From the Daily Telegraph comes good news:
Britain's most prominent Muslim leader last night demanded a crackdown on "rogue" Islamic preachers, blaming them for brainwashing young men with sermons promoting holy war against the West.Fantastic to hear this kind of thing! Let's hope for more.
Iqbal Sacranie, the secretary-general of the Muslim Council of Britain, was backed by the families of some of the eight men arrested in Tuesday's anti-terrorism raids in south-east England.
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Mr Sacranie said he had been urging the Government for some time to introduce an offence of incitement to religious hatred.
People such as Omar Bakri Mohammed, the leader of Al-Muhajiroun, which campaigns for an Islamic state in Britain, brought "much harm to the Muslim community".
He said: "These elements are preaching a message of hatred and violence that is against the Koran.
"They have nothing to do with Islam. There are more than a thousand mosques in Britain. We are not aware of this sort of activity in more than one or two."
...I'll do on the Clarke kerfuffle - because this, aside from everything else, settles it.
If President Bush had followed every last letter of Richard Clarke's recommendations starting Inauguration Day, it still would not have prevented 9/11. How do we know this? Richard Clarke says so.Yes, please - and post-haste. Goodbye, Mr. Clarke. And good riddance.
Here's how the disgruntled National Security Council veteran put it last week in an exchange with Slade Gorton, a member of the 9/11 Commission and former Washington Senator:Mr. Gorton: "Assuming that the recommendations that you made on January 25 of 2001 . . . including aid to the Northern Alliance which had been an agenda item at this point for two and a half years without any action, assuming that there had been more Predator reconnaissance missions, assuming that that had all been adopted, say, on January 26, year 2001, is there the remotest chance that it would have prevented 9/11?"....................
Mr. Clarke: "No."
[W]hen pressed on that point under oath, Mr. Clarke was forced to concede that the impression he'd created, the very reason anyone was paying any attention to him, was false. As long as Mr. Clarke is in the apology business, can we have one for wasting a week of the Administration's precious antiterror time?
Mark Steyn's review of the Passion of the Christ is now available online. As per usual, he nails it on the issues surrounding the film.
That's the real argument over The Passion Of The Christ. It's not between Christians and Jews, but between believing Christians and the broader post-Christian culture, a term that covers a large swathe from the media to your average Anglican vicar. Some in this post-Christian culture don't believe anything, some are riddled with doubts, but even the ones with only a vague residual memory of the fluffier Sunday School stories are agreed that there's little harm in a Jesus figure who's a "gentle teacher". In this world, if Jesus were alive today he'd most likely be a gay Anglican bishop in a committed relationship driving around in an environmentally-friendly car with an "Arms Are For Hugging" sticker on the way to an interfaith dialogue with a Wiccan and a couple of Wahhabi imams. If that's your boy, Mel Gibson's movie is not for you.Go read the whole thing.
Indeed, though Mel is Catholic, his Passion is a hit thanks to evangelical Protestants - those who believe the Bible is the literal truth and not a "useful narrative" culminating in what the Bishop of Durham called a "conjuring trick with bones". Instead of Jesus the wimp, Mel gives us Jesus the Redeemer. He died for our sins - ie, the "violent end" is the critical bit, not just an unfortunate misunderstanding cruelly cutting short a promising career in gentle teaching. The followers of Wimp Jesus seem to believe He died to license our sins - Jesus loves us for who we are so whatever's your bag is cool with Him.
Apparently so.
altern_active
Bill Whittle has posted his latest in a series on metaphorical maps, and he makes some fantastic observations:
Intellectualism, as it is practiced today, is a trap.His entire point is that, as he puts it in his extended metaphor, we need to get out of the bilge water of intellectual squabbling, go up on deck, and look around to find out what's really going on.
It is not a palatial hall of great minds looking for answers and then testing them in the real world; it is a basement in your parents house filled with lazy and filthy hippies eating your leftovers and drinking the last of your milk. Intellectualism is certainly not the same as intelligence, and more and more, it is becoming antithetical to intelligence. When well-off people who call themselves intellectuals drive their SUV's to march in support of Marxism, you can see the chasm between intellectualism and intelligence in full flower. When elitists who fancy themselves brighter and more compassionate than the rest of us choose to support the Taliban, with its stoning of women and execution of homosexuals in football stadiums before mandatory audiences, over a representative democracy with unparalleled structural protections of minorities and freedoms of expression; then self-styled intellectuals have abandoned intelligence altogether, as well as morality, reason, compassion and indeed sanity.
Likewise, when coffee-house intellectuals dictate their worldview according to non-existent pipelines or supposed theft of oil revenues where no evidence of such theft can be produced but deposits into Iraqi national accounts can, then one has to ask one's self if this intellectual badge is worth the mud it's printed on.
How many students today believe what they believe because they met someone who knew a guy whose girlfriend turned him on to an article by Noam Chomsky? Noam Chomsky predicted, in his even, intellectual, authoritarian, tenured manner, that if the US went to war in Afghanistan after 9/11 the result would be 3 million Afghan casualties. How many of these students who worship St. Noam independently ask themselves why he has, to date, come up 2,999,500 bodies short? Noam is not wrong by a fact of one or two; Noam is not wrong by an order of magnitude. Noam is not wrong by a factor of a hundred to one. Noam is wrong by more than three orders of magnitude. Noam is wrong by a factor of 6,000 to one. Noam says the reef is ten feet off the port bow; when in fact it is more than three miles away. That?s six thousand to one. Noam says the ocean is six thousand feet deep when in fact the keel has been ripped out and is sitting on the sandbar back yonder: that's a 6,000-to-one error. Extrapolating this accuracy rate, if Noam writes 6,000 pages on the evil of the United States, how many pages of truth might there be in such a twenty-volume set?Whittle is really arguing (it seems to me) for a kind of modernism in the face of post-modernism. For intelligence in the face of intellectualism (as he puts it). He is outlining the dangers of post-modern thinking, the traps to which it leads, and arguing that it needs to be exchanged, post-haste, for something more in touch with reality.
Does this mean that everything Noam Chomsky writes is nonsense? Not at all. He is a professor of Linguistics. I am not qualified to say how accurate the work in his field of expertise is. I can however make a stab at how accurate he is in the field of US foreign policy, and if you have a handheld calculator at home, you can make the same comparison and achieve the same results.
Socialist intellectuals will tell you that Cuba is a model nation: universal free health care, near total literacy, and essentially no gap whatsoever between the rich and the poor. They call it an island paradise where brotherhood and compassion reign in stark contrast to the brutal inequalities of the heartless and racist capitalist monster to the North, ruled by it's Imperial Nazi King, who is the devious mastermind of all manner of Conspiratorial Wheels and also a moron.
Capitalist intellectuals - and there are not many, since most of these people have jobs - argue that Cuba is a squalid, corrupt, poverty-ridden basket case, a land of oppression and secret police and torture chambers run by a megalomaniac who practices the most idiotic, inhuman and degrading economic system ever invented.
So here we sit in the chartroom, with our competing maps. What to think?
Well, we can agree that the act of giving up your home, your friends and your family must be traumatic, especially since you will face prison, or worse, if you are caught trying to vote with your feet. And I think all can agree that placing your infant daughter and your aged mother on a raft of inner tubes would be a trifle more traumatic and horrifying than not getting enough whole cane sugar in your grande frappucino at Starbucks.
So, is Socialism a better way to live, or is Capitalism? Leave the armies of experts and intellectuals down in the bilge where they belong.
Go up on deck, get out the telescope, and answer one simple question for me and for yourself:
Which way are the rafts headed?
Mark Steyn uses Germany to explain how anti-Americanism-as-government-policy leads to national ruin:
Germany, like much of Europe, has a psychological investment in longer holidays, free healthcare, early retirement, unsustainable welfare programmes, decrepit military: the fact that these policies spell national suicide is less important than that they distinguish Europe from the less enlightened Americans.As pointed out by Steyn, the US is preparing to remove their military presence in Germany, and Europe as a whole, assuming Bush wins a second term. This has Germans alarmed, for -
The so-called "free world" was, for most of its members, a free ride. Absolving wealthy nations of the need to maintain credible armies softens them: they decay, almost inevitably, into a semi-non-aligned status.It's been said before, but I'll say it again. True sovereignty, as is shown throughout the course of history, is attained and held by one, and only one, method: securing and maintaining a strong, functioning military. Even when you have no 'enemies' (as my left-leaning friends were so fond of pointing out during my high school years). Why? Because the only way you are taken seriously on the world's stage is if you have the might to back up your mouth.
Victor Davis Hanson, eminent historian and classicist, expounds upon the question of when the West should drop it's support of Israel, and gives a list of actions that Israel must take:
[W]e should no longer support Israel, when...Of course, the whole point is that Palestinians have done all of those things (and continue to engage in similar activities to this day). There are great gulfs of difference between Israel's behavior and that of the Palestinians; refusing to acknowledge that fact, and refusing to hold them to the same standards to which we hold Israel, reeks of a deep-seated racism - not against Jews, but against Palestinians.
- Mr. Sharon suspends all elections and plans a decade of unquestioned rule.
- Mr. Sharon suspends all investigation about fiscal impropriety as his family members spend millions of Israeli aid money in Paris.
- All Israeli television and newspapers are censored by the Likud party.
- Israeli hit teams enter the West Bank with the precise intention of targeting and blowing up Arab women and children.
- Preteen Israeli children are apprehended with bombs under their shirts on their way to the West Bank to murder Palestinian families.
- Israeli crowds rush into the street to dip their hands into the blood of their dead and march en masse chanting mass murder to the Palestinians.
- Rabbis give public sermons in which they characterize Palestinians as the children of pigs and monkeys.
- Israeli school textbooks state that Arabs engage in blood sacrifice and ritual murders.
- Mainstream Israeli politicians, without public rebuke, call for the destruction of Palestinians on the West Bank and the end to Arab society there.
- Likud party members routinely lynch and execute their opponents without trial.
- Jewish fundamentalists execute with impunity women found guilty of adultery on grounds that they are impugning the "honor" of the family.
- Israeli mobs with impunity tear apart Palestinian policemen held in detention.
- Israeli television broadcasts - to the tune of patriotic music - the last taped messages of Jewish suicide bombers who have slaughtered dozens of Arabs.
- Jewish marchers parade in the streets with their children dressed up as suicide bombers, replete with plastic suicide-bombing vests.
- New Yorkers post $25,000 bounties for every Palestinian blown up by Israeli murderers.
- Israeli militants murder a Jew by accident and then apologize on grounds that they though he was an Arab - to the silence of Israeli society.
- Jews enter Arab villages in Israel to machine gun women and children.
- Israeli public figures routinely threaten the United States with terror attacks.
- Bin Laden is a folk hero in Tel Aviv.
- Jewish assassins murder American diplomats and are given de facto sanctuary by Israeli society.
- Israeli citizens celebrate on news that 3,000 Americans have been murdered.
- Israeli citizens express support for Saddam Hussein's supporters in Iraq in their efforts to kill Americans.
I know, I know: I just linked to a slew of posts by PowerLine last night, and now I'm going to send you to one more; but hey, can I help it if these guys do good work?
Reprinted in Front Page Magazine Online, John "Hindrocket" Hinderaker's examination of certain "BUSH LIED1!!1!" claims provides us with yet more depressing news about the Democratic Party.
To an extent that, in my judgment, has no precedent in American history, the contemporary Democratic party has defined itself as a party of hate. The current frenzy over the self-contradictory and in some instances patently false claims of Richard Clarke has shown the Democrats at their most vituperative.Begala and his Democratic co-host James Carville were the two primary political strategists that Bill Clinton worked with to secure his two Presidential terms. Before now, though I have disagreed with him on the issues, I have always viewed him as a reasonable, intelligent foil for Tucker Carlson and Robert Novak. His record on and approaches to the issues have convinced me that Mr. Begala is politically nowhere near the 'fringe.'
A case in point is Paul Begala's hysterical attack on Condoleezza Rice yesterday on CNN's Crossfire...
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Some will defend Begala on the ground that he is mentally unbalanced, and argue that his type of fanaticism does not typify the Democratic Party. But I cannot agree. Begala seems to me to be typical of the modern Democratic Party--a party that makes Joe McCarthy look calm, reasonable and scrupulous.
