Reads

Last year I essentially superglued myself to the idea that I was going to read as much about early American history as I could. It started early last year when I saw historian Joseph Ellis talking about his book, "His Excellency", which was a biography on George Washington. The talk was compelling (thanks C-Span!) enough for me to spirit away the book out of my father's library (I don't think he missed it; it was returned in due time) and dig in. Ellis mentioned that despite the fact that though Washington is the most well-known of the Founding Fathers, he is also one that people know the least about, save the apocryphal stories about chopping down the cherry tree and that he had wooden teeth. (He didn't; he wore dentures made of others human teeth...a story in and of itself.) After reading his book, I found out that I, too, knew very little about Washington the man. Thus started a cycle of non-stop reading about our Founding Fathers: John Adams by David McCullough, 1776 by David McCullough, Alexander Hamilton, American by Richard Brookhiser, Alexander Hamilton by Ron Chernow, and to finish off, The History of the American People by Paul Johnson. In between I managed to squeeze in Neil Peart's Traveling Music just to take a break in the American history theme, as well as How To Think Like Da Vinci(which was interesting)...and Keith Emerson's autobiographical Pictures of an Exhibitionist. A good year for reading!

This year it is all about Rome. I started off the year with Rubicon: The Last Years of the Roman Republic, seguing into Suetonius' Twelve Caesars. And how did I wind up reading about this Roman stuff? Believe it or not, HBO's series of the same name. What has struck me about the death of the Roman republic is how terribly its demise set back the progress of republican democracy for a thousand years. Granted, Rome was more of a plutocracy than democracy, but it still had democratic leanings, coming as it did after the rise of the Athenian democratic model. But with Julius Caesar's single act of crossing over the Rubicon and entering Rome under arms (a predecessor, Sulla, had done the same thing, but he in the end relinquished all power and retired), he destroyed republicanism as a means of government for close to fifteen hundred years, leading to a Roman imperium, then with the collapse of the Western Roman Empire, feudalism and monarchies that dovetailed into the whole "divine right of kings" concept fostered by the Roman Catholic Church. Not until the Age of Enlightenment did European thinkers take up the cause of democratic republicanism, and not until the founding of the United States as a republican entity did the concept once again take hold.

One thing about history. You never know where it will find its relevance to today's world.

Not Exactly "Miracle On Ice", But....

Switzerland beat Canada in Olympic hockey today by a score of 2-0. Hard for a lot of people who don't follow hockey (much less international hockey) to understand the magnitude of, but in the hockey world, this is a big deal. Canada doesn't really have a lot that it can hang its hat on culturally, so Canadian dominance in hockey is a point of pride for them. When they lose in international competition, its a painful national experience. When the Team Canada failed to win the gold medal in the Nagano Winter Olympics a few years back, Wayne Gretzky (then still playing) described himself as "devastated". When the Edmonton Oilers won the Stanley Cup for the first time in 1984, one Canadian hockey writer after another insinuated that the Cup was "back in Canada, where it belongs". I guess there was some pride lost to Americans when the Toronto Blue Jays won the World Series of baseball, but if there was, I didn't read about it or talk to anyone who felt it. Conversely, Canadians feel simply awful when they don't win in hockey, acutely when there's no Canadian-based teams competing for the Stanley Cup, and significantly more when they lose in international competition.

Switzerland has never been considered a hockey powerhouse in any way, shape, or form. The traditional European hockey powerhouses are Sweden, Czechoslovakia (now Czech Republic and Slovakia), Russia (formerly USSR), and to a lesser extent, Finland. The Swiss, Germans, Danish, Norwegians or Italians rarely figured into the equation, and were considered "also-rans". Not so with the Swiss in these Olympics. The Swiss, sporting a 2-1 record in the round-robin tournament, have on their wall the scalps of two hockey powerhouses: Czech Republic and Canada.

There's still an opportunity for the Canadians to climb back into it and win the Olympic tourney. But their loss to the Swiss has made things a lot more interesting.

There has been a shift in power in the hockey world.

Happy Valentine's Day...I Want To Talk About Al Gore

And now that we've gotten that out of the way, I'd like to talk about Al Gore's speech in Saudi Arabia this weekend. I'll let the exact quotes speak for themselves, and I'll weigh in in brackets:

"The thoughtless way in which visas are now handled, that is a mistake...the worst thing we can possibly do is to cut off the channels of friendship and mutual understanding between Saudi Arabia and the United States."

[Gore is talking about, get this, the fact that the United States made the student visa application process for Saudi students appreciably more difficult after 9/11. Gore either obviously forgot that a.)fifteen of the nineteen hijackers on 9/11/01 were here on student visas, and b.) that they came from Saudi Arabia. Or not. Either way, I fail to understand how a rational, thoughtful, and informed man could make this statement. I guess if you're not rational, thoughtful, and/or informed you could. Glenn Reynold's put it best: "Only Al Gore could come up with the idea of criticizing Bush for not sucking up to the Saudis enough."]

Associated Press wrote this:

"Former Vice President Al Gore told a mainly Saudi audience on Sunday that the U.S. government committed 'terrible abuses' against Arabs after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, and that most Americans did not support such treatment.

Gore said Arabs had been 'indiscriminately rounded up' and held in 'unforgivable' conditions."

[I'm all for knowing if this is true. But this is the first I've heard of it, and if it did happen (and in all likelihood, it did), I'd like to know who was "terribly abused", and whether they were held in "unforgivable" conditions. More to the point, if Gore were so concerned about this, why is he saying this in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, and not in the United States (which essentially means his comments will get played all over the Arab world, which already spouts dangerous agit-prop to begin with)? As I previously said, that there was mass round-up, I do not doubt. How many of these people were on illegal work or student visas? According to Bill O'Reilly (who I don't always agree with, but I believe his research on this point), all of 70 people were rounded up, with all of 13 having been falsely detained, though quickly released. O'Reilly called Gore's people about THEIR source material, but was told, in essence, to stick it. This is an Eason Jordan moment for Gore, in my opinion. Jordan, if you recall, said at a conference in Europe last year (Davos?) that the United States Military was deliberately targeting journalists. At first he denied he said it, but when an audio of his speech was produced, he couldn't produce any evidence of his contention. He soon lost his job as head of CNN News. Execrable though Gore's charge is, as he said it on foreign (enemy?) soil, he can redeem himself somewhat if he backs up his claim. I doubt he can.]

Snowstorms, Gretzky's Wife, Emergency Rooms, And An Emotionally Co-Dependent Cat Named Bob

Pardon the lack of posting these last few weeks, folks. A combination of ill health and mental exhaustion due to overwork had rendered me bereft any thoughts on anything, save sleeping, eating, taking codein-based cough suppressant (which, by the way, gives a pretty decent buzz), and a nasal steriod. I'm appreciably better now, but it was tough going for a few days there, as I tried to work through my sickness and wound up checking into NYU Downtown Medical after resultant bronchial difficulties at work. I've noticed a tendency in my outlook when I'm sick, which is that I can't remember what it was like to be healthy. Conversely, I've also noticed that when I'm healthy I forget what it is like to be sick, and thus fail to take care of myself enough to avoid getting sick. Strange.

So here we are, in mid-February, with one humdinger of a snowstorm on our hands. Winter has been pretty mild in these parts, but in my bones I knew it was too good to last for the whole season. I used to love winter, but I find my dislike for it growing with every passing year. I won't be leaving New York any time soon, but I am looking forward to the spring.

As for the burgeoning gambling scandal in hockey, I'm still monitoring it closely. I've always loved hockey, not just because of the sport itself, but also for the way in which those in the game have conducted themselves. Unlike the other three major (and more popular) sports, pro hockey players typically don't get in trouble with the law, and eschew the brash, arrogant behavior that one sees in other sports, particularly in football and basketball. I still think this is by-and-large true, but this gambling scandal has certainly tarnished the game. That Wayne Gretzky's wife was implicated in this cannot be construed as a non-issue, as some have said. It is reported that Gretzky has been caught on tape conspiring to protect his wife from the public relations fallout that he knew would inevitably ensue. Understandable though his sentiments are, Gretzky lied to the press a day before, saying he knew nothing of his wife's gambling. The day after his denials, the news broke that he knew about his wife's gambling vis-a-vis the wiretaps, as he was caught talking to asst. coach Rick Tocchet about the situation.

I can't think of anyone who has carried themselves with more poise during their playing careers than Wayne Gretzky. In the entire 20 year professional career that he had, I can recall Gretzky saying only one controversial thing. (He said in '82 that the New Jersey Devils were a "Mickey Mouse franchise", which, needless to say, blew up in his face.) For a man who carried himself with such grace and class for so long to get busted lying to the press, it certainly doesn't look good for Gretzky, his wife, or The Game.

As I write this blog-entry, I'm being harrassed by my cat (Bob), who absolutely refuses to not be the center and object of my attention. Just figured I'd let you all know of his existence. Little bastard.

Pardon The Interruption

I've been feeling a bit "under the weather" for a while, and particularly in the last week. I'll resume blogging is soon as I am able to put together a coherent thought and not cough all over the keyboard every 30 seconds.

Hope you are all as well as I look forward to being.

Mojo

Yesterday I picked up the latest issue of Mojo Magazine, which features Pete Townshend and Roger Daltrey on the cover. I guess I could consider myself a fan of Mojo, as well as a few other British music magazines like Classic Rock and Q, for a very simple reason: far from writing about the latest "hot" act, they look at music in a much broader, linear way. Thus, in 2006, they feature two ol' geezers in their 60's, Roger and Pete. In every issue I've ever bought of the aforementioned publications, I've always read something interesting about an act or acts that I'd never known, heard or heard of. In this particular issue of Mojo, for example, they have several features on The Who, but also the Strokes (who I'm not keen on, but they are a current, popular act), Dion (famous doo-wop guy from the late 50's), and Thin Lizzy (Dublin-based hard rock outfit who were much bigger in Britain and Ireland than here). Far from being snotty and elitist like Spin or Rolling Stone, Mojo celebrates music in a wider sense. It's pretty refreshing, albeit more expensive, but worth every dollar.

