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Daily Dish

That's Activism For all of those who believe that judicial activism is a "liberal" proclivity, you'll have to explain this story to me

An Indianapolis father is appealing a Marion County judge's unusual order that prohibits him and his ex-wife from exposing their child to "non-mainstream religious beliefs and rituals."

So what exactly is a "non-mainstream" religious belief? Well, we don't know precisely. It's one of those fuzzy ideas that popped into the Judges head. But what we do know is that the the divorcing couple are pagans. More specifically, Wiccan.

So it seems clear that Wicca, at least, is a "non-mainstream" religious belief. So I have a few questions, how are the parents supposed to comply with this ruling? How is this ruling to be enforced? And if the parents decide to abandon Wicca as their spiritual path, do they have to go to the Judge to confirm that their new path is OK by him?

I mean, some people consider Catholicism as a "non-mainstream" religion. But, it seems Catholicism is OK since the parents send their child (strangely) to a Catholic school and the Judge doesn't seem bothered by that.

Obviously the case will be appealed and overturned. But the question has to be asked, if the US government, and the military are happy to accommodate Wiccans, what's the beef?

Maybe they don't see much Wiccan activity in Indiana.

DeLayed Reaction A Texas judge has ruled that the Political Action Committee started by House Majority Leader Tom Delay violated the State's campaign finance laws. Specifically the suit was against the groups treasurer who must now repay some $200,000 to five Democratic candidates.

But as a result of this action.

DeLay has not been accused of any wrongdoing.

Can someone send a memo to Howard Dean? And when you do, ask him if Sen. Clinton should be sent back to New York to serve time.

Let me know what he says.

Looks Like Turkey got there First It seems that the first pipeline from the Caspian Sea goes not through Afghanistan, but through Turkey.

More than ten years after the first plans were developed, a pipeline from the world's third richest oil field has started moving oil to the West.

In a grand ceremony today, the presidents of Azerbaijan, Georgia and Turkey jointly opened a pipeline that will soon be moving up to 1 million barrels of Caspian Sea crude a day to Turkey's Mediterranean port of Ceyhan.

Iran, Russia, Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan and Kazakhstan all extract from the Caspian fields, but the pipeline -- Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan, or BTC -- bypasses Russia and Iran completely.

Some, like fellow Vermont Blogger Katherine of Cut to the Chase have argued that desire for Capsian Sea resources was the real reason for America invading Afghanistan even though

As yet, there are no foreign investors vying for the project, but talks between Turkmenistan, Afghanistan, and Pakistan are proceeding. In mid-April, the three countries and the Asia Development Bank held their eighth round of meetings to hammer out details of what Turkmenistan has, how much gas Pakistan needs, and whether Afghanistan is safe enough.

Even though it would have been just as easy for America to have been persuaded to attack Iran where threading a pipeline from the Caspian Sea would have been much easier. I mean, if the Bush Administration was into deceiving people for gain that would have been the way to go.

But the pipeline to Turkey is real. And who benefits?

Earth Times said the investing consortium comprising 11 partners who are also the developers of the oil fields. Led by BP, the largest shareholder with 30.1 per cent, the others partners are the State Oil Company of Azerbaijan (25 per cent), Unocal (8.9 per cent), Statoil of Norway (8.7 per cent), the Turkish Petroleum Corporation (6.5 per cent), Eni and Total (5 per cent each) Itochu (3.4 per cent) Inpex and ConocoPhillips (2.5 per cent each) and Amerada Hess (2.3 per cent).

Just so you know.

Daily Dish

Foundation An interesting aspect of brain science is studying how people decide things. What goes into deciding what you will wear today, for instance. What newspapers do you choose to read and why? Is there a predictor of how a person chooses their politics?

Not surprisingly, the science of choice not only interests researchers.

a budding field called "neuroeconomics" seeks to explain exactly how people make up their minds by using the latest imaging technologies to examine the grayish lump of brain tissue where each decision begins. The researchers, migrs from fields like psychology, neuroscience, and economics, hope to build a theory of human behavior that starts at the level of single nerve cells but can describe the choices individuals make, and even how markets work.

Their goals, ultimately, are to illuminate brain disease, save customers time, money and aggravation, and even improve the national economy by getting consumers and investors to act more rationally.

Sure there is an obvious dark side to such reasearch; specifically how will such information be used by marketers?

But it is clear that such research should be undertaken, right?

Or are you one of those who thinks that some avenues of research should not be pursued for fear that the results or the methods are morally wrong?

I hear Harry Seldon calling.

Daily Dish

Ice 9 Elections in Iran are upcoming and already there are problems. Iran's Guardian council has rejected the applications of all but six out of the 1,000 people who applied to run for President in next month's elections. All female candidates were rejected. Two that were rejected are considered viable reformists.

News of this instigated riots among the student population in Tehran. Perhaps because of the protests, which are not isolated incidents, perhaps for some other reasons related to internal power struggles among the hard line rulers,

Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has ordered a review of the disqualification from next month's presidential election of two reformist candidates.

Supreme leader is not a misnomer. Though unelected, Ayatollah Khamenei holds most of the rings of power in Iran and is definitely not a reformist. But pressure is building within Iran. Protests were frequent in April (see here,  here, here, and here) and March.

Today, Secretary Rice alluded to the upcoming elections in her remarks to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee's Annual Policy Conference

Ladies and gentlemen, the Middle East is changing and even the unelected leaders in Tehran must recognize this fact. They must know that the energy of reform that is building all around them will one day inspire Iran's citizens to demand their liberty and their rights. The United States stands with the people of Iran.

And also put it in a broader context

We measure our success in the democratic revolutions that have stunned the entire world: vibrant revolutions of rose and orange and purple and tulip and cedar. The destiny of the Middle East is bound up in this global expansion of freedom. The days of thinking that this region was somehow immune to democracy are over. Working with our G-8 partners, the United States has created the Broader Middle East and North Africa Initiative to build partnerships with people in the region who are working for greater liberty.

And in fact, the region is changing; has changed. The events in Lebanon, where a popular, non-violent uprising forced Syrian home, are no small indication. Egypt, Kuwait and Quttar have taken steps towards democratic reforms. Even Syria is facing pressure to change.

Indeed, as Fouad Ajami writing in the Opinion Journal notes

"George W. Bush has unleashed a tsunami on this region," a shrewd Kuwaiti merchant who knows the way of his world said to me....

To venture into the Arab world, as I did recently over four weeks in Qatar, Kuwait, Jordan and Iraq, is to travel into Bush Country. I was to encounter people from practically all Arab lands, to listen in on a great debate about the possibility of freedom and liberty. I met Lebanese giddy with the Cedar Revolution that liberated their country from the Syrian prison that had seemed an unalterable curse. They were under no illusions about the change that had come their way. They knew that this new history was the gift of an American president who had put the Syrian rulers on notice. The speed with which Syria quit Lebanon was astonishing, a race to the border to forestall an American strike that the regime could not discount. I met Syrians in the know who admitted that the fear of American power, and the example of American forces flushing Saddam Hussein out of his spider hole, now drive Syrian policy. They hang on George Bush's words in Damascus, I was told: the rulers wondering if Iraq was a crystal ball in which they could glimpse their future.

The Mullahs in Iran seem self-consciously blind to the change. They seem to want to wish it away. Perhaps, if they get their nukes, they'll be able to make it go away.

Similarly, there are those on the left who refuse to see or acknowledge the facts on the ground. And that refusal is driving some away. Keith Thompson is leaving the Left

Nightfall, Jan. 30. Eight-million Iraqi voters have finished risking their lives to endorse freedom and defy fascism. Three things happen in rapid succession. The right cheers. The left demurs. I walk away from a long-term intimate relationship. I'm separating not from a person but a cause: the political philosophy that for more than three decades has shaped my character and consciousness, my sense of self and community, even my sense of cosmos.

I'm leaving the left  --  more precisely, the American cultural left and what it has become during our time together.

I choose this day for my departure because I can no longer abide the simpering voices of self-styled progressives  --  people who once championed solidarity with oppressed populations everywhere  --  reciting all the ways Iraq's democratic experiment might yet implode.

In this, it seems, the Left-who-Hates-Bush and the Mullahs in Iran, have something in common; they both hate Bush and they both refuse to recognize that the goals of Liberalism are being carried out and brought to life in the Middle East. There is little doubt that the Mullahs hate these developments, but does the Left? I can't say. I would hope not because what would that leave them ideologically?

The strategy wherein the transformation of the Middle East takes hold, the dominoes fall, and ultimately results in a safer world may yet fail. There never were assurances; guarantees.