[German philosopher Martin] Heidegger's peculiar neutrality-slash-denial about Nazism and the Holocaust after the facts had come out, and the contemporary Left's curious neutrality-slash-denial after the facts had come out about Marxist genocides - in Russia, in China, in Cambodia, after 20 million, 50 million, who knows how many millions had been slaughtered. Not all of the Left; many were honorable opponents. But for many others, it just hasn't registered, it just hasn't been incorporated into their "analysis" of history and human nature; it just hasn't been factored in. America is still the one and only evil empire. The silence of the Left, or the exclusive focus of the Left, on America's alleged crimes over the past half-century, the disdainful sneering at America's deplorable "Cold War mentality" - none of this has to be reassessed in light of the evidence of genocides that surpassed Hitler's, all in the name of a Marxist ideology. An ideology that doesn't need to be reassessed. As if it was maybe just an accident that Marxist-Leninist regimes turned totalitarian and genocidal. No connection there. The judgment that McCarthyism was the chief crime of the Cold War era doesn't need a bit of a rethink, even when put up against the mass murder of dissidents by Marxist states.
The point is, all empires commit crimes; in the past century, ours were by far the lesser of evils. But this sedulous denial of even the possibility of misjudgment in the hierarchy of evils protects and insulates this wing of the Left from an inconvenient reconsideration of whether America actually is the worst force on the planet. This blind spot, this stunning lack of historical perspective, robs much of the American Left of intellectual credibility. And makes it easy for idiocies large and small to be uttered reflexively.
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[A] year later, it seems that despite Mr. [Christopher] Hitchens and a few other voices, such as Todd Gitlin's, the blind-spot types have won out on the Left - the blind spot to Marxist genocide obscuring any evil but America's. You could see it at the Sheeps Meadow. You can see it in the hysterical seizure on Enron and other corporate scandals: See, we were right all along - corporations and businessmen are (surprise!) greedheads. This excuses averting their eyes from anti-American terrorism - from people and regimes preparing to kill Americans rather than merely diminish their 401(k)'s. Enron was the fig leaf many on the American Left needed to return to their customary hatred of America. Because America isn't perfect, it must be evil. Because Marxist regimes make claims of perfection, they must be good.
I was asked by a friend earlier exactly why I don't like one Mr. Richard Clarke. Power Line has summed it up neatly (some of these are long, but everything is worth reading):
Starting back on the 21st - "Richard Clarke, Fraud"
Jumping ahead to the 23rd - "Dick Clarke's American Grandstand"
As a side note on the same day - "Sure To Be Overlooked..."
Later, a comparison - "Clarke Then And Now"
On the 24th - "Sinking Faster Than Paul O'Neill"
After that - "Clarke Takes A Beating"
The next day (25th), PowerLine comes out with - "Richard Clarke, Liar"
Same day, a little bit of clarification - "Shay's Rebellion"
Ending off the evening of the 25th, a reference to Ann Coulter - "Coulter Rips Clarke"
Early on the morning of the 26th - "Chutzpah Of The Year Award"
Later, we had - "A Question For Mr. Clarke"
And finally (bringing us up to date, at least) this afternoon - "The Duplicitous Mr. Clarke"
I told ya - lots of reading. And that's just one source. If you want more, I've got quite a few other pieces left over.
I don't know how good Clarke was at counter-terrorism, but as a media performer he is a total dummy. He seemed to think that he could claim the lucrative star role of Lead Bush Basher without anybody noticing the huge paper trail of statements he has left contradicting the argument in his book.
The reality is that there is a Richard Clarke for everyone. If you are like me and reckon there was an Islamist angle to the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing, then Clarke's your guy: he supports the theory that al-Qa'eda operatives in the Philippines "taught Terry Nichols how to blow up the Oklahoma Federal Building".
On the other hand, if you're one of those Michael Moore-type conspirazoids who wants to know why Bush let his cronies in the House of Saud and the bin Laden family sneak out of America on September 11, then Clarke's also your guy: he is the official who gave the go-ahead for the bigshot Saudis with the embarrassing surnames to be hustled out of the country before they could be questioned.
Does this mean Clarke is Enron - an equal-opportunity scandal whose explicitly political aspects are too ambiguous to offer crude party advantage? Not quite. Although his book sets out to praise Clinton and bury Bush, he can't quite pull it off. Except for his suggestion to send in a team of "ninjas" to take out Osama, Clinton had virtually no interest in the subject.
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In the 1990s when al-Qa'eda blew up American targets abroad, the FBI would fly in and work it as a "crime scene" - like a liquor-store hold-up in Cleveland. It doesn't address the problem. Sure, there are millions of disaffected young Muslim men, but, if they get the urge to blow up infidels, they need training and organisation. Somehow all those British Taliban knew that if you wanted a quick course in jihad studies Afghanistan was the place to go. Bush got it right: go to where the terrorists are, overthrow their sponsoring regimes, destroy their camps, kill their leaders.
Instead, all the Islamists who went to Afghanistan in the 1990s graduated from Camp Osama and were dispersed throughout Europe, Asia, Australia and North America, where they lurk to this day. That's the Clarke-Clinton legacy. And, if it were mine, I wouldn't be going around boasting about it.
This morning's Wall Street Journal editorial neatly sums up where I stand on the 9/11 Commission.
[I]n her 9/11 testimony this week, Ms. Albright blamed the Bush Administration detentions at Guantanamo for creating more terrorists. "It is possible and perhaps probable that anger over these detentions has helped bin Laden succeed in recruiting more new operatives," she said. So the detention of Taliban fighters caught while fighting Americans and harboring terrorists will only help the terrorists? This is the same "mindset" that blocked strong U.S. action against al Qaeda for half a decade.As I wrote in the comments over at Mader Blog a few days ago:
Or consider this episode from the 9/11 Commission's staff report on the U.S. response to news that terrorists linked to Iran had killed 19 Americans at Khobar Towers in Saudi Arabia in 1996:
"Albright emphasized to us, for example, that even if some individual Iranian officials were involved, this was not the same as proving that the Iranian government as a whole should be held responsible for the bombing. National Security Adviser Berger held a similar view. He stressed the need for a definitive intelligence judgment. The evidence might be challenged by foreign governments. The evidence might form a basis for going to war."
Yes, it might. But the failure to act without "definitive" evidence and "foreign" agreement might also encourage the terrorists to think that they can get away with it and so hit us again.
The idea that every President would have toppled the Taliban after 9/11 is also wishful thinking. The press at the time was full of hand-wringing about the dangers. The establishment consensus, even so soon after 9/11, was that the U.S. could end up bogged down in Kabul like the British and Soviets. President Bush is the one who took the risk of using force to rout the Taliban and the al Qaeda camps they were protecting.
All of this is what we ought to be debating this election year, not how selective Dick Clarke's memory is. Even if everything Mr. Clarke says is true--and he's already contradicted himself numerous times--it is beside the point. What matters is which strategy against terrorism the U.S. should pursue now and for the next four years.
The reversal in approach to terrorism was nearly absolute [after 9/11]. So why do we keep coming back to examine 'pre-attack' thinking? Whether the failure belongs to Bush, or Clinton, or Bush, or Reagan, or - heck, why not? - even Washington, its all irrelevant to the current situation.Like the WSJ editorial mentions, if Bush's opponents continue this line of questioning and criticism to its logical end, they are going to wind up supporting his moves in Afghanistan and Iraq. They are arguing for a streamlining of the administration so that intelligence failures don't happen again - weeding out thinkers like Richard Clarke, so that the Bush Doctrine of pre-emption against terror and its supporters can be more effective. Sounds good to me.
Unless, of course, this 'who-do-we-blame game' is going to result in the shaking loose of the last pre-9/11 thinkers in the Intelligence field. But if we look at where the game is heading, we see it's aiming for the top, and not for the offending cogs. It's a worthless waste of time.
Look: to me that's ancient history. That's Flintstone time. If it weren't for these hearings I wouldn't give a tin fig for who didn't do what when and where. September Eleventh was the bright red gash that separated the Now from the La-la Then, and we've been living in the hot spiky Now ever since. I am interested in the Now and the What Next. I don't have much patience for people who believe that the salvation of Western Civilization depends on hiking the marginal tax rates to pre-2002 levels. But if you want to play Eight Years vs. Eight Months, fine. Just remember that before 9/11, the skies over Afghanistan were clear. After 9/11, they thrummed with the sound of B-52s until the job was done.Indeed.
No small distinction.
Jessica's Well has declared victory for the blogosphere in the Richard Clarke fiasco:
The total collapse of Richard Clarke.Indeed, it does appear so. Just take a look at the latest article from TIME.
Would it have happened without the blogosphere? Seriously, would the mainstream media have done any of the footwork necessary to find out about this guy and come up with instance after instance after instance of outright self-contradictions? I say no.
What is more....in the past the mainstream media thought they could ignore blogs. Now I think they read them and heed them as a now very necessary self defense.
Nowhere do we see the President pointing fingers at or even sounding particularly "vigorous" toward Clarke and his deputies. Despite Clarke's contention that Bush wanted proof of Iraqi involvement at any cost, it's just as possible that Bush wanted Clark to find disculpatory evidence in order to discredit the idea peddled by Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld that Baghdad had a hand in 9/11. In the aftermath of 9/11, Bush rejected Wolfowitz's attempts to make Iraq the first front in the war on terror. And if the President of the United States spoke "testily " 24 hours after the worst terrorist attack in U.S. history, well, can you blame him?To echo InstaPundit: is Karl Rove paying these guys?
Clarke's liberties with the text don't stop there. On 60 Minutes he said that after submitting to the White House a joint-agency report discounting the possibility of Iraqi complicity in 9/11, the memo "got bounced and sent back saying, 'Wrong answer.'" The actual response from Deputy National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley, shown later in the program, read "Please update and resubmit." On 60 Minutes, Clarke went further, saying that Bush's deputies never showed the President the joint-agency review, because "I don't think he sees memos that he wouldn't like the answer." This is pure, reckless speculation. Contrast that with the more straightforward account in Against All Enemies: after his team found no evidence of Iraqi involvement, Clarke writes that "a memorandum to that effect was sent up to the President, and there was never any indication that it reached him."
In a few other instances, Clarke's televised comments seem designed to disparage the President and his aides at all cost, omitting any of the inconvenient details - some of which appear in the pages of his book - that might suggest the White House took al-Qaeda seriously before Sept. 11.
Unbelievable. Robert Spencer has spent more than twenty years examining and studying Islam and its followers. Recently, he has come under attack for the things he has observed. The results are just...mindboggling.
Here is a personal attack on me and on Jihad Watch from Amir, a Muslim in Britain. (Thanks to Harry.) I get attacked all the time, and ordinarily wouldn't bore you with the details, but this one is interesting. Look at why this guy is angry:It's just stunning - his opponents are quite literally demonstrating that his positions and observations are correct. Further, they are angry at him not because he has observed their positions, but because he is actively trying to discourage people from taking them. "Don't you dare try to dissuade people from killing in the name of Islam!"AoA. I hope there isn't a Muslim in the whole world who stumbles across "Jihad Watch" and falls for the crap Robert Spencer is pumping out. Him and his loyal band of anti-Islamics (who flood his article comments with Islamaphobic preaching) have dedicated time and effort to make an influential impression on people, mainly Muslims, to re-write the meaning of Jihaad and make people believe it. Mainly Muslims.Leaving aside his characterization of my own religious faith, look at what he says about jihad. In his view, evidently, violent jihad - warfare against unbelievers - is the correct Islamic concept, and when I call upon Muslims to reject it I am asking them to veer close to apostasy.
Spencer hasn't necessarily studied Islam for the purpose of calling people away from it, he isn't a fanatical enough of a Christian to be doing that, he's instead studied Islam for the purpose of convincing Muslims to adopt incorrect Islamic concepts -- namely on the issue of jihaad. From the Muslim perspective it's not as bad as apostasy, but still pretty damn bad.
To turn my view from American to Canadian politics for a moment, Andrew Coyne reports that newly-elected Conservative Party leader Stephen Harper has fired a broadside into the sinking Liberal ship. (Full speech available here).
Mr. Speaker, this is the tenth budget of this tired, old and corrupt Liberal regime. The first eight budgets were delivered, as Canadians know, by the current prime minister. Before turning my attention to today's budget, I want to take a small detour through some of those earlier budgets.There's a lot more there, and it just keeps getting worse and worse for the Liberal Party.
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In his 1995 budget speech, the current prime minister said the following:
The government has just introduced a new and much tighter system to manage its spending...Reviewed annually, one can only assume, by the minister of finance, or at least by Treasury Board, on which the minister of finance was the vice chair.
For the first time, departments will have to prepare business plans for three years forward...that transparency and that accountability will mark a major departure from the past. ...
Individual ministers are being asked to alter their funding approach accordingly. They will be held accountable for their decisions and those decisions will be reviewed annually.
The year 1995 is significant. That is the year in which the Liberal government nearly lost the country. That was also the year in which the Liberal government decided to create a sponsorship program.