Random Thoughts 01/20/2006

Since I made the mistake of falling asleep at 9:00 pm, I'm now blogging at 3:00 am, as I've fulfilled my quota for sleep for the day/night and my biological schedule is now officially out of whack for the next twenty-four hours. C'est la vie.

Osama bin Laden supposedly released an audiotape within the last twenty-four hours, purporting any number of things. I'll not go into them, as they barely warrant much of a response. But one thing that is obvious about the message is that he's fully aware of what is going on within the United States and what people are saying about this war on Islamo-fascism. Last year, for example, he taunted Bush about his continued reading of 'My Pet Goat' even after being told by Chief-Of-Staff Andy Card that the World Trade Center had been hit on 9/11. I'm not sure what Bush would've or should've done in that moment, as he was essentially powerless at that moment to act in any meaningful way; nor was it clear at the time to his people that location that he was in at the time was secure, or that his path of movement was secure. But so it goes. Yet another ridiculous bone of contention from the barmy left, picked up and used by our mortal enemy bin Laden. Michael Moore followers must've taken great pride in themselves at that moment. (Note sarcastic tone.) Anyway, bin Laden claims he can and will hit the U.S. again at the time of his choosing. I don't believe him, and I think his operational ability to launch an attack has been sereverly compromised by any number of measures taken against him and his network, both domestically and internationally. More than that, I'm still wondering why Ayman al-Zawahiri can make videotapes of his speeches, but bin Laden now only makes audiotapes. I've previously posted that bin Laden is either seriously injured and/or disfigured or dead. I still hold to that theory.

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I've been a Macintosh person for most of my life, having learned to use one back when I was going to college. I don't think I'd be stretching it to say that having learned how to use a Mac enabled me to graduate from college, as I had a very paper-intensive major and concentration. (On any given week during my junior and senior year I had anywhere from three to five papers to write, some long-form, some short.) As a result, I've had an affinity for Macintoshes since that point in my life. (I'm currently writing this blog entry on a Mac.) That said, I'm not really sure the Mac is the most practical machine for uses such as blogging. For example, though this blog program is available in both Mac and PC formats, the Mac version doesn't let me italicize, bullet-point, or post links, whereas the PC version does. It's not the worst thing in the world, mind, but it does cramp one's style. A few years back I bought a Mac G4 (which I still currently use) specifically to run ProTools, a music recording software. The salesman at Sam Ash who sold it to me told me that the PC version of ProTools was substandard and that I'd be pulling my hair out in frustration if I went the PC route. (Which was a cheaper route, natch.) So I went the Mac route. I don't regret it, mind, but for things such as blogging, internet surfing, etc., it's just not as good. In all likelihood, I'll probably get a PC laptop and use the Mac strictly for recording.

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There was a story that I read about in Paul Fussell's 'Wartime-Understanding and Behavior of the Second World War' that I always found amusing involving General George S. Patton. Patton had a reputation as a "fighting general", and was nicknamed by the fawning American press "ol' blood and guts". He also had a reputation for being a martinet of the first order, and got himself into hot water at one point for slapping not one, but two GIs that had been infirmed at field hospitals in Sicily for combat fatigue. (One of the GIs that he slapped for, as he put it, "cowardice", had actually been involuntarily pulled off the line by his commanding officer not because he had lost his nerve, but because he'd been on the line for months and had become incontinent. He also had been previously wounded twice, and had received a Silver Star for bravery under fire.) Anyway, the story went like this:

General Patton pulls into a field hospital to "buck up" the wounded GIs. After talking to three or four wounded GIs, Patton comes to a fellow sitting in bed, minding his own business and reading a comic book. Patton bellows to the wounded man, "Soldier! Do you know who I am!?! You show proper respect and salute me!!!" The wounded man looks over his comic book, then says to Patton, "Hey, f*ck you, General. I'm in the Merchant Marine."

Too bad the story was apocryphal. But many GIs believed it to be true at the time. As the saying goes, never let the facts geet in the way of a good story.

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I haven't heard Howard Stern's new Sirius radio show, and frankly, I'm not that motivated or interested enough to make an effort to hear it. However, I have listened to David Lee Roth's show in the same time slot that Howard used to have on K-Rock (now re-branded as "Free Radio"), and I have to say...that I actually enjoy it. I've never been a fan of David Lee Roth, as I found him to be kind of clownish when he was in Van Halen. (I know there are alot of people who swear that VH went down the tubes when Roth left and Sammy Hagar took over, but I'm not one of them; I think there was some great music that came out of the "Van Hagar" era. But I digress.) I'm not sure he'll survive in his current slot, as Howard Stern is a tough act to follow. But I'm kind of rooting for Roth to succeed. Additionally, it is rather refreshing to listen to an enthusiastic, positive guy in the morning in the person of Roth than miserable, negative, and frequently cruel Stern. Sure, Stern was funny, but it was often at someone else's expense.


Consider me a nominal fan of Roth at this point. I might even forgive him for wearing pink spandex with furry boots when he was in VH. Here's to hoping for his success in this new endeavor of his.

I'm off to make a futile attempt at sleeping.

Benjamin Franklin Turns 300

Today marks the 300th birthday of Benjamin Franklin. Nothing I can write one way or another could either add or detract from the man's impact on American, and by extension world, history. Christopher Hitchens, in the Wall Street Journal, called Benjamin Franklin "the Socrates of Philadelphia". Franklin was a wit, an innovator, a bon vivant, a pillar of society, and a lovable con man, but more than that, he was indispensable to the cause of American republican democracy.

The George Foreman Grill

Appropo of nothing save my wonder for the device, I'd like to state for the record to all of you readers out there my extreme pleasure with the George Foreman grill. I'm currently grilling a few hamburger patties as I write this, and the tasty aroma is currently filling my apartment. I look forward to the delightful yield of the all-mighty George Foreman grill, as well as any future epicurean delights this ingenious contraption may serve up for my dining pleasure.

Quote

As for Borking — the smearing of conservative Supreme Court nominees through blatant dissembling about their character and thinking — it falls flat today because the American people have become largely immune to the strategy. It has been unleashed with such frequency and fury during the last 20 years that even a casual observer understands that every conservative nominee cannot possibly be a racist, sexist, and unethical pervert.

--Mark Levin

Mrs. Alito

Drudge Report has reported that Judge Samuel Alito's wife was so taken aback by the rough and sometimes humiliating treatment Alito received at the hands of Biden, Kennedy, Feingold, Schumer, etc. that she broke into tears. This was an interesting moment, potentially a watershed. I'm very interested to see how this plays out in the press the next few days/weeks/months, but as far as Spitfire's Hurricane is concerned, I can't see it being a net gain for the Democrats on the judiciary committee. Making a man's wife cry is....uh....kind of brutish and ugly, and certainly won't play well with women. Whether it is a factor during this mid-term election remains to be seen. (Mind you, we're only in January, and the elections are a long way away.) But it isn't good. At all.

Reading Eric Alterman's daily leftist rage today on MSNBC's website, I was happy to see that he agreed with my previous contention that all this Democratic bloviating from Biden, Leahy, Kennedy, Schumer was actually helping Alito, not hurting him. The libs on the Judiciary Committee are spending the lion's share of their allotted question-time on throwing haymakers at Alito, and less time listening to his answers.

It's all over but the shouting. Alito is in, barring some unforeseen unearthed dirt on the man.

The Bigger Picture

Analysis of current events is a very tricky thing, and having read many, many, many books on history on subjects as diverse as World War Two, World War One, the American Civil War, and biographies of Churchill, Roosevelt, Stalin, Mao, Robespierre, Eisenhower, Kennedy, Khruschev, etc., one underlying theme has revealed itself time and again: things are not what they seem at the time that history is unfolding. A few examples:

-It is common perception that Hitler violated the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact by invading the Soviet Union and betrayed his oath of non-aggression towards Stalin. As legend would have it, Stalin was placed into a state of catatonia for close to five days after the Nazi war machine had hurtled deep into Soviet territory, so shocked he was at this betrayal. This is only partially true. According to unearthed KGB archives that author Edvard Radzinsky, Stalin had every intention of thrusting westward to crush Hitler. Stalinists apologists in this country, peopled as they are in the academic cadres of our universities, have been peddling the "Stalin was a victim of betrayal" line for years. But the documents don't lie. In a document Radzinsky unearthed at the Historical/Military Archive of the USSR called "Reflections on a Plan forf the Strategic Deployment of the Armed forces of the Soviet Union in the Event of War with Germany and her Allies", a plan for an offensive was meticulously mapped out. Fifteen pages of the text discuss plans for a surprise attack on Germany.

Radzinsky's book was published in 1996. American academics had been teaching the lie of a peaceful USSR having been attacked by an aggressive Nazi war machine, in all likelihood, since the war itself. All Hitler did was beat Stalin to the punch, as Hitler got himself prepared for an offensive sooner than Stalin. (A sidenote: I was absolutely floored by this revelation in the Radzinsky book, and relayed my findings to my mother, who grew up in Europe during the war. Her response was even more surprising, when she said "EVERYONE in Europe knew that!")

-From 1943 on, Allied bombers flying from England, North Africa, then later Sicily and Italy (after Sicily and Italy had been taken) flew to Germany with the express goal of destroying the German military-industrial complex and its capacity to produce tanks, planes, guns, ball-bearings, etc. In May of 1945, after VE Day, the Allies had discovered that despite repeated bomber sorties and fighter plane strafings, the German industrial capacity was still operating at 80% of full capacity. German Armaments Minister Albert Speer had cleverly subdivided the factories into smaller, underground complexes, and thus, was able to maintain an unforseen (by the Allies) production resiliency. What the incessant bombing sorties DID accomplish was they burnt out the German Luftwaffe (airforce) staffs. So frequent were the bombing raids that the Germans lost all their best pilots over a two year period, leaving them with more than enough planes, but no one to fly them. Attempts at training fresh pilots were for naught because the skies were too dangerous most of the time, thus fresh pilots couldn't get enough air time to be effective.

