Sobering Thoughts |
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Comments on politics, the culture, economics and religion by Paul Tuns -- in short, everything about the human endeavour from a non-hyphenated conservative perspective.
I am Toronto-based writer and editor, whose articles, columns and reviews have appeared in more than 35 publications. I am editor-in-chief of The Interim, Canada's life and family newspaper, author of Jean Chretien: A Legacy of Scandal and a regular contributor to the book pages of the Halifax Herald.
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Thursday, September 30, 2004
Ingenious new political thinker on the block Cameron Diaz tells Oprah Winfrey that if George W. Bush is re-elected because of the apathy of non-voting young women, rape could be legalized. This leads Mark Shea to describe Diaz as a "political scholar, social analyst and moral theologian." The Speccie special conservatism issue Incredible issue of The Spectator -- all about conservatives and conservatism including Mark Steyn explains why America is conservative, Patrick J. Buchanan argues that the Republican Party is not conservative, Oliver Letwin promises his Tories would deliver a low-tax England, Michael Gove says that conservatism speaks for regular people, and Daniel Kruger praises Roger Scruton as the thinking man's conservative. Steyn's essay in great and if I posted the "best" quotes, 50% of his piece would be excerpted here, but I couldn't resist this one: "Second Amendment conservatism is more secure and better integrated with the bespoke mainstream than it’s been in years. The government can’t tell you you’ve got to be on full alert and at the same time announce new restrictions on the right to defend yourself and your home." Oliver Letwin wrote that Leviathan needs to be starved before it suffocates us: "The bloated bureaucracy means that every nook and cranny of our day-to-day life is subject to regulation and control. When you have a Civil Service the size of a major city, when an extra 511 civil servants are recruited every week, when there are 15 new regulations every working day, the effect is to throw a huge and suffocating net over the social and economic life of this country." Our religious leaders are appeasers in the war against the dual enemies of modernism and Islamofacsism. Kruger quotes Scruton on the need for the Church to do more; to do something: "The Anglican Church is uncomfortable with evangelising. It has a nonconformist ring to it. But yes, the Church must be evangelical — no one is reaching out to young people but violent and criminal mullahs. I don’t know what the Church should be doing, really. But it should not be simply making concessions. It should be affirming the superiority of its message." Quote of the Day William Kristol on Fox News (as quoted by Hugh Hewitt): "The core of the Bush claim is 9/11, and the world changed, and the Democrats want to go back to 9/10." The Debate Boring. Dreadful to watch, which is good. My guess is that people began tuning out at 9:30. I think Kerry might have scored a point when he said that Osama bin Laden is a free man today because President George W. Bush was allegedly distracted from hunting him down by the liberation of Iraq. I thought it was effective line when he said that Bush had troops readying to go into Iraq when they could have been used to apprehend bin Laden. But one line in a 90-minute two-person press conference does not a winner make. On a tie decision, Bush wins, so Bush won. I agree with Kate O'Beirne's assessment in The Corner: "I thought the President was repetitive and reactive. Maybe the latter couldn't be helped with both Kerry and Lehrer going after his decisions, but he never tried to take command of the back and forth. He could have contrasted need for strong defense with Kerry's Senate record. Kerry was smoother and proactive, though ultimately unconvincing. "Mixed messages" is wimpy. The President was apparently only prepared to go after Kerry for flip-flops - not for being wrong about every national security issue for the past 30 years. Kerry needed more than a draw." It gets tiring and tired to complain about media bias but Cliff May makes an important observation: "Kate is right: Why were all the questions about Bush's record? Why didn't Lehrer at least ask Kerry if he stil thinks he was correct to vote against the 1990 Gulf War?" VodkaPundit was live blogging and had these great observations: "Here's what we have so far. Kerry is an impressive attack machine. Bush impressively refuses to budge. If I had to guess, the question most viewers will ask is, 'In time of war, do I want the debate team captain, or the guy he can't move?' ... 