viewers, the video feed could be the sole on-screen image, or could share the space with the speaker.

White House officials say they are weighing how -- and how often -- to use the video capability. But the new technology could help transform White House briefings -- midday exchanges with reporters in a utilitarian setting -- into more interesting viewing. Both the planned video capabilities and Mr. Snow's hiring appear to be part of a subtle but sweeping effort by administration officials to deliver their message directly to the public, particularly through video.

Because as long as we can give the illusion that everything is o.k., everything is o.k.!

Hat tip to the Agonist.

One of these things is not like the other, according to Michelle Malkin:


Filthy, disgusting Hispanics rallying around a foreign flag. In America!


Filthy, disgusting Hispanics rallying around a foreign flag. In America!


Admirable, saintly Hispanics rallying around a foreign flag. In America, baby!

Dual loyalties? To right-wingers like Malkin, IOKIYACANAM.*

(*It's OK if you're a Cuban and not a Mexican.)

(X-post.)

WHY IT MUST SUCK BEING FIDEL CASTRO'S BROTHER
1) Fidel keeps all the good Cohibas for himself.
2) Wherever he embraces you, stuff from his beard gets in your ear.
3) Mama always said "Why can't you find a country to take over, like your brother?"
4) You always have to eat first, just in case someone poisoned the food.
5) Not much money in the economy left over to skim off.
6) The chicas always want to meet "tu hermano."
7) Knowing that when you take over and the US invades, no one will give a shit.

Man Seeks Dog to Enter Political Race
Tricky Rick Santorum Courts Selfish Green Rogue

U.S. Senator Rick Santorum (Man, PA) is hoping lightning can strike twice. The highly unpopular Republican Senator, who is fighting for his Senate seat in this November's elections, is banking on wealthy Republican donors to plant and nurture a "Green" candidate who can drain progressive support from his opponent as Ralph Nader did from Al Gore in the 2000 presidential election.

(Despite trailing in the popular vote, George W. Bush ultimately prevailed over Gore in a 2000 presidential election that came down to a hotly disputed contest for Florida. Although control of the entire Florida state election apparatus was held in the hands of Bush's brother, Jeb, the 97,421 votes cast for Nader in Florida proved conclusive: George W. Bush's margin of victory in the state was 537 votes.

Bush has parlayed his assisted victory in 2000 together with the subsequent 9-11 terrorist attacks into two terms as president, majorities in both houses of congress, and at least two Supreme Court appointments. All that currently stands between the Texas-dominated national GOP and its goal of reconstructing the social world of a Theodore Dreiser novel is the health of 85 year-old moderate Republican Justice John Paul Stevens.)

Santorum, among the lowest-rated politicians in the nation on the environmental issues ostensibly important to the Green party, currently trails his Democratic opponent, Bob Casey, in polls by nine points, although the race is expected to tighten. Casey, however, shares Santorum's pro-life and pro-gun positions, stances Democrats hope will abandon the outspoken Santorum up shit's creek without a paddle.

Enter Carl Romanelli, Green party candidate from Pennsylvania's Luzerne County. According to Paul Kiel of TPMMuckraker.com, at least $55,000 of the $66,000 raised by the PA Green party to get Romanelli on the PA ballot in November was raised from conservatives, at least $40,000 of it from those who also gave to Rick Santorum's campaign.

"Both Republicans and Democrats have this notion that, if Greens are in the race, Democrats lose votes," Romanelli told The Philadelphia Inquirer. "If that was going to motivate someone to contribute, I am fine with that."

Santorum's campaign has admitted its complicity in the ploy, according to the Inquirer:

"We have encouraged those who have inquired or asked to assist in this effort," said Virginia Davis, Santorum's spokeswoman, of the Green Party petitions. She declined to provide specifics. "I think the bigger question here is why is Bob Casey going to such extremes to silence another voice in the Democratic process?"

Among the most active contributors to this PA Green party bid, the Inquirer noted, was the Santorum-boosting Taylor family of Salinas, California:

Steven and Kathryn Taylor and two others at the same address who listed their occupation as students contributed $10,000 to the Green Party; five Taylor family members have contributed $20,700 to Santorum's reelection campaign.

Salinas, California, is about 2,945 miles, or two days and two hours by car, from the Keystone state.

[Edited third paragraph and as noted in comments.]

It's National Clown Week!

Seriously. This is not a comment on politics at all. Honest.

Update: Shakespeare's Sister has the pronouncement which started it all...

Obviously.

As noted by Ahab below, some bloggers, including the EU Referendum, came up with evidence that the Qana atrocity was staged! The bloggers based this claim on their peerless expert opinions about degree of rigor mortis of the bodies, the types of injuries the kids had, the amount of dirt on the rescue workers' clothes, and time stamps on the photos posted on the web.

Now, well-known conservative radio personality, Rush Limbaugh, has weighed in:

"These photographers are obviously willing to participate in propaganda," Limbaugh said. "They know exactly what's being done, all these photos, bringing the bodies out of the rubble, posing them for the cameras, it's all staged. Every bit of it is staged and the still photographers know it."

Obvious, maybe, to a guy like Rush, who obviously has an M.D./Ph.D. in Forensic Pathology, a Ph.D. in Forensic Psychology and a Master's in Photo Analysis. Just so you know, he also did an internship just last year at AP, so obviously knows how their system works. But it's not so obvious to, you know, the photographers and photo editors in question. First, they note that the time stamps on the photos do NOT indicate when they were taken:

...AP does not distribute pictures sequentially; photos are moved based on news value and how quickly they are available for an editor to transmit. The AP indicates to its members when they are sent on the wire, and member Web sites sometimes use a different time stamp to show when they are posted.

They also express their confusion and amazement that such a thing would even be considered.

"It's hard to imagine how someone sitting in an air-conditioned office or broadcast studio many thousands of miles from the scene can decide what occurred on the ground with any degree of accuracy," said Kathleen Carroll, AP's senior vice president and executive editor.

Carroll said in addition to personally speaking with photo editors, "I also know from 30 years of experience in this business that you can't get competitive journalists to participate in the kind of (staging) experience that is being described."

Kath obviously has forgotten Rush's internship in her office. I guess she really was that sloshed at the Holiday party last year! She obviously forgot how he single-handedly solved that filing problem which had vexed the office for nearly a decade!