Allow me to rephrase that:
The year that the Liberals created the Sponsorship Program was also the year in which the current prime minister put in place "a new and much tighter system to manage its spending."
It has been revealed that Mr. Richard Clarke is yet another political opportunist, saying whatever he thinks will best benefit his personal aspirations. Check him out in an interview with FoxNews in 2002 [emphasis added]:
RICHARD CLARKE: Actually, I've got about seven points, let me just go through them quickly. Um, the first point, I think the overall point is, there was no plan on Al Qaeda that was passed from the Clinton administration to the Bush administration.Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the destruction of Richard Clarke's credibility.
Second point is that the Clinton administration had a strategy in place, effectively dating from 1998. And there were a number of issues on the table since 1998...in January 2001, the incoming Bush administration was briefed on the existing strategy. They were also briefed on these series of issues that had not been decided on in a couple of years.
And the third point is the Bush administration decided then, you know, mid-January, to do two things. One, vigorously pursue the existing policy, including all of the lethal covert action findings, which we've now made public to some extent. And the point is, while this big review was going on, [they] were still in effect, the lethal findings were still in effect.
The second thing the administration decided to do is to initiate a process to look at those issues which had been on the table for a couple of years and get them decided.
So, point five, that process which was initiated in the first week in February, uh, decided in principle, uh in the spring to add to the existing Clinton strategy and to increase CIA resources, for example, for covert action, five-fold, to go after Al Qaeda...
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JIM ANGLE [of FoxNews]: You're saying that the Bush administration did not stop anything that the Clinton administration was doing while it was making these decisions, and by the end of the summer had increased money for covert action five-fold. Is that correct?
CLARKE: All of that's correct.
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ANGLE: So, just to finish up if we could then, so what you're saying is that there was no ? one, there was no [Clinton] plan; two, there was no delay; and that actually the first changes since October of '98 were made in the spring months just after the [Bush] administration came into office?
CLARKE: You got it. That's right.
[During his testimony today,] Clarke apparently couldn't deny that what he says in his book is completely different from what he had previously testified to. Clarke attributed his changing story to his outrage over the Iraq war.Indeed it will - let's see if we can get the truth out.
The Richard Clarke saga will be an interesting test of the power of the blogosphere and talk radio. Sophisticated news consumers know that Clarke is a fraud and a shill for the Kerry campaign. The mainstream press will try to keep this fact a secret from the vast majority of the population that relies on newspapers and television for their information. It will be interesting to see whether the blackout can succeed.
This guy's working for Rove. By the time he's done imploding, Bush will have discredited the media and all his critics. It's the only thing that makes sense....and links to a Reason article by Michael Young that is well worth the read.
The other possibility is that Clarke held an important national security job for years while being dumb as a post, so dumb that he would write a book making explosive accusations against the White House while knowing -- or forgetting? -- that all sorts of contradictory evidence was on the record and bound to come out. Otherwise, wouldn't he at least have tried to explain this stuff up front?
As I've said before, I think there's a lot to complain about regarding pre-9/11 antiterror policy, by both Clinton and Bush...And a lot of people probably should have been fired. But Clarke is now saying that his real problem is with the invasion of Iraq, even as he focuses on pre-9/11 events.
A useful critique would be nice, but Clarke seems to be producing incoherent grandstanding.
Debbye at Being American In T.O. takes David Brooks' latest column and does some expansion:
[H]ow can people who lack a spiritual nature nourished by God truly comprehend the murderous nature of those who believe they are the divine instruments of Allah? How can people who have no beliefs understand that there are fanatics who are consumed by their beliefs?To truly understand what's going on in the spiritual areas of life, one must be plugged into those areas in one's own existence. It's similar to the 'inside/outside' problem in sociological approaches to religion. An observer from the 'outside' cannot fully grasp or understand what is happening on the 'inside.' As a result, any response made by those who don't have that spiritual connection (or who don't respond to it) will be (naturally) uninformed.
Equally true is the fact that those who acknowledge their own spiritual natures are capable of recognizing the spiritual nature of others as it manifests in the others' religions. However much Americans are mocked because we have retained our religious sensibilities, the existence of those sensibilities enables us to truly respect Muslims rather than patronize them.
People like Cherie Blair react to suicide bombers in buses with a patronizing, condescending sympathy. Such things can only be caused by some kind of grievance, a reaction against unjust colonialist legacies. Rejection of Kyoto or inadequate foreign aid. Rigged WTO rules. There just has to be something. It is a patronizing view where people are less than fully human and they just can't be blamed for how they react to western countries.This point can be roughly reduced to the conflict between the 'personal responsibility' and 'group responsibility' worldviews - who do we hold accountable? The idea has been elaborated upon at length by the incredible Bill Whittle, and his essay is a must-read primer for the subject.
Bret Stephens of the Wall Street Journal examines the effects of Israel's 'targeted assassination' policy [emphasis added]:
After [the terrorist massacre at Netanya in 2002], Israel invaded the West Bank and began to target terrorist leaders more aggressively.The bold phrase is, I think, the crux of the situation (not coincidentally, it's also the crux of the article). The 'wise heads' that predict doom every time Israel goes after one of the terrorist leaders don't understand - if you take out their leadership, you provide a convincing argument for peace.
The results, in terms of lives saved, were dramatic. In 2003, the number of Israeli terrorist fatalities declined by more than 50% from the previous year, to 213 from 451. The overall number of attacks also declined, to 3,823 in 2003 from 5,301 in 2002, a drop of 30%. In the spring of 2003, Israel stepped up its campaign of targeted assassinations, including a failed attempt on Yassin's deputy, Abdel Aziz Rantisi. Wise heads said Israel had done nothing except incite the Palestinians to greater violence. Instead, Hamas and other Islamic terrorist groups agreed unilaterally to a cease-fire.
In this context, it bears notice that between 2002 and 2003 the number of Palestinian fatalities also declined significantly, from 1,000 to about 700. The reason here is obvious: As the leaders of Palestinian terror groups were picked off and their operations were disrupted, they were unable to carry out the kind of frequent, large-scale attacks that had provoked Israel's large-scale reprisals. Terrorism is a top-down business, not vice versa. Targeted assassinations not only got rid of the most guilty but diminished the risk of open combat between Israeli soldiers and Palestinian foot soldiers.
[W]hen one looks closely at just who the suicide bombers are (or were), often they turn out to be society's outcasts. Take Reem Salah al-Rahashi, a mother of two, who in January murdered four Israeli soldiers at the Erez checkpoint on the Gaza-Israel border. In a prerecorded video, Rahashi said becoming a shaheed was her lifelong dream. Later it emerged she'd been caught in an extramarital affair, and that her husband and lover had arranged her "martyrdom operation" as an honorable way to settle the matter. It is with such people, not with themselves, that Palestinian leaders attempt to demonstrate their own fearlessness.So what happens when the terrorists stop encouraging people to go and blow themselves up? The Palestinians are human - they care about their own lives, and the lives of their children. You'd have a difficult time, were you not a 'spiritual' terrorist leader, convincing them to go die in your stead.
...read this insightful essay on the reshaping of politics, by Professor Frank Furedi of the University of Kent.
The other day my eight-year-old son came home, took off his jacket and announced 'Daddy, I really hate Bush!' Until that point, this child had strong views on the subject of football (which he loves), school dinners (which he dislikes) and mobile phones (which he desperately desires). But this was his first statement of political preference. Why did he feel so strongly about the American president? 'Because he's so stupid', my son replied.It's late, and I'm not at my optimum writing/thinking levels, so I'll just forego any attempts at segue into the next quote:
As a proud father, I would like to boast that my young son and his classmates have developed a precocious interest in political affairs. Unfortunately, that is not the case. Children are no more curious about political life than their elders. Rather, political life in the Western world has become so infantilised that even eight-year-olds can share its brilliant insights.
.....................
In the USA, demonstrating how much you hate Bush has animated discussion during the Democratic Party primary elections. Howard Dean, who has perfected the art of being very angry, managed to mobilise tens of thousands of young people to join his vociferous campaign - before it failed.
It appears that how you feel, rather than what you believe in, has become the defining feature of political protest.
[M]ore importantly, protest has become a strikingly personal matter. It is about the protester as an individual, and says more about how he feels about himself than what he thinks of the issue at stake. That is why it is difficult to define today's acts of protest as constituting a political movement. On the contrary: they are the product of a profound mood of political disengagement that afflicts most Western societies.This piece needs to be read from top to bottom.
Israel struck a huge blow against Hamas last night/this morning, killing their founder, Sheikh Ahmed Yassin.
"The state of Israel today hit the first and foremost head of Palestinian terrorism. His ideological basis was the murder of Jews and the destruction of Israel," Sharon said.Others have discussed this already, and have made interesting points, so there's not a lot for me to add, other than my own personal reaction: "Wow. Hope they have their security up to snuff."
"The war on terror is not over, and will take place every day and in every place. It is the natural right of the Jewish nation, as it is the right of any peoples, to hunt down those who wish to exterminate them," Sharon added.
In the center, there are concerns about reprisals. I think these concerns are misplaced. All indications are that Hamas has been gearing up for a major terrorist campaign to promote the view that any full or partial withdrawal from Gaza is its doing. This campaign is receiving logistical and financial support from Hizbollah and tactical support from the Al Asqa wing of Fatah. Much better to go on the offensive against Hamas, keeping its leadership in hiding and on the run, than to sit back and wait for Hamas to go after Israel.I agree that going on the offensive against one's already aggressive enemies is a preferable strategy; and honestly, how is this rhetoric - "Sharon, start preparing your body bags because (Hamas's) Qassam Brigades will put Israeli houses in mourning and make a funeral in every Israeli street," and "Islamic Jihad vowed 'to wage war, war, war on the sons of Zion' in response." - any different from what was already going on? Weren't they already 'pulling out all the stops' against Israel?
If the European allies cannot accept the killing of the head of Hamas, who has already murdered hundreds of people, it is very hard to imagine that those same European allies would have accepted the assassination of Osama bin Laden before 9/11. And since the defining idea of American liberal Democrats is the paramount need for European approval of major American actions (see below) - then there's really no mystery at all about why the Clintonites behaved as they did before 9/11. They didn't want to upset anyone. So they did nothing. And now they're engaged in the one foreign-policy activity at which they are truly expert: blame-shifting.Command Post has a summary of world-wide opinion. Trudeaupia points out that Canada's response is less-than-adequate.
Perhaps [Canadian Foreign Minister] Bill Graham, idiot du jour, would note that Palestinians were supposed to actually combat terrorists, not laud them as martyrs. In the absence of the Palestinians policing themselves Israel is left with the unpleasant chore of defending itself. The Palestinians could put an end to this state of affairs any time they choose to. Perhaps Bill Graham, idiot du jour, should encourage the Palestinians to consider their international legal obligations, which frown on blowing up buses and pizza parlours.Indeed.
Steven Den Beste gets it:
If we refuse to face the real root cause of this war and refuse to work on correcting it, then eventually we'll face the stark choice of either committing genocide or being victims of it.Den Beste's back in form (ie. long), but needs to be read. Reading this, strangely enough, was a comfort to me - it is reassuring that other people see this, too.
The problem won't go away simply because we ignore it or refuse to admit that it exists.
And that is why the invasion of Iraq was necessary. The invasion had very little to do with WMDs, even though that was the core of the public debate in the UN. The real reason we needed to invade Iraq was because we needed to take control of one core Arab nation so we could establish something like a western liberal government and society there, with equal rights for the women, with a truly free press, with the right of free speech and free assembly and free exercise of religion, and a government which served the people rather than trying to rule them. If we are even partially successful in doing that, it will seed those ideas into the entire region, and bring about reforms elsewhere more indirectly.
Steven Den Beste's recent post on whether Iraq was a distraction featured a single sentence that I believe is very important to provide amplification [of:] "The invasion had very little to do with WMDs, even though that was the core of the public debate in the UN." The question naturally arises why didn't we debate the real questions and instead created some sort of shadow puppet debate that created confusion where there should, ideally, be clarity.His answer needs to be read by everyone, but particularly, I found this quote quite enjoyable:
The UN, crys out much of Western Europe, is largely a US created institution. Why doesn't the US just work within the UN framework? The answer is simple. If you're going to blow up bedrock, one thing you absolutely must do is before you hit the detonator switch is to stop standing on it.Overarching idea? 'The UN is a big part of the problem.'
We chose to act first, in part as a method of forcing the UN to confront how untenable its baseline assumptions are, in part because we couldn't sit around and argue out the paperwork before we acted. But we also chose not to completely break the system and humiliate the world but leave everybody a figleaf.Answer: to allow the UN to save face.
And that's why the UN discussed WMDs so much.