'I will hunt and kill the terrorists wherever they are.' That's the second (third?) time Kerry has used that line, and it's a loser. For Kerry, it's a promise. For Bush, it's a perceived fact. ... Methinks he doth protest too much. Kerry, for the umpteenth time tonight, has said he's never wavered on Iraq. The record says different and, even if it didn't, that windsurfing TV ad makes it the public perception." Adam Daifallah was overly generous to Bush but was right to find that Kerry did absolutely nothing to dispel the idea that he is a flip-flopper. Instapundit thought that the lack of rhetorical skills in either candidate led to a more substantive debate. Really? Hugh Hewitt says Bush won big and grades the candidates' responses by each question. Bush gets all As with the exception of two Bs. Kerry scored considerably lower, even earning an F. Editorial of the day Montreal Gazette opposes physician-assisted suicide. No one will be surprised to find that I think PAS, euthanasia and the misnamed compassionate homicide are morally wrong but the Gazette takes the position that permitting these would lead down a dangerous path: "In our era of scarce medical resources, assisted suicide brings us closer to the perilous point at which terminally ill people, and then perhaps simply old people, begin hearing hints they have a "duty to die." Baby boomers who think that over might lose some of their enthusiasm for permitting people to help others to die." The paper begins its editorial implicitly urging readers not to allow the often emotional stories behind assisted suicide (if that indeed is what the Charles Fariala case is) to confuse the issue -- it is illegal (and wrong) to kill someone: "[It] is illegal in Canada to assist another person to commit suicide, just as it is against the law to practice euthanasia. Nothing in the terrible human tragedy of Charles Fariala and his mother, Marielle, should be allowed to change that." MP pay raise The NCC's Gerry Nicholls addresses the most important issue in debate about increasing MP pay: "And let's not forget that just a few short months ago, MPs were begging us to elect them. They knew what the salary for the job was and they still wanted the job. If they thought the pay was too low why did they run?" Here's an idea: Let's have MPs pass pay increases that do not take effect until after the next federal election. Even better yet, force them to vote on the increase within six weeks of an election call so that they are forced to defend to voters their decision to increase their own pay. The magic number is 1 New York Yankees beat the Minnesota Twins and a probable post-season opponent in both sides of a double-header. One more Yankee win or one more Boston Red Sox loss and the Bronx Bombers win the division. Also, one more win for the Yankees and they will have their third straight 100-win season. I know that cheering for the Yankees is like cheering for Microsoft (to update George F. Will's comment in the 1970s that it is like cheering for IBM), but what a great and (too) exciting year it has been. I was hoping that the Yankees had it sewn up before the weekend series in Toronto; I have tickets to all three games but I couldn't watch it if the division was on the line. JO'S on what it takes to win World War IV and the moral necessity to do it Cold, sober realism, not the utopian fantasies that dominate in Europe and the Europe-loving fashionable liberal circles in North America. John O'Sullivan drives home this point in the Chicago Sun-Times: "But as Bacon pointed out: "Revenge is a kind of wild justice." It will inevitably -- and arguably rightly -- become the resort of decent people when law and government fail to deliver justice. Post-modern governments fail in just that way. Humanitarian bodies such as Amnesty International are even worse: They practice a sort of unilateral civil libertarianism that holds governments to account for the smallest infraction of civil liberty but treats terrorism as a natural disaster. Transnational bodies like the U.N. and the EU are worse -- they seek to take the weapons of war and capital punishment from us in our struggles against terrorism, slavery, piracy and hostage-taking and to force us to rely instead on their own paper resolutions and elevated principles. All these responses -- from the critical reactions to 'Man on Fire' to the E.U.'s prohibition of capital punishment -- are overcivilized. That sounds almost like a compliment, as if it meant more civilized. In fact, to be overcivilized is to be less civilized because genuine civilization includes a robust willingness to enforce its order and truths on anarchy, violence, murder and superstition. As long as we remain overcivilized, anarchy, violence, murder and superstition will continue their sinister recovery -- until one day you may think you hear your own mother's voice on the network news." To play nice with people who want to kill you because you play nice is not a sign of being enlightened but incredibly, almost indescribably stupid. Bloomberg's Olympian monovision Nurse Bloomberg wrote in the Wall Street Journal yesterday about "investing" in New York City's "golden" future: "When I visited Athens during the recent Olympic Games, it gleamed with new roads and subways, state-of-the-art athletic facilities, modern housing and a new airport. It was all built for the Olympics, which lasts only 17 days, but residents will enjoy these improvements for decades to come." What he doesn't mention is that not only will residents have new roads and state-of-the-art (and useless) athletic facilities for decades to come, but also debt and high taxes for decades to come. Just ask Montreal, which is still paying for the 1976 Olympics. Wednesday, September 29, 2004