Despite Rush's qualifications, another photo editor type pointed out how unlikely it was that people would even be able to set up such a charade in a war zone:

"Do you really think these people would risk their lives under Israeli shelling to set up a digging ceremony for dead Lebanese kids?" asked Patrick Baz, Mideast photo director for AFP. "I'm totally stunned by first the question, and I can't imagine that somebody would think something like that would have happened."

The AP had three different photographers there who weren't always aware of what the others were doing, and filed their images to editors separately, said Santiago Lyon, director of photography.

Patrick?! Santiago?! Don't you remember Rush astounding you with his polymath knowledge? Remember how Patrick would fly in from France and you two would let your inter-agency rivalries rest while you and Rush discussed the very best photographs - the reason you all entered this dirty business in the first place? You remember!! He's brilliant, guys! Don't you remember he knows everything?! Obviously.

Cross posted to Little Green Fascists in honor of Rush. Obviously.

Update: Glenn Greenwald makes the point as well as anybody can... perhaps better!

Is Lebanon Israel's Vietnam?

The Boston Globe reports today from inside the Hezbollah unit which drove the Israelis from Bint Jbail:

It was here, a week ago, that Hezbollah fighters stopped several Israeli tanks and turned back an Israeli ground advance that sought to rout them from this strategic Hezbollah stronghold in southern Lebanon. Israeli soldiers have given vivid accounts of hand-to-hand combat, sneak ambushes, and fighters who sprang from a network of tunnels to surprise the Israelis.

The article goes on to paint a portrait of rebels which are very much like the Viet Cong in tactics and determination. And there is a reason for that:

The two Hezbollah fighters described a discipline modeled on the Viet Cong, in which fighters live off the land, scavenge vegetables and canned food, and do battle in autonomous groups with little need for command supervision.

Hussein and Hamid credited their devotion to Islam for their success against the Israelis, but they described a meticulous blueprint for guerrilla warfare built around a carefully selected force, whose members begin training at age 14.

As for the dedication part, it apparently comes from deep religious belief and a profound sense of injustice:

Yesterday afternoon, downtown below Tel Masoud, Hussein was praying alone in a mosque whose rear wall had been blasted away by a shell, giving a view of the battleground above.

The fighter was by turns angry, mystical, and emotional. One day, he said, he gave his only food, a can of tuna, to a dog so hungry that its tongue was hanging contorted from its mouth.

"If I showed mercy on the dog, maybe God would show mercy on me," he said.

After scouring the battleground, Hussein returned with journalists to the hospital at the edge of Bint Jbail to visit friends. He put his head in his hands and started to weep.

"I'm not crying for the fighters. The fighters can handle it. I'm crying for the ordinary people," Hussein said.

Can Israel learn from the lessons of the United States in Vietnam, Somalia and now Iraq? If not, Lebanon just might be their Vietnam.

QUOTE OF THE DAY

Most of the time, I'm an extraordinarily good Christian.

--Ann Coulter, interview at Beliefnet.com

You have to read the whole thing. It's a train wreck -- the questions are serious, and Coulter has clearly crammed for the test, but she can't break out of the riffing-Vegas-insult-comic rhythm:

... You say that the Episcopal Church is "barely even a church." Why?

Because it's become increasingly difficult to distinguish the pronouncements of the Episcopal Church from the latest Madonna video.

Are churches that don't agree with your politics or religious beliefs not really churches?

Correct: They're called "mosques." ...

It's Christian apologetics with a two-drink minimum. She's Andrew "Dice" Aquinas.

Bonus: Ann Coulter's Favorite Bible Verses. No, really.

(X-posted.)

Qana You Sink Any Lower, Confederate Yankee?
Bobo Owens Claims Airstrike Deaths Were Staged

According to wingnut extraordinaire Bobowens of Confederate Yankee, the Lebanese civilians who died this past weekend at Qana staged their own deaths just to make Israel look bad. Or something like that.

Inspired by an article posted on a rightwing Israeli website , Bobowens and sundry likeminded jackals have apparently been spending an inordinate amount of time mired in gory photographs documenting the horrors committed at Qana.

Based on just the web posting, a Wikipedia entry on rigor mortis, and his own, keen CSI skillset, Bobowens reaches his harsh verdict:

I, for one, see clear evidence of a most revolting Hezbollah fraud.

Suicide most foul! The whole thing was staged! Who knew Hezbollah was so devilishly ingenious? Oh, the author of the rightwing Israeli website piece knew it, and he even has a word for it: Hezbollywood.

Careful, though--regarding Bobowens' verdict as that of a crazed conspiracy theorist just might get you IDed as Hezbollah yourself (and eligible for prompt bombing by the IDF?):

Assuredly, Hezbollah's supporters will accuse those questioning the Qana attacks as conspiracy theorists, so I simply advise that viewers view the evidence with their own eyes, and draw their own conclusions from there.

Just trust your eyes, wingers, that's where you'll find the truthiness of the matter.

The Newest Threat to Our Military:

Jon Swift has notified us of a new danger within the ranks of our very own military -- community theater actors! He tells us the terrifying story of Bleu Copas, a soldier who was accused in an anonymous email of being gay, a strict no-no in this man's army. In following up on the accusations, army investigators asked Copas if he acted in community theater, and his positive response was all they needed to boot him out of the service for good.

It turns out that while he was serving in the military, unbeknownst to his superiors, Bleu Copas (whose name sounds like a stage name, which should have been a clue) had acted in three community theater musical productions: 'Ragtime', 'Children of Eden', and 'Beauty and the Beast'. And apparently he has not reformed his theatrical ways since being drummed out of the military as he has just been cast as the male lead in a production of 'Bye, Bye Birdie'. I don't know how many of you have seen a community theater production, but I can tell you from horrifying first-hand experience that community theater is not very good at all. The thought of one of our fighting men tromping around onstage with a bunch of amateur actors in front of slapped together plywood scenery singing wretched show tunes is just too horrible to imagine. I don't know how many other soldiers are currently involved in community theater but I think the Pentagon needs to launch a full-scale investigation immediately. If it turns out that there is a cabal of thespians in the military recruiting other soldiers to perform in sad little theaters across the country, it needs to be nipped in the bud as soon as possible for the safety of our country.