But you know what? It would much more likely to succeed if everyone were on the same page. We know that ANSWER is on the other side, but what about the rest on the "Left"?

What about the rest.

7 Senators A small cabal of Senators has taken it upon themselves to decide the fate of Judicial nominations in lieu of using filibusters. These Senators, 7 Democrats and 7 Republicans have decided to exercise reason and, in my view, rebuf the radical tactics of Senators Leahy, the Democrats on the Judiciary committee, and Sen Reid among others.

Do I see this as a win for the Democrats? Not if Justice Owens gets confirmed today.

Do I see this as a win for Republicans? Quite possibly if in fact Justice Owens, Janice Brown, and William Pryor get confirmed.

Clearly some on the side of the Democrats have labeled these people "extreme". This is the justification for using the filibuster to block them from being voted on.

It must also be noted that it was the Republicans and President Bush wanted these people to have a vote on the floor. It also must be noted that the filibuster was used because Democrats didn't have the votes to defeat these nominees. And the fact is, the 7 Democrats that are part of this deal must not believe these nominees are as radical and extremist as some others believe.

In the words of the agreement, these are not people for whom the "extraordinary" circumstance of filibusters should be used.

Filibusters should be allowed in the Senate, but they should not be abused.

Democrats have, in fact, been abusing the filibuster and, make no mistake, Seven Democrat Senators agreed.

Sen. Reid bluffed and Frist called his bluff. Reid lost, but it would have been worse for Democrats had that hand played out because while most people are not aware of the filibuster fight, people would have noticed had Democrats shut down the Senate, just like they noticed when Gingrich shut down the House.

Democrats were saved by seven Senators.

What you don't hear Arthur Chrenkoff's newest edition (part 28) of Good News from Iraq is up and, as is typically the case, it's a long post. While the main news channels can usually come up with a few car bombs a day, Arthur manages to detail scores of good things.

One that would make my fellow Vermont blogger Jeff Soyer happy, leads the news

You might remember Dhia Muhsin, carpenter from a working-class Baghdad neighborhood of al-Dora, who became a celebrity of sorts back in March, when he and his nephews stood up to insurgents who terrorized his area and in a firefight lasting half an hour killed three of them and forced the rest to retreat.Well, two months on, and Muhsin is still ready to take on any intruders: “I expect them (the insurgents) to come back and I’m ready to face them,” says the 33-year old who seems to have inspired his neighbors:

Al-Dora residents had been too scared to face down the insurgents but after seeing Muhsin’s bravery, some, it seems, have decided to fight back.

“We are ready to confront any terrorist and the people in the area, after they saw what I did, have become more daring and strong,” said Muhsin.

Mudher Khudher, 42, a bakery owner, said he is proud of Muhsin actions and he and others have decided to follow his example, “Dhia taught us that the terrorists are cowards and they can’t face all Iraqis.”

Saleem Barakat, 32, a student, called Muhsin a hero and noted that their street in al-Dora has been quiet since the insurgents were killed.

Al-Dora has not been completely violence-free since that fateful day in March, but the example set by Muhsin is nevertheless very important one for the Iraqi people. Insurgents and terrorists thrive on fear and passivity - they can't win when society turns against them.

This is a lesson that increasing numbers of Iraqis seem to be learning, and it is important more than ever, now that the past two weeks have passed under the shadow of a bloody suicide bombing campaign. This carnage around Iraq has dominated the media coverage, and once again it managed to overshadow most of the positive developments taking place around the country, in security and other areas of life. Below are some of these stories that you might have missed.

Now you haven't.

Daily Dish

Addition and Subtraction RNC Chairman Ken Mehlman addressed the Latino Small Business Convention earlier this month in an attempt to make his case for Republican ideas. To do this, he didn't attempt to denigrate Democrats; he did not call any Democrats criminals, or idiots. Instead he said

In 1979, an ex FDR Democrat named Ronald Reagan predicted that others would soon follow his path, "Hispanics are Republicans, they just don't know it yet," he said.

And then he made the case for why Latino should be aligned with Republicans

And what are the bedrock principles that the party of Lincoln shares with Hispanics? First, in America, your aspirations matter more than your origins. We are not defined by our race, our religion, our national origin. We are united by something more important: our commitment to freedom and opportunity.

Our second principle is that freedom must constantly be expanded and extended. Every generation of Americans has recognized this principle. Americans have never been satisfied with the way freedom was defined yesterday. From our nation's founding to the end of slavery, from women's suffrage to civil rights, each generation's legacy has been to expand freedom's scope for tomorrow.

Mr Mehlman is not just courting Latino voters

Mehlman, chairman of the Republican National Committee, is courting black and Hispanic voters on a regular basis. Beyond the usual run of speeches, fundraisers and meetings with donors, he has visited Latino neighborhoods and historically black campuses. He has attended black-oriented receptions and ceremonies, spoken to minority chambers of commerce and raised money for Otto Banks of Harrisburg, Pa., a black city council candidate new to the GOP.

Recently, Mehlman convinced a prominent Black City Councilman in Harrisburg, PA to become a Republican, then hosted a fund-raising event for him which raised $22,000 for his political aspirations, but more importantly to the Republicans

The crowd of 60 or so who attended the buffet breakfast, which featured Mr. Mehlman...included many of Mr. Banks' black supporters, among them clergymen.

It is clear that Republicans are attempting to build the party and make a bigger tent. Broaden their constituency.

In contrast, Governor Howard Dean is playing to his base, and what has become the diseased core of the Democratic Party, by feeding his crowds political red meat.

    • In a speech in Kansas in February, not long after his election as DNC chairman, Mr. Dean said the contest between Democrats and Republicans was "a struggle of good and evil. And we're the good."
    • In Florida earlier this week, he accused Republicans of being "corrupt," saying, "You can't trust them with your money, and you can't trust them with your votes. ... Evangelicals don't like corruption either."
    • In a closed-door Democratic fundraiser in Lawrence, Kan., he said conservative Republicans were "intolerant" on the issue of abortion. "They don't think tolerance is a virtue. I'm not going to have these right-wingers throw away our right to be tolerant."
    • Speaking to Democrats Abroad, Mr. Dean called Republicans "brain-dead," saying the reason his party lost the 2004 race to the "brain-dead" Republicans was because of the Democrats' "tendency to explain every issue in half an hour of detail."

More recently, during an address to Massachusetts Democrats at their state convention Governor Dean said

"I think Tom DeLay ought to go back to Houston, where he can serve his jail sentence down there."

And in the next breath complained about

"this ugly, nasty dialogue that is coming from the right wing of the American Republican Party."

The comments were egregious enough that they caused Rep Barney Frank, a critic of Rep DeLay, to comment to the Boston Globe

''That's just wrong...I think Howard Dean was out of line talking about DeLay. The man has not been indicted. I don't like him, I disagree with some of what he does, but I don't think you, in a political speech, talk about a man as a criminal or his jail sentence."

Governor Dean, it seems to me is engaged in subtraction while Mr Mehlman is attempting addition; Dean is alienating people from the Democratic Party while Mehlman is attracting people to the Republican party. I could be wrong. Perhaps the Governor is doing exactly the right thing for his Party. Perhaps, despite what it seems, this is in fact the way to grow. I know this though, if that's the case, I don't want anything to do with a party that grows using such methods because the people who would be attracted would be people I don't want to know or be associated with in any way.

But using objective measures, such as they exist, it seems that Mehlman's approach is working far better than the Governor's. The National Democratic Committee has

$16.7 million raised in the first quarter of 2005, compared with $34 million reported by the Republicans.

I don't think such indicators are good news for Democrats or the country. To the extent that Republicans become the only choice in National Politics is precisely the extent to which we lose alternative voices.

While it is a good thing that the Republicans are striving to become more inclusive because this will dilute any concentration of political ideas and avoid approaches that are too ideologically focused, we still need a viable political alternative.

And as I have said many times on these pages, at the moment we don't have one. From my point of view the only viable faction within the current Democratic Party is the Clinton's Democratic Leadership Council but it seems that this is a small voice and that the National Party is catering to the crowd at the Democratic Underground instead.

This is not a good thing...

Alternatives Bucking the Democratic Leadership, Representative Robert Wexler of Boca Raton Florida has proposed a solution to the Social Security problem.

U.S. Rep. Robert Wexler (D-Boca Raton) on Friday became the first Democrat in Congress to put a Social Security bailout bill on the table.

“My plan guarantees that all Americans receive the monies they deserve without cutting benefits or raising the retirement age,” said Wexler, who outlined the bill at a luncheon in Delray Beach on Monday.