Drezner on out-sourcing Candidates demagogue, everyone understands that. But no issue has been so abused and misrepresented as out-sourcing. The University of Chicago's Daniel Drezner asks the question that no one else will: "is the outsourcing of jobs a problem?" He answers that it isn't and explains: "Now, however, we can add some actual figures to the overheated debate. The Government Accountability Office has issued its first review of the data, and one undeniable conclusion to be drawn from it is that outsourcing is not quite the job-destroying tsunami it's been made out to be. Of the 1.5 million jobs lost last year in "mass layoffs'' - that is, when 50 or more workers are let go at once - less than 1 percent were attributed to overseas relocation; that was a decline from the previous year. In 2002, only about 4 percent of the money directly invested by American companies overseas went to the developing countries that are most likely to account for outsourced jobs - and most of that money was concentrated in manufacturing. The data did show that from 1997 to 2002, annual imports of business, technical and professional services increased by $16.3 billion. However, during that same half-decade, exports of those services increased by $20.5 billion a year. In 2002 alone, the United States ran a $27 billion trade surplus in business services, the sector in which jobs are most likely to be outsourced. The G.A.O. correctly stressed that it is impossible to compute exactly how many jobs are lost because of outsourcing, but unless its figures are off by several orders of magnitude, there's no crisis here." Kerry and the debate Senator Jean Kerry flip-flops so often, the real debate might not between President George W. Bush and the Democratic candidate but between Kerry and Kerry about which one should show up. Now, for the record, Kerry doesn't like the flip-flop label, although immediately afterward he said, "Ah shucks, it's not that bad." Just joking, of course. But the real joke is Kerry's planned response if Bush brings up the multiple positions issue during Thursday's debate; the New York Times reports, "At the same time, Mr. Kerry's aides suggested that if Mr. Bush accused him of inconsistency in Thursday's debate, Mr. Kerry might retort that the president had 'consistently been wrong' on foreign policy and national security, particularly on Iraq." Dick Morris, who as far as anyone can tell has never waivered on his affinity for toe sucking, said that Kerry will have serious trouble in the foreign policy debate, even if he was "Daniel Webster in disguise, schooled in the arts of debate and fluent or even eloquent in expression," because of the "inherent contradictions in Kerry's position on these issues." Americans want leadership not handwringing. Bush just has to be Bush: "To win Thursday's debate — decisively — all he has to do is state his position on the issues of terrorism, Iraq, Afghanistan, North Korea, Iran and the myriad threats we face." Ah yes, leadership in confronting terror. Kerry worries about whether or not the conflict is going well in Iraq and thus shifts his position as U.S. fortunes seem to shift in the Middle East, but Americans know that it is better to be fighting wars on foreign soil than at home. Kerry's adventures in the mud -- a replay From Jay Nordlinger's Impromptus column: "Did you hear what James Rappaport had to say about running against Kerry (in a Massachusetts Senate race)? "He didn't attack me for my positions . . . He attacked me primarily personally ... At one point, he called me a chicken hawk because I was strong on defense but hadn't served in Vietnam. He forgot that I was 16 when the war ended.' Me, I don't think Kerry forgot — I think he didn't give a damn. A dirty politician, Kerry. Really — even for the breed overall." Is Missouri still a swing state? So goes the headline on a New York Times story. But if you have to ask ... The Times reports that Wisconsin is the new Missouri "with Madison now ranking fifth on the list of cities with the heaviest political advertising spending and St. Louis and Kansas City dropping into the lower ranks of the leading 50." Kerry has seemingly given up on Missouri's 11 Electoral College votes. And as anyone who follows