-The Cuban Missle Crisis is generally thought of as a victory for Kennedy and a defeat for Khruschev. Psychologically this was true, but strategically the Soviets got the better of the deal. In return for removing intermediate-range missles from Cuba, Kennedy was forced to remove intermediate-range American missles from Turkey. He was also forced to give a committment not to attempt to invade Cuba again.

-Throughout the Cold War, liberals charged that there was an unnatural obsession amongst conservatives regarding communist infiltration in government, media, entertainment, and journalism. Alger Hiss, in particular, became the cause celebre of the liberals when he was named by the House of Un-American Activities as a Soviet spy. (Hiss, by the way, was the Undersecretary of State in the Roosevelt Administration and was a major player in the negotiation of the Yalta Agreement, an agreement that essentially sold all of central and eastern Europe to Stalin and condemned tens of thousands of Czech, Polish, Hungarian, etc. refugees to repatriation and death in Stalin's camps.) For decades, DECADES, liberals said that Hiss was the victim of a witch hunt, a great American slandered by the "fascist" right. And they kept it up until....the Venona files were opened up for public viewing. Venona, the code name for the secret program that J. Edgar Hoover started, was a secret group within the FBI that had cracked the Soviet codes and revealed many of the Soviet spies within government, entertainment, journalism, and the military. Hiss was revealed, beyond a shadow of a doubt, as a Soviet spy.

Now, consider this: Hiss was convicted of perjury in 1950 for denying that he knew Whittaker Chambers, but not for spying. The Venona intercepts, now completely public, put to rest for all of history that Hiss was a spy, in 1997. The truth, as it really was, came to pass FIFTY SEVEN YEARS LATER.

Which brings me to my point:

Many on the left (all?) have claimed that the charge that Bush made to invade Iraq, the existence of WMDs, was deliberately bogus and designed to get us into a war with Iraq for the sole purpose of avenging Saddam's assassination attempt on "Daddy" (Bush's father). Pretty simplistic reasoning, I'd say, but whatever. But WMDs have not been found, so the casus belli for the war was not justified. Perhaps so, perhaps not. Sometimes history unfolds quickly, but most times, it takes years, perhaps decades, sometimes even centuries for the true nature of a historical event to actually reveal itself. It might be the case that Saddam had no WMDs. I doubt this contention profoundly, not because I have actual evidence that they existed, but a tremendous amount of anecdotal evidence. For instance, why all the oil-for-food bribes to all these significant people in the United Nations? Why the attempt to buy yellowcake uranium from Niger? (Yes, it did happen folks, Joe Wilson's prevarications notwithstanding; Wilson told one thing to the press, another to the Senate Intelligence Estimate, and the attempted buy was backed up by officials in Niger as well as Wilson himself. The false documents that the Italians provided were not the sole reason why the president used those fateful "18 words" in SOTU.) Why did the Clintonistas warble the same threats of WMDs throughout the 90's? Where did they go between the Bush and Clinton Administrations? Why did Italian, German, Israeli, Jordanian, Egyptian, Kuwaiti, and British Intelligence come to the same conclusions regarding the presence of WMDs as the CIA did? Is it beyond the realm of possibility that they were moved to either Iran or Syria? (He had plenty of time to move them!) And why is this such an impossible assumption for the anti-war lefties to make? And what of the Saddam terrorist links? We're only now getting around to translating those seized Iraqi documents, and they're showing MASSIVE support of jihadists. (Read Stephen Hayes at the Weekly Standard regarding that topic. You certainly won't see it on the front page of the New York Times.)

I'm taking the longview. There are too many unaswered questions on the whole Saddam/WMD connection for me to concede that it was an absolute fraud. If it took fifty seven years for proof of Alger Hiss's guilt to come to light, if it took fifty four years for Edvard Radzinsky to unearth a document that irrefutably proved that Stalin had every intention of attacking Hitler before Hitler attacked Stalin, and if it took over a decade for the truth to come out that Kennedy had actually strategically LOST the Cuban Missle Crisis face-off, I think I'll give it some time before the WMD question is settled. The study of history doesn't operate with a time expiration.

Where's Osama?

Good question. We've been hearing this query from the derisive left mostly, in a kind of semi-taunt at the Bush Administration, which supposedly "dropped the ball" at Tora Bora. (This taunt, by the way, is an intrinsic, if unintended, insult to our military brass and specifically to Delta Force, the most elite fighting force in the United States Military. But they're for the troops!) I've been saying for at least a year that Osama is, in all likelihood, dead. I might or might not have been wrong a year ago, but I did have good reason to think that OBL no longer walked amongst the living. For one thing, people like Osama are megalomaniacs: they love the sound of their own voice, they glory in the power they possess to move people to self-destructive acts, they take delight in their potency. But we haven't seen OBL for some time. Sure we've gotten some audio-tapes of him, but what happened to all those videos of him pontificating, clothed in a combined contume of drab military garb and Islamic head-dress, with automatic weapon to his side, haughtily taunting us western decadent types? I haven't seen a new video of OBL in at least two and a half years, which leads me to believe a few things. Either he is:

a.) Dead
b.) Critically injured or deformed by combat
c.) Deathly ill
d.) Laying low

Let's take choice d.) for starters. If OBL is "laying low", what good does that do for the morale of al Qaeda, or the wider jihad movement? The answer is...it doesn't. I fail to see how morale could be high in the jihadist movement or al Qaeda when the spiritual leader either can't or won't stick his head out of the caves just to say "hi!", even if it is on video. Ayman al-Zawahiri clearly is still alive...he's been communicating with Zarqawi in Iraq (we've intercepted his communications), and has made videos as well as audiotapes. He's still out there "selling" the jihad. But nothing of OBL. Something is afoot.

Peter Brookes, sometime NY Post columnist and a representative of the conservative Heritage Foundation wrote about this in his column today. The indispensable Michael Ledeen, who has massive contacts within Iran, has also written about this, claiming that his Iranian contacts have told him that OBL died this past December of kidney failure. Might or might not be true, but I'd say the reasons for his absence are closer to the first three choices I posted above, and probably less about the last. In times of war, many in America, particularly on the left, lose their nerve easily and assume that the enemy (whoever that enemy may be) is superhuman, super-durable, and is immune to our ferocious barrages. Nothing could be further from the truth. Our enemies, like us, are human, subject to the same fears of injury and death, and I don't think the incessant incantations of "Allahu Akbar!" change that. (This is why I take great issue with the leftist contention that we've created "a million bin Ladens". For one, there's no way to quantify this, and two, I seriously doubt that potential young jihadists would find it greatly motivational when their older brothers or fathers come home from the jihad maimed or in a pine box. If anything, I think the opposite is true. They may be more radicalized, but they're not apt to take up arms when the prospect of their young lives ending within a month is a genuine inevitability.) So I don't think that OBL has walked away from his former headquarters in Afghanistan unscathed; I think he's at best "on the run", never sleeping in the same bed twice, and cut off from the world. At worst (for him, that is), he's disfigured (and is thus no longer "camera friendly"), or he's dead. If it is the latter, and the rumors are true that he died of kidney failure, it would be a case of the "law of unintended consequences" once again rearing its head. It would be fine by me. His inability to get proper medical treatment was probably the result of being on the run in places with little to no modern medical technology. Either way, dead is dead. And in OBL's case, dead is good.

In conclusion, I think it would be greatly in the interests of the United States and our allies in the war on Islamo-terrorists to make a big campaign to have OBL show himself to the world, if only on video. Let's demand "proof of life". Let's see if the "great man", the "strong horse" is still running the show, is in good health, and is operational. Bush and/or prominent members of his administration should make a point of mentioning that OBL is nowhere to be found, and that it is doubtful he is fully functional, if not alive. Force the hand of the jihadists. If OBL is alive, he'll come out of his lair and declare so. If he's not, it would be a big blow to the jihadist movement and a coup for the forces of civilization. Either way, we win.

Alito, Day Two

I spent the day at home attempting to get over a nasty cold ( I've been trying to beat it for five days), which meant I occupied my time sneezing, wheezing, and coughing in front of C-Span today watching the Alito hearings. A few observations:

I filched these numbers from NRO Bench Memos blog, which I think are indicative of the long-winded, torturous questioning technique of Joe Biden:

Biden: 3673 words
Alito: 1013 words

What these numbers mean? That Biden more interested in hearing the sound of his own voice than asking pointed questions to Judge Alito. It's not really about Alito, you see. Whether Biden is aware of it or not, he treats these hearings like they're about him, not the justice nominee in question. Can you imagine a job interview where the interviewer talks 260% more than you do? I will say this: if Biden wants to use up all his questioning time on himself, fine. It actually benefits Alito. If I were a liberal, I'd be very annoyed with Biden for wasting precious time making interminable observations and little time demanding responses from his subject. At one point, Joe Biden took TWELVE minutes to ask a question. Zzzzzzzzz.

Ted Kennedy did his Ted Kennedy thing. Reductio ad absurdum.

Senator Russ Feingold came off articulate, if partisan. He asked very pointed questions of Alito regarding presidential powers and seems in a state of high dudgeon over the NSA wire-tapping issue. I got the feeling he was using Alito as a proxy for his gripes against the administration. From what I understand, Alito has written very little (if anything) regarding the powers of the executive branch, so it might've been a bit off base asking these questions of Alito. But at least he was (moderately) polite.