David Frum takes us through what new Spanish prime minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero has said concerning the war on terror, and gives us his take on what it means. And what it means is not pleasant.
Note...that Zapatero did not limit his condemnation of "bombs" to Iraq alone. He was endorsing the emerging Euro leftist thesis that the very idea of fighting terrorism is an error. Romano Prodi, the chief of the European Commission, gave utterance to the new doctrine at the beginning of the week: "It is clear that using force is not the answer to resolving the conflict with terrorists." Not "force alone." "Force." Zapatero and those like him are ready to paint their hands white and raise them in the air everywhere, and not just the Sunni Triangle.Not only is Spain in full on 'surrender mode' - their choice, if a wrong one - but now our 'allies' are hoping to influence our elections:
[O]ne more thing Zapatero said in his radio interview. "I said during the campaign I hoped Spain and the Spaniards would be ahead of the Americans for once. First we win here, we change this government, and then the Americans will do it, if things continue as they are in Kerry's favor."Yes it is (go read the rest). But it is also rather clear to me that refering to Spain as an ally is a bit shaky, especially in light of my earlier thoughts. Yeah, they are in a Parliament, and yeah, there are still treaties; but this new government is acting like anything but an ally. Aren't there guidelines for this sort of thing? What does an ally have to do to lose its status?
Isn't this amazing? And doesn't it cast a new light on all those European complaints about American "arrogance" and "unilateralism"? Has any official of the United States ever expressed a preference for one party over another in a Spanish election - or indeed an election anywhere else in democratic Europe?
Zapatero helps us to understand what is really dividing the US from Europe. The problem is not that the two continents disagree - they have often disagreed before, without lasting harm to the trans-Atlantic alliance. The problem is much deeper.
As I mentioned before, this has got to be way out of bounds by more or less anyone's standards. What kind of treatment does Zapatero expect from a second Bush administration? The President knows well how to isolate an antagonistic 'friend', as Canadians know well.
Or is that the point? Is Zapatero so convinced of American error that he's willing to wreck Spanish-American relations in order to advance his career as champion of European anti-Americanism?
Bob, over at Let It Bleed, has a devastating fisk of Salim Lone ("director of communications for the UN mission in Iraq") and his placing of the blame for the Madrid bombings.
This kind of thing really upsets me. (Not the fisking, the original statements). There are very few things that are certain in this world, but a few are becoming more and more apparent. One: terrorism is real, and it desires the death of Western civilization - not because we have personally or individually slighted them or harmed them, but because our very existence is insufferable. Two: the UN is worthless in combating this threat. Three: the widely Liberal 'international' community desires that we pre-emptively surrender to the terrorists - or at least that we hand off our defense to that corrupt and crooked body of the previous point, so that they can surrender to the terrorists.
And this makes me upset.
People have accused me of seeing things in black & white, of being unable to appreciate the gray areas that are always so prevalent in today's 'modern' society. But that's not true. I fully appreciate the gray areas of life - I live through and with them nearly every day. I have to constantly struggle to balance my thinking and my speech among a great many nuanced positions so that I don't make my friends into my enemies. I understand gray.
But do you know what else I understand?
I understand that, even though a lot of the world is gray, there are parts of it that are monochrome. Basic mathematics is a good example. One plus one does not, and will never, equal three, no matter how much we might want it to. It's simply an undeniable fact (and yes, I've read all about Gödel's work - I'm taking classes on him right now, thanks). The square root of four is always going to be two, even if we fervently wish it to be something else. Another example is that of survival, and my instinct to prolong it. If an attacker is coming at me with a weapon, I'm not going to sit and consider all the nuances of his position. I'm not going to ponder what the 'root causes' of his anger and malice are. I'm either going to defend myself, or I'm going to die. These are black and white situations, with right and wrong solutions, that can be quickly and easily answered.
Another is the current world situation. We are all under threat - from the smallest child to the oldest grandparent, from the most 'peaceful' beatnik to the most 'violent' rifleman - from a malicious force that wants to see us all either cowering before their 'god' or lying beneath their rubble. There is no nuance here. I can see it, plain as day; and just as easily as I can see the keyboard and mouse at my fingertips. But it seems this isn't the case for everyone. There are people so used to searching out areas of gray, who have spent so much of their thinking lives poring over every nuance they could find, that they can no longer step back and see the situation for what it is: life or death.
I'm not going to apologize for choosing life, and for choosing to fight for it in whatever way I can. There are quite a few gray areas in this world and in this life. But this is not one of them.
Andrew Sullivan, of The New Republic, and I may not agree on everything, but there are some issues upon which we are indistinguishable. Namely, the utter lack of moral sense displayed by the Guardian in their latest editorial on the Madrid bombing:
The stunning aspect of this boilerplate is how utterly empty it is. The only constructive suggestion the Guardian proffers is an "international conference." No this is not, apparently, self-parody. While hundreds lie dead, the most important thing is to stick on your lapel name-labels, hurry down to the nearest Marriott lobby, and have a seminar. Above all, after an atrocity of this scale, it is vital that the perpetrators of such evil not "be hunted down and smoked out of their lairs." Heaven forbid such an action. That would be the American way, after all.This is a large part of the reason Mark Steyn predicts the doom of 'Old Europe.' It just doesn't know right from wrong, and when confronted with true evil, it doesn't know how to respond.
In Europe, there are no bad guys, even those who deliberately murdered almost 200 innocents and threaten to murder countless more. Ask yourself: If the Guardian cannot call these people "bad guys," then who qualifies? And if the leaders of democratic societies cannot qualify in this context as "good guys," then who qualifies? What we have here is complete moral nihilism in the face of unspeakable violence.
It's not complete moral nihilism, alas. It's not as if they show the same unwillingness to pass judgment where American actions are concerned....and so does Steven Den Beste:
Of course, the answer is obvious: America is the bad guys. Anyone who opposes America can't be bad guys, which is why the Madrid murderers can't be condemned.
Victor Davis Hanson (now added to my BlogRoll - I seem to be doing that a lot lately) takes a first-hand look at the state of medical care in the poorer areas of the US.
When I listened to Howard Dean, John Edwards, and John Kerry rail about "30 million Americans without health care" I assume they are talking about impoverished places like my hometown, not their own pricey digs around Burlington, Georgetown, or Beacon Hill.The whole thing deserves to be read (as does most anything written by VDH), but note especially his conclusion:
Still, when I arrived there last week I was a little startled by the contrast between my cars and the others in the parking lot. My 1999 Mazda with the door badly dented and a weak battery was put to shame by brand new Chevy and Ford trucks that were lined up in front of the ER entrance. There were a couple of new Ford Rangers and some assorted late model Toyotas and Hondas.
In the cohort of waiting patients, I was the only one who seemed either to speak English or have health insurance. I waited my long turn, as the ER admirably ran simply on the basis of triaged first-come, first serve. Insurance, citizenship, or knowledge of English made absolutely no difference. There was no class, race, or even legal hierarchy that determined who saw the doctor first.
And what followed might have further impressed Ted Kennedy. None of the patients were turned away, although many of their apparent ailments that morningãsniffles, a bad hangover, a sprained wrist, a turned ankle, and back painãseemed to me less urgent than my then swollen broken arm.
[W]e should perhaps remember that we are not heartless the next time some demagogue slurs the United States as an oppressive society that ignores its less fortunate. By any definition of classical poverty and neglect, the patients I sat with last week were neither terribly impoverished nor without care - nor worried in the least about how all the nurses, doctors, receptionists, and expensive machines and drugs that they took for granted would be at their service were going to be paid for.
Alan Dershowitz recounts his recent brush with virulent anti-Semitism:
One sign carrier shouted that Jews who support Israel are worse than Nazis. Another demanded that I be tortured and killed. It wasn't only their words; it was the hatred in their eyes. If a dozen Boston police were not protecting me, I have little doubt I would have been physically attacked. Their eyes were ablaze with fanatical zeal.Note that these are the same people who are so quick to accuse others of racism and bigotry - the ones who throw around the term 'Nazi' so often as to make it meaningless. It strikes me as parallel to another earlier example of insanity that I saw a few months ago:
The feminist writer Phyllis Chesler aptly described the hatred often directed against Israel and supporters of the Jewish state by some young people as eroticized. That is what I saw: passionate hatred, ecstatic hatred, orgasmic hatred. It was beyond mere differences of opinion. When I looked into their faces, I could imagine young Nazis in the 1930s in Hitler's Germany. They had no doubt that they were right and that I was pure evil for my support of the Jewish state, despite my public disagreement with some of Israel's policies and despite my support for Palestinian statehood. There was no place for nuance here. It was black and white, good versus evil, and any Jew who supported Israel was pure evil, deserving of torture, violence, and whatever fate Hitler and Goebbels deserved.
On January 15th, New Yorkers awoke to single-digit temperatures and a few inches of new snowfall. Al Gore chose the day to give a speech on global warming. The speech--delivered at the Beacon Theatre on Manhattan's Upper West Side--was sponsored by MoveOn.org, a website-turned-political-action-committee that recently gained notoriety by hosting two political ads equating President Bush with Adolf Hitler. Although such comparisons were common at anti-war rallies, I still wasn't sure whether this mindset was now infecting the Democratic base--the sort of folks who'd brave the cold to hear Al Gore speak. To find out, I spent a few shivering hours outside the Beacon.Watch the video, then come back. I'll wait.
As it turned out, I was not actually able to express any of my opinions, even in response to their outrageous mischaracterization of my views or their comparisons of me to the most evil men in the world. When I turned to answer one of the bigoted chants, the police officer in charge gently but firmly insisted that I walk directly to my car and not engage them. It was an order, reasonably calculated to assure my safety, and it was right. The officer got into my car with me and only got out a few blocks away. The intimidation had succeeded. I was silenced, and their horrible message went unanswered in the plaza near Faneuil Hall.I fear that it will not be the 'Right' to lead us back into Germany of the 1930s, but the 'Left;' for all their protestations. Need more evidence? Go take a look at Brain-Terminal's video collection.
Mark Steyn sees the Spanish Elections 'living in infamy':
At the end of last week, American friends kept saying to me: '3/11 is Europe's 9/11. They get it now.' I expressed scepticism. And I very much doubt whether March 11 will be a day that will live in infamy. Rather, March 14 seems likely to be the date bequeathed to posterity, in the way we remember those grim markers on the road to conflagration through the 1930s, the tactical surrenders that made disaster inevitable. All those umbrellas in the rain at Friday's marches proved to be pretty pictures for the cameras, nothing more.Steven Den Beste, in an uncharacteristically short post, agrees.
The people of Spain marched in the streets on Friday.My cautious optimism is under attack, and not only by the pundits, but also by the new Spanish government:
Then they crawled on their knees into their voting booths on Sunday.
Having vanquished an ally of President Bush, Spain's newly elected prime minister announced Monday he will pull troops from an Iraq coalition that he described as a "disaster" for Iraq and its people.(By the way, Zapatero has unequivocally backed John Kerry for President). This hurts, and has been bugging me all day. It's what has been putting me off. It's not the end of things - not by a long shot - but you hate to see this. It's not every day that a democratic government caves in to terrorism.
"The war has been a disaster, the occupation continues to be a great disaster," Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero said. "It hasn't generated anything but more violence and hate."
You know what my feelings are right about now, regarding the Spain debacle?RTWT™.
I'm thinking, Good. You see what you morons get.
Is that wrong of me? Does that make me a bad person?
I'll decide later whether I regret saying this. But right now, my gut's telling me something, and I'd better just get it out before it gives me heartburn. It's telling me that If Europe is determined to play this role, let 'em play it to the hilt. It makes things easier, and it might shorten the war.
Why? Well, here's what I'm thinking...
Bill Whittle (who is now in my BlogRoll) has unveiled his latest treatise: And Then A Miracle Occurs...
There was a time, an age ago, where the differences between what we call the Left and the Right seemed more or less academic; maybe the distance from one high-rise tower to its twin - close enough to see the coffee mugs and family photos on the other side's desk.I feel like a heroin addict that has just had his fix. Ooh, yeah. Go read the whole thing, man...
Then something happened.
Now we peer across a divide so wide that we can no longer see the other side; where the residents of the opposing camps as not seen as having a difference of opinion so much as being considered insane.
Two worldviews this opposed cannot both be right (although they could both be wrong.) I was about to write that one of them must be closer to the truth, but I stopped myself, for often people will define truth as conforming to their ideology, rather than the reverse. But surely one of these positions, widely called "liberal" and "conservative," must conform better to reality, to the evidence, for anyone with an open mind to see?