Agreed. Which is why is was extra-horrifying to read in the treasonous newspaper of record, the New York Times, about a theater program in Maine which teaches storytelling and acting to wounded soldiers as a way to assist in their rehabilitation. So, on one hand, we are kicking them out of the military if they are actors and on the other hand we are 'helping' them by teaching them acting? This sounds like a commie moonbat plot!

And once we realize the program is a plot, we are not surprised to learn that the originator of the program is a Catholic monk.

The idea for the program came from Brother Rick Curry, a Jesuit who founded the workshop 19 years ago to provide what he simply calls 'options' for disabled theater artists. About 3,000 disabled students have participated in acting, music, dance and writing classes since 1977, said Brother Curry, 63, but the program had never before specifically sought out veterans. Last July, however, he met an Iraq war veteran whose leg had been amputated above the knee. Brother Curry, who often wears a clerical collar, recalled that the veteran "pulled me aside and said: 'Brother, I don't know where I am. I'm more scared than I was in Iraq.'"

As if that is going to happen. As if one of our brave, wounded veterans is going to have any doubts at all even if they have left body parts behind in Iraq.

Brother Curry wondered if theater might help the soldier find his way. "I thought that a writing program would work," he explained. "They all have a story to tell, and telling a story theatrically gives you a voice that you can share. It emboldens you."

He speaks from experience. He was born without a right hand and forearm. When he was 6, his father enrolled him in an acting class near their home in Philadelphia to help him eliminate a stutter. Brother Curry said he experienced 'the transformative power of the arts.' He recalls the class as 'a watershed in his life,' saying acting inspired him with confidence.

Once we realize the depths to which the obviously deranged moonbat crackpots have sunk, we should be concerned about what they are going to do to our brave wounded veterans!

The staff members had their reservations as well. "I was concerned at first," said Jerome McGill, an alumnus of the acting program who now serves as a resident playwright and mentor. "I thought these guys have kind of a macho sensibility." But the program's communal lifestyle and rigorous morning-to-evening schedule helped the two groups quickly integrate. "I realized after the first day that they really did fit in," Mr. McGill said.

So, the deranged moonbat lunatics are forcing our brave soldiers to live communally as if they were just abject communists. And they are forcing them to follow a rigorous daily schedule. What other indignities are they imposing on these brave young men?

Mr. Conforti's work is supported by that staple of creative writing workshops everywhere: peer criticism. Faculty and students take meals together. Trading ideas and stories throughout the day, the veterans describe the program as a "full-immersion" experience.

Isn't 'full immersion' considered torture now? And the brave soldiers have to tolerate the additional torture of constant and unrelenting criticism -- at breakfast, lunch and dinner!
And what is the ultimate nefarious goal of the disturbed moonbat head cases?

Mr. McGill said the work's impact would go beyond the individuals who create it. "We're going to have a whole new population of people with disabilities helping to create a body of dramatic literature about disability," he said. "It's going to enrich the literature we create."

Sounds like a plan for world domination to me!


Cross posted to Little Green Fascists.

Julia would like to remind you that if anti-war Democrats really were engaging in a "purge," a certain other non-peacenik Northeastern marquee-name Senate Democrat who's up for reelection would be feeling the wrath of the Stalinists, which is decidedly not the case.

(X-post.)

WHY WE NEED MORE MEXICANS IN THE US, NOT FEWER:

Leftist Plans Sit-Ins to Challenge Mexico Vote

Maybe they can teach us something about how democracy works.

TAKING THE THIRD
Living in Europe with its numerous political parties makes the failure of third parties in the US even more striking and quizzical for me. At Sadly,No! , Retardo Montalban wades into the contentitious issue of third party politics, and admirably avoids getting bogged down in a discussion of 2000 and the attendant finger-pointing. He concludes with:

I agree that as a practical matter, supporting a third party is suicidal. But until it's acknowledged what drives the Left into the arms of third parties and something's done about it, it'll keep happening. The Left always gets killed; the height of cruelty is to demand that it shouldn't die at least on its own terms.

As one who has felt driven out of the Democratic Party for the last several elections (to the point of driving me out of the US), I can say that one problem is the utter refusal of the Party leadership to engage substantively in the issues which I deem important. The namby-pambying about Iraq is only Exhibit ZZ in a long line of major disappointments from the supposedly "centrist" Dems who supposedly know how to win elections (alternative energy, major electoral reform, education, blah blah, you can list your own).

And don't tell me to work within the established structure. I tried that in New York, Indiana and California, and there was almost zero input into national policy at the local party level. I understand that under Dean that has changed somewhat, but the DLC are still not welcoming us with open arms, which is a stark contrast to how the GOP wooed Southern conservative voters. Without wanting to replay 2000, I would dare to say that if Gore had made any acknowledgements of the concerns of Nader voters (he wouldn't even mention Nader's name until the very late days) about the environment, consumer protection, et al., that he wouldn't have lost Florida (assuming those votes would have been counted correctly).

Look, Dem leaders, I'm here to tell you that we progressives can be bought cheap. Really. Just tell us, as Clinton did, that you are concerned about our issues, and we'll be right there with you. We just want to be listened to (and loved). Is that so wrong?

HATEMONGER CAMPAIGNS FOR REPUBLICAN SENATE CANDIDATE IN MICHIGAN

Rock star Ted Nugent is speaking out again, this time for Michigan Republican U-S Senate candidate Mike Bouchard.

Nugent and Bouchard, the Oakland County, Michigan, sheriff, met with supporters tonight before the "Motor City Madman" performed at a Sault Sainte Marie casino.

Bouchard faces Troy minister Keith Butler in the August-eighth G-O-P primary. The winner will face incumbent Democratic Senator Debbie Stabenow in November...