Then there was Chuck Schumer. What an obnoxious guttersnipe. Asking questions with a tone of unmistakeable contempt for Alito, Chuck wouldn't even wait for a full answer before cutting in with more rudeness. I've written about this before and I still think it to be the case: this Roe v. Wade defense on the part of people like Schumer has done more harm than help to the Democrats. First off, it's ghoulish to be so passionate about such a thing. Secondly, Roe has severely damaged the integrity of SCOTUS by creating a constitutional right where none existed. But more importantly, had Schumer done his homework, he would've realized that Alito, whilst on the 3rd Circuit Court, actually ruled IN FAVOR of Planned Parenthood and voted to strike down the a ban on partial birth abortion based on the laws and precedents that he found were binding. In the end, I think Chuck and the rest of the Democrats on the Judiciary Committee are going to vote against Alito anyway, and use these hearings as a way to beat the crap out of a nominee while they're able to.

Prediction: Alito gets confirmed along party lines, with a few defections. The Dems won't filibuster in an election year, particularly since it would be construed as a violation of the "Gang of 14" agreement.

Something to remember: Justice John Paul Stevens is 86.

Alito

These confirmation hearings, even the edited versions that find their way onto the evening news, are painful to watch. There's nothing more cringe-worthy than watching superannuated drunkard Ted Kennedy pontificating and hectoring a man that is clearly his superior on every level. Then there's the pre-eminent pompous blowhard/plagiarist Joe Biden piping in with his long-winded and inevitably impertinent blather. Then there's Patrick Leahy, the quintessential nancy-boy/pain-in-the-ass weighing in. But the guy that takes the cake is Chuck Schumer. Ugh....pejoritive adjectives cannot describe or do justice to what an execrable presence this guy is. Makes me long for the days of Senator D'amato. Alphonse may have been corrupt, but at least he didn't come off like the human incarnation of a ferret. (Come to think of it, isn't Chuck Schumer's staff under investigation for attempting to gain access to the credit report of Lt. Governor Michael Steele (Md.)? Steele, by the way, is black, which certainly goes a long way in explaining why Chuckie's minions went on a mission to destroy him. (Nothing more offensive to a liberal than a black Republican! Diversity of opinion isn't for minorities, you know....))

I usually attempt to remain somewhat erudite and reasoned with these posts, but these Democratic senators on the Judicial Committee are too much.

All right. Enough mud thrown.

Random Thoughts 01/07/2006

A few things that have been going through my mind for the last week or so:

Since when did having military service under your belt (politically speaking) make one an expert on all things military? Since when did one's positions politically become unassailable due to military service? The answer to the questions are...they don't. However, for the last few years, having military service in one's resume has come to mean that one's political positions are unassailable. The silliness of staking this claim amazes me. Sure, Rep. Jack Murtha (D-Pa.) has a right to say whatever he wants about the war in Iraq. But the legitimacy of his critiques are no more and no less legitimate than anyone elses. Ditto John Kerry. They have a right to speak out in any way they so wish, as ridiculously as they wish, but their military experience adds little heft to their opinions. It also shouldn't preclude those who see their opinions, who lack the same military and combat experience, from saying that they're wrong, or that their integrity is without question. Consider this man's resume:

After beginning his career as a teacher and a coach, he joined the U.S. Navy and became one of the most highly decorated pilots in the Vietnam War. As the first fighter ace of the war, he was nominated for the Medal of Honor, received the Navy Cross, two Silver Stars, fifteen Air Medals, the Purple Heart, and several other decorations.

Some military record, eh? The above excerpt was from the biography of now-disgraced Pennslyvania Congressman Duke Cunningham (R). Is Duke Cunningham above reproach?

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During the DNC in '04, I was cringing at the ridiculously fatuous military posturing of John Kerry. There's little doubt that his service was honorable (although some of his former colleagues in the Navy would disagree), and there is little doubt that his opportunistic behavior was absolutely disgusting once he came back to the States, culminating in his mostly apocryphal and slanderous testimony in front of the Senate in '71. Just to remind, Kerry claimed that American forces in Vietnam "personally raped, cut off ears, cut off heads, taped wires from portable telephones to human genitals and turned on the power, cut off limbs, [blew] up bodies, randomly shot at civilians, razed villages in fashion reminiscent of Genghis Khan, shot cattle and dogs for fun, poisoned food stocks, and generally ravaged the countryside." (It was later revealed that many of these events were conveyed to Kerry from bogus sources, and it is questionable that Kerry witnesses any of these acts himself.)But let's assume that the preceding excerpt from John Kerry's Senate testimony was correct. Why, then, would John Kerry stand up in front of the entire DNC, and by extension all of America, and proclaim, "I'm John Kerry, reporting for duty!"

I'm still trying to figure why, if John Kerry himself admitted that he's a "war criminal", he would make such a militaristic spectacle out of his nomination. If John Kerry was "reporting for duty", does that mean he was reporting for duty to "cut off ears, cut off heads...and shoot cattle and dogs for fun"?

I guess it doesn't matter at this point. Kerry is a busted flush, and the closest that he'll ever get to the White House is if he is either invited to it, driving by it, or becomes a cabinet member in a Democratic presidency.

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Russian President Vladimir Putin has been showing his true colors as of late, threatening to cut off gas to Ukraine if they don't pay significantly higher prices for it. (Price gauging would be the word to use.) Me thinks that he's not too happy to see an emerging democracy in Ukraine, much less Georgia. There is little doubt in my mind that Putin, old KGB officer that he is, is aiming to reconstitute some semblance of the old Soviet empire. It might not be as strictly dogmatic ideologically as the USSR, mind, but the man certainly has imperial ambitions to take back the pieces of what was once traditionally Russian imperial territory, which would include Ukraine, Georgia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia, among others.

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One of the biggest misconceptions of American history is that Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal policies got America out of the Great Depression. The numbers don't support this theory in the least. If anything, it elongated it, and the only thing that pulled the United States (and the world, for that matter) out of the Great Depression was, ironically, the Second World War. Herbert Hoover can take lion's share of the blame for precipitating the Great Depression, but not for the reasons that Lefties would like you to think. Modern day leftist thought likes to depict Hoover as a "do-nothing". If only! Hoover, despite being a Republican, was no conservative. Calvin Coolidge, who employed him in his cabinet for political reasons, once said of Hoover: "That man offered me unsolicited advice for six years....all of it bad ." Hoover was a social engineer, a socialist in the classic sense. When the economy took a hit after the Crash of '29, Hoover started meddling with the economy to get it back on track. As is always the case when government gets involved in the commercial aspects of America, it didn't work. Hoover's Secretary of Treasury Andrew Mellon gave Hoover the best piece of advice that unfortunately was never used. "Liquidate, labor, liquidate stocks, liquidate the farmers, liquidate real estate...purge the rotteness from the economy". Historian Paul Johnson postulates that "by allowing the Depression to let rip, unsound business would quickly have been bankrupted and the sound would've survived. Wages would have fallen to their natural level". Instead of agreeing with Mellon, Hoover did just the opposite: he raised taxes on the highest bracket from 25% to 63% (!?!), he approved the Smoot-Hawley Tariffs, which ignited a trade war with the rest of the world and turned the Depression into an international malady, and of course, went on a bender with social programs. By the time Hoover left office in 1933, unemployment was over 30%. Not that Roosevelt was any better. Unemployment never went below 18% on his watch, and there was still little to no GDP growth. At one point Roosevelt's agricultural policies included paying farmers for CUTTING BACK on production or for producing nothing at all. By decreasing supply, Roosevelt postulated, he would raise produce prices. As for the existing surplus, he had, in the midst of the Great Depression mind you, had ten million acres of cotton destroyed and six million pigs slaughtered. Agriculture secretary (and Soviet spy, by the way) Henry Wallace called it "cleaning up the wreckage from the old days of unbalanced production". Unbelievable.

In 1974, New Dealer and Roosevelt Administration official Rexford Tugwell said, "We didn't admit it at the time, but practically the whole New Deal was extrapolated from programs that Hoover started".

If only Calvin Coolidge had run in 1928, we could've avoided all of this. Coolidge was the last true laissez-faire president America has had. Coolidge and his oft-slandered predecessor, Warren Harding, went through a similar economic downturn in 1920-21. (Coolidge was Harding's VP.) Instead of jumping into the U.S. economy with both feet and screwing up the works as Hoover and Roosevelt did, they did nothing, save cutting government spending. The net result was the greatest economic upsurge in American history up 'til that point, the "Roaring 20's". Far from being the gluttonous, profligate era that Lefties depict it to be, with little to no enjoyment of wealth beyond an elite few, the 20's saw personal savings of Americans quadruple, and 11 million new homeowners spring up. The wealth was far more widely distributed than leftist historians would have you believe.

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"Nothing is easier than the expenditure of public money. It doesn't appear to belong to anyone. The temptation is overwhelming to bestow it on somebody."

-Calvin Coolidge

(How I wish every politician on both sides of the aisle would remember this!)


Enjoy your weekend, readers.

Europe and the Jews

Despite contentions to the contrary from some kooks on the far-left (is there another kind?) and the far-right, not to mention the mainstream press and academia of the Middle East (not counting Israel, natch), the wholesale genocide of the Jews in Europe DID happen. The proof is in the pudding, specifically in regards to the meticulous records the Nazis kept. Though I've not been there, there are voluminous records at places like Auschwitz, Bergen-Belsen, Treblinka, etc. that document every person that came through the gates, save the weak, the elderly, and the crippled, who were dispatched on the spot. Either the Holocaust is the greatest, most meticulous, enormous fraud ever perpetrated, or the records the Nazis left behind are real. Why this is of any question to anyone is beyond me, and it never ceases to amaze me that the more execrable elements of the world deny that it happened, YET wish that it WOULD happen. In one fell swoop, they deny it happened, yet wish for it. Amazing. But more than anything else, the thought that crossed my mind this week was this: did Europe snuff out its greatest minds? Consider the scientific, medical, technological, and artistic achievements of the Jews; as a people, I can't think of too many that rival them in regards to being at the vanguard of human progress. Europe snuffed them out. A few went to Israel before and after 1948, a few stayed in Europe, but a large portion of them came to America. Is it just happenstance that America has been the pre-eminent world power since the Second World War? Is it happenstance that the vast majority of medical breakthroughs, technological breakthroughs, artistic breakthroughs, and engineering breakthroughs all seem to derive from the United States these days, particularly since WWII? Does one need to wonder why our economy trumps all others? Was it luck? IS it luck?