Republicans oppose the bill which they claim will raise taxes. Most Democrats are reluctant to sign on, saying they don’t want to offer a counterproposal until President George W. Bush drops his plan to set up private accounts.

Hooray for Rep Wexler. I don't care if his proposal raises taxes, we don't have to accept it. More importantly, there may be parts of his proposal that will become part of the legislation that finally does pass.

That something has to be done is clear. That most people think that something has to be done is also clear.

In a recent AP/Ipsos poll participants were asked

Some have said that the Social Security program in its present form will run out of money at some point to pay all of the promised benefits. Do you agree or disagree?

and answered

Agree................................................ 70
Disagree ........................................... 27
Not sure.......................................... 3

A recent Rasmussen poll found

Sixty percent (60%) of Americans oppose a do nothing approach.

Democrats are evenly divided on the question--43% of Nancy Pelosi's party favor the leave-it-alone approach while 45% are opposed.

Republicans, by a 75% to 16% margin reject that approach. Those not affiliated with either party are nearly as strong in their opposition to doing nothing--61% of unaffiliateds oppose that approach while only 23% support it.

It appears that doing nothing is not what people want. Yet, Rep Wexler is the first Democrat to propose a solution and only one of a handful of Democrats that will even admit there is a problem. It is clear to me that either the Democratic leadership is blind, or they are attempting to use the issue for partisan purposes.

Ross Kaminsky writing for the Global Politician puts it this way

For the Democrats overall, Wexler's plan is an important first crack in their wall of silence and puts them in a no-win situation....The major problem for the Democrats now is that Wexler has demonstrated why the Party has had no choice but to keep quiet: their only proposal to fix Social Security is to raise taxes and they know that outside Manhattan, San Francisco, and other bastions of liberal strength, tax hikes are not politically popular.

But here's the deal, Social Security has to be fixed. The more solutions put on the table, the higher the quality of the subsequent discussion. No proposal will survive intact, and a broader array of "pieces" available will more likely result in a better solution for Americans that is agreeable to a majority.

Sidelining the debate for partisan advantage is not what we send people to Washington for. We expect them to solve problems not jockey for power.

And I predict that those who are seen avoiding fixing a perceived problem for purposes of obtaining power will pay at the voting polls.

Grow the Fuck Up Already The First Lady is visiting the Middle East and using her bully-pulpit to call for more freedom for women in the region.

``Women who have not yet won these rights are watching,'' [Laura] Bush said at the King Hussein Bin Talal Convention Center on the banks of the Dead Sea. ``Freedom, especially freedom for women, is more than the absence of oppression. It's the right to speak and vote and worship freely. Human rights require the rights of women. And human rights are empty promises without human liberty.''

Given that Kuwait has recently approved political rights and suffrage for women (as the Dish reported here), that leaves Saudi Arabia as the only remaining Middle Eastern country that denies women the right to vote and engage in political activity. Of course, Saudi Arabia even denies women the right to drive.

While promoting her Women's rights and religious tolerance agenda, Mrs Bush visited the Wailing Wall in Israel as well as the Al Aqsa Mosque in East Jerusalem. Some didn't like it.

"We strongly reject this visit and we consider it against the highest interests and the legitimate rights of the Palestinian people," said a Hamas leaflet.

    "In principle, we are not against a visit to Al Aqsa Mosque, but the visit of Ms. Bush is aimed at improving US image in the Islamic world after US army officers tore the papers of Quran before prisoners at the Guantanamo detention camp," it said.

That we have not heard condemnation from Hamas for Musab al-Zarqawi's justification for killing innocent Muslims (and innocents in general), which presumably is worse than flushing a Quran down a toilet, I again note that many of these people are simply acting like spoiled and dangerous children. They want tolerance but refuse to be tolerant. Mrs Bush said

``As freedom becomes a fact of life for rising generations in the Middle East, young people need to grow up with a full understanding of freedom's rights and responsibilities: the right to discuss any issue in the public sphere, and the responsibility to respect other people and their opinions,''

That's adult behavior.

And what's more, it is time that people, many in the press, Europe and the US, resolve to stop enabling the continuation of this childishness. More importantly, the Muslim world needs to call these people to task and stop coddling them because they need to grow the fuck up before they destroy the beauty of the Islamic religion forever.

They need to grow the fuck up before they can be allowed to be full participants in the global community and until they do they should be shunned.

It is disgraceful that the Saudis can imprison Christians and desecrate their bibles with impunity and then become indignant when they hear that a Quran was flushed down the toilet.

It is disgraceful that Arab regimes can condemn the release from tyranny of millions in Iraq and yet do nothing to help the black Christians being murdered en masse by the Arab League member country Sudan. Not to mention that they never once took a stand against Saddam for the atrocities he committed while he was committing them.

And of course it is disingenuous to say the least to require tolerance when you are trying to eradicate the Jewish religion, not to mention the state of Israel.

You want tolerance, then show some tolerance.

And while you're at it, let your women vote and hold office. Human rights includes women, damn it.

Because women are human, in case you didn't notice.

Get Nekkid A new scientific study recommends that women should lay out in the sun naked for long periods of time.

For years we have been told to stay out of the sun, paste ourselves with sunblock, sit in the shade and wear a hat.  Now, it seems that we should be spending some of that time out in the sun, without the hat or sunblock, if we want to have a plentiful supply of Vitamin D and reduce our chances of developing cancer.

Experts are beginning to notice that sunlight protects from cancer at a significantly greater rate than the risks.  We get Vitamin D by exposing our skin to ultraviolet rays.

OK, so I maybe misrepresented the study a wee bit.

But ladies, it couldn't hurt...could it?

Daily Dish

Blog Voices First and foremost comes this urgent message from RedState.org

Time is running out. The public comment period for the FEC's proposed rulemaking regarding your freedom online ends on June 3rd. I can tell you that they have not yet received nearly as many comments as they expected.

There is a threat. You need to act.

As I pointed out in April 14th's Dish, one of the emerging results of the McCain-Feingold Campaign Finance "reform" Act is the idea that political speech by a blog for or against a candidate in a Federal election may be considered a campaign contribution.

The Center for Democracy and Technology explains

The FEC initially ruled that Internet activity was almost entirely exempt from BCRA. In September 2004, however, the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia ruled in Shays v. FEC (brought by two of BCRA’s Congressional sponsors) that the FEC could not completely exempt Internet activity from regulation. The federal court left it to the FEC to determine, in the first instance, what types of Internet activities should be regulated under BCRA and the campaign finance laws more generally.

The CDT outlines the implications of the propsed FEC rules for all bloggers

Among the problems confronting small and individual Internet speakers are:

• disclaimer requirements and other campaign finance regulations would apply to individuals who pay only a few dollars for a paid Internet advertisements;


• if two or more independent online speakers collaborate on a web site, they may have to register with the FEC as a “political committee;”


• expenditures on small and independent Internet speech may trigger a requirement to file reports with the FEC; and


• most importantly, many small and individual speakers will need to obtain legal advice to determine whether and what campaign finance rules apply to them.

All of these concerns will act to discourage small speakers from expressing their political views – a result that is directly contrary to the goals of the campaign finance laws. These and other concerns are discussed more fully in a separate document.

The FEC is encouraging comments from the public up until June 3rd. Make sure you are heard. And make sure you do it right. A commenter at RedState.org has tips

Federal Register
16967
Vol. 70, No. 63
Monday, April 4, 2005

ADDRESSES: All comments must be in writing, must be addressed to Mr. Brad C. Deutsch, Assistant General Counsel and must be submitted in either electronic, facsimile, or hard copy form.   Commenters are strongly encouraged to submit comments electronically to ensure timely receipt and consideration.

Electronic comments must be sent to either [email protected] or submitted through the Federal Regulations Portal at http://www.regulations.gov.

Any commenters who submit electronic comments and wish to testify at the hearing on this rulemaking must also send a copy of their comments to [email protected]. If the electronic comments include an attachment, the attachment must be in the Adobe Acrobat (.pdf) or Microsoft Word (.doc)format. Faxed comments must be sent to (202) 219-3923, with hard copy followup. Hard copy comments and hard copy follow-up of faxed comments must be sent to the Federal Election Commission, 999 E Street, NW., Washington, DC 20463. All comments must include the full name and postal service address of the commenter or they will not be considered. The Commission will post comments on its Web site after the comment period ends. The hearing will be held in the Commission's ninth floor meeting room, 999 E Street, NW., Washington, DC.

It also would behoove us (you) to write your Senators and Congressfolk to support HR. 1606 and S. 678 which would legislate the solution and take it out of the FECs hands altogether.