Which one? And how do we tell? [Emphasis in original]
I've been a bit off today - I'm not sure exactly why, but I am not feeling particularly pleasant or flexible (perhaps I'm only too aware of the devastating blow Al Qaeda has struck against the War On Terror) - and as a result, I passed over a number of issues that have come to my attention. Most of those have disappeared into the ether, but one of the more important things I've seen recently is a new blog by a good friend of mine.
Jeff has been added to my 'Friends & Family' list. This is a man to whom you need to pay close attention - he's got something to say, and it's definitely worth your time.
Donald Sensing writes for the Wall Street Journal this morning, and sets the record straight on the state of marriage:
Sex, childbearing and marriage now have no necessary connection to one another, because the biological connection between sex and childbearing is controllable. The fundamental basis for marriage has thus been technologically obviated. Pair that development with rampant, easy divorce without social stigma, and talk in 2004 of 'saving marriage' is pretty specious. There's little there left to save. Men and women today who have successful, enduring marriages till death do them part do so in spite of society, not because of it.I can't help but agree. Things got out of hand a long time ago, and society is hurting as a result. This is not to say I think that we should capitulate to SSM advocates - it is still wrong, and against the very nature of democracy, to impose social rules by fiat - and I'm not sure (as Rev. Sensing is) that "this fight is over," but we do need to wake up. The truth is that we started to lose this battle decades ago.
....................
I believe that this state of affairs is contrary to the will of God. But traditionalists, especially Christian traditionalists (in whose ranks I include myself) need to get a clue about what has really been going on and face the fact that same-sex marriage, if it comes about, will not cause the degeneration of the institution of marriage; it is the result of it. [Emphasis in original]
It's for these reasons that I find drawing the line at gay couples to be so morally troubling. Enforcing one rule for the majority and another rule for a tiny minority is so gratuitously unfair it runs the risk of being understood as pure prejudice.Translation: 'it's immoral to fall so far, and yet not go all the way.'
Rudyard Kipling - the more I read, the more I appreciate his insight. Here, he elaborates in verse on what Spain seems to have just done:
IT IS always a temptation to an armed and agile nation,Mader Blog elaborates.
To call upon a neighbour and to say: -
"We invaded you last night - are quite prepared to fight,
Unless you pay us cash to go away."
And that is called asking for Dane-geld,
And the people who ask it explain
That you've only to pay 'em the Dane-geld
And then you'll get rid of the Dane!
It is always a temptation to a rich and lazy nation,
To puff and look important and to say: -
"Though we know we should defeat you, we have not the time to meet you.
We will therefore pay you cash to go away."
And that is called paying the Dane-geld;
But we've proved it again and again,
That if once you have paid him the Dane-geld
You never get rid of the Dane.
It is wrong to put temptation in the path of any nation,
For fear they should succumb and go astray,
So when you are requested to pay up or be molested,
You will find it better policy to say: -
"We never pay any one Dane-geld,
No matter how trifling the cost,
For the end of that game is oppression and shame,
And the nation that plays it is lost!"
The Spanish people today voted to pay the Danegeld. They do not want to fight against the terrorists, but instead are happy to comply with their demands. They will now run away from Iraq. And then? When they have done their best to appease the murderers? Will they then be safe?I am disappointed for Spain, but there is still hope, for those of us who are optimistic. Perhaps the Socialists will follow through on their pledges to "beat all forms of terrorism." Perhaps they will set aside their previous position of withdrawing their support from the war on terror. Perhaps they will become a silent ally, but remain an ally nonetheless. Perhaps.
Of course not. The enemy is not out to secure small concessions. Their goal is the destruction of Western civilization. They are not opposed to the war to liberate Iraq. They are opposed to freedom, to democracy, to rights for women, gays and other minorities.
...but I had to work it out myself to be sure. It's true: the attacks in Spain on 3/11 came 2 and 1/2 years, to the day, after 9/11; further, they came exactly 911 days after 9/11.
I'm not sure what to make of it, but it can't be denied.
[HatTip to Being American.]
Daniel Aronstein has been trying to work himself inside the mind of al Qaeda by treating it as a psychopathic serial killer. Aronstein originally alerted Hugh Hewitt to the 911 days between the 9/11 attack on America and the 3/11 Madrid massacre. He continues to analyze the numerological pattern behind al Qaeda attacks. Here's Aronstein's computation of the 911 days and related numerological analysis:So I misunderstood. It's not 911 days from 9/11 to 3/11, it's 911 days inbetween the two dates. What this may mean is anyone's guess (and Power Line links to some discussion), but my earlier correction of my earlier post was correct, but I still didn't fully grasp what was being discussed. Ah well - assuming no further corrections, this is the way it is.If one start the count on 9/12/01 (day one) then 3/10/04 was day 911, meaning there were 911 days BETWEEN the attacks.
365 days (2002)
+ 365 (2003)
+ 19 (remainder of sept 01)
+ 31 (oct 01)
+ 30 (nov 01)
+ 31 (dec 01)
+ 31 (jan 04)
+ 29 (feb 04)
+ 10 (days in march 04 w/no attck)
_______
911
...you don't have a future. So sayeth Mark Steyn, and he's got the evidence to back it up [no direct link available]:
Maybe the collapse of the church and the looming demographic disaster facing Quebec and most of Catholic Europe is just another coincidence. But, for whatever reason, Europeans have less and less interest in God's first injunction, to "go forth and multiply". And, as a consequence, they'll enjoy their post-Christian EUtopia, but only for the two or three generations it lasts. Russia is headed for the same fate. China, where Christianity is booming, seems unlikely to make the same mistake.This feels similar to James Taranto's "Roe Effect" theory - the idea that, given past trends, liberal thinkers tend to non-breed themselves out of existence. The only trouble is, while they're about the business of dying off, will they ruin the world for the rest of us?
...............
In post-Christian Europe - where fertile women who not so long ago would have had three children by the age of 24 now have one designer child at 39, where social welfare programmes depend on a growing population, where the main source of immigration is from a culture that despises secularism as weak, short-sighted narcissism - societal "forgetfulness" isn't just a passing phase you can snap out of. In this situation, the Christian fundamentalists, Holy Rollers, born-again Bible Belters and Jesus freaks of America are the rationalists. It's the hyper-rationalists of secular Europe who are living on blind faith.
This is all over the 'net and the news, and I really don't having anything more to add. It appears that the ETA is responsible - we don't know just yet. If they were, they just made the biggest mistake they ever could have. They are now on the same level as Al-Qaeda, and gentlemen, that is not a playing field you want to be on.
Inside Europe, Back Seat Drivers, Secular Blasphemy, and Instapundit (as always) have more.
First, ETA generally warns Spanish authorities moments before launching their attacks in which civilians are likely to be harmed. This, obviously, was not the case on Thursday.Also lending credibility is the discovery of a van outside of Madrid:
Second, ETA traditionally targets representatives of the government or the administration, such as policemen, the military, magistrates or even journalists who oppose them.
Third, ETA customarily selects "symbolic" targets, such as military barracks and administrative buildings. Although ETA's largest attack to date was in 1987 against a supermarket in Barcelona that killed 21 people, this was the exception rather than the norm.
Fourth, ETA always claims its attacks. Following any ETA bombing, ETA militants call in a claim to Spanish authorities. This failed to happen this time.
Fifth, ETA has never in the past carried out multiple attacks. According to some sources, at least 10 bombs were detonated almost simultaneously on Thursday.
On the other hand, these murderous attacks bear the traditional hallmark of al-Qaida: multiple bombs detonating a few seconds apart and programmed to cause the largest possible number of human casualties.
Again, according to the World Observatory of Terrorism, several elements seem to point to the "International Jihad Movement."
The "multiple targeting," reports the WOT, is the standard operating procedure of the fundamentalist Islamist movement.
Spanish Interior Minister Angel Acebes said authorities were investigating a van found in the town of Alcala de Henares, outside Madrid, with at least seven detonators and an Arabic tape with Koranic teachings.Obviously, more will emerge as time progresses.
The tape contained no threats and is a type available commercially. The van was stolen last month.
Brian, over at Peeve Farm, explores Republican stereotypes [strong language warning]:
"Why shouldn't friends let friends vote Republican?" I'd ask, innocently, like a good brainwashed right-wing Pakled.He covers several points, and creates a great primer for the defense of conservative viewpoints. RTWT™ (Read The Whole Thing).
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Republicans are racist! Sure, everybody knows that! All Republicans are secretly KKK members, or at the very least Pat Robertsonites, which is just as bad. Uh huh... never mind that it's the Democrats who were the party of the Confederacy, the Democrats who were the slaveholders, and the Democrats who fought hardest against desegregation and Civil Rights. Today, racism is but a shadow of its former self. Sure, there are the inevitable racist conservatives, who are roundly condemned by their fellow conservatives when they show their true colors. But let me tell you: I have never seen so much alarming, casual racism as I have from my tolerant, compassionate, multicultural liberal friends.
I've created a new blog, The Entertainment Center, in order to have a more organized way of expressing my opinions on subjects that have little or nothing to do with what I'm usually discussing here. The inaugural entry says it all:
As long as I'm wandering down the path toward exhibitionism (ugh), I figured I might as well chronicle what I'm seeing, reading, and hearing. This kind of subject matter wouldn't exactly fit over at my other blog - that's more in the realm of the socio-political. But here - here I've got an explicit mandate to write down my thoughts on the entertainment industry and its products.If you're interested in what I think and what my aesthetic tastes are (and, really, who isn't?), then head on over and check it out.
Want an idea of just how corrupt Canadian politics really is? Andrew Coyne elaborates:
Just so everyone is clear: The former Deputy Prime Minister of Canada says there was a criminal conspiracy to defraud her of the nomination in Hamilton East-Stoney Creek, part of a "massive, orchestrated fraud" campaign that "follows a pattern" established in other ridings and that was carried out with the knowledge, if not the direction, of the current Prime Minister of Canada.That list is just a taste - and he's only talking about political races. There's still the whole other realm of political handouts to take into account as well.
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After everything else we've heard of late, it's hard to dismiss out of hand. Canadians, I think, are awakening to how profoundly corrupt our political system has become. We were so accustomed to it, we barely noticed any more. But the evidence is accumulating, and it is inescapable. Indeed, it is everywhere...
A list of newly recruited Conservative members in Quebec contains discrepancies, including clusters of memberships at single addresses and blocks of members in sparsely populated areas of the Gaspe.Somebody stop the merry-go-round, please. I wanna get off.
The discrepancies in the confidential list, a copy of which was obtained by CanWest News Service, are prompting fear among senior party members of the kind of vote-buying scandal that plagued the Canadian Alliance's leadership campaign in 2000 in the same region.
Jason takes note of Canada's crackdown on those dangerous Christians:
Another karate chop to freedoms in Canada.This one is worse than Nova Scotia's attempts to quell free speech. At least that (as of yet) has no real teeth to it. Hamilton schools are now actively stifling the practice of religion.
The Hamilton Board of Education here in Ontario, Canada has recommended that Christian groups can meet - but only if they agree to have other faiths represented for alternate perspectives. Leaders and speakers from other religions must come and address the students in these faith groups, to gain his or her perspective.
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There you have it: state mandated and directed instructions for how we may worship.
Andrew Coyne has eloquently nailed it on the Martha Stewart conviction:
Talk about irony: the arguments made in Martha's behalf are perilously close to those made by Bill Clinton's apologists. Of course he lied, they said then. Of course she lied, others say now. Wouldn't you? Well no, not in a court of law, and not to the police. But even if I would -- even if it is understandable, in some sense, that he/she did -- that is not the business of the law. The law cannot look at it from 'his point of view.' It must look at things from the point of view of the law, and of what is necessary for the rule of law to be maintained.I've been reading about this case on quite a few blogs, and most of the comment I've seen has been, if not pro-Martha, then anti-conviction; and it all points to the fact that she was convicted of lying, rather than of actually engaging in illegal stock activities. But I think Andrew's right:
Contrary to what some would have you believe, she was not prosecuted for the Kafkaesque crime of denying her guilt. She was charged with, prosecuted for and convicted of specific acts of obstruction of justice: lying to investigators, destroying evidence, etc. It doesn't matter how justified or unjustified the authorities were in launching their investigation. Her only valid course in law was, if not to cooperate fully, then at least not to obstruct their efforts.And why do I feel he's right? Because all the prosecutors did was make use of a legal tool that they had at their disposal to convict a person who broke the law. We see this all the time, folks - it's not anything new (just as fining Howard Stern is nothing new). Heck, they do the same thing on Law & Order.
Via Instapundit and COINTELPRO Tool comes this amazing example of Robert "There Are No Troops In Baghdad" Fisk's fictional journalism. Or, as the BlogFather so aptly puts it: "Fisk Fisks Fisk."