electoral history knows, only in 1956 has Missouri not gone with the winning presidential candidate. Victory in World War IV The New York Times reports: "A judge in Yemen sentenced two men to death and four others to prison terms up to 10 years for the deadly attack in 2000 against the warship U.S.S. Cole. The convictions today are the first stemming from the water-borne suicide bombing that provided an early glimpse of the brazen nature of Osama bin Laden's global terror network." One of the two men sentenced to death, Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, is a Saudi-born associate of Osama bin Laden who helped plan the attack that killed 17 American sailors. Nashiri is also thought to be behind the bombings of U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998. Not only are the perpetators of terrorism getting their just deserts, but there has been change in the behaviour of the Yemeni government. The Times, again: "Yemen is Mr. bin Laden's ancestral homeland and was considered a safe haven by members of Al Qaeda fleeing the United States fight against Afghanistan after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. But the country has been trying to distance itself from a reputation for harboring terrorists with the arrests of hundreds of suspects and by allowing steps like the United States using a missile to assassinate an important operative for Al Qaeda in 2002." And lest we forget, the victims of the terrorist attack on the U.S.S. Cole: * Hull Maintenance Technician Third Class Kenneth Eugene Clodfelter, of Mechanicsville, Va. * Electronics Technician Chief Petty Officer Richard Costelow, 35, of Morrisville, Pa. * Mess Management Specialist Seaman Lakeina Monique Francis, of Woodleaf, N.C. * Information Systems Technician Seaman Timothy Lee Gauna, of Rice, Texas * Signalman Seaman Apprentice Cherone Louis Gunn, 22, of Rex, Ga. * Seaman James Rodrick McDaniels, 19, of Norfolk, Va. * Engineman Second Class Marc Ian Nieto, of Fond Du Lac, Wis. * Electronics Warfare Technician Third Class Ronald Scott Owens, 24, of Vero Beach, Fla. * Seaman Apprentice Lakiba Nicole Palmer, 22, of San Diego, Calif. * Engineman Fireman Joshua Langdon Parlett, of Churchville, Md. * Fireman Apprentice Patrick Howard Roy, of Cornwall on Hudson, N.Y. * Electronics Warfare Technician Second Class Kevin Shawn Rux, 30, of Portland, N.D. * Mess Management Specialist Third Class Ronchester Mananga Santiago, of Kingsville, Texas * Operations Specialist Second Class Timothy Lamont Saunders, 32, Ringold, Va. * Ensign Andrew Triplett, 31, of Macon, Miss. * Fireman Gary Graham Swenchonis, Jr., of Rockport, Texas * Seaman Apprentice Craig Bryan Wibberley, 19, of Williamsport, Md. Taube & Tuns on the what's wrong with the NHL This column on the NHL lock-out appeared in the Vancouver Sun today. The NHL must die: Too many teams are paying too much money for a talent pool of middling players; for pro hockey to survive, this trend must be reversed by Michael Taube and Paul Tuns A couple of weeks before National Hockey League owners locked out their players, a rumour circulated that some team owners were "seriously considering" starting a new league if the lockout lasted past January. The rumour, started by an unidentified NHL team owner, is still unsubstantiated. But the idea itself is not necessarily a bad one. As it stands, the NHL is one of the least profitable sports leagues in existence. The 30 professional hockey teams reportedly lost around $273 million US during the 2002-03 season, according to a disputed, NHL-commissioned paper. The league also suffered a massive cut in its once-lucrative television contract, which will undoubtedly lead to further losses down the road. The idea of starting a new hockey league could help the owners reverse two trends that have contributed to the NHL's rapid decline over the past decade or so. Since 1979, the NHL has added 13 new teams,and nearly doubled in size. This includes the four former World Hockey Association squads for the 1979-80 season, as well as nine expansion clubs. Meanwhile, six NHL teams have shifted cities due to continuing losses, while four teams have declared bankruptcy. In the 1990s, NHL owners greedily sought new owners willing to pay exorbitant expansion fees, utterly blind to the long-term effects it had on the game. A half-dozen new teams required about 120 NHL-calibre players, players that unfortunately don't exist. Stuck with an economic mess and inferior hockey, the NHL stubbornly refuses to downsize. Next was the explosion in players' pay. The salary of the average pro hockey player has increased from $271,000 US in 1990-91 to more than $1.8 million in 2002-03. Unfortunately for the NHL, revenue did not also increase sixfold. The NHL spends about 75 per cent of its revenues on player salaries. That's nearly 20 per cent higher than other sports, including baseball, basketball and