--AP

Longtime readers of my blog have seen most of these already, but here are a few of Nugent's most charming quips:

"My being there (South Africa) isn't going to affect any political structure. Besides, apartheid isn't that cut-and-dry. All men are not created equal." - Detroit Free Press Magazine , July 15, 1990

"...Yeah, we want to go to Saudi Arabia, man, and see if we can't get a four iron and knock people's laundry off the top of their heads. Wear laundry on your head and die, is the basic theme of the Damn Yankees ... (The Damn Yankees was Ted's band in the '90s)" - WRIF-FM, Detroit, Ted Nugent as guest D.J., September 25, 1990

"... Yeah they love me (in Japan) - they're still assholes. These people they don't know what life is. I don't have a following, they need me; they don't like me they need me ... Foreigners are assholes; foreigners are scum; I don't like 'em; I don't want 'em in this country; I don't want 'em selling me doughnuts; I don't want 'em pumping my gas; I don't want 'em downwind of my life-OK? So anyhow-and I'm dead serious ..." - WRIF-FM, Detroit, Ted Nugent as guest D.J., November 19, 1992

About Hillary Clinton: "You probably can't use the term 'toxic cunt' in your magazine, but that's what she is. Her very existence insults the spirit of individualism in this country. This bitch is nothing but a two-bit whore for Fidel Castro." - Westword Newspaper , Denver, Colorado, July 27, 1994

... Interviewed in late '92 on WRIF-FM ... he referred to Heidi Prescott (of The Fund for Animals) as a 'worhtless whore' and a 'shallow slut' and suggested 'Who needs to club a seal, when you could club Heidi?' Detroit Free Press , April 5, 1995

More here.

Bouchard leads Butler in the polls.

Forget Ann Coulter -- why is Nugent not beyond the pale? Because he rawks?

(X-post.)

Qana

This weekend, the Israeli Defense Force bombed a compound in Qana where two large extended Lebanese families had taken shelter from Israel's reign of death and destruction. The dead are in the dozens, mostly children.

Will Martin Peretz allow me to note that those who murder innocent people are not innocent? Will Alan Dershowitz permit me to point out that the man whose five children, aged two to fifteen, perished, is indeed a victim undeserving of the horror brought on him, even though on NPR I heard him swear allegiance to Hizbullah and Nasrallah? Will Leon Wieseltier, Peter Beinart, and Marshall Wittman sanction my right to speak about the Israeli Brigadier General who attempted to justify the so-called 48-hour hiatus in bombing when even the IDF admits it is no such thing? The general simply could not answer the question about how the "hiatus" differs from the status quo. Are Al From and his friends Steven Rosen and Keith Weissman going to call me anti-Semitic for labeling this IDF general, and by extension, the Israeli power establishment, as the apotheosis of Orwellian?

If there's one thing to take from this episode, other than the starkly frightening voice of the Lebanese man who said on the radio "Israel will be razed. It will be cancelled from the map," it is that Joe Lieberman must be destroyed. Because Israel must suffer a defeat after this; we cannot allow it to move beyond this unscathed, and Lieberman's defeat will be a defeat for Israel, only without the death of innocents. God knows that Joe Lieberman, along with Peretz, Dershowitz, Wieseltier, Beinart, Wittman, From, Rosen, and Weissman, not to mention that Brigadier General, are not innocent.

Stupidly fighting a war in a way that radicalizes the populace, destabilizes the region, and almost certainly threatens to create more terrorists? Check:

An Israeli air raid on the southern Lebanese town of Qana killed dozens of civilians on Sunday, many of them children, marking the bloodiest day of this conflict....

... there is ... pressure from allied Arab nations like Egypt, Jordan and Saudi Arabia, who want to see Hezbollah diminished but who sense rising anger about the civilian death toll in Lebanon among their populations.

Demonstrators in Beirut attacked a United Nations building, breaking windows and ransacking some floors. They carried signs reading: "Arabs, you chickens," and "American-made bombs, dropped by Israeli planes, with Arab cover."...

The crowd chanted slogans against the Egyptian president, Hosni Mubarak, saying: "Zionist, oh Zionist, Hosni Mubarak is a Zionist."...

Losing ground when you were sure your tactics would bring a quick, glorious victory? Check:

On Sunday, Hezbollah fired more than 156 rockets into northern Israel, the Israeli Army said, the highest total so far in the fighting....

It almost seems as if America was jealous of Islamicist groups like Al Qaeda that seem to have exported their war-fighting style to other fighters -- so we exported ours to Israel.

(X-post.)

More Good News Out of Iraq!

BAGHDAD, Iraq, July 29 - The State Department agency in charge of $1.4 billion in reconstruction money in Iraq used an accounting shell game to hide ballooning cost overruns on its projects there and knowingly withheld information on schedule delays from Congress, a federal audit released late Friday has found.

The [United States Agency for International Development] hid construction overruns by listing them as overhead or administrative costs, according to the audit, written by the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction, an independent office that reports to Congress, the Pentagon and the State Department...

The findings appeared in an audit of a children's hospital in Basra, but they referred to the wider reconstruction activities of the development agency in Iraq.

But they asked permission to count it that way:

In March 2005, A.I.D. asked the Iraq Reconstruction and Management Office at the United States Embassy in Baghdad for permission to downsize some projects to ease widespread financing problems. In its request, it said that it had to "absorb greatly increased construction costs" at the Basra hospital and that it would make a modest shift of priorities and reduce "contractor overhead" on the project.

The embassy office approved the request. But the audit found that the agency interpreted the document as permission to change reporting of costs across its program.

Referring to the embassy office's approval, the inspector general wrote, "The memorandum was not intended to give U.S.A.I.D. blanket permission to change the reporting of all indirect costs."

I wonder if some former Enron executives were involved.

The report said it suspected that other unreported costs on the hospital could drive the tab even higher. In another case cited in the report, a power station project in Musayyib, the direct construction cost cited by the development agency was $6.6 million, while the overhead cost was $27.6 million.

One result is that the project's overhead, a figure that normally runs to a maximum of 30 percent, was a stunning 418 percent.

Meanwhile, Sergeant Lucas Murray managed to build a playground for Iraqi kids using no Federal funds at all:

The constant weapons raids and roadside bomb explosions began to weigh on the mind of Sergeant Lucas Murray during his year in Iraq. Watching local children play soccer, with artillery shells marking the goals, made the Boston parks architect think he could make a lasting contribution to the community simply by doing what he did for a living back home.

He built a playground.

With donations from a playground equipment company and muscle from friends in the National Guard, he constructed the park he had dreamed of, giving the children of Abraham Jaffas, north of Baghdad, somewhere to play other than trash heaps in a town still devastated from the invasion three years ago.

"The children of Iraq are the ones we want to grow up seeing us as the good guys, as opposed to an organization that came in to remove a dictator and left them worse off," Murray said. "This was my strategy for helping the war effort on a humanitarian level. We built something permanent to leave behind."