Before WWII, America was a sleepy little nation; Western Europe was at the front of the upward surge of humanity. Now America is. Coincidence? Or is it the European Jewry, who were lucky enough to flee before the war, or lucky enough to survive the war, got to America, and contributed to its present-day pre-eminence? I'm not saying that they account for ALL of America's great 20th Century achievements, but one cannot discount their significant contribution to American supremacy in so many important fields of endeavor either. If one cares to debate this point, one can simply think of Albert Einstein (Swiss Jew who left before WWII), Edward Teller (fled Hungary prior to WWII), Jonas Salk (parents were Russian-Jew refugees from Czarist pograms), Milton Friedman (Hungarian Jewish parents), Henry Kissinger, Andy Grove, and Yitzhak Perlman. All of them either emigrated from Europe, or had parents that did. In all likelihood, all of them were fleeing for reasons of persecution. This is just a partial list; I can spend the next fifty sentences plugging in the names of Jewish-Americans who can count their emigration, or their parents, to the United States in the last hundred years.

Europe let the Holocaust happen...no, they ENCOURAGED the Holocaust to happen. Now Europe, particularly Western Europe, is a backwater with 12% unemployment, stagnant economic growth, and unsustainable welfare states.

Jeez....if only they didn't chase Milton Friedman's parents out the door, they might have someone with some economic sense.

Geddy Lee Interview

Cool interview with Geddy Lee on the Fender Guitars website. It's a good read, even if you're not a Rush fan. (As I am a huge Rush fan, I'm obviously partial, but...)

"You're My Boy, Blue!"

Patrick Cranford, the superannuated pledge from the movie Old School, passed away at the age of 86 of natural causes. Accordingly to this article, Cranford's daughter claimed that he had "become like a rock star in his 80's", with people calling out "You're my boy, Blue!" when they recognized him.

Author Frank McCourt, his latest memoir Teacher Man, said, "F. Scott Fitzgerald said there were no second acts in American life. He was wrong. He just didn't live long enough to know he was." Patrick Cranford, a character actor for most of his life, reached the apex of his fame whilst in his 80's. Proof once again that Fitzgerald was, as McCourt observed, wrong.

Happy New Year

And stuff. See you in 2006. Thanks for reading this blog!

Propino fibi salutem!

Random Thoughts 12/28/05

It has been an interesting year in the world of Spitfire's Hurricane. Just to recap for the masses: got laid off in February by the multinational financial conglomerate I had been working for for more than 3/4s of a decade, got a nice severance as well as stock options, took six months off, went to Costa Rica and communed with poisonous snakes, flying toucans (had no idea they could fly!), and monkeys that use their crap as a weapon (if you get too close to them, that is; they'll crap on cue and chuck it at you). I also wound up crossing paths with a lunatic from Virginia that, due to his intake of psychotropic medication in combination with prodigious consumption of alcohol, went completely wild in the hotel room next to mine, wholly destroying his room in the process. (He was subsequently deported, so it was rumored.) Came back to NYC, went to the gym a lot, started to get bored with my early retirement, then went back to work in September for different multinational financial conglomerate. As for reading, it seems that I've gotten through a record nine books this year, and I'm about a third of the way through a tenth. (Unemployment does have its perks, I guess.) Not small ones, either. The bio on Hamilton was almost eight-hundred pages, and Paul Johnson's epic "History of the American People" clocked in at slightly under one-thousand. At the rate that I'm going, I think I might be intellectually strong enough to tackle Edward Gibbon's "Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire". I'm currently reading "Rubicon-The Last Years of the Roman Republic", by Tom Holland. Fun, fun, fun.

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In times of crisis, New York has a tendency of being a very interesting place to be in. I've written about 9/11 and its aftermath, but one time I wasn't in New York (meaning Manhattan, that is) was when we had a blackout in the summer of 2003. From what I've been told, it was great fun to be in Manhattan at that time. (I'm kind of sorry I was living in Queens at the time.) I did, however, manage to experience the transit strike last week. Yes, it was kind of a pain in the ass to get around, particularly in light of the fact that it took me two hours each day to get from Queens to Brooklyn by car each day of the strike. (Normally, it is a 20-minute ride by car.) It also kind of sucked that it cost me anywhere from $10-$15 a day to park near the Brooklyn Bridge. And the cold weather made it all that much more challenging. All that can't be disputed. But you know what? I rather enjoyed going across the Brooklyn Bridge every morning. To me, there is no more beautiful bridge than the Brooklyn Bridge, and there's no better view of the east side of Manhattan or downtown Manhattan than from the Brooklyn Bridge. Frankly, I can think of much less visually striking paths with which to walk to work to and from. I'm not going to say it was a wholly enjoyable experience, but it wasn't a wholly unpleasant one, either. The American Red Cross was giving out hot chocolate every night on the Brooklyn side of the bridge; I thought that was cool. I also thought it was cool that Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz was on a bullhorn every night welcoming Manhattan commuters back to Brooklyn. I'm not a fan of Markowitz per se, particularly since he's a lib and he once said he was going to take down a portrait of George Washington from Borough Hall because he "wanted to get rid of all the pictures of dead white guys" (typical lib thing to say), but he won some semblance of my respect for being out there in the cold like the rest of us.

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Saw the Johnny Cash biopic "Walk The Line" about a week back. Decent flick; Joaquin Phoenix and Reese Witherspoon both did a creditable job.

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Here's a real random thought: How weird does the three-martini lunch seem these days? I was speaking to a co-worker who's about two decades older than I, and according to this fellow, this now-extinct institution was de rigeur up until the mid-to-late 80's, but was particularly common in the 60's and 70's. How weird does the three-martini lunch seem now? About as weird as seeing someone smoking indoors in a public building, I guess.

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I think the taste of most vegetables is awful. I've had people tell me that they like the taste of green vegetables. Bullsh*t, I say. I eat vegetables, but I usually need some kind of topping on them to make them even remotely palatable. No one REALLY likes green vegetables. Anyone who says that they do isn't telling you the truth. I know I'm right on this.

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I've 'ad enough. I'll see y'all tomorrow...or the next day.

Happy Boxing Day

To those in Great Britain, Northern Ireland, Australia, New Zealand, and Canada, I wish you all a Happy Boxing Day. And remember....use your jab, don't let 'em keep you on the ropes, and be sure to stick and move.

Bertie Felstead And The Christmas Of 1915

Bertie Felstead passed away in July of 2001 at the age of 107, Royal Welch Fusiliers, British Expeditionary Force. He was the last known survivor of the Christmas Truces of 1915, the last Christmas truce of the Great War (WWI). I was quite moved when I read Andrew Stuttaford's piece on his passing four and a half years back; I still find it so. It's worth the read, if only to remember that sometimes, despite the most brutally malevolent circumstances, some shred of peace can be achieved, albeit temporarily.

Read it here. Enjoy.

Merry Christmas and Happy Chanukah.

Wall Street Journal On Wiretapping

Thank You for Wiretapping
Why the Founders made presidents dominant on national security.

Tuesday, December 20, 2005 12:01 a.m. EST

Wisconsin Democrat Russ Feingold wants to be President, and that's fair enough. By all means go for it in 2008. The same applies to Lindsey Graham, the South Carolina Republican who's always on the Sunday shows fretting about the latest criticism of the Bush Administration's prosecution of the war on terror. But until you run nationwide and win, Senators, please stop stripping the Presidency of its Constitutional authority to defend America.

That is the real issue raised by the Beltway furor over last week's leak of National Security Agency wiretaps on international phone calls involving al Qaeda suspects. The usual assortment of Senators and media potentates is howling that the wiretaps are "illegal," done "in total secret," and threaten to bring us a long, dark night of fascism. "I believe it does violate the law," averred Mr. Feingold on CNN Sunday.

The truth is closer to the opposite. What we really have here is a perfect illustration of why America's Founders gave the executive branch the largest measure of Constitutional authority on national security. They recognized that a committee of 535 talking heads couldn't be trusted with such grave responsibility. There is no evidence that these wiretaps violate the law. But there is lots of evidence that the Senators are "illegally" usurping Presidential power--and endangering the country in the process.





The allegation of Presidential law-breaking rests solely on the fact that Mr. Bush authorized wiretaps without first getting the approval of the court established under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978. But no Administration then or since has ever conceded that that Act trumped a President's power to make exceptions to FISA if national security required it. FISA established a process by which certain wiretaps in the context of the Cold War could be approved, not a limit on what wiretaps could ever be allowed.
The courts have been explicit on this point, most recently in In Re: Sealed Case, the 2002 opinion by the special panel of appellate judges established to hear FISA appeals. In its per curiam opinion, the court noted that in a previous FISA case (U.S. v. Truong), a federal "court, as did all the other courts to have decided the issue [our emphasis], held that the President did have inherent authority to conduct warrantless searches to obtain foreign intelligence information." And further that "we take for granted that the President does have that authority and, assuming that is so, FISA could not encroach on the President's constitutional power."

On Sunday Mr. Graham opined that "I don't know of any legal basis to go around" FISA--which suggests that next time he should do his homework before he implies on national TV that a President is acting like a dictator. (Mr. Graham made his admission of ignorance on CBS's "Face the Nation," where he was representing the Republican point of view. Democrat Joe Biden was certain that laws had been broken, while the two journalists asking questions clearly had no idea what they were talking about. So much for enlightening television.)

The mere Constitution aside, the evidence is also abundant that the Administration was scrupulous in limiting the FISA exceptions. They applied only to calls involving al Qaeda suspects or those with terrorist ties. Far from being "secret," key Members of Congress were informed about them at least 12 times, President Bush said yesterday. The two district court judges who have presided over the FISA court since 9/11 also knew about them.