On the same subject, from the same site, here's a handy guide to reading the "journalist."
I've discovered a way to read a piece of Robert Fisk's reporting...You just have to completely forget everything else you've ever read by him. While you're at it, it wouldn't hurt to just forget everything you've ever read period.Please, can anyone explain to me how this man still has a job?
Mark Steyn expounds on what a government is, what it should do, and what it should not do. In the process, he touches on Haiti:
[C]onsider Haiti. John Kerry, in quite the most stupid observation of his campaign, insisted that Bush should have sent in the troops to Haiti to prop up President Aristide - or 'Father Aristide', as Kerry likes to call him, defrocking notwithstanding - because the Holy Father was 'democratically elected'. After a fashion. But so what? Charles Taylor, the recently retired head wacko of Liberia, was also democratically elected. The tinpot thugs of the world have got very good at being just democratic enough to pass muster: they kill a lot of people, they hold an election for the benefit of the IMF, and then, when the international observers are gone, they pick up the machetes and resume where they left off. The problem in Haiti is that the necessary conditions for civil society don't exist. Fetishising Aristide's 'election' appeals to Kerry's reflexive belief that government is the be all and end all. But it isn't.It's scary how much I agree with this man.
I'm a small-government guy, so my default position on any issue is that, generally speaking, I'm on whichever side the government's not.Frightening, indeed.
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That's my basic rule: whatever the problem, the government's a bigger one. Those cultists at Waco may have been a bit kooky (whoops), but they didn't deserve to get immolated by Janet Reno's stooges. If she'd opened fire on a gay bathhouse instead of a Branch Davidian compound, you'd never have heard the end of it from the media Lefties.
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I'm a conservative, and I don't need any qualifying adjectives. My objection isn't to the deficit, it's to the big wasteful government programmes that lead to the deficit. If the Dems wanted to balance the budget by cutting the spending, I'd be the first to dance up and down shaking my pom-poms. But they don't. They want to balance the budget by raising taxes, which is no help either way.
So I'm sitting in class this afternoon - Wisdom Literature In Ancient Israel. It's an intriguing mix of academics and theology, and we're just now moving into examining whether the classical concept of wisdom is present in the prophetic works of the Israelite people. To set us up for all of this the prof (actually, he's a PhD candidate) is trying to explain the wisdom dichotomy (divine and human, further divided into three sections: priestly, sage, and prophetic) and how it is used to look at the texts, when one of my fellow students (quite learnéd himself) embarks on a series of questions, the purpose of which is to point out to that he doesn't think the examples the prof gave really fit what he is trying to say.
As a third party observer, I felt rather tolerant of his queries at first; but as he continued to draw things out, I realized something: they were both saying the same thing! The prof was trying to give examples of how, in this particular instance, divine wisdom can agree with human wisdom, and how, in other situations, they diverge completely. The student was taking umbrage, and saying, in different wording, he felt uncomfortable implying that divine and human wisdom were one and the same.
I did a mental double-take. 'Did you not listen to what the prof just said?'
This conversation continued throughout the next two hours, always hitting the same points, and always coming to the brink of vehemence - but they both kept making the exact same points, and never realized it.
Why not? Because they weren't actually listening to each other. They'd grab a point or two from the other person's exposition and assume it was their "opponent's" position; so they'd argue against it, all the time pointing to the Scriptures in front of them and coming to the same conclusions, but in different phrasings. If it hadn't been a waste of my time, I would have found it rather amusing.
What is it about humans that we don't actually listen? Countless times, as a child, I would say something to my parents, and they would nod, grunt, 'yeah, okay' and ignore me. Until, that is, they realized my point on their own, and (on occasion) recognized that my point was important. To an extent, this still happens - my father and I share a love for music (as does most of my family), but whenever we (the boys) play him a tune that we've found and enjoy, he usually doesn't absorb it. Then, three or four weeks later, when he comes across the song himself, he points it out to us as a great one - and we remind him that we played it for him not but a month ago.
I do the same thing with my brothers - they are excited about the latest punk/emo/screamo/whatever-the-current-mo-is selections, and I only listen half-heartedly when they play it. Then later, when I hear it on the radio, or hear them playing it through the house, I realize that it was as good as they were saying.
We have a propensity to ignore those around us. The problem in my class was that the student wasn't listening to the lecture 'as a whole' - he was merely picking up small points and piecing them together on his own, rather than letting the lecturer come to his conclusion before he started his own (unnecessary) argument. In the case of music, my father and I weren't exactly fully plugged into the conversation. In both instances, we aren't really listening.
Listening is a skill, and it has to be developed. As with most skills, it improves with practice. But there's something deeper here than not listening to those around us. Why don't we listen? Because we are focused on ourselves, and not necessarily in the more benign 'self-interest' category, but quite often with a passive/aggressive selfish-ness.
This, I think, is at the core of why people - in all walks of life, and in all aspects of society - don't listen. We don't care - or more accurately, we care more about whatever is on our minds now than what you are saying to us. Of course, if I were to keep running with this, I'd tie it all back to C.S. Lewis' insightful observation that everything begins and ends with pride. He's right, but that's not my point.
My point is that we are missing out on so much. My two hours of class was not a total waste - we did make some progress - but it was almost completely focused on a single issue that had no real conflict in it, but could not be abandoned because the parties would not listen to one another. I have frequently missed out on what my brothers enjoy musically for weeks at a time, because I'm too self-focused to pay attention to them. Trivial or not, when we don't listen, we cheat ourselves - not only out of information, but also out of the benefit that information brings.
My solution? We should all just shut up.
Not really. But we need to realize that, in most situations, it is in our best interests to really listen. Even when we're tired. Even when we know we're in the right. Even when we know that the other guy isn't making any coherent point. Because if we do, if we really listen to those who speak to us, then we'll almost always find something we didn't know before. And that's definitely a good thing.
[Edited for grammar and coherence. -- Ed.]
...stuff like this comes to my attention.
The government is trying to find out what happened to a federal sponsorship grant that was supposed to aid the famed Bluenose II schooner, but apparently never arrived.It's a multi-topic news story! It fits neatly into both the Adscam debacle, and the recent stream of 'crazy' news out of Nova Scotia. Ah, politics and money - was there ever a worse coupling?
"We're tracing funds that may have gone adrift, and we will be getting them back," Public Works Minister Stephen Owen told the Commons on Monday.
At issue is a $2.3-million cheque that was directed to the Bluenose through Lafleur Communications, a Montreal ad agency that played a key role in the now-disgraced sponsorship program.
The trust that oversees the schooner - a major tourist attraction in Nova Scotia - says it received only $359,000.
If you live in Canada and you're not already reading Trudeaupia every day, then you need a good excuse. He's in my Canadiana BlogRoll for a reason, y'know.
Well guess what? An hour and a half of Mathematical Philosophy didn't help matters - maybe I should just go to bed?
It's strange. When I'm sitting in that little breakfast nook, with my morning paper and Handspring, I can write and (if I may be permitted a little immodesty) write well. But when I'm sitting in front of my big honkin' desktop, looking at the same stuff I was working on not but a few hours before, it doesn't feel the same, and I can't get going again.
See, this is why I think trading my desktop for a laptop would be a good thing for my 'writing life.' It'll allow me to have a more powerful system when I go mobile, and write just about wherever I am. Assuming the muse hits, of course. That way I could pull out my full-featured word processor whenever the moment strikes - man, that would be nice.
This has been one of those days - aside from being slow, or perhaps as a result - where you get upset because people aren't at your beck and call. It's not a rational thing, of course - but since when is humanity rational? Either my reading isn't exciting (why couldn't this author have written a better book?!), or my friends aren't around (why aren't you there when I ring?), or the crowds using the TTC are going out of their way to get into mine (c'mon, don't make me late - please?).
One of those days where you just want to go back to bed (which, of course, is a cliché so old that I'm feeling even worse about today for having used it). It would've been nice had the sun been out, like it was last week; but even the weather is conspiring against me.
Ah well - tomorrow is another day, and, with luck, a better one.
Oh - one good thing? Tonic.
Tonic, Tonic, Tonic. And even more Tonic. Seriously, the only redeeming part of my day was their music. Give 'em a spin if you get a chance.
I don't know why, but today just feels really slow. Didja ever see that one episode of SportsNight? The one where nothing was happening in the sports world at all, and the entire cast and crew were just sitting around? Yeah, well that's what I feel like today. Nothing's happening.
I've done some work on my upcoming assignments, I've jotted a little on my latest short story, and I've surfed through all my blogs. Nobody's around the house for the present, and until 7pm, nothing has an urgent demand on my time. At this moment, I'm absolutely free.
I'd rather be busy. Blech.
I finally got the CSS layout to work correctly in both Safari and IE (well, the Mac version of IE, anyway - I'm still waiting for a chance to get on a library PC to check the modifications). Whew!
In other news, I've had a slew of friends start up new (or new-ish) blogs, so I've expanded my Friends & Family link section - additions include Al, Amy, Annalauren, and Ian. They're on my link list, so they must be good - go read!
Good morning, and welcome to Canada's Liberal Party Squabbles! Today we have two humdingers, each promising to provide weeks, if not months of solid political entertainment value.
First, in the center ring, we have the notorious Sheila Copps - recently ousted from her Hamilton-East/Stoney Creek Riding - just about calling for a UN contingent to sweep in and verify the oh-so-close upset she suffered at the hands of Tony Valeri. Money shot:
On Sunday, Copps said she wants to review the numbers before making a decision. At least 400 of her supporters were unfairly challenged at the polling booth, she said, including her mother and riding association president.Her own mother, ladies and gentlemen!
Upset with Parrish's offer of a $500 door prize for party members who show at the nomination meeting, last week a Mahoney supporter asked the Ontario Court of Justice to pursue illegal lottery charges.Lotteries, bribes, money to be had for all; and it doesn't stop there. Marvel at the insults to which politicians in the same party will resort - "scorched-earth polic[ies]" school children's tales, obnoxious child-like behavior, name-calling, and so much more! And look! Another money quote:
"Can you believe that? Parrish's guys are challenging my wife Katie's right to vote!... I've had enough. She attacks my wife in public, accuses my wife of being against religion. I mean, this woman is so low in the gutter that it's a shame that she's standing to represent the Liberal Party."Gutterballs! Mothers and Wives defamed! All on the next episode of Liberal Party Leadership - stay tuned!
' I Told You So'.
Marchers have taken to the streets in both Washington and New York to blame whatever has gone wrong in Haiti on President Bush, who has become, for the Democrats, the universal source of all evil in the world.It's sad, really - opponents of Bush are hitting a new low. The ignorance displayed is both incredible and disheartening.
In the photo below, marchers in New York allege that President Aristide was "kidnapped" and that "Haiti's Blood is on Bush's Hands."
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Haiti's blood is on the President's hands, presumably, because Bush waited too long to intervene, and should have helped Aristide by sending Marines to fight the rebels. Well, that makes a certain amount of sense if your concern is mostly about preserving Aristide's government, not about American interests. But wait--the third sign says "U.S. and French Troops Out of Haiti." If we took our troops out of Haiti, the rebels would be unopposed and would slaughter Aristide's allies and Aristide himself, should he try to return. Hard to discern a coherent policy there.
Well, hey! Looks like I'm doing better than before:
I get 'lanched, and my Goodness improves...interesting. Is this evidence that Instapundit is a herald of all that is good and right in the world?
As has just been brought to my attention, the Nova Scotia Funny Farm has been set in verse by the multi-talented DoggerelPundit.
Pass The WordIt's brilliantly done, and there's more to it - go read the rest!
A poet's life is fraught with risks
Allayed by folks from OSHA,
But spare me writing - lengthy Fisks
- Or verse in Nova Scotia.
A crazy place, by all accounts
No spot for nervous breakdowns;
Where 'crats use brains in small amounts
To run eccentric shakedowns.
Here's Kooky Kisely's PCd grip
On unsuspecting writers;
There's health (he says) in censorship
Against such mental blighters.
Yea, bards there cannot choose for rhyme
From lists of banned expression,
Like madman, nutcase (there's a crime)
No fruitcakes? pure repression!
Jason Van Steenwyk, over at Iraq Now, recounts the sights as his convoy moves into Kuwait from Iraq.
There were hundreds of children lining the road as we drove out, begging for food. Soldiers were throwing MRE's out of their humvees as we drove by.
Here and there, you'd see a veiled woman sitting by the side of the pocked and pitted, intermittently paved road.
The houses, though average by Iraqi standards, were fairly destitute by anything approaching western norms.
If the people had cars at all, they were practical wheels: a beat up pickup truck on its last legs. Not much more.