The time to act is now.

Or not.

Your choice

This is where you make a stand? President Bush is threatening to veto the first bill of his Presidency. No it's not Campaign Finance Reform, though he had the chance. No, its not about the creation of the TSA, though he could have vetoed that too. No the bill he is about to veto has to do with Federal funding of stem cell research.

President Bush threatened on Friday to veto legislation that would loosen restrictions on government funding of embryonic stem cell research and expressed concern about human cloning research in South Korea.

Does this mean the end of stem cell research? No. Stem cell research will continue. It will continue abroad, that's for sure. But it will also continue in the US. The state of New Jersey and the state of California are both funding research. Private institutions may do stem cell research as well. And I don't think this the result is awful.

Though some are questioning what consituency Bush is catering to, I do not believe his stand on this is political. He has stated his reasons for opposing this and I believe him

"I've made it very clear to the Congress that the use of federal money, taxpayers' money, to promote science which destroys life in order to save life -- I'm against that. And therefore if the bill does that, I will veto it," Bush told reporters...

I just disagree. And there may be enough voices in Congress to overide the veto.

Pressure is building in Congress, including some Republicans, to allow more research, believing it could ultimately lead to cures for diseases like diabetes and Alzheimer's.

It is disheartening to me, though, that it is on this subject that the President has decided to put his foot down whereas from my point of view, there were many more, and better, opportunities for using his power of veto.

Will he at least make up for it by vetoing the highway bill?

On can only hope.

He's on the other side. His lawyer said he was fired from the TSA because of his political leanings.

defense lawyer William Swor said Ahmed's conviction had more to do with his political views than with any real crime.

The TSA said they fired him for lying on his application.

[Sadeq Naji] Ahmed, 25, of Dearborn, was accused of lying to the government about his Air Force discharge in order to get his job at Detroit Metropolitan Airport. Prosecutors said he lied on a 2002 Transportation Security Administration questionnaire when he said he never left a job under unfavorable circumstances and when he failed to disclose that his security clearance had been revoked.

The lawyer says

...Ahmed did not lie when he said he had never left a job under unfavorable circumstances because he received an honorable discharge. Furthermore, his statement that he never had a security clearance revoked was technically true, even though his commander suspended his access to classified information, Swor said.

So why did the US Air Force suspect Ahmed's access to classified information and subsequently discharge him early? And, why did the TSA fire him from screening passengers who would fly on airlines?

Ahmed's former commander at Eglin Air Force Base in Florida testified Wednesday that military officials had concerns about the loyalty of the Yemeni immigrant, but took action only after the Sept. 11 attacks.

Col. Steven G. Seroka said Ahmed's colleagues quoted him as saying that if the United States attacked certain countries, he would have to fight for the other side. Ahmed also talked about Osama bin Laden as "a holy man, someone to be looked up to, to be listened to," Seroka said.

Seroka said several officers told him they heard Ahmed praising the attacks on New York and Washington and saying that the United States deserved it

Oh I see. He's on the other side.

BTW, the jury convicted him of lying on his Federal application and he is facing five years in a Federal prison.

Daily Dish

Democratic Reality The elections in Lebanon are less than two weeks away and politics is the order of the day. While the UN is providing technical assistance, others are attempting to provide a score card. One of these is Michael Husdon a member and former director of Georgetown University's Center for Contemporary Arab Studies. In his view, Syria's influence in Lebanon is not yet a thing of the past.

"Once you get over the euphoria of liberation, you ask: 'Who are the real forces in the country?' And it turns out they're pretty much the same forces who were running things already," he said.

Hudson suggested that the continued dominance of familiar political forces was likely to help sustain Syrian influence in Lebanon.

"There are about half a dozen major forces in the country," he said, "and Syria will therefore retain very substantial influence, even if it doesn't have a significant mukhabarat presence here."

Also, he says, there are distinct demographic forces in play.

Hudson described witnessing "two Lebanons" represented in the numerous street demonstrations leading up to the Syrian withdrawal.

"There was the Lebanon of the poor, the Lebanon of Islam, the Lebanon of true nationalism," he said, referring to the largely Shiite rallies often organized by Hizbullah.

Hudson added that this Lebanon feels "very strongly about what Israel has been doing to them and to others, and very strongly object to what they might have seen as an American-led plot to expel the Syrians, disarm Hizbullah and so on."

Hudson described the other Lebanon as "people who are cosmopolitan, well off, who really like America, who really don't like Syria, who would like to be done with the whole Israeli business."

He also suggested opposition members might be more inclined to forge a peace agreement with Israel.

"Their leaders would be prepared, when they came to power, to disarm Hizbullah and conclude another May 17 agreement with Israel, bringing back (Michel) Aoun, bringing back (Samir) Geagea. Maybe Aoun or Geagea would become president.

"If that was the case," he said, "you would have two Lebanons in conflict."

Not to mention the fact that Syria wouldn't like this result either.

A Sunni political party is being led by the son of the man whose assassination started the movement to kick out the Syrian army, and is just one party hoping for success at the end of the month.

A party now led by Mr. Hariri's son, Saad, has emerged as a favorite, taking nine of the 19 parliamentary seats in Beirut by acclamation after several challengers withdrew yesterday. But the pro-Syrian party that ruled until its resignation this spring also remains a factor.

Other parties include Walid Jumblatt's Druze party and several Christian parties. All of these had combined forces several months ago united in their attempt to remove Syrian influence from Lebanese politics. Since winning this fight, they have drifted towards electoral competition. But it is the Christians that have become the most fractured. In attempt to heal this and present a more united front, the recently returned from exile

Former Lebanese Army commander Michel Aoun paid a shock visit to his jailed former rival Samir Geagea in what was seen as a bid to unite Lebanon's Christian community just 10 days before landmark parliamentary elections...

Geagea, who was blamed for a wave of political assassinations and bombings when he led the Lebanese Forces militia during Lebanon's long civil war, has spent most of the past 11 years in solitary confinement in an underground cell for his actions, while other former warlords were rewarded with Cabinet posts.

Supporters of the fiercely anti-Syrian warrior have staged large demonstrations demanding his release since the last of Damascus' forces left the country.

Mr. Aoun, a former prime minister and military commander who returned from exile on May 7, had himself waged a bloody struggle with Geagea for control of Lebanon's Christian community before he fled in 1990 after losing a confrontation with Syria.

But he showed no sign of rancor after his prison meeting yesterday, joining in calls for Geagea's release in an apparent attempt to end tensions between his Free Patriotic Movement and other opposition groups.

"The visit lays the foundations for a new relationship within the democratic process we are witnessing today, and within the framework of letting go of the past, which is now part of history," Mr. Aoun said at a press conference.

In some areas of Lebanon, the elections are less important than getting Syria off their land. People in the town of Maarboun claim that Syria moved the border to the deficit of their town, and they are ready to fight to defend it.

these villagers are angry - very angry. Most young men in Maarboun carry pistols and have collected heavier weapons, which they keep at a secret location outside the village.

Two weeks ago they opened up on a bulldozer on the now Syrian side of the border. Nobody got hurt, but the tone was set: "We are ready to fight for our land against Syria," they all say.

The people of Maarboun claim Syria has illegally moved the border a couple of kilometers inside Lebanon, thus turning 15 square kilometers of Lebanon into Syria.

It seems that it will take years before the imprint of the boot left by Syria's occupation is fully removed from Lebanese soil.

A Lasting Legacy Former President Clinton has some thoughts on the situation in the Middle East that he shared with reporters in Denmark

the political changes in Iraq, including parliamentary elections in January, will help bring stability to the region....

"There is no point living in the past," Clinton said. "Look at where we are now. Everyone, all freedom-loving people would be better off with a genuinely representative, effective, free government in Iraq whatever your feelings are about what went on before."

True 'nuff. It would seem that those who embrace the real goals of Liberalism should be on board with this regardless of how they felt about the situation that led up to it. Cassandra of the Villainous Company blog points to a speech by former Bush critic, Historian John Lewis Gaddis who was invited by the Bush Administration to address the National Security Council because the President had read his book and liked it so much, he made it required reading at the Whitehouse. He recalls

I of course said yes, but then started quickly flipping through the book to review what I’d actually said about the President and his policies. Here are some sample quotes:

I said that he had “failed miserably” in getting United Nations support for the invasion of Iraq.

I said that his solutions to complex problems tended to be “breathtakingly simple.”

I said that the phrase “axis of evil” originated “in overzealous speechwriting rather than careful thought.”