Inside the executive branch, the process allowing the wiretaps was routinely reviewed by Justice Department lawyers, by the Attorney General personally, and with the President himself reauthorizing the process every 45 days. In short, the implication that this is some LBJ-J. Edgar Hoover operation designed to skirt the law to spy on domestic political enemies is nothing less than a political smear.

All the more so because there are sound and essential security reasons for allowing such wiretaps. The FISA process was designed for wiretaps on suspected foreign agents operating in this country during the Cold War. In that context, we had the luxury of time to go to the FISA court for a warrant to spy on, say, the economic counselor at the Soviet embassy.

In the war on terror, the communications between terrorists in Frankfurt and agents in Florida are harder to track, and when we gather a lead the response often has to be immediate. As we learned on 9/11, acting with dispatch can be a matter of life and death. The information gathered in these wiretaps is not for criminal prosecution but solely to detect and deter future attacks. This is precisely the kind of contingency for which Presidential power and responsibility is designed.

What the critics in Congress seem to be proposing--to the extent they've even thought much about it--is the establishment of a new intelligence "wall" that would allow the NSA only to tap phones overseas while the FBI would tap them here. Terrorists aren't about to honor such a distinction. As Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Sunday on NBC's "Meet the Press," before 9/11 "our intelligence agencies looked out; our law enforcement agencies looked in. And people could--terrorists could--exploit the seam between them." The wiretaps are designed to close the seam.





As for power without responsibility, nobody beats Congress. Mr. Bush has publicly acknowledged and defended his decisions. But the Members of Congress who were informed about this all along are now either silent or claim they didn't get the full story. This is why these columns have long opposed requiring the disclosure of classified operations to the Congressional Intelligence Committees. Congress wants to be aware of everything the executive branch does, but without being accountable for anything at all. If Democrats want to continue this game of intelligence and wiretap "gotcha," the White House should release the names of every Congressman who received such a briefing.
Which brings us to this national security leak, which Mr. Bush yesterday called "a shameful act." We won't second-guess the New York Times decision to publish. But everyone should note the irony that both the Times and Washington Post claimed to be outraged by, and demanded a special counsel to investigate, the leak of Valerie Plame's identity, which did zero national security damage.

By contrast, the Times' NSA leak last week, and an earlier leak in the Washington Post on "secret" prisons for al Qaeda detainees in Europe, are likely to do genuine harm by alerting terrorists to our defenses. If more reporters from these newspapers now face the choice of revealing their sources or ending up in jail, those two papers will share the Plame blame.

The NSA wiretap uproar is one of those episodes, alas far too common, that make us wonder if Washington is still a serious place. Too many in the media and on Capitol Hill have forgotten that terrorism in the age of WMD poses an existential threat to our free society. We're glad Mr. Bush and his team are forcefully defending their entirely legal and necessary authority to wiretap enemies seeking to kill innocent Americans.

Al Qaeda's Advocates

CIVIL LIBERTIES & SECURITY: DEMS FOR TERROR
By DICK MORRIS

ANYONE who wonders whether the Democratic Party in general and Sen. Hillary Clinton in particular are really tough on terror — or are just posing for the cameras — needs to look at the vote by the entire Democratic Senate delegation (excepting only Nebraska's Ben Nelson and South Dakota's Tim Johnson) to prevent closure of their filibuster against the Patriot Act extension.

While the legislation President Bush proposed extends the entire act, certain key provisions are set to expire at year's end. (The rest of the act is good until September 2007.) By voting to allow these provisions to lapse, the Democrats have shown a total disregard for national security.

It is particularly galling that Sens. Clinton and Chuck Schumer — whose New York constituents are in the terrorists' bull's-eye — voted to let these vital protections expire.

How galling? One of the key provisions due to expire in two weeks is one that President Bill Clinton presented as the cornerstone of his response to the escalation of terrorism in the wake of the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing.

The measure allows "roving wiretaps" — so that the FBI can tap all phones a suspect uses, rather than just one specific number. Hillary's vote to let this provision expire is incredible.

Back in the '90s, the Republican-controlled Congress refused to enact the legislation promptly — and the Clintons excoriated the GOP for dragging its feet on this vital proposal.

After 9/11, the measure became law in the Patriot Act; it it remains a centerpiece of the War on Terror. Yet now Hillary Clinton, Chuck Schumer and the rest of the Democratic Party in the Senate are voting to kill it, by preventing a vote on the measure to extend it.

As a further Christmas anti-present to New Yorkers, Clinton, Schumer & Co. are also killing the Patriot Act provision that demolishes the infamous wall — erected by Clinton-era Deputy Attorney General Jamie S. Gorelick — between those who investigate terrorism and those who prosecute suspects.

The goal was to avoid tainting criminal prosecutions, by avoiding the collection of evidence without a full search warrant. But the result was to keep the left hand from knowing what the right hand was doing when it came to preventing acts of terrorism.

Like the 9/11 attacks.

As a result of the wall, the FBI was unable to access the personal computer of Zacarias Moussaoui when it had him in custody before 9/11; that laptop reportedly contained the names of other hijackers.

The feds seized Moussaoui a full month before 9/11 — but could not follow up on the leads his laptop would have highlighted because of the pernicious wall that Senate Democrats are now fighting to restore.

Equally irresponsible is the criticism Democrats are leveling at President Bush for his use of National Security Agency wiretaps to catch terrorists. Before Clinton and Schumer criticize this policy, they'd do well to reflect on the fact that the Brooklyn Bridge might well be rubble, with thousands dead, if Bush did not use these wiretaps.

In 2002, the feds (presumably the NSA) picked up random cellphone chatter using the words "Brooklyn Bridge" (which apparently didn't translate well into Arabic). They notified the New York Police Department, which flooded the bridge with cops. Then the feds overheard a phone call in which a man said things were "too hot" on the bridge to pull off an operation. Later, an interrogation of a terrorist allowed by the Patriot Act led cops to the doorstep of this would-be bridge bomber. (His plans would definitely have brought down the bridge, NYPD sources told me.)

Why didn't Bush get a warrant? On who? For what? The NSA wasn't looking for a man who might blow up the bridge. It had no idea what it was looking for. It just intercepted random phone calls from people in the United States to those outside — and so heard the allusions to the bridge that tipped them off.

In criminal investigations, one can target a suspect and get a warrant to investigate him. But this deductive approach is a limited instrument in fighting terror. An inductive approach, in which one gathers a mass of evidence and looks for patterns, is far more useful.

But, if the Democrats are to be heeded, it will no longer be possible.

Bye-bye, bridge.

U.S. Code, Title 50, Section 1802

In case any one of you are actually interested in reading the legality of POTUS' right to wiretap without court order, feel free to read the following passage from the aforementioned U.S. Code, Title 50:


Section 1802. Electronic surveillance authorization without court order; certification by Attorney General; reports to Congressional committees; transmittal under seal; duties and compensation of communication common carrier; applications; jurisdiction of court

(a)(1) Notwithstanding any other law, the President, through the
Attorney General, may authorize electronic surveillance without a
court order under this subchapter to acquire foreign intelligence
information for periods of up to one year if the Attorney General
certifies in writing under oath that -
(A) the electronic surveillance is solely directed at -
(i) the acquisition of the contents of communications
transmitted by means of communications used exclusively between
or among foreign powers, as defined in section 1801(a)(1), (2),
or (3) of this title; or
(ii) the acquisition of technical intelligence, other than
the spoken communications of individuals, from property or
premises under the open and exclusive control of a foreign
power, as defined in section 1801(a)(1), (2), or (3) of this
title



Read the whole thing here:

http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/casecode/uscodes/50/chapters/36/subchapters/i/sections/section_1802.html

Next Time You Read About Casualties In Iraq, Remember This Quote

"Utter ignorance of history enables any war with any casualties to be depicted in the media as an unmitigated disaster."

--Thomas Sowell

The US News Media Leans Left, UCLA Study Finds

And I couldn't be more shocked. Story here.

Somebody notify Eric Alterman.

One Word For It: Sedition

“This is a highly classified program that is crucial to our national security. Its purpose is to detect and prevent terrorist attacks against the United States, our friends and allies. Yesterday the existence of this secret program was revealed in media reports, after being improperly provided to news organizations. As a result, our enemies have learned information they should not have, and the unauthorized disclosure of this effort damages our national security and puts our citizens at risk. Revealing classified information is illegal, alerts our enemies, and endangers our country.”

--President George W. Bush, December 17, 2005

AT WAR (From Yesterday's Wall Street Journal)

Very interesting article. Worth reading:

Mightier Than the Pen
Why I gave up journalism to join the Marines.

BY MATT POTTINGER
Thursday, December 15, 2005 12:01 a.m.

When people ask why I recently left The Wall Street Journal to join the Marines, I usually have a short answer. It felt like the time had come to stop reporting events and get more directly involved. But that's not the whole answer, and how I got to this point wasn't a straight line.
It's a cliché that you appreciate your own country more when you live abroad, but it happens to be true. Living in China for the last seven years, I've seen that country take a giant leap from a struggling Third World country into a true world power. For many people it still comes as a surprise to learn that China is chasing Japan as the second-largest economy on the globe and could soon own a trillion dollars of American debt.

But living in China also shows you what a nondemocratic country can do to its citizens. I've seen protesters tackled and beaten by plainclothes police in Tiananmen Square, and I've been videotaped by government agents while I was talking to a source. I've been arrested and forced to flush my notes down a toilet to keep the police from getting them, and I've been punched in the face in a Beijing Starbucks by a government goon who was trying to keep me from investigating a Chinese company's sale of nuclear fuel to other countries.

When you live abroad long enough, you come to understand that governments that behave this way are not the exception, but the rule. They feel alien to us, but from the viewpoint of the world's population, we are the aliens, not them. That makes you think about protecting your country no matter who you are or what you're doing. What impresses you most, when you don't have them day to day, are the institutions that distinguish the U.S.: the separation of powers, a free press, the right to vote, and a culture that values civic duty and service, to name but a few.