I'm thinking we put Murray in charge of reconstruction and there might actually be some hope for Iraq.

Update:

The Basra hospital mentioned was championed by Laura Bush and Condoleeza Rice. This is what Dr. Chasib Latif Ali, executive director of the Health Ministry, said about that project and others:

"The Americans have made a lot of promises to us, but not even 10 percent of them have materialized."

He said that, of nearly 180 medical facilities promised by the U.S., contracts were awarded for 142. Only six have been completed and turned over to the Iraqis and those "are not even fully complete."

"This comes as a sharp contrast to the Japanese," Ali said. "They have promised and delivered 13 hospitals around the country, including three cutting-edge cancer centers. The Japanese have been very faithful to us, unfortunately, the Americans aren't like that."

I guess the problem is that we promised too much to the Iraqis. Maybe if we promised 6 hospitals to them and 136 to Bechtel, we could have delivered. Or we could have promised playgrounds to the Iraqis. Now, there's an idea!

Bomb their infrastructure to kingdom come and then build playgrounds. That'll work!

AS PROMISED...
I have been meaning to write "lighter" post about living in Austria, amongs the "Wieners" focusing (as is my wont) on the strange and bizarre aspects of being here. While I hate the typical "Oh my God, these people do things differently from us, isn't that kooky!" type of narrative that afflicts Slate's (among others) travel writers, there are some things that I find rather inexplicable from a culture so similar to the one I know from the US. Chief among these:

It's a great town for dogs but they don't pick up their dogs' shit. Having a very cute Labrador, I am grateful that Vienna has a lot of parks and green space which are open to dogs, and that dogs are allowed on the buses, trains and in restaurants (I can feel all you dog haters crossing Vienna off your itineraries right now). BUT, even though this is a clean city where people don't throw trash on the streets, dog owners do NOT clean up their dog poops. Even though they all eventually step in some other doggies' do, it does not occur to them to, as Gandhi said, "be the change they want." I have no explanation for this, unless it is related to the fact that:

Wieners openly and unashamedly break their own laws. One friend of mine here was commenting about driving in America and was amazed how much Americans mind the speed limits as compared to Austrians (even thought heir speed limits are higher). I, in turn, was amazed that he thought this, but it made me realize that most Americans break laws guiltily, whereas here they do it without qualms. On any given bus or train about 80% of the people are "Schwartzfaherer", i.e., those who ride without paying. There are occasional inspectors, but there are also websites that list the stations at which the inspectors will be on a given day.

Wieners are generally pretty grumpy people. When even Germans complain that Wieners are dour, you know something is amiss. For a people who invented the term Gemütlichkeit, they don't seem to be enjoying themselves very much. Again, I have no explanation for this. This is a clean (except see above) attractive well-run city with a good economy and a better climate than most of central Europe. I think it may have something to do with the fact they still haven't gotten over going from the largest empire in Europe at one time to a country the size of Maryland. Another Wiener friend of mine commented that "we don't like the Germans, we don't like the Swiss, we don't like the Italians, and we don't like ourselves very much either." The only ones they tolerate are the Hungarians, their partners in lost empiredom. This sense-of-superiority-while-looking-for-something-to-feel-superior-to feeds (I believe) into the following tendency:

Wieners like telling other people what to do. Again, when Germans complain that Wieners nag too much, you know it's a serious problem. These nags are particularly (it seems) sharp when it's over something that doesn't concern them in the slightest. E.g., when I ride my bike with my dog next to me on the leash, I always receive someone yelling at me about how I am endangering his life, even though if I were in an accident, the first thing I would do would be let go of the leash so he wouldn't be dragged into it.

And, the thing I find most annoying (OK, besides stepping in other dogs' crap):

Wieners are notorious line-cutters. Anyone who has ever been in a queue in the Third World will recognize the "triangle formation" of most Wien queues, with the apex somewhere at the end of the line and the base at the front, where numerous people are trying to edge their way in. The old ladies are particularly good at this, it seems. Also, if you are in line at a supermarket, and another cash register opens, sprint as quickly as you can to the new line, because everyone else is. None of this "I can help the next person," stuff here. By the way, if you think American sales clerks hate their jobs, wait until you see the ones here. And while we're on the subject:

Most bars and many restaurants here do not have cash registers. This can cause getting drinks at bars to be agonizingly slow, as the ubiquitous leather money pouch must be opened and the correct change pulled from the mass of coins inside. Again, I have no explanation why this is so. The technology exists, I have seen it.

OK, disclaimers: I have largely enjoyed my time here. As I said, this is a very livable and affordable city, with a lot of stuff going on, and once you make some friends, you make very deep and lasting friendships. But it is always the things one doesn't expect that stand out.

One final warning: if you are here and it is your birthday, don't mention it in a bar unless you want to buy a round for the house. That is the tradition here, the reverse of what we are used to (fortunately, on my birthday my friends here understood this and bought me a round - my tradition rules!) . I am told it is this way in most of Europe except England, so it is not specific to Vienna, but I thought it a useful bit of advice for my fellow travelers - it can save you a lot of money.

God, Can't Imagine How THAT Happened

The NY Times, still clinging to the quaint notion that some civility might be shamed out of the Bush administration, bemoans the partisan divide over Iraq which, according to some polls cited, exceeds that over Vietnam. And of course they are concerned about this affecting the famed congeniality of the Senate. In good Times fashion, they go first to Inside-the-Beltway types for money quotes.

"The old idea that politics stops at the water's edge is no longer with us, and I think we've lost something as a result," said John C. Danforth, a former senator and an ambassador to the United Nations under President Bush.

Well, gosh and golly, J.C., why do you suppose that is.? Could it be because YOUR former boss made it a partisan issue? That he has consistently portrayed the Democrats as acting against American interests when they cast doubt (in the mildest terms possible) on any of his nitwitted foreign policy ventures? Or because the Republicans control the Executive and the Legislature and have rammed through idiotic proposals without even consulting the Democrats (or giving them time to read the legislation) and then acucsing the Dems of being obstructionist?

This is not meant to rag on John Danforth who is a good and decent man (even if his name does sound suspiciously like John Danforth (Dan) Quayle) and has taken the Bush administration to task in the NY Times. But to rue the loss of this mythic bipartisanship and not to point out who is to blame is telling half the story at best

Herr Perfesser: Filthy Liar

Josh Marshall has the "dark and shameful" details.