I said that the failure to find weapons of mass destruction in Iraq had “diminished, in advance, the credibility of whatever future intelligence claims Bush and Blair might make.”

I said that the so-called “coalition of the willing” there had been “more of a joke than a reality.”

I said that, “within a little more than a year and a half, the United States had exchanged its long-established reputation as the principal stabilizer of the international system for one as its chief destabilizer.”

But he went and found something different than what he expected

I’d been told, first of all, that the President never read anything beyond his daily press and intelligence digests. So it was certainly a surprise to find that he had read my book, and that he had done so ahead of his own staff. We’ve since learned, of course, that the President has a pretty eclectic reading list, ranging from Nathan Sharansky and Ron Chernow to Tom Wolfe.

I’d been told, second, that this was an administration that could not take criticism – that it listened only to people who agreed with it. But the criticisms I’d made didn’t seem to bother anyone.

And I’d been told that this was an administration that was incapable of changing direction, of learning from mistakes, of assessing its own performance. But the whole tone of the discussions was one of acknowledging that, while the overall direction of policy was right, much had gone wrong along the way, and that in the second term – if the voters were to grant one – there would have to be certain changes.

Huh. Who'da thunk

But the best is yet to come. Read the whole speech for yourself.

Daily Dish

Redrum What happened on Friday in the Uzbek town of Andijan? The oppressive Soviet-style government of Islam Karimov claims there was an uprising of radical Islamists which it had to put down with deadly force. Opposition forces say the Uzbek government fired on unarmed protesters.

So what happened?

There is no doubt that the Uzbek government is an oppressive regime.

The United Nations has accused Karimov's government of systematic torture of his political opponents. All Uzbek press is controlled by the state, and the country has virtually no legitimate political opposition.

Political life in Uzbekistan has been ''burnt out and razed" by government suppression, Russian analyst Maxim Shevchenko told the Radio Rossii station yesterday. He described the Uzbek unrest as a spontaneous revolt, which may be difficult to direct or contain.

There is also little doubt that Islamic extremists with ties to both al Qaeda and the Taliban exist within Uzbekistan.

Militants from several Islamic groups have been active in Uzbekistan.

The Islamic Movement of Turkestan (IMT) - said to have links to al-Qaeda - was blamed for a bomb blast in Tashkent in 1999 which killed more than a dozen people.

Mr Karimov also accused the IMT and another group, Hezb-e-Tahrir, of  involvement in bomb attacks in the summer of 2004.

Both groups have the stated aim of establishing an Islamic state in Central Asia, though Hezb-e-Tahrir says it wants to do so using peaceful means.

What exactly happened on Friday is difficult to assess but from what I have pieced together this is what happened..

It started with an armed prison break.

Early Friday morning, supporters of the defendants, perhaps numbering up to 60 men, raided a military base and seized weapons, according to news reports from the city. They then stormed the prison where the Akramis were being held, freeing them and up to 2,000 other prisoners.

Amnesty International concurs with this, though they put a lower number on the prison population:

According to a press release issued Monday by human rights watchdog Amnesty International, all of the prison's 1,200 inmates were released at the same time.

It also seems that there was armed attacks against police and destruction of Government buildings, but whether this was part of the prelude to the prison break or not is hard to discern. But eventually, a large crowd took to the streets venting frustration over political and religious restrictions by the government. They were also downright sick of being poor and oppressed.

The prison assault coincided with demonstrations as thousands of people tumbled into the streets, angry with the region's crushing poverty and Karimov's government.

The exact sequence of events that followed remains murky because Uzbekistan has kept out foreign journalists and nongovernmental organizations. By some accounts, extremists holding 10 police officers hostage were fired upon by soldiers, killing the police as well as their captors. Witnesses and human-rights organizations reported that troops opened fire on the crowd, killing hundreds of civilians, including women and children — some at close range.

The Uzbek government claims they only fired on armed "radicals" but this is likely not the case. It seems clear they also fired indiscriminately into crowds of unarmed people which included women and children

an AP reporter and other journalists witnessed troops opening fire on the crowd at Andijan's central square.

Glenn Reynolds has a report from an NPR reporter who witnessed more of the same

NPR had a very good piece on Uzbekistan today, featuring a reporter who was in the area where the massacre occurred.

The journalist was very clear that the official Uzbek government line is a lie. She personally witnessed Uzbek troops opening fire on demonstrators, including women and children, with no prior warning. She claimed the casualty figures were much, much higher than reported - at least 1000-1500 dead - and that did not include women and children, whose corpses the government gathered and "disappeared".

It was a disturbing report by an eyewitness.

 

It is clear that the Uzbek government is under-reporting the number of deaths and refusing to allow international agencies to conduct an independent investigation. One might assume they have something to hide and most likely do.

From what I can tell, this is a big problem for US foreign policy in its attempt to promote Democracy and not coddle dictators. It is not simply a matter of the US supporting pro-Democratic forces as was likely done in neighboring Ukraine because here there is a component that is clearly willing to use violence. And this component is likely led by folks who are allied with al Qaeda and Taliban types.

So if we were to support a pro-Democracy movement here, who would we be supporting?

There is no doubt that some leaders of the opposition movement want to create an Islamic state in Uzbekistan.

The leader of a group of rebels claiming to control this Uzbek border town said Wednesday that he and his supporters intend to build an Islamic state and are ready to fight if government troops attempt to crush their revolt.

Which is not necessarily a problem unless it is an undemocratic Islamic state in the model of what Afghanistan used to be; only with more resources and infrastructure. Supporting an anti-government movement here could result in a new Iran consisting of Sunni Islamists instead of Shi'a.

It is also clear that the tyrannical government now in place has fed and continues to feed the desire for revolution. Armed clashes have already spread to neighboring areas and countries.

It could very well be that Washington has already lost the ability to influence the situation and the end result is that the US will have to sit on the sidelines while an extremely dangerous new country is born.

Judging Women Sen Bill Frist formally brought the nomination of Texas Supreme Court Justice Priscilla Owens for the 5th Circuit Court to the floor of the Senate. This is a woman who's nomination has been blocked by a few Democrats for four years by means of the filibuster. Minority Leader Reid thought it would be a good idea if other, less controversial, nominations were brought up first but it seems the thinking on the part of the Majority Leader is if we are gonna have a fight might as well be sooner rather than later.

"I've made it clear what the principle is -- a fair up-or-down vote," Frist said Tuesday. "And we will have whatever debate is required to really exhaust the discussion on these candidates."

The debate will likely carry on for most of the week, (no one will be able to say the nomination was not talked to death) after which Sen Frist is expecting a vote to be taken. If the Democrats try to filibuster, then the fun will begin.

No one claims Justice Owens is unqualified. The fight is not about her judicial record: the American Bar Association claims she is well qualified for the job.

The fight is about her personal beliefs which are too conservative for some.

But there is zero evidence that her personal beliefs have ever impacted her judicial duties of interpreting the law when the two conflict.

Which should make the Democrats happy that they won't be appointing a Judicial activist: someone who makes law from the bench.

Or, perhaps, they are suspicious precisely because a judicial activist is what they want.

Just not one of the Conservative flavor.

Ya think?

One Little Indian So is Ward Churchill an Native American or not? He was asked this question by his employer since he was hired and got his position because he told them he was a Native American.  And according to his lawyer,

"He responded to everything, including the absolutely unconstitutional inquiry into his ethnicity," [his attorney, David] Lane said.

Lane said that federal law provides four points on which American Indian status can be legally claimed, and that Churchill can satisfy at least three.

So which three does Mr Churchill claim he fulfills?

Well, he calls himself an American Indian. That's one.

One, Lane said, is how a person self-identifies. Churchill has identified himself as an Indian - by at least one recent account - since he was 10.

Then there's the fact that people believe that he's and Native American. Though it must be admitted that far fewer believe this now than did before.

And finally, being a member of a tribe is another qualifier. OK, So Ward Churchill is not a member of a tribe but he is an associate member of a tribe. And according to the professor, that's better than being an honorary member of a tribe.

Churchill and Lane insist that associate membership is more significant than the "honorary" membership the same tribe once gave President Clinton. Several tribal members, however, say there is no difference between the two.

One can only guess, or do more research than I'm willing to do on my lunch hour, that the fourth criteria would actually involve having a relative that is an Native American. And it would seem that Mr. Churchill does not claim to fulfill this particular, if not crucial, requirement.

But of course all of this is simply a prelude because the University of Colorado is also investigating  allegations that Mr Churchill

has engaged in plagiarism, falsification and fabrication.

I wonder if he can use the same logic to absolve himself?