I'm not an uncritical, rah-rah American. Living abroad has sharpened my view of what's wrong with my country, too. It's obvious that we need to reinvent ourselves in various ways, but we should also be allowed to do it from within, not according to someone else's dictates.

But why the Marines?

A year ago, I was at my sister's house using her husband's laptop when I came across a video of an American in Iraq being beheaded by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. The details are beyond description here; let's just say it was obscene. At first I admit I felt a touch of the terror they wanted me to feel, but then I felt the anger they didn't. We often talk about how our policies are radicalizing young men in the Middle East to become our enemies, but rarely do we talk about how their actions are radicalizing us. In a brief moment of revulsion, sitting there in that living room, I became their blowback.

Of course, a single emotional moment does not justify a career change, and that's not what happened to me. The next day I went to lunch at the Council on Foreign Relations where I happened to meet a Marine Corps colonel who'd just come back from Iraq. He gave me a no-nonsense assessment of what was happening there, but what got to me most was his description of how the Marines behaved and how they looked after each other in a hostile world. That struck me as a metaphor for how America should be in the world at large, and it also appealed to me on a personal level. At one point I said half-jokingly that, being 31 years old, it was a shame I was too old to serve. He sat back for a second and said, "I think I've still gotcha."

The next morning I found myself roaming around the belly of the USS Intrepid, a World War II aircraft carrier museum moored a few blocks from Times Square, looking for a Marine recruiting station and thinking I'd probably lost my marbles. The officer-selection officer wasn't impressed with my age, my Chinese language abilities or the fact that I worked for one of the great newspapers of the world. His only question was, "How's your endurance?"

Well, I can sit at my desk for 12 hours straight. Fourteen if I have a bag of Reese's.

He said if I wanted a shot at this I'd have to ace the physical fitness test, where a perfect score consisted of 20 pull-ups, 100 crunches in two minutes, and a three-mile run in 18 minutes. Essentially he was telling me to pack it in and go home. After assuring him I didn't have a criminal record or any tattoos, either of which would have required yet another waiver (my age already required the first), I took an application and went back to China.

Then came the Asian tsunami last December.

I was scrambled to Thailand, where thousands of people had died in the wave. After days in the midst of the devastation, I pulled back to Thailand's Utapao Air Force Base, at one time a U.S. staging area for bombing runs over Hanoi, to write a story on the U.S.-led relief efforts. The abandoned base was now bustling with air traffic and military personnel, and the man in charge was a Marine.

Warfare and relief efforts, as it turns out, involve many skills in common. In both cases, it's 80% preparation and logistics and only a small percent of actual battle. What these guys were doing was the same thing they did in a war zone, except now the tip of the spear wasn't weapons, but food, water and medicine. It was a major operation to save people's lives, and it was clear that no other country in the world could do what they were doing. Once again, I was bumping into the U.S. Marines, and once again I was impressed.

The day before I left Thailand I decided to do my first physical training and see what happened. I started running and was winded in five minutes. The air quality in downtown Bangkok didn't help, but the biggest problem was me. I ducked into Lumpini Park in the heart of the city where I was chased around by a three-foot monitor lizard that ran faster than I did. At one point I found a playground jungle gym and managed to do half a pull-up. That's all.

I got back to Beijing and started running several days a week. Along the way I met a Marine who was studying in Beijing on a fellowship and started training with him. Pretty soon I filled out the application I'd taken from New York, got letters of recommendation from old professors and mentors, and received a letter from a senior Marine officer who took a leap of faith on my behalf.

I made a quick trip back to New York in April to take a preliminary physical fitness test with the recruitment officer at the USS Intrepid. By then I could do 13 pull-ups, all my crunches, and a three-mile run along the West Side Highway in a little under 21 minutes, all in all a mediocre performance that was barely passable. When I was done, the officer told me to wipe the foam off my mouth, but I did him one better and puked all over the tarmac. He liked that a lot. That's when we both knew I was going for it.

Friends ask if I worry about going from a life of independent thought and action to a life of hierarchy and teamwork. At the moment, I find that appealing because it means being part of something bigger than I am. As for how different it's going to be, that, too, has its appeal because it's the opposite of what I've been doing up to now. Why should I do something that's a "natural fit" with what I already do? Why shouldn't I try to expand myself?

In a way, I see the Marines as a microcosm of America at its best. Their focus isn't on weapons and tactics, but on leadership. That's the whole point of the Marines. They care about each other in good times and bad, they've always had to fight for their existence--even Harry Truman saw them as nothing more than the "Navy's police force"--and they have the strength of their traditions. Their future, like the country's, is worth fighting for. I hope to be part of the effort.



Mr. Pottinger, until recently a Journal correspondent in China, is scheduled to be commissioned a second lieutenant tomorrow. He spent the last three months at Officer Candidates School in Quantico, Va. As of early December, his three-mile run was down to 18 minutes and 15 seconds.

Tired

Apologies for failure to blog. Too mentally exhausted to come up with anything remotely creative this week. Hopefully I'll regenerate some semblance of creativity over the weekend.


ZZZZZZZZZZZZZzzzzzzz.

Match The Personality To The President

Which one of these two characters from Roman history, Cato and Caesar, draw similarities to which president? Makes for interesting reading, and also shows that there's not much difference between the behaviors of men of power two thousand years ago and today. Have fun analyzing:


Caesar was esteemed for the many kind services he rendered and for his lavish generosity; Cato, for the consistent uprightness of his life. The former was renowned for his humanity and mercy; the latter had earned respect by his strict austerity. Caesar won fame by his readiness to give, to relieve, to pardon; Cato, by never offering presents. The one was a refuge for the unfortunate, and was praised for his good nature; the other was a scourge for the wicked, admired for his firmness. Finally, Caesar had made it a rule to work hard and sleep little; to devote himself to the interests of his friends and to neglect his own; to be ready to give people anything that was worth the giving. For himself he wanted a high command, an army, and a war in some new field where his gifts could shine in all their brightness. Cato's taste was for restraint, propriety, and, above all, austerity...he was more concerned to be a good man than to be thought one; and so the less he courted fame, the more did it attend his steps unsought." Sallust, 54, the Conspiracy of Cataline

Lennon

Surely everyone has a "where were you?" moment when it comes to when they were informed that John Lennon had been murdered. I certainly have mine, and remember it quite vividly, as I was twelve at the time and already deep into my love affair with music. I will say that while I personally found and continue to find John Lennon's politics and beliefs utterly objectionable and terribly hypocritical, I also must admit that he was probably the author of more of my favorite Beatles songs than any other Beatle. My favorite Beatle song of all time is "I Am The Walrus", which could be the weirdest Beatles' song in their catalog, followed closely by "Day In A Life", and the mind-bending "Tomorrow Never Knows". (What can I say...I like weird music.)

I'm sure the encomiums will come rolling in about what a wonderful guy John Lennon was, how he was all about peace, non-violence, and social justice (etc., etc., blah...blah...blah...). I'm sure Rolling Stone, published by perhaps the worst rock star suck-up/sycophant on the planet, Jan Wenner, will give the full force of its journalistic hackery to promote, yet again, this meme. Those in the know are well aware that this was BS. John Lennon beat both his wives, abandoned his first son, and was capable of tremendous verbal cruelty. (Peter Brown, in probably the best book written on The Beatles (titled "The Love You Make"), recounted that when the gay manager of The Beatles, Brian Epstein, asked for suggestions about what the title of his autobiographical book should be whilst riding in an elevator with John Lennon and ghostwriter Derek Taylor, John Lennon suggested Epstein call his book "queer Jew". By the end of the elevator ride, Epstein had his face in his hands crying hysterically, while Lennon grinned sardonically at his cruel, verbal handiwork.) He was a habitual substance abuser, touted worldwide communism ("Imagine no possessions/heaven/countries, etc...etc...) whilst living in high luxury, and hung with ultra-violent Black Panther types. If the contradictions amongst all of us were and are extreme, those in Lennon were exponentially worse than even the most contradictory personalities. John Lennon spoke about peace, love, and caring, but he did very little of what he preached; if anything, Paul McCartney lived and practiced these concepts, whereas Lennon merely spoke of them.

In the end, and this is merely my opinion, I think Lennon was a dreamer because his reality was so terribly unhappy. A sad childhood such as Lennon's manifested itself in many ways: while he was a utopian, he also did everything in his power to make the lives of the people he loved more difficult. He wanted a better world, but more than anything, what he really wanted was peace of mind; he seemed to lash out and hurt those around him when he failed to get it. Whether or not he got it in the years preceding his demise is subject to debate. What Lennon represents to me is earnestness coupled with deep disappointment. Afflicted with the terrible sadness that a dysfunctional family life brings, he was both hopeful, yet discontent. He wanted a better world because his personal world was such a mess. Perhaps his politics, misguided though they were, were a projection of that sentiment.

Most of his solo stuff wasn't worth much, as I'm of the opinion that George Harrison put out, in all likelihood, the best post
Beatles solo album ("All Things Must Pass"). Some was good, some was not, none of it great. But his output within the context of The Beatles was stellar, particularly his later work with the group. It was cutting edge because he was cutting edge, both musically and psychologically. All things being equal, John Lennon was a creative giant.