Update: (I'm slow on the uptake here--Atrios linked to this hours ago. But I'm going to leave it up anyway. I like the look of it.)

Update 2: Digby's got great post up on this topic, and Atrios has more .

Update 3: Roy Edroso dramatizes the case nicely.

Breaking: Now We Will Win In Iraq!

BAGHDAD, Iraq - The U.S. command confirmed Saturday that it will move about 3,700 troops to Baghdad to try to quell violence in the capital.

The 172nd Stryker Brigade, which had been due to leave Iraq after a year's assignment, will be sent from northern Iraq to the capital, Gen. George W. Casey Jr., the top U.S. commander in Iraq, said.

They'll be all rested and refreshed when they get to Baghdad, so this transfer means we will definitely win the war, now! And Casey agrees with me:

"This will place our most experienced unit with our most mobile and agile systems in support of our main effort," Casey said. "With the rest of the elements of the plan, this gives us a potentially decisive capability to affect security in Baghdad."

The statement followed President Bush's decision this week to bolster American forces in Baghdad to try to stem the tide of Sunni-Shiite violence - now seen as a greater threat to Iraq than the Sunni-led insurgency.

I just can't wait until we win the war and that sweet Iraqi crude starts flowing again. I'm going to buy me a Hummer when that happens!

Cross-posted to Little Green Fascists. It's hard work to write posts for both blogs, as LGF, as we like to call it, is much less sophisticated than Roger's blog!

But We're Safer From Terrorism Now, Right?

(AP) Undercover government investigators purchased sensitive surplus military equipment such as launcher mounts for shoulder-fired missiles and guided missile radar test sets from a Defense Department contractor...

In June, two GAO investigators spent $1.1 million on such equipment at two excess property warehouses. Their purchases included several types of body armor inserts used by troops in Iraq and Afghanistan, an all-band antenna used to track aircraft, and a digital signal converter used in naval surveillance.

"The body armor could be used by terrorists or other criminal activity," noted the report, obtained Friday by The Associated Press.

"Many of the other military items have weapons applications that would also be useful to terrorists." Thousands of items that should have been destroyed were sold to the public, the report said. Much of the equipment was sold for pennies on the dollar...

At least 2,669 sensitive military items were sold to 79 buyers in 216 sales transactions from November 2005 to June 2006.

It wouldn't be so bad if the GAO had just discovered the problem, but this isn't the first time they have told the Defense Department about it:

"During previous hearings we learned DOD was a bargain basement for would-be terrorists due to lax security screening of excess military equipment," [Rep. Christopher Shays, R-Conn., chairman of the House Government Reform Committee's national security panel,] said in a statement Friday. "Based on GAO's most recent undercover investigation it looks like the store is still open."

Heck of a job, Dubya Administration!

Seattle Erupts Into Holy War
Wingnuts man battlestations, prepare for long hard slog

Pajamas Media (no link, on second thought) makes first contact with the enemy and--surprise!--it's the MSM:

22:48 PDT Let the Spin Begin! The AP is already being careful in its reporting on the Seattle shootings: "The gunman, who employees said claimed to be a Muslim angry at Israel." Emphasis added [sic].

AP being careful. Can you effing imagine? Don't these idiots know we're at war? The Constitution's not a suicide pact, after all, yada yada yada.

And then there's this:

23:26 PDT Champion of Free "Expression." The New York Times begins its first story on the Seattle shootings thus: "Five people were injured and one was killed Friday afternoon when a man who expressed anger toward Jews opened fire in the offices of the Jewish Federation of Greater Seattle, the authorities said." Story is handled at the bottom of the page under "More News." At the top of the page with full color illustration: Casualties of War: Lebanon's Trees, Air and Sea. (NYT)

You can't make this stuff up. We're trying to fight WWIII here and these cheese-eating French surrender monkeys would have us humping foreign trees, etc. Jesus wept!

More later as the fighting unfolds...

Update: Steve M. in comments points us to reaction from the ne plus ultra of wingnuttery, Michelle Malkin. Says Malkin of the FBI's conclusion that the shooting is probably not terrorism-related: "Crikey."

Update 2: Steve M. has much more on this story, as does Tom Hilton.

[Edited incessantly.]

More Correct Facts from Ann Coulter

The other day, Coulter displayed the careful fact checking which has made her a household name. Chris Matthews didn't even notice:

On the July 27 edition of MSNBC's Hardball with Chris Matthews, in addition to asserting that former Vice President Al Gore is a "total fag" and suggesting that the American people would like to see the U.N. headquarters bombed, right-wing pundit Ann Coulter also pronounced herself "in awe of the voters of South Carolina" -- a pronouncement that might be true, if by "Carolina," she meant "Dakota," and if by "in awe of," she meant "disgusted with." Coulter was erroneously crediting activists who oppose abortion rights with garnering enough public support to place an abortion ban on the ballot. In fact, it was supporters -- not opponents -- of abortion rights in South Dakota -- not Carolina -- who placed a measure on the November ballot that would allow voters to uphold or strike down a state law banning most abortions.

Contact Sporty: theskewer(at)[the extremely warm]mail.com if you wish.

Breaking: George W. Bush Apologizes ... Sort Of

Staff at Prestwick Airport in Scotland have been uncomfortable with handling the flights of American planes stopping there for re-fueling because the planes are carrying bombs for Israel. This issue is being investigated by the British government and it appears there have been procedural errors in notifying the Scots about the planes' cargo. The matter came up in discussion at Tony Blair's meetings with the President at the White House today:

Briefing reporters after the discussions, Mr Blair's official spokesman told reporters: "President Bush did apologise for the fact that proper procedures were not followed, but that was all.

"It was just one line. As part of the introduction, the president said sorry there was a problem.

"It was a gracious thing to do."

Friday Cat Blogging!














Tony
Greatest Cat of All Time
(1990?-2005)














Eli
Not the Greatest Cat of All Time
(2005-?)

Bilmon Says it Best About Israel in Lebanon

"The military and political leaders of the Jewish state are doing and saying things that go way beyond the blustering arrogance of a powerful nation at war. Not to put too fine a point on it, but they are behaving like a gang of miltaristic thugs -- whose reply to any criticism or reproach is an expletive deleted and the smash of an iron fist...