Five minutes south of the berm, in Kuwait, it looked for all the world like a posh Palm Springs highway.
Almost every vehicle you saw was a high-dollar SUV or Mercedes sedan.
The streets were well paved, and level. Streetsides were impeccably clean. Streetlamps worked.
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Both countries are blessed with a wealth of natural resources.
But only one had Saddam Hussein as a ruler for decades.
And only one had to struggle under more than a decade of sanctions--however porous they were.
Two hundred meters.
More information on the status of pre-war Iraq comes out:
A group of Russian engineers secretly aided Saddam Hussein's long-range ballistic missile program, providing technical assistance for prohibited Iraqi weapons projects even in the years just before the war that ousted him from power, American government officials say.But wait - I thought Russia was on our side! Huh. Well, I guess not.
Iraqis who were involved in the missile work told American investigators that the technicians had not been working for the Russian government, but for a private company. But any such work on Iraq's banned missiles would have violated United Nations sanctions, even as the Security Council sought to enforce them.
Although Iraq ultimately failed to develop and produce long-range ballistic missiles and though even its permitted short-range missile projects were fraught with problems, its missile program is now seen as the main prohibited weapons effort that Iraq continued right up until the war was imminent.
Of course, the post below was a thought experiment, dealing with a semi-perfect world. In the real world of Canadian politics, as Andrew Coyne reveals, politicians may not actually be thinking people.
Hilarious story in the Sun about an inadvertently-broadcast meeting of the Liberals' Ontario caucus, aka the Nervous Nellies. These are the people who surfed in on the Liberal wave in 1993 and have been coasting ever since. They've never had to fight in a real election all their lives, and the sudden prospect of it has them nauseous.As Coyne goes on to point out, even with this huge scandal looming large over their heads, the Liberal MPs in question are still more concerned about "tactics and strategy and how to manipulate the debate" than what to do about the charges.Beaches-East York MP Maria Minna told caucus her own sister doubts whether she and other Grits didn't benefit from the sponsorships.Yes, good thing the whole thing wasn't televised or anything. [Emphasis in original]
"When we lose our own families, when they're questioning us ... it is bad," Minna told MPs, adding she felt the Ontario caucus was the only safe place for her to vent.
Nothing in the story indicates that MPs were especially concerned about the substance of the scandal -- finding the facts, punishing the guilty, reforming the system, etc. Just the possible political impact on themselves.Now what was I saying about learning the character of our representatives?
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If Liberal MPs are having a hard time sleeping these days, it's not on account of their consciences.
This is probably in the realm of Political Science courses, but as I'm not a PolSci specialist, major, or minor (heck, I haven't even taken it as an elective), I must confess to a background of ignorance on this one.
I was thinking this morning, after reading Lee Harris's TCS Column on calling Sean Hannity names, about the question (discussed briefly there) of 'selling out' to politicans and parties. Is Sean Hannity, as one writer has apparently put it, a "pimp for the GOP"? Does it matter?
I don't listen to Hannity on the radio, and I can't see him on FOX News, as it's not allowed to broadcast up here (curse you, CRTC regulation!). As a result, I can't claim familiarity with Mr. Hannity's antics or political statements; and rather than speak from ignorance, I'm going to grab a tangent by the tail, and run with it for all my brain is worth. Leaving aside the question of a private citizen's 'selling out to the man,' what about the question of a politician's 'selling out'?
This question has bugged me for a while now. When I think about it, this issue really boils down to who we are selecting as our representatives, and what exactly it is that we are telling them to do. When we vote for someone, are we voting for that person? Or are we voting for his platform?
I think this is an important distinction, because if we vote for the one, then it's impossible for him or her to 'sell out;' while if we're actually voting for the other, then 'selling out' becomes as commonplace as eating dinner.
Let me explain my thought process here. If a politician shows up at my front door (it's never happened) to get my vote, is he asking me to review his stances, or his character? If he's asking me to look over his positions, and is not of a similar ideological bent, then I'm not to to vote for him at all - but what if he's asking me to look over who he is?
I suppose my question is: are politicians human beings, or are they mouthpieces for our views? If they are human beings, then their ideas on the issues may very well change - heck, this happens all the time. Is it selling out to change one's mind in an argument? It is if the politician is merely voicing the concerns of the community - he's not supposed to have any principles himself, he's just supposed to say what we want him to say, as our representative. But it's not necessarily a violation of confidence if we see politicians as people (difficult, I know) who's mind changes.
So when a man or woman comes to town to drum up my vote, am I supposed to judge his or her character, to see if this is a good person to represent me based on how they think, how they make decisions, and how they debate the issues - or am I supposed to choose based on their ability to mimic my stances?
I really think that it's the former, rather than the latter - we are choosing people based on who they are (a part of which is what they believe), and not primarily on their ability to state whatever I want them to say. He or she will be up in Ottawa, or Washington, or wherever, arguing for or against a great number of positions, including those that directly affect my daily life. If all they are is a mouthpiece, then there is the very real possiblity that they can sell out, and start mouthing someone else's concerns. But if they are human beings (and if we give them the benefit of the doubt in this thought experiment), then aside from being bribed, can they really sell out? We've elected them to office as a thinking individual, and thinking individuals do, on occasion, change their minds.
If my political representative changes his or her mind, and I don't agree with the new position, it is my right to change my vote the in the next election - but what about the current term that is being served? Have I been 'sold up the river'? Or should a politician vote against his or her conscience for the remainder of the election cycle, to remain true to the positions they were elected with?
I don't know. I can't claim to answer this one, but it does bring about a second point - which I think has a lot of bearing on politics in general, and about which I can come to a conclusion. Given that I believe we are electing not mouthpieces, but rational thinkers to office, it becomes extremely important that we know the moral and intellectual character of these people. If we were electing positional players, and not human beings, then their morality wouldn't really concern me, so long as they voice the right things.
This, I think (albeit way too late to do any good) was roughly the divide over Clinton, at least in my mind. Those who defended him claimed that his morality and character didn't matter - so long as he did the right thing politically. Those who were against him (and weren't motivated by an irrational anger) claimed that his morality did matter, because he was representing all of us, and we had to be sure his character would allow him to make correct moral decisions on the world's stage.
Obviously, it's not that simple. But if we're electing people to mimic what we want them to say, then it doesn't matter all that much what their personal opinions and behaviors are like - it just doesn't. If, on the other hand, we are electing human beings, with thoughts, morals, character flaws, and the ability to change their positions, then we should be able to examine the whole of their person, and not just their stump speeches. And we can't exactly get upset when they do change their minds, can we? After all - if we did our job, we'd know who these people are, and we'd know how likely they are to 'flip-flop.' It's our fault, as much as it is theirs, if things go badly - unless, of course, we've been genuinely deceived.
Fred Reed has a list of questions he'd like those who are knowledgeable about the Theory of Evolution to answer for him.
Any takers?
[HatTip to Bane for the link.]
How dare you! I want people to READ my posts, and you're making it disappear!!!! You keep posting and posting! My goodness golly gosh don't you have any manners?! I guess not. So, my fellow earthlings.............I don't have anything else to say........ good bye.
P.S. Good bye
Let's see - I write a piece on Nova Scotia's censorship, rattle off an email or two, then go to class for a bit. When I come back, I've had more than 1300 visitors. Instapundit rules.
For those who are worried about Howard Stern, perhaps you should turn your eyes north. You know, to get a look at real government censorship [from the print edition of the National Post - those of you who subscribe can find the article online here]:
HALIFAX - The Nova Scotia government has published a list of words and phrases it wants banished from the news media, including "madman," "nutcase," "fruitcake," and "kooky," and will pay people for reporting their use.So they're paying citizens to turn in those who violate speech codes?
The Health Department is offering cash awards to citizens who inform authorities of instances of "outdated, negative, inappropriate" terms it considers offensive to people with mental illness.Yep. They sure are.
The government even says "mental hospital" and "nervous breakdown" should be verboten, not only in stories dealing with the mentally ill, but in all public discourse.It gets worse. Public discourse?! Attention those of you who enjoy free speech: avoid visiting Nova Scotia.
Added the province's Health Minister, Angus MacIsaac: "This initiative will show us if and how media need more guidance and education."Guidance? Education? Government interference with the media? That's some fairly scary stuff you're throwing around there, Mr. MacIsaac.
Dave Wilson, Nova Scotia's opposition Liberal party health critic, thinks the government's health officials have lost their marbles on this one - although he can't say that because "losing your marbles" is one of the government's blacklisted phrases.Well whaddya know? I agree with a Liberal party member! And kudos again for Mr. Foot's editorial commentary.
The unwanted words and phrases were handed down by the government's Anti-Stigma/Discrimination Working Group...Ahhh, here's the problem!
...and the Canadian Mental Health Association, which is a partner in the media survey.Okay, look. This is just wrong. I agree - the stigma against mental illness is an issue. But this is not the way to deal with it! Especially not by offering cash prizes for those who do comply!
For the next six months, Nova Scotians are being asked to take home a pair of checklists - one for mental illness and one for suicide - and report back on how newspapers, television, and radio newscasts treat these subjects and whether they use any of the targeted words in other stories.
"I think this is a fun way to get some information," said Carol Tooton, executive director of the Canadian Mental Health Association in Nova Scotia.Okay, this is just too much. Stop the presses, people - this is censorship. It's government sponsored, and it flies in the face of the right to free speech. I can't think of language that is strong enough to adequately display my disgust and abhorrence.
"We're hoping to get a good picture of how the media covers issues relating to mental health in the province. And we're trying to send the message that people should be watchdogs in their community, to pay particular attention to news items they hear about or read." [Emphasis added]
"I'm not one of these politically correct stalwarts that comb the language looking for examples of words that might offend someone, "Dr. [Steven] Kisely [chairman of the government's Anti-Stigma working group] said.Bait...Switch:
But we need to see a general move away from the indiscriminate use of words likes schizophrenic and psychotic. Sloppy language perpetuates a view in people's minds that mentally ill people are very strange or bizarre or dangerous." [Emphasis added]Tell me, doctor: how does one diagnose a mental illness? I mean, what's the primary symptom? Odd and strange behavior. Huh. Funny, but you just pointed out that we need to stop thinking the mentally ill are strange. The thing is, though, that they are. By definition, that which is not normal is abnormal, is strange.
I'm tired today (see the new Mood Indicator). That's what comes from catching a late film the night before I have a too-long day (Wednesdays are always my worst). Not even two cups of coffee were enough to kick me into gear this morning.
Oh, how I'm looking forward to Thursday - only one class, and it's at 6pm. My head needs that pillow.
So I saw The Passion Of The Christ last night.
Afterwards, I felt rather empty - sucked dry of any further emotional response. My tears were flowing for most of the film, and all that saline just drained everything out of me. I wasn't, however, moved to silence. My friend Nathan and I (with whom I viewed the movie) discussed some of our observations, one of which was the longing for a 'longer' film, including more of the story.
The flashbacks throughout the film succeed, in my view, in making Christ seem more fully human. Sometimes, I think, as Christians - and this is not a new idea - we tend to distance ourselves from Christ's humanity; not necessarily in a conscious, deliberate way, but it happens nonetheless - perhaps as a result of the superficial 'dryness' of the translated Gospel texts. Heretical teaching throughout history has often emphasized one of Christ's natures over the other (his humanity over his deity, or vice versa), and I think believers are all susceptible to that. I know I am, and so it's good for me to see the 'manhood' of Christ emphasized, as a reminder of His being one of us.
Being a Protestant, I obviously have issues with the portrayal of Mary (Christ's mother), but as a 'film critic' (ha!), I applaud the fantastic use Gibson made of her. I may disagree with the director on the theological stance, but the effect she has on us as an audience is undeniable, and provides a 'safe-place' for us to store our emotional response. That is, had we watched the film without the emphasis on Mary's character, we would have been forced to completely empathize with Christ himself - and while that may have been good for our souls, that would not have been good for the film. It's like M. Night Shyamalan has said: if you show a child crying on the screen, you've just exhausted all the audience's emotional reserves; they've got nothing left to give you. In the same way, the audience for The Passion needs a focus on Mary so that they can have some respite from the terrible agony Christ suffers, and make it through the rest of the film.
To me, this represents just how fallen we are. We can't even take the suffering of Christ in a film without needing several breaks. Jesus doesn't get one, but the audience does. We have to have special consideration given to us by the director, or we'll be unable to make it through two hours of a re-enactment. That's just pitiful.