football. Now, team owners want to establish a salary cap to keep their spending levels in check, seeing the success of this mechanism to control team expenditures in the National Football League and National Basketball Association. As far as we are concerned, a salary cap for today's NHL is too little, too late. The NHL is not a marketable sports league any longer. There are too many teams paying ridiculously high salaries for a talent pool of middle-of-the-road players. And even though the vast majority of well-paid players lack enough talent and the ability to sustain long-term careers, their artificial market value has skyrocketed. The problem is not the superstar getting $10 million a year, but the third-string winger or fifth defenceman getting $2.5 million. But in an oversized league, a legitimate third liner becomes a recent expansion team's starter who can command big bucks. While players are allowed to ask for high salaries, and team owners are allowed to give them, the economic calculus is not sustainable. The owners must sense it, the players' union is surely aware of it, and the fans definitely know it. Team owners could change all this by abandoning the NHL and starting a new pro hockey league. The new league, which we'll call for the sake of this article the PHL, will have to do three things to survive. First, the PHL must reduce the number of teams by at least five or 10. We suggest returning to the status quo of the 1980s, with 21 teams. The criteria to eliminate teams could be based on financial position, attendance levels, gate receipts and hockey tradition. The new PHL team owners would buy out the floundering teams for a little less than their expansion fee. Or some teams could simply merge, such as the geographically close Tampa Bay Lightning and Florida Panthers. Whatever the method, the key is to get the number of teams down to a manageable level. By doing so, second-tier teams such as the Vancouver Canucks, Edmonton Oilers and Calgary Flames would be able to put on exciting hockey matches, regain their competitive fire and recapture their glory days. Second, the PHL must reduce annual salary levels. This wouldn't be too hard to accomplish -- with fewer teams competing for players, there would be less competition to drive up salaries and less need for mediocre players. Therefore, PHL team owners could be more selective when offering salaries to players. Third, the PHL must, unlike its predecessor, allow the free market to flourish. For instance, teams that declare bankruptcy must fold, and not be protected by the league. Team owners must be allowed to spend whatever they want on a player's salary, and not be forced into a restrictive financial environment that includes foolish items like luxury taxes. And if hockey players decide to go on strike, PHL teams must have the right to hire replacement players instead of temporarily closing down the league. The NHL may be beyond saving, but the PHL can be a great success. At the very least, perhaps just thinking about how a PHL could be run successfully will lead the NHL to make the necessary improvements before taking the drastic step of ending a century's worth of hockey tradition and starting a league anew. Tuesday, September 28, 2004
Kerry's lameness Jonah Goldberg pokes fun at John Kerry's silly attacks on President Bush. First there was "W is for Wrong." Now there's this criticism of Bush's so-called negative attack ads: "I'm calling them 'misleadisments,'. It's all scare tactics because (Bush) has no record to run on." Goldberg is too kind to call this "lameness wrapped in dorkiness swaddled in wimpiness" before noting "At least when Bush butchers a word he does it by accident. Kerry probably sat down and hammered this out with aides. I wonder why they didn't go with distortials or miscommercials. I also wonder why I could only find this tidbit in foreign newspapers." Political geography Obesity and global warming are some of the topic National Geographic has recently tackled as the magazine slides into tedium. Patrick J. Michaels has the dirt in the Washington Times on the decline of a once great magazine. Thank God the Republic has Drew Barrymore The Washington Times reports on a TNR story on getting youth to vote: "'Young people don't vote and that's, like, so not cool.' Such is the verdict of actress Drew Barrymore, whose pro-voting documentary, 'The Best Place to Start,' aired this week on MTV." Certainly democracy is strengthened when the people who don't care enough about the issues or the candidates to vote are finally persuaded to show up at the ballot box because a barely literate Drew Barrymore shamed them there. Kerry courts the gays I thought that Senator Jean Kerry already had the homosexual vote all tied up, but apparently he thought he needed to pander a little bit more. He supports the gay agenda: hate crimes, gay adoption and "gay parenting" and, despite his