This all might be considered normal military behavior for, oh say, a Bosnian Serb militia captain, circa 1991, but when the political and military leaders of an allegedly civilized state start talking this way, something big is going on, and going wrong. The dehumanization of the enemy (much of the Israeli press routinely uses the word "terrorist" to refer to any Hizbullah fighter or Palestinian militant), combined with the rage and humiliation at not being able to stop the rain of rockets falling on northern Israel, are knocking the props out from under whatever remains of Israel's claim to be different from, and morally superior to, its enemies...

If there's one thing that should be obvious from this God awful tragedy in the making, it's that history has a savage sense of irony -- cruel and pitiless almost beyond belief. That Israel, haven to Holocaust survivors, should find itself in this situation, and respond to it in this way, is enough to make the very walls of Jerusalem weep. As I weep now."

Go read if you haven't already.

ANN COULTER MAKES HER BIG POLITICAL MOVE!

...Er, sort of. She's finally found a candidate who's not embarrassed to be seen with her on the campaign trail:

This guy.

He's Jeffers MacArthur Dodge and he's running for ... er, well, he's only running for the California State Assembly (warning: utterly inappropriate audio -- a cover version of Midnight Oil's not-even-remotely-right-wing "Beds Are Burning"). Ann's kicking off his campaign with a fund-raiser at Culver Studios -- which, as Mr. Dodge gleefully points out, is the site of Tara from the movie Gone with the Wind.

(Hey, Ann -- your guy picks this site for a fund-raiser and you're making wisecracks about Clinton and Gore's heterosexuality?)

Mr. Dodge makes videos and engineers music for such Z-listers as Michael McCarthy and the Beautiful Fools and Rainlord. He also provides Web services, e.g., for Media Drool. (Which really might be the ugliest site ever designed.) And he made this utterly incoherent 9/11 video, which seems to suggest that on that day Hitler flew airplanes from Saturn into the lower floors of the Twin Towers, after which the terrorists fled, leading their camels. (I may be garbling a few plot points.)

Despite my offensive snark a couple of paragraphs up, Mr. D. is very much anti-gay -- so much so that he wants to prevent businesses from choosing to offer benefits to domestic partners. (Being pro-capitalist doesn't mean letting capitalist enterprises decide these things for themselves -- not when there are yahoos to pander to!) He's also "Against Transsexual/Cross Dressing in Workplace."

He thinks it's important to "secure the boarder." He compares the ACLU to the Nazi Party under Hitler. Oh, and his policy on transportation?

"Flintstones" vs. "The Jetsons" - The choice is yours.

Er ... yeah, right. Got it.

Ann, I think you've found a guy who is to public service what you are to human decency.

****

(X-posted.)

The Austrian Connection

One of the four UN observers killed in the Israelei airstrike in Lebanon was an Austrian brigadier. Here in Wien it is a major topic of conversation. Well, if they truly want to get some UN troops to act as peacekeepers there, I know one nation that is definitely not going to volunteer troops. Another triumph for diplomacy (I know John Bolton would heartily approve).

Also, I think this is a telling headline "Bush-Blair discuss Middle East discord." Do you think they were talking about how to make more of it?

Shorter Peter Beinart: "Ditto Joe Lieberman: 'We undermine the president's credibility at our nation's peril.'"

Update: Is it me, or has that photo drifted to the right?

The Unborn, Like The Undead, May Always Be With Us (Updated)

I was winning an argument about economic policy with a guy from Tennessee* on July Fourth. So, he got desperate and tried to change the subject to one not so dependent on facts by asking, "What do you think about 'The Unborn'?"

I replied, "What do you mean, 'The Unborn'? Is that like 'The Undead'?"

Needless to say, he wasn't very pleased. But it did get me thinking about The Unborn and The Undead and not just because goo is often involved in both. They have much in common:

• Both are catch-all terms for groups which have a lot of variety -- The Unborn range from a just-fertilized egg to a 36 week-old fetus able to live outside the womb. The Undead range from vampires through mummies to zombies. Now that is quite the variety since I have it on good authority that zombies just love sunlight while sunlight turns vampires to dust.
  
  
• Both are scary -- The Unborn are scary if you don't want to be a parent and are pregnant or if you do want to be a parent and something goes wrong or you do want to be a parent but you don't know if you can handle it... and The Undead, of course, are scary because they want to tear us limb from limb, drink our blood and/or eat our brains.
  
  
• Both have had movies made about them.
  
  
• Both can be invisible -- Have you ever seen The Undead in real life? Of course not. And if you said yes, it was just some kid dressed up as a zombie on Halloween. Similarly, The Unborn can be very, very small -- about a tenth of the size of the period at the end of this sentence. [Heh. 'Period'. Get it?]
  
  
• Both are tricky -- Does the vampire warn you before she bites you? No! Do you even know if one of The Unborn in fertilized egg form is floating around in you unless it implants and you start getting symptoms? Of course not!
  
  
• Both are relentless -- The Undead will not give up at all. Think about the zombie films you've seen where The Undead just keep coming back in their ferocious search for brains. Think of Nosferatu unable to resist his craving for blood. That is just like a pregnancy. The Unborn will do what it takes to become The Born because they are programmed for survival. Well, unless there is a lethal defect so embryo doesn't implant correctly or develop properly. Or the mother's health and nutrition won't support a pregnancy. Or... well, we all know that not every pregnancy ends happily. [Warning: one of the following links freaked out D. Sidhe, who will never have sex again] And those molar pregnancies are some some scary stuff -- just like zombies.
  
  
• Both The Unborn and The Undead are vulnerable to flames, stakes and/or electrocution.

Finally, although both are funny looking and have dedicated fan base, neither 'The Unborn' nor 'The Undead' is an conclusive description of human beings. 'The Unborn' is just another inaccurate label and I rightly wiped the floor with that Tennessee guy's butt* when he tried to get all sanctimonious on me.

* not hard to do since he started the whole debate by saying, "I come from one of the richest states in the country!" (look at the state tenth from the bottom)


Update: Thanks to commenter Geezer, I now realize I've been channeling B-film maker Roger Corman for this article. The proof is here and here. Direct all comments to Roger Roger's estate. No, not that Roger! Roger Corman!

Contact Sporty: theskewer(at)[the extremely warm]mail.com

And now a message from the American Family Association and Agape Press:

"Good news! We found yet another thing for right-wing Christians to be angry about even though it doesn't affect them in any way, shape or form!"