Hamilton On Public Opinion

In The Federalist 71, Alexander Hamilton expounded upon the fickle undercurrents of public opinion, and the need for the chief executive to forge public consensus, not bow to it. The essence of leadership, lost on those on the left who feel that the president should shift course with the mercurial whims of the hoi polloi, is to chart a course and navigate that course, no matter what gale winds may blow. Acquiescing to the whims of opinion polls is not leadership; it is spinelessness, (Manifestly displayed in the person of Bill Clinton, a man more concerned with being popular than being principled. Then again, when you have no principles, I guess it comes with the terroritory.) Once again, the prescient words of the great Alexander Hamilton echo into the modern day:

There are some who would be inclined to regard the servile pliancy of the Executive to a prevailing current, either in the community or in the legislature, as its best recommendation. But such men entertain very crude notions, as well of the purposes for which government was instituted, as of the true means by which the public happiness may be promoted. The republican principle demands that the deliberate sense of the community should govern the conduct of those to whom they intrust the management of their affairs; but it does not require an unqualified complaisance to every sudden breeze of passion, or to every transient impulse which the people may receive from the arts of men, who flatter their prejudices to betray their interests. It is a just observation, that the people commonly INTEND the PUBLIC GOOD. This often applies to their very errors. But their good sense would despise the adulator who should pretend that they always REASON RIGHT about the MEANS of promoting it. They know from experience that they sometimes err; and the wonder is that they so seldom err as they do, beset, as they continually are, by the wiles of parasites and sycophants, by the snares of the ambitious, the avaricious, the desperate, by the artifices of men who possess their confidence more than they deserve it, and of those who seek to possess rather than to deserve it. When occasions present themselves, in which the interests of the people are at variance with their inclinations, it is the duty of the persons whom they have appointed to be the guardians of those interests, to withstand the temporary delusion, in order to give them time and opportunity for more cool and sedate reflection. Instances might be cited in which a conduct of this kind has saved the people from very fatal consequences of their own mistakes, and has procured lasting monuments of their gratitude to the men who had courage and magnanimity enough to serve them at the peril of their displeasure.

You Blow Out A Candle, But You Can't Blow Out A Fire

Strange, isn't it...all these demostrations for self-determination and democracy, eh? Lebanon, Ukraine...and now Hong Kong. It's spreading, and it is no coincidence that these demonstrations are becoming more and more commonplace at this juncture in history. More proof (as if we needed more) that the words that are uttered from the leader of the free world resonate with a power unlike no other throughout the globe.

Read up on it below:



Huge Democracy Rally Held in Hong Kong
Tens of Thousands Urge Timetable for Universal Suffrage
By K.C. Ng
Special to The Washington Post
Monday, December 5, 2005; A17


HONG KONG, Dec. 4 -- Tens of thousands of people marched through Hong Kong on Sunday to protest the slow pace of democratic reform in this former British colony, but the territory's Beijing-backed leader again rejected demands to set a timetable for achieving universal suffrage.

Police and protest organizers gave sharply conflicting estimates of the size of the march, but the demonstration appeared to be the largest in Hong Kong since the huge anti-government rallies in 2003 and 2004 that drew crowds of more than 500,000 people into the streets demanding the right to elect the city's leaders.

Organizers said more than a quarter-million people participated in Sunday's protest, which was intended to pressure the Chinese government and the man it picked to run Hong Kong, Chief Executive Donald Tsang, to modify a proposed package of limited political reforms. Police said about 63,000 participated in the protest.

Tsang's plan would add seats to the legislature and expand the committee that China uses to name the chief executive, but the pro-democracy opposition has condemned it as inadequate and vowed to block the proposal when it comes to a vote later this month.

Speaking at a news conference Sunday night, Tsang struck a conciliatory tone and said he would "see what I can do to perfect the package." But he said the march had not persuaded him to make significant changes, and he rejected the opposition's main demand for a timetable for introducing general elections.

Instead, Tsang said, he would work on producing a timetable after his plan was enacted. "I am 60 years of age. I certainly want to see universal suffrage taking place in Hong Kong in my time," Tsang said. "My feeling and my wish is the same as most other people participating in the rally today."

China has ruled out direct elections in 2007 and 2008 to choose the territory's next leader and all its legislators, and has refused to say when it will fulfill a long-standing promise to allow universal suffrage in Hong Kong.

Pro-democracy lawmakers called on Tsang to overhaul his proposal in light of the size of the protest. "Any responsible government should make a positive response to this march," an independent legislator, Ronny Tong, told reporters.

A small group of protesters began a sit-in outside government headquarters after Tsang's news conference, and march organizers said they were considering staging another large demonstration next weekend if Tsang refused to offer concessions.

In a development that could give a boost to the democracy movement, one of Hong Kong's most popular politicians -- a career civil servant who has not participated in similar demonstrations in the past -- joined the march Sunday.

"I feel that there are moments in one's life when one has to stand up and be counted, and for me, I believe this is one of these moments," said Anson Chan, who stepped down as the territory's number two official in 2001 and is often described as "Hong Kong's conscience."

Chan said she decided to march in the protest after a hastily convened meeting that Chinese officials held with pro-democracy legislators and community leaders this past week. At the meeting, Chinese officials declared that it would be unlawful to set a timetable for achieving universal suffrage.

On Sunday, Chan's voice was quickly drowned out by applause and cheers when she was spotted in the crowd. Analysts consider Chan a potential candidate in any future election to lead Hong Kong and say the government might be forced to offer a compromise if the public rallied around her.

Stanley Ho, a casino tycoon in nearby Macau who is a power broker in the region and serves as an adviser to the Chinese government, dismissed the protest as "insignificant" and warned the public against angering Beijing. "If 500,000 people came out, the government might need to do something," he told reporters.

Bernard Chan, a member of Tsang's council of advisers, also said the government would not offer any concessions, adding that only the people of Hong Kong would suffer if the limited reforms that Tsang has proposed were rejected.

The reforms would double the size of the 800-member Election Committee that chooses the chief executive and add 10 seats to the legislature. Analysts say that would introduce a measure of greater representation to the political system but keep the government firmly under Beijing's control.

Tsang has campaigned aggressively for the proposal, and he delivered an unprecedented televised address on Wednesday to answer his critics, arguing that the reforms were the best that Hong Kong could currently win from nervous Chinese leaders.

But many in the crowd of demonstrators -- who wore black T-shirts and waved banners saying "We want direct elections!" -- demanded faster change.

"We are not anti-China. We are here to fight for the rights we should have as citizens," said Tang Bok-man, 74. "I probably cannot see full democracy in Hong Kong in my life, but I hope my children and grandchildren can enjoy it."

Correspondent Philip P. Pan in Beijing contributed to this report.

Reagan Vindicated (As If There Was Any Doubt At This Point)

Truth Out of Poland

New York Sun Staff Editorial
November 29, 2005
URL: http://www.nysun.com/article/23684

When President Reagan described the Soviet Union in 1983 as "an evil empire," he was widely denounced as a warmonger. The British historian Eric Hobsbawm, whose bestselling history of the 20th century, "Age of Extremes," has become a standard text on many campuses, reckoned that in the "Second Cold War" that began in 1979 when the Russians invaded Afghanistan, American democracy was "more dangerous" than Soviet totalitarianism. "The hysteria in Washington was not, of course, based on realistic reasoning.... There was absolutely no evidence, or likelihood, that the USSR wanted a war...let alone that it was planning a military attack on the West. The feverish scenarios of nuclear attack which came from the mobilized Western cold warriors and government publicity in the early 1980s were self-generated," he wrote. Historians of the 21st century, he predicted, "remote from the living memories of the 1970s and 1980s, will puzzle over the apparent insanity of this outburst of military fever...."

Well, the 21st century is here and it turns out that it is not the Cold Warriors but the "peace movement" that in retrospect looks insane. That is the meaning of the the Warsaw Pact map of Europe covered in nuclear mushroom symbols that was disclosed last week by the new Polish defense minister, Radek Sikorski, and reproduced on our foreign page yesterday. Mr. Sikorski is the Polish patriot who has made it his mission to teach his countrymen the truth about communism. He was recently based at the American Enterprise Institute in Washington, D.C., until he was elected to the Polish Senate and joined the new government as head of the armed forces. Historians who, unlike Mr. Hobsbawm, do not have a record of lifelong support for communism now have a duty to examine the evidence that is emerging.

Mr. Sikorski's recent press conference, our Daniel Johnson wrote us from London, marked the first time that the Warsaw Pact archives have been opened for public scrutiny. Mr. Sikorski unveiled a battle plan dating from 1979. The Soviet led alliance was then poised for a massive tactical nuclear strike against forces of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, paving the way for the occupation of Western Europe. Much of Germany, Denmark, and Belgium would have been obliterated, including hundreds of thousands of American military and civilian personnel. This scenario was based on the assumption that NATO would retaliate with its own tactical nuclear weapons against a line of targets in Poland along the Vistula. The Kremlin was cynical enough to expect its Polish ally to launch an unprovoked offensive against the West in the full knowledge that millions of Polish civilians would be sacrificed.

It turns out that many of those who are today's leading European anti-Americans were the same individuals who, in the late 1970s and early 1980s, demanded unilateral nuclear disarmament. It is now clear that the deployment of Cruise and Pershing missiles by NATO, bitterly opposed by the so-called peace movement, was decisive in deterring a Soviet invasion of Western Europe. Yet not only communists and fellow travelers but leftists on both sides of the Atlantic insisted throughout that America, not the Soviet Union, was the greater threat to world peace, especially once the Reagan administration halted the period of decline that followed the Vietnam War. Wouldn't it be something to have been a fly on the wall when President Putin, the erstwhile KGB colonel who is now leading Russia, clicked on his television to watch Mr. Sikorski, who spent the years of Soviet-imposed martial law in Poland in exile?

The editors of these columns have long been for an Eastern European lustration. But the historical record will be a good start, particularly if other other governments of former Warsaw Pact countries will have the courage to follow Poland's lead and throw open their archives, too. They should ignore not only the Kremlin, but also the hypocritical complaints of those who say that old wounds are being reopened. For these disclosures - and there will be more, once historians have sifted through the documents - have vital lessons for the present. Once again, America is being depicted as an aggressor for standing up to a tyranny that thinks nothing of genocide. Once again, Europe is in danger of losing its nerve. Once again, an administration that refuses to appease the foe is accused of hysteria. Only this time the enemy is not communist but Islamist. The threat that an "Islamic bomb" will be developed and used, either by Iranian mullahs or by terrorists, is real and imminent. It is good that President Bush and veterans of the Cold War, such as Vice President Cheney and Secretary Rumsfeld, are in a position to ensure that these lessons are learned, not forgotten.