1) He doesn't call himself a plagiarist
2) Many people don't call him a plagiarist
3) He's a member of a tribe that doesn't plagiarize: College Professors....oh wait...scratch that

The Amish Store Wal-Mart is catering to the needs of its consumers, even if their consumers drive horse-powered buggies.

 

A new Wal-Mart that caters to the Amish has opened in Middlefield, Ohio...

The store has an expanded parking lot that includes 37 hitching posts for horse-drawn carriages.

Attending the Grand Opening is by invitation only

Geauga County Commissioner Mary Samide says the Wal-Mart fills a void created by the shutdown of an Ames store several years ago.

You mean Ames had buggy hitching posts as well?

 

 

Daily Dish

Suffrage Women in Kuwait have been granted the right to vote by a majority of male Parliamentarians. It had to be that way since not only were women not allowed to vote, they were not allowed to serve in government. But all of that has changed....with a few restrictions

Islamist and conservative tribal lawmakers, who previously had adamantly opposed the idea of women voting, claiming that it would result in women neglecting duties at home and would lead to a breakdown of the family, included an article in the bill requiring that any female politician or voter abide by Islamic law.

But most women's groups in the Islamic state paid the restrictions little mind.

Women activists, however, did not pay much attention to the amendment, with many of them saying they were not concerned by the vague reference to Islamic law, while others understood it as meaning separate polling stations and not an Islamic dress code.

And instead celebrated

Chairwoman of Kuwaiti Women's Volunteer Society for Community Services, Sheikha Latifa Al-Fahad Al-Salem Al-Sabah, thanked all those who supported the Kuwaiti women, such as NGOs, academics, institutions, press and students, pledging that women would be up to this confidence.

Most accounts recall that there was celebrating in the streets and such, but clearly, not everyone was happy

Some Islamists accused the government of pressurising MPs to pass the amendment to the electoral law, saying the change goes against religious teaching and serves US interests.

Kuwait becomes the fourth Gulf country where women as well as men can vote in elections after Bahrain, Oman and Qatar. Saudi Arabia holds strictly limited, male-only elections.

And US pressure didn't hurt.

The Bush administration has been pressing its oil-rich and strategic Middle East allies to bring in reforms since the 11 September 2001 attacks on the US - arguing that political stagnation fuels terrorism.

"We think this is an important step forward for Kuwait, for the women of Kuwait and for the nation as a whole," said US state department spokesman Richard Boucher after Monday's vote.

You know, if the Bush Administration has a "secret agenda" in the Middle that his hidden from everyone, while on the surface Democratic change comes to an area sorely in need of political and economic freedom and liberalism, then I say: Let it be until such time as the evil plot is umasked.

Because the fact is that so much good has already been accomplished, there is going to have to be some monstrous, hell-invoking evil to outweigh it.

But I suspect many of Bush's critics already know that....

We Don't Need Your Help The leaders of seven African nations have declared that with regards to the situation in Darfur, Western intervention is neither welcome nor needed.

In a statement issued at the end of the two-day meeting, leaders of Egypt, Libya, Chad, Nigeria, Sudan, Gabon and Eritrea decided to "reject any foreign intervention in the Darfur problem and dealing with it should be through its African framework."

Sure. No problem. The fact that the Sudanese Government is Muslim and all the Darfur victims are black and Christian probably doesn't impact on this decision.

The fact that the Arab League has yet to reign in the atrocities and genocide (a US term because the UN is loath to use it in this case) committed in the region probably should be ignored as well.

The fact that the Sudanese government refuses to comply with any UN resolutions relative to Darfur is likewise irrelevant.

The African Nations can take care of the problem

The Darfur conflict erupted after a rebel uprising against what is seen by many in the vast western province as years of state neglect and discrimination against Sudanese of African origin. Sudan's government is accused of responding with unleashing and supporting the Janjaweed, an Arab militia that committed wide-scale abuses against the African population.

The United Nations estimates 180,000 people have died since violence broke out in Darfur in February 2003, mainly from war-induced hunger and disease....

The seven African leaders said they would support reconciliation efforts between the people of Darfur, pay compensation and "try crime suspects in Darfur according to the national judicial system."

In their closing statement the leaders called on the warring parties to resume peace talks in Abuja, Nigeria before the end of this month and asked the African countries involved in the Tripoli summit to send high ranking delegates to the talks to help.

I hope it helps because frankly given current sensitivities it is unlikely that that the US could engage in an "elective" war against a Muslim nation in support of black Christians without a clear national security motive so the AU is going to have to handle it.

The Arab League sure as hell isn't going to to stand against one of their own.

Restored From fellow Vermonter, and self-avowed gun nut (though he's not nuts at all), Jeff Soyer comes a story about what a media source lost and then found as a result of bloggers noticing

Secretary of State Dr. Condoleeza Rice had appeared on Larry King and reiterated her support for the Second Amendment. Here's just a brief re-cap of what she was saying:

KING: We have a Second Amendment. People can own guns. By the way, what do you think about gun control?

RICE: The way I come out of my own personal experience, in which in Birmingham, Alabama, my father and his friends defended our community in 1962 and 1963 against White Knight Riders by going to the head of the community, the head of the cul-de-sac, and sitting there, armed. And so I'm very concerned about any abridgement of the Second Amendment.

I'll tell you that I know that if Bull Conner had had lists of -- of registered weapons, I don't think my father and his friends would have been sitting at the head of the community, defending the community.

KING: So you would not change the Second Amendment? You would not...

RICE: I also don't think we get to pick and choose from the Constitution. The Second Amendment is as important as the First Amendment.

KING: But doesn't having the guns, while it's protection, also leads to people killing people?

RICE: Well, obviously, the sources of violence are many, and we need to -- to get at the source of the violence. Obviously, I'm very much in favor of things like background checks, and you know, controlling it at gun shows. And there are lots of things we can do.

But we have to be very careful when we start abridging rights that our Founding Fathers thought very important. On this one, I think that they understood that there might be circumstances that people like my father experienced in Birmingham, Alabama, when in fact, the police weren't going to protect you.

And suddenly, a mystery was born because originally, the transcript on CNN's website wasn't showing this part of the interview. Could it be that the transcriber was biased against gun ownership? Or CNN? Well, we KNOW CNN is biased against them. We may never know why that segment was edited out but fortunately, the blogosphere came to the rescue with folks such as CounterTop Chronicles and InstaPundit giving the disappearance wide-play.  And guess what?  The missing dialogue has been restored.  The blogosphere gets results!

Yes it does.

But what does the anti-gun leftists do with a statement by a high-ranking, intelligent black woman who claims the 2nd Amendment helped save the lives of people who were being oppressed?

Got me.

Daily Dish

Sensitivity Training OK, so yesterday I got on Newsweek's case for sloppy reporting that got people killed. Today, I'm gonna get on the case of Islamists who are so concerned about a millionth generation facsimile of a sacred document being flushed down a toilet.

So let's be clear. Americans are supposed to be OK with their flag being burned by angry mobs who heard that the Koran was being flushed down the toilet.

Americans are supposed to be OK with bibles being confiscated in Saudi Arabia where the book is banned. And we are supposed to be OK with Christians being abducted there by the Saudi religious police and not have riots against Muslims in America because we need to be sensitive to other cultures. All of this while the Saudi Royal family expresses outrage for their holy book being flushed down the toilet.

Riyadh called for a quick investigation into the alleged incident and for the perpetrators to be punished.

Where is the quick investigation into Sam Varghese's abduction by the Saudi Police?

The Muttawa asked Varghese for his passport. However, he was only able to give them a copy because the Saudi government had taken his passport since he was requesting a visa extension. They then asked him what was in his bag. In his bag, he had one Bible in the Hindi language. The Muttawa then took Mr. Varghese away and there has been no communication from him since. Friends of Mr. Varghese went to the local police station but the police would not disclose any information in his regard. Samkutty Varghese has a wife and small children waiting on word of his whereabouts back in India.

More importantly, is it ever correct for anyone, anywhere, to show sensitivity to the sensibilities of Americans or Christians in general?

Ever? At any time?

All of which is fine by me. Why? Because every instance where we see this kind of thing in other cultures makes me even more proud to be an American. Because killing and looting and rioting in the streets because of a supposed lack of sensitivity to your culture by another is behavior indicative of a self-absorbed child.

While being able to keep your cool and respecting the sensibilities of others is indicative of a mature adult.

And you wonder why it is that some of these cultures fail both economically and scientifically?

Do you wonder the same thing about children?

Of course not. Children are expected to act like children.