Prospective applicants to prestigious Harvard Business School no longer have to be of the male or female gender. One pro-family leader in Washington, DC, is criticizing the school for legitimizing transgenderism.

Before completing an application, students looking to enter the Harvard Business School MBA program are asked to fill out an online profile that offers three choices of gender: female, male, or transgender. The form also asks prospective applicants if they would be interested in learning more about the school's "lesbian/gay/bisexual/transgender" community.

(It's true -- check out the "Gender" pull-down menu on the application.)

Bob Knight, director of the Culture and Family Institute (CFI) at Concerned Women for America, says "it's not compassionate" for Harvard to encourage people to reject their "God-given natures." But then Knight considers the source.

"I'm not surprised it's coming out of Harvard," he says, "because they've flirted with the idea that, in terms of sexuality, anything goes, and they've given intellectual respectability to it." ...

My advice to Harvard Business School? Admit the transgendered. But stop admitting the ignorant, self-satisfied cokehead frat boys with politically prominent parents.

****

(X-posted at NMMNB.)

Shorter David S. Broder: "Hate the sin [Bush White House], love the sinners [who put him there]."

Hewitt and Reynolds Agree:
Jews Control the Press

I don't actually have anything to add to what I posted on this yesterday, but I didn't want my attempt at "school of Roger" styling in that earlier post to steal the emphasis from this Instapundit slur (Reynolds citing Hewitt):

UPDATE: Indeed: "When next the elders of the MSM tribe gather to moan the loss of civility in politics, I hope somebody brings along this tape."

So there it is again for your viewing pleasure. I have the password and carte blanche from Roger, so I may post this one a few more times for good measure. Although chances are Reynolds will put up some fresh new outrage for us today.

Shorter Peggy Noonan: "George W. Bush needs to grow the hell up. Or maybe he can just spin his way out of it."

Andrew Sullivan is never wrong

So Andrew Sullivan finally admits that Al Gore is right about global warming. But lest you think that might be a moment of soul-searching after Sullivan compared Gore to Dick Cheney and the entirely fabricated argument for war in Iraq, Andrew makes sure to spend more time bashing Gore for be insufficiently pro-active on this issue than he does crediting Gore for being right, oh, forty years and counting before the ruling party.

Keep in mind that for basically his entire pundit career, Sullivan has scorned the global warming movement and laughed at those who critically examined the evidence and came away in agreement with 100% of the peer-reviewed studies of climate change. But wait!

"I think a serious gas tax and a tough increase in mandatory fuel economy standards in the U.S. are essential to prompting the technological breakthroughs that alone can ameliorate this. And yet Gore balked. Just like he did when he was in power."

First of all, make no mistake, if Gore were President he would have kept our signature on the Kyoto Protocol and spent significant political capital on ramming it up James Inhofe's ass.

Secondly, Andrew Sullivan takes up a stance in opposition to a leader of the movement that will, if successful, enact the measures needed to combat global warming, even though he just said that radical measures need to be adopted. That is both inexplicable and mind-bogglingly inept politics. And this man is actually paid to write on the subject about which he evidently knows so little?

THE best-kept secret in global diplomacy is out - US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice will perform a piano recital at the annual gala of Asia's top security meeting, diplomats and reports said....

Rice ... is expected to perform a work from one of her favourite composers, who include Brahms and Shostakovich, the New Straits Times said....

--GG2.net News

Accompanied, presumably, by Nero on fiddle.

(Cross-posted at No More Mister Nice Blog.)

IT TAKES A VILLAGE; OR AT LEAST A PRESENT PARENT

So, Fran Mainella, head of the National Park Service is resigning, "...ending a five-year tenure at an agency often at odds with environmentalists and Westerners." Her stated reason for resigning was "to spend more time with her family." Of course the cyncial amongst us note that is the excuse for resigning whenever a government official is caught taking brides, a Congressman's fondling of a female staffer is unveiled, or a Cabiner member proves to be disloyal to George Bush. The extremely uncharitable (you talkin' to me?) might note that that Mainella has made great headway in her goal of having no more National Parks to service, and like the Lone Ranger, her work here is done.

But let's take her at her word. So does that mean her loved ones been languishing in neglect while she was busy selling off parcels of land with a view of Old Faithful? What does that mean for a "family values" administration? I can imagine the scene today at the Mainella household*:

[*NOTE: from what I could determine, Fran Mainella was recently remarried after having lost her first husband of 28 years, and I could not tell if she has any children. So let's take an archetypal female government employee who just resigned to spend more time with her family and call her, oh, "Fran Mainella"]

She: Who are those ill-behaved brats?

He: Those are our children, dear. You gave birth to them, remember?

She: Impossible! I gave birth to cute little gook-covered red dolls! What happened to them?? There were two, right?

And let's zoom in on a therapist's office, circa 2015:

"Life was OK, just us and Dad, and then this woman appeared, claiming she was our Mom and wanting to spend more time with us. But she had been away so long, she had no idea what we were like, and all she did was get testy with us. It was when she proposed thinning our numbers that things got really horrific..."

We can't let this kind of neglect go on! For the sake of the children, I propose that ALL adminsitration officials with families IMMEDIATELY resign to spend more time with them! And those who don't have families yet (paging Ken Mehlman) well, go out and get one! It's your duty, after all!

The Protocols of the Elders of Wingnuttia

Chris Matthews' recent and long-overdue public smelling of the coffee drives Instacracker firmly into the arms of homeys Don Imus and Hugh Hewitt:

Here's the best reaction Instabigot can come up with for himself:

[Matthews] has a rather shaky grasp of reality, judging by these comments.

So he turns for support to the incontinent sputterings of an old fart:

I can't do better than quote Don Imus's observation: "That is really just an...that is just an absurd, ridiculous position. I'm just...I'm almost embarrassed that you've said that."

Before finally plumbing the bottom together with Hewitt the nitwit in a typical wingnuttian anti-Semitic smear:

Indeed: "When next the elders of the MSM tribe gather to moan the loss of civility in politics, I hope somebody brings along this tape." Though the problem is less a lack of civility than a lack of coherence.

I'm sorry to say that this one's no forgery, folks. It's just the idle chatter of another eminently civil and coherent day atop the freeper dungheap.