Is it a gory film? Yes. Is it gorier than anything I've seen before? That takes more consideration. Saving Private Ryan - a film to which the Passion has been repeatedly compared - is just as bloody a film in my memory, but only lasts a half hour (with occasional spurts of violence later). The Passion is the first portion of Private Ryan spread into two hours. It, surprisingly, wasn't as violent as I expected. Was it startling? Yes. Was it disturbing? Yes. Did it hurt me to watch? Yes. But did it exceed my expectations, my preparations? No. I don't know what more I was expecting, and anything more would probably have pushed the film over the top, but I was prepared for more that didn't come.
Now, to the charge of anti-Semitism. I've referred before to Dennis Prager's wonderful essay on the issue, and I can only emphasize that I'm viewing this from a Christian point-of-view. To me, I killed Jesus. My sins, my faults, my iniquities and transgressions. I had my hand around those rods that beat His back, the haft of that cat o' nine tails that scourged Him bloody, the rope whips that mercilessly pounded Him as He walked up that road to Golgotha. It was me. I'm siding with Gibson on this one: anti-Semitism on the behalf of a Christian is a sin, and is to be condemned whole-heartedly.
Do I feel this movie will spread anger against Jews? I don't think so, but anti-Semites have used less than this to take up arms before. For me, this turns rapidly into a 'free speech' issue. Should we do as Germany has done, as Canada has done, and bar a film, book, or article that has 'potential' to raise someone's ire against someone else? In the US, the 1st Amendment says no, and I repeat that statement here. To outlaw expression because it might have unintended results flies in the face of freedom. If hateful people use this movie as a banner, then that is a reflection on them, and not of Mel Gibson. To claim otherwise is to tread too close to designating 'hate speech' (which itself is a travesty against freedom). Gibson has made all the necessary disclaimers, all the necessary renunciations, and all the necessary defenses. He's not the one responsible for the actions of others.
Leaving that issue, then, was the movie a good one? It had high production values, was skillfully crafted, and featured fantastic performances. Jim Caviezel as Christ was brilliant; it's easy to see why Hollywood is so willing to accede to his demands (he refused to perform nude scenes in two of his films - High Crimes, and the Count of Monte Cristo): he's a fantastic actor. The direction was sure of itself, and though a few decisions were made that I would not have (too much slow-motion for my tastes), I must give the technical aspects of the film a thumbs up.
The choice to make Satan a character (though he is not to be found in the Gospel accounts) was a good one. This ties back into the accusations of anti-Semitism, and demonstrates to me why the film should not be considered anti-Jew in the least. Every time you see the Jews accosting Christ (or Judas), their faces twist into perverted, demonic features, and Satan is seen walking among them. Some critics have used this to decry Gibson for implying the Jews were 'demons themselves,' but I see it as completely the opposite: Satan was exerting his influence among those people whom were in his grasp. The machinations of Lucifer are just that - his work. Satan twists and perverts God's good creation. Here, he is seen corrupting the hearts of men (who happen to be Jews and Romans) to his ends. It's what he does.
Is it the best movie I've ever seen? I don't think so. Is it good? Yes. Should it be nominated in next year's Oscars? Yes, yes and yes. Will it be? I can't see it happening.
The film is something every Christian should see, just as Saving Private Ryan was a film every beneficiary of the sacrifices of that generation should see. And on top of that, it's a good movie, too.
When this film first loomed on the horizon, the received wisdom of the metropolitan sophisticates was that Mel Gibson had blown well over 30 million bucks of his own money on a vanity project of no interest to anyone but him and a few other Jesus freaks. A couple of weeks ago, when stories began to trickle out of amazing advance sales and Bible Belt multiplex owners booking it on to all 20 screens simultaneously, the received wisdom did a screeching U-turn:Go read the rest. Steyn's about to reclaim that flaming torch.
How about that Mel Gibson, huh? He claims to be such a devout Christian yet he's pimping his Saviour's suffering to the masses and raking in gazillions of dollars.
.................
Throughout the whiplash U-turn, only one feature of the "controversy" remained constant: that the movie is "anti-Semitic."
It's true that in Europe "passion plays" often provided a rationale for Jew-hatred. But that was at a time when the church was also a projection of state power. What's happening in America is quite the opposite: One reason why Hollywood assumed Mel had laid a $30 million Easter egg was because the elite coastal enclaves who set the cultural agenda haven't a clue about the rest of the country when it comes to religion.
I've discussed and rethought some of the portions of my view on the American System that I posted the other day. Aside from structural concerns (it suffers from that too-prevalent blogging condition: it's haphazard), I think there are other ways to make my points clearer, and I think I touch on things in the post that have little to no bearing on the larger issue I was trying to discuss. Look for a revised update later, after I do some more work.
Evan points out that reasoned dialogue in today's world is lacking:
There are a lot of angry people out there waiting and hoping for something new to protest, slander, and joke about. Why, I asked myself, do people find it necessary to slam anything and everything that happens? Whether it is politics, movies, music, TV, or Internet, there will always be at least one person sneaking his way through the tall grass, and hiding in the deep recesses of the Internet ready to pounce on the issues.Ah, the oft-desired 'depth.' Personally, I've noticed the truth of the following statement: "The most vehement arguments tend to come from those who are most ignorant of the issues." Is it possible to be 'deep,' and yet have little to no understanding of the topic at hand? Somehow I don't think so.
While I agree that some things should be put down, everything does not need to be "flamed." The reason for this is that most people believe that by being angry and stating the other side of the issue, they become "deep."
Just before I hit the sack, allow me to wish my fellow Texans a happy Independence day. 168 years old today; but we're not exactly showin' our age, are we?
Well, if this is true [scroll down] - and as there's no link, I can't verify - then the Archbishop of Canterbury has something in common with my sister: they're both insane.
THE ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY DENOUNCED PASSION FILM AS PRO-CHRISTIAN. In his homily yesterday during a memorial service for Palestinian suicide bombers, the Right Reverend Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury, denounced Mel Gibson's film 'The Passion of the Christ' as being 'overtly pro-Christian.' OVERTLY PRO-CHRISTIAN! What the blazes does he think the movie is all about.I don't think any further comment is necessary, the event speaks for itself.
About my biography, COMMENT IT. Tell me what you think. Isn't that a tragic story about my life? Man you guys sure are lucky, you got to read it FIRST, and FIRSTHAND. Wow! I'd be wanting my autograph by now! You know, just in case.
[Edited to clean up, well...everything. Spelling, capitalization - you'd think the daughter of an English major and the sister of another two would be able to get the rules of language down. Guess not. -- Ed.]
When Laurie was young, she was deeply emotionally abused by her older brother Eric. He left scars that she would remember for the rest of her life. By the age of 7 Laurie had more anger than Austin when he found out some CRAZY politician won the election that he didn't like, and believe me THATS BAD (that's bad, that's really really bad). So finally, Laurie snapped. She decided to take over the world.
Since Laurie is EXTREMELY smart she started making WMDs ( Weapons of Mass Destruction) to threaten the World Leaders. At the age of 10, Laurie had moved to Canada, which nearly ruined her plans. This was because Canada HAS no WMDs and nothing she could use to make WMDs. Canada does not have the same supplies as America does for war weapons. This enraged Laurie even more.
Finally, at age 11, Laurie had created the worlds BIGGEST, SCARIEST, EVILEST, BEAUTIFULIST, AWESOME POSSUMIST WMD.
On July 16, Saddam Hussein stole her beautiful weapon. Laurie finally gave up and calmed down, but in secret she is planning to take over the world with the help of her newest family member, Krysta Medeiros. DUN DUN DUNNNNNNN WATCH OUT WORLD CUZ IF YOU MAKE ME MAD I'll KILL YA (KILL Ya, KILL ya, KILl ya, KIll ya, Kill ya, kill ya!)
[Yes, I must say: my sister is now, certifiably, insane. And I think my 'Goodness' rating just fell even lower. -- Ed.]
Looks like I've got some work to do.
In other news, I'm going to see the Passion Of The Christ tonight. I'll leave you to draw your own connection between these two pieces of information.
I'll probably have my own reactions posted later tonight, or tomorrow (more likely).
...just learned the ins and outs of Style Sheets!
I'll give you three guesses, and the first two don't count.
The flame is safely kept aburnin' by James Lileks:
[T]ake these two statements:It's times like these when I wish he placed anchor tags at each of his section breaks - it would make linking more convienient. Ah, well. Until such time as changes are implemented, I'm forced to say: scroll down to find the relevant portion (but hey, the whole thing is enjoyable, so spend some time).
"The liberty we prize is not American's gift to the world, it is God's gift to humanity."
Or:
"We pray that God is on our side, and we pray hard. And God has been on our side through most of our existence."
Which one best represents the face of America you'd like the President to show to the world?
I marked up the comment section of the National Post in a graduated fashion as I ate breakfast this morning. If you moved from left to right across the page, you could see that I left George Jonas untouched, started in on Anthony Daniels about halfway through (and forsook mere underlining in favor of margin comment), and circled whole paragraphs of Colby Cosh.
I moved from Jonas' article on miscarriages of North American justice into Daniels' piece on the hopelessness of the Haitian situation, and the broiling political mess, in a roundabout way, gave me insight into why, as I queried last week, the American system of government is to be preferred over other forms of democracy. In short, I hope to answer last week's question by way of the Haitian conflict.
Dr. Daniels, in his column (not yet available online), despairs of ever succeeding in a true Haitian reformation, short of a 100-year occupation:
This time, yet another police force will be trained, that will turn out to be just as corrupt and venal as its predecessors; another constitution will be promulgated, offering the sun, the moon, and the stars, with every safeguard that constitutional lawyers can devise; and then, once everyone has gone home, the nightmare will begin all over again.A feasible resolution for the Haiti affair I leave to other, more knowledgeable commentators (or that ever-fictional 'later piece'). The lamentable circumstances in the Caribbean lead Dr. Daniels to briefly examine the history of Haitian conflict, dating back nearly 200 years, and to make the following comments.
Only a prolonged occupation, lasting a century or so, might break the cycle, but no one cares enough or has the stomach for it; and the Haitians themselves, eager to loot themselves into personal wealth but national extinction, would soon chafe under it. Look on Port-au-Prince, o ye mighty, and despair!
Truth to tell, the Americans were never very keen on the little ex-priest anyway, with his crypto-socialist promise to raise Haitians from their abject misery to dignified povertyIndeed - and just to break in here, elsewhere, in the news portion of the paper, the following appears:
It won't be long before the worst motives are imputed to the Americans as if, were it not for their repeated military interventions, Haiti would be some kind of Caribbean Denmark
In Montreal, about 200 Aristide supporters gathered outside the U.S. consulate and waved placards claiming the President had not left voluntarily.It has already started. Back to the column:
"France and the US kidnapped him with a knife to his throat," Robert Ismaal said. "But the resistance is organized in Haiti to show we will not accept this coup-d'etat.
America's conscience regarding Haiti is not much clearer than France's...the Americans refused for even longer [than 70 years] to recognize [Haiti's independence] in case their own slaves got ideas above their station.This is (finally!) what I want to discuss, if only tangentially: the view that pre-emancipation America can be considered the same as modern America; or, more precisely, the transmission of culpability (which Dr. Daniels is not implying, just to be clear) from the distant past to the present.
[Written ~11am]
I feel good this morning, and that's surprising. I stayed up until the Oscars were done last night - I knew that a Lord Of The Rings' victory was a sure thing, but I wanted to see it complete the historic sweep - and thus didn't get a lot of sleep before my 7am alarm. I was nearly late for class, owing to the lackadaisical morning TTC performance (which, in all honesty, is a rarity), and my brain was whirring with adrenaline soaked exhaustion as I listened to the TA expound upon Alice Munro's 'oppositional feminism.' (I assure you, that's not a good combination).
But after that? I went to New York Deli over on Bay street and had a cheap breakfast. Bacon, eggs, hash brown, toast, OJ, coffee and a paper, all for just over 5 bucks. I mention this only because that place is one of my favorites. It's warm, cozy, friendly (despite the name), and a fantastic place to read and relax between classes. I'm in there often enough that the morning staff recognize me (always a good feeling), and the atmosphere is such that I'm nearly always inspired to write - I don't know what it is about the place, but my muse always starts working when I'm there.
Right now, I'm sitting in the food court across the street (I can't bring myself to lounge in the Deli for more than an hour at a time - I feel like I become a burden on the staff...even though the place is usually rather empty), amidst the pre-lunch throng, rattling off this entry before I head to my next class.
This is what I always imagined a writer feels like when he's in the midst of his craft. Calm, yet excited; relaxed, yet active. There's a soothing peace that comes from forming cogent thoughts and getting them down, and that's definitely helped along by the warm atmosphere of the nook-diner.
My writer's muse is pushing me now, and though these posts won't show up until this afternoon (when I'm able to upload them), I'm going to see if I can't rattle off a few pieces of observation before I have to pack it up.
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