And the fact that the only instance of a Quran being flushed down the toilet at Gitmo is by a Muslim I think is indicative.

It is Muslims themselves that are flushing their religion.

Gay Bashing As a result of their immigration policy, a city that has been considered the most welcoming and liberal in Europe has become dangerous to gays.

WHEN the editor of one of America’s leading gay magazines visited the world’s gay capital a fortnight ago, he assumed that he would be safe.

But as Chris Crain, editor of the Washington Blade, was walking hand in hand with his boyfriend near one of the gay districts in Amsterdam, two men standing on a street corner spat at his face. He stopped to ask why, was called a “fag” and suddenly the two youths turned into seven.

Surrounded, Mr Crain was kicked to the ground by the gang and ended up in hospital with a broken nose and badly bruised face.

His attackers were Moroccan youths, blamed by Dutch gay rights groups for a disturbing rise of gay-bashing, as conservative Islamic culture clashes with Dutch liberalism.

This is the very same country, and the very same perpetrators that attacked and killed Dutch filmaker Theo van Gogh for daring to make a film about how women are treated in Muslim cultures.

The Netherlands is starting to wake up, at least

“But you have to acknowledge that Islam has got problems adapting from a majority religion in the originating countries, to a minority position in an individualist and secular society”, says Scheffer. Muslims feel victimised. They claim rights such as religious freedom and acceptance of their identity for themselves, but deny those rights to others. They do not respect other religions - or atheism, for that matter.”

Today’s problems derive from immigration, says Scheffer. “In Amsterdam 40 percent of the unemployed are first generation immigrants. In New York, 90 percent of the immigrants work. I remember an anecdote the deputy mayor of Amsterdam Mohammed Aboutaleb told me. When in the late sixties and early seventies companies came to Morocco and Algeria, the recruiters would ask the applicant a question in French. If he replied in French eh was sent home. Overqualified. Today we’re facing the consequences. Normally the completion integration takes 3 generations. Today, 95 percent of immigrants marries a person from the country of origins. This is a huge set-back in the integration of the children that come from this marriage. The Netherlands have not benefited from the immigration from Mahgreb-counties – instead we’re facing nothing but problems.”

They may be waking up, but for now, if you're gay, or a critic of how women are treated in Muslim cultures, stay away from Amsterdam.

Numbers Game The Sunday Times of London has some fairly reliable information about the number of Iraqis killed during the American invasion.

The survey for the UN Development Programme, entitled Iraq Living Conditions Survey 2004, questioned more than 21,600 households this time last year. Its findings, released by the Ministry of Planning yesterday, could finally resolve the debate over how many Iraqis were killed in the war that overthrew the regime of Saddam Hussein in April 2003.

The 370-page report said that it was 95 per cent confident that the toll during the war and the first year of occupation was 24,000, but could have been between 18,000 and 29,000. About 12 per cent of those were under 18.

This number is in stark contrast to the number that was produced by an American researcher sitting in his living room that has been widely quoted up until this point.

The figure is far lower than the 98,000 deaths estimated in The Lancet last October, which said that it had interviewed nearly 1,000 households. But it is far higher than other figures.

The Lancet research was flawed. The 98,000 number was essentially pulled out of the "researchers" ass.

Readers who are accustomed to perusing statistical documents know what the set of numbers in the parentheses means. For the other 99.9 percent of you, I'll spell it out in plain English—which, disturbingly, the study never does. It means that the authors are 95 percent confident that the war-caused deaths totaled some number between 8,000 and 194,000. (The number cited in plain language—98,000—is roughly at the halfway point in this absurdly vast range.)

This isn't an estimate. It's a dart board.

Hey, it's close enough for those who wished Saddam was still around and Bush was in jail.

Referring to the Lancet report, Fred Kaplan writing for Slate notes:

The problem is, ultimately, not with the scholars who conducted the study; they did the best they could under the circumstances....

However, these scholars are responsible for the hype surrounding the study. Gilbert Burnham, one of the co-authors, told the International Herald Tribune (for a story reprinted in today's New York Times), "We're quite sure that the estimate of 100,000 is a conservative estimate." Yet the text of the study reveals this is simply untrue. Burnham should have said, "We're not quite sure what our estimate means. Assuming our model is accurate, the actual death toll might be 100,000, or it might be somewhere between 92,000 lower and 94,000 higher than that number."

Not a meaty headline, but truer to the findings of his own study.

But now we know. How much longer will the Lancet numbers be quoted?

Well...how widely distributed was the new, more accurate numbers?

There ya go.

New Reaction It appears that some environmentalists are warming to the idea of nuclear energy.

Several of the nation's most prominent environmentalists have gone public with the message that nuclear power, long taboo among environmental advocates, should be reconsidered as a remedy for global warming.

Well, I guess the junk science that is the Global Warming scare does have its upside. But what will happen when people realize that this is precisely what President Bush advocated in his State of the Union Address in February?

To keep our economy growing, we also need reliable supplies of affordable, environmentally responsible energy.  Nearly four years ago, I submitted a comprehensive energy strategy that encourages conservation, alternative sources, a modernized electricity grid, and more production here at home --  including safe, clean nuclear energy. My Clear Skies legislation will cut power plant pollution and improve the health of our citizens.  And my budget provides strong funding for leading-edge technology -- from hydrogen-fueled cars, to clean coal, to renewable sources such as ethanol.  Four years of debate is enough:  I urge Congress to pass legislation that makes America more secure and less dependent on foreign energy.

The reasonable ones will support him the others, in my opinion, have ulterior motives and could care less about the environment.

Cannes Goes Pro-War OK, so that's a bit of an overstatement. But it's hard to deny the impact a film, made by an Iraqi, is having in France. A film that is the antithesis of Michael Moore's mocumentary.

The main part of Hiner Saleem's Kilomètre Zéro, premiered in competition for the Palme D'Or, is set in 1988 against the backdrop of the deaths of thousands of Iraqi Kurds at the hands of Saddam's cousin, "Chemical" Ali Hassan al-Majid.

It is framed by scenes of the main characters, now exiled in France, rejoicing at the fall of Baghdad in 2003.

And it's not like Mr. Saleem is pro-war, he's just against, you know, mass murder.

"I am against war of any kind," Saleem said. "But we didn't have the luxury to say, 'For the time being, we will be exterminated'.

"If you say that the US is an imperialist country, then you are right. Had Sweden, Liechtenstein, France, come, it would have been wonderful. But they gave the US free rein; I am extremely pleased."

Yeah. France gave the US imperialists "free rein". That's one way of looking at it.

He denied that the film was overtly political in its message: "You don't produce a film to draw people's attention to politics.

Um, Michael Moore does.

China's Focus on Evacuation Finally China turns its attention to one of the more important aspects of modern life.

The city of 20 million, standard-bearer of communist China’s march into capitalism, is in the midst of a massive toilet modernization. It wants anyone without a toilet at home to have a public facility a few steps away, and offers a hot line for those who can’t find one.

This month Shanghai hosted the World Toilet Expo and Forum in hopes of getting advice on how to spruce up its loos. “We have observed that the state of public toilets, especially men’s toilets, is not up to standard and poses quite a challenge,” Hong Hao, deputy secretary general of Shanghai’s city government, told the gathering.

Who says their country is in the crapper?

Gumby It's the 50th Birthday (anniversary?) of Gumby. And he's making a comeback.

Five decades after Gumby first captured the nation's imagination, the little green guy and his chums are starring in a new art exhibit - the first in a series of events to mark the 50th anniversary of the television icon's creation and launch his comeback.

"Gumby and Friends: The First 50 Years" attracted fans of all ages at Saturday's opening at the historic Lynn House Gallery in Antioch, about 45 miles northeast of San Francisco. Creator Art Clokey, now 83, signed Gumby figurines at the two-story exhibit, which featured photographs, toys and other memorabilia.

Oh goody.

The Antioch exhibit is the first event planned this year to commemorate the 50 years since Clokey made a short art film called "Gumbasia," featuring clay animation set to jazz music, that inspired the beloved television series that debuted a year later in 1956.

Well jazz is cool.

Daily Dish

License to Kill Newsweek published an article with an unsourced accusation that Americans at Guantanamo Bay detention facility tore up a Koran and flushed it down a toilet.

Among the previously unreported cases, sources tell NEWSWEEK: interrogators, in an attempt to rattle suspects, flushed a Qur'an down a toilet and led a detainee around with a collar and dog leash....

These findings, expected in an upcoming report by the U.S. Southern Command in Miami, could put former Gitmo commander Maj. Gen. Geoffrey Miller in the hot seat.

But it appears no such report is forthcoming

General Richard Myers, chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, said military investigators have not yet found any evidence that American interrogators treated the Koran with disrespect.

What's more, it appears that the only instance of a Quran being flushed down a toilet was by an Islamic prisoner attempting to clog his toilet in an act of disobedience.

Myers said investigators have so far found only one piece of evidence that a Koran had been misused -- and that was allegedly by an Afghan prisoner, not by an American.

"They cannot confirm yet that there was ever the case of the toilet incident, except for one case -- a log entry which they still have to confirm -- where a detainee was reported by a guard to be ripping pages out of a Koran and putting [them] in the toilet to stop it up as a protest," Myers said.

But Newsweek said that this incident was already investigated, found, and about to be released in a report. Iron clad. No doubt about it.

Huh.

Guess they were wrong. Oh well. You know, sometimes you get it right, and sometimes you get it wrong.

Unfortunately, in getting it wrong Newsweek touched off a firestorm of death and destruction in Afghanistan, lead by professional instigators and fueled by Newsweek's article.

At least seven people have died in a fast-spreading wave of anti-US riots in Afghanistan, provoked by allegations that US soldiers desecrated the Koran at an interrogation centre in Guantánamo Bay.

Strangely, the magazine appears blind to the fact that the violence in Afghanistan was caused by their own extremely flawed reporting and exploited by anti-Democratic forces in the region. They act as if the reports were from someone else.

May 23 issue - "Protect our holy book!" Muslim protesters in Afghanistan, demonstrating against reports of desecration of the Qur'an by U.S. interrogators at Guantanamo.

I wonder if the irony-impaired publication has reported that President Hamid Karzai

has blamed "enemies" of Afghanistan's progress and its ties with the international community for the violence. The protest over the alleged desecration is not over.

Hmmm, I wonder if he would include Newsweek in that?

Speaking at a news conference Saturday in Kabul, President Karzai said those behind the violence are trying to tarnish Afghanistan's image as it moves toward political and economic stability. He said foreign hands are behind the disturbance, but he did not identify them.

That could mean Newsweek. But it could also mean those who know that the only way to defeat the progress Afghanistan has made is for the US and the International forces providing security there to leave.

To be fair, Newsweek has retracted the story, kinda

How did NEWSWEEK get its facts wrong? And how did the story feed into serious international unrest? While continuing to report events on the ground, NEWSWEEK interviewed government officials, diplomats and its own staffers, and reconstructed this narrative of events:

...NEWSWEEK National Security Correspondent John Barry, realizing the sensitivity of the story, provided a draft of the NEWSWEEK PERISCOPE item to a senior Defense official, asking, "Is this accurate or not?" The official challenged one aspect of the story: the suggestion that Maj. Gen. Geoffrey Miller, sent to Gitmo by the Pentagon in 2001 to oversee prisoner interrogation, might be held accountable for the abuses. Not true, said the official (the PERISCOPE draft was corrected to reflect that). But he was silent about the rest of the item. The official had not meant to mislead, but lacked detailed knowledge of the SouthCom report....

Well it seems to me that sloppy reporting in this case cost lives and reputations. Will some Muslim Cleric now hold up the retraction and blame a prisoner, a Muslim, instead?

When you fire a bullet there's no way to take it back.

It is quite clear that magazines like Newsweek have a license to kill with a pen. And they had best keep the safety on until they intend to kill.

"These kinds of wars are ultimately political," [Radek Sikorski who specializes in Afghanistan at the American Enterprise Institute] said. "You need to persuade the local population that you are on their side. And on the whole, I think, in Afghanistan, [the United States has] done it right, much better than in Iraq. The U.S. footprint is small, the U.S. is not seen as an occupier. It will be a terrible shame if we lost what essentially is still a success story."

Won't it though? Newsweek, you listening?

Denying Credit It seems that some US Border Patrol agents claim they have told to do less patrolling in areas recently evacuated by the Minute Man Project.

U.S. Border Patrol agents have been ordered not to arrest illegal aliens along the section of the Arizona border where protesters patrolled last month because an increase in apprehensions there would prove the effectiveness of Minuteman volunteers, The Washington Times has learned.

More than a dozen agents, all of whom asked not to be identified for fear of retribution, said orders relayed by Border Patrol supervisors at the Naco, Ariz., station made it clear that arrests were "not to go up" along the 23-mile section of border that the volunteers monitored to protest illegal immigration.

The whole immigration thing is a real problem for the Republicans claim to be better able to protect Americans from terrorists than Democrats. And this fact has not been lost on at least one potential candidate for President in 2008

New York Sen. Hillary Clinton is urging the Bush administration to appoint a border security coordinator who would be responsible for devising a strategy to stop terrorists from entering the U.S. from Canada.

"We know that the northern border is an important gateway for people coming into our country," Clinton said on Wednesday.

She's right. And she's also right about the whole Real ID thing.

in a statement posted to her Web site Tuesday, Clinton complained that the new immigration bill was "seriously flawed" and shouldn't have been attached to a "must-pass" military spending bill.

While this NewsMax piece can't figure out why the Real ID act is flawed, other do know. Bruce Schneier for instance

REAL ID is expensive. It's an unfunded mandate: the federal government is forcing the states to spend their own money to comply with the act. I've seen estimates that the cost to the states of complying with REAL ID will be $120 million. That's $120 million that can't be spent on actual security.

And the wackiest thing is that none of this is required. In October 2004, the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004 was signed into law. That law included stronger security measures for driver's licenses, the security measures recommended by the 9/11 Commission Report. That's already done. It's already law.

REAL ID goes way beyond that. It's a huge power-grab by the federal government over the states' systems for issuing driver's licenses.

And what's more

verifying that someone has a photo ID is a completely useless security measure. All the 9/11 terrorists had photo IDs. Some of the IDs were real. Some were fake. Some were real IDs in fake names, bought from a crooked DMV employee in Virginia for $1,000 each. Fake driver's licenses for all fifty states, good enough to fool anyone who isn't paying close attention, are available on the Internet. Or if you don't want to buy IDs online, just ask any teenager where to get a fake ID.

Harder-to-forge IDs only help marginally, because the problem is not making sure the ID is valid. This is the second myth of ID checks: that identification combined with profiling can be an indicator of intention.

Our goal is to somehow identify the few bad guys scattered in the sea of good guys. In an ideal world, what we'd want is some kind of ID that denotes intention. We'd want all terrorists to carry a card that says "evildoer" and everyone else to carry a card that said "honest person who won't try to hijack or blow up anything." Then, security would be easy. We'd just look at people's IDs and, if they were evildoers, we wouldn't let them on the airplane or into the building.

This is, of course, ridiculous, so we rely on identity as a substitute. In theory, if we know who you are, and if we have enough information about you, we can somehow predict whether you're likely to be an evildoer. This is the basis behind CAPPS-2, the government's new airline passenger profiling system. People are divided into two categories based on various criteria: the traveler's address, credit history, and police and tax records; flight origin and destination; whether the ticket was purchased by cash, check, or credit card; whether the ticket is one way or round trip; whether the traveler is alone or with a larger party; how frequently the traveler flies; and how long before departure the ticket was purchased.

Read it all and decide for your self. (this was brought to my attention via the Instapundit.)

While it is doubtful that Democrats can really field a pro-National Security, anti-Stalinist candidate in 2008, that's not the point. The point is when they are right they are right. And never forget that it will be easy for a Democrat to run to the Right of Republicans on immigration issues while also holding up the Civil Liberties banner.

Ban the Internet! There is an organization called United Confederacy Against WWW and they want the Internet banned.

the destructive way in which we use the internet degenerates society's standards. "The internet is nothing but filth to steal our children from God and truth", says Gladis [Haralski, founder of UCAWWW]...

OK, so they only have 43 members. But strangely, they don't seem to have a problem using the Internet to spread the word about the evils of the Internet. They have an online petition.

We, the members of UCAWWW, petition that the Internet (World Wide Web) creates nothing but harm in society today. The Internet is a cause for addiction and sin while taking away traditional family values. Our children are being exposed to filth that causes sexual tendencies and drug addiction. We therefore, demand that the internet be permanently banned from American homes. We MUST restore faith in God and steer clear of the devil!

As expected, while the response to the petition is overwhelming, it's not what was ideally desired.

Oh well. Maybe they should stick to letter writing.

Red Light Rome. OK, I don't know what to say about this.

Rome's top security official suggested that the city needs a red-light district to keep prostitutes off the streets, saying in an interview published Saturday that citizens complain daily about prostitutes working the streets of the Italian capital.

Uh huh.