claims to support traditional marriage, he brags "I was the only elected senator up for reelection to oppose the Defense of Marriage Act in 1996." Are the terrorists winning? Washington Post columnist David Ignatius writes that no they are not: "Looking at the gruesome images of beheadings and suicide bombings in Iraq, it's easy to think that the Islamic holy warriors are winning. But a new book by a distinguished French Arabist named Gilles Kepel argues the opposite case. For all the mayhem the jihadists have caused, he contends, their movement is failing." P.J. O'Rourke notes in his book Peace Kills, that terrorism is the weapon of choice of losers with no real job prospects. That said, Ignatius and Kepel both warn that terrorists could win -- which Ignatius says is defined as Muslim fundamentalists taking over the Middle East -- if the U.S. doesn't get Iraq exactly right; "A precipitous withdrawal, leaving the field to the jihadists, would be a disaster," says Ignatius. "But so would a bloody and unending occupation." Unfortunately, for Ignatius and Kepel the key is re-starting the Israeli-Palestinian peace process (of endless talks during which Jews are fair game for Palestinian terrorists). It appears that once again, it comes down to peace at any cost in Israel which would inevitably lead to the destruction of Israel. If that happens, the terrorists really do win. Negotiating with terrorist kidnappers This Newsday editorial reminds us why we don't -- and can't: "It would be a terrible mistake to reward such acts and, in the longer run, giving in would only encourage more hostage-taking. That is the sad, hard lesson learned after decades of trying to deal with hostage-takers. Give in just once, as was the case recently in Iraq, and you encourage the perpetrators. If the barbarians who commit such an act believe it will help them obtain their objectives, the result will be wholesale kidnappings." Kerry probably doesn't even know he is right about this one This Washington Times editorial rightfully takes on the Johns Kerry and Edwards and their campaign staff for their attacks on interim Iraqi Prime Minister Iyad Allawi as nothing more than President Bush's puppet and the best face that Bush can put on the war in Iraq. Of course, they are right, although inadvertently so: Allawi, like many of his compatriots, suffered horribly under Saddam Hussein. It was precisely because of his torment that Iraq needed to be liberated. Back to the future for New York? The New York Post worries that the ghost of David Dinkins will come back to haunt the Big Apple and bring with it racial discord, high crime, dysfunctional courts, failing schools and the trap of welfare. The paper's editorial notes last week's Manhattan Supreme Court ruling in which, "Justice Shirley Kornreich, upholding a nonsensical jury verdict, ruled that the city must pay more than $170,000 to the mother of Jose 'Kiko' Garcia — a dangerous drug dealer killed by police gunfire in Washington Heights 12 years ago." The editorial continues: "... the days when City Hall reflexively fawned over a dead drug dealer are long gone. But forever? Another mayoral campaign begins this November. Among other things, it will help determine whether Judge Kornreich's kooky ruling was an anachronism." Let's pray it was. Celsius 41.11 My son brought this to my attention on the weekend and Adam Daifallah links to it today. What an incredibly powerful trailer; I watched it about a dozen times on Sunday. I look forward to seeing the film. And now you get only half of the story This Chicago Tribune editorial on Terri Schiavo-Schindler ignores a lot of evidence damning to the case in favour of killing her. The Tribune is correct to begin its pro-death editorial: "Terri Schiavo is a horribly unfortunate person. In 1990, at the age of 26, she suffered a heart attack as a result of a potassium imbalance. She has been unconscious ever since, reduced to a persistent vegetative state." But of all the "unfortunate" things that have happened to her, the paper misses the most obvious: her husband wants her dead. Monday, September 27, 2004
There is no EUropean future Mark Steyn, in another brilliant column, writes in the Daily Telegraph: "If embracing Europe meant pasta, Mercedeses and flaunting one's wedding tackle on the Cote d'Azur, who could object? Unfortunately, embracing Europe means embracing German corporatism, French public-service ethics, Belgian foreign policy, Swedish tax rates and Greek state pension liabilities which, by the year 2040, will account for 24 per cent of GDP. So, if Britons are becoming more European, they ought to stop, because it's a death cult. Fifty million Frenchmen can be wrong, and 50 million Britons joining them in their fantasy won't make it come true." And one of those fantasies is that Germany should be a permanent fixture on the UN Security Council, an idea that Steyn finds absurd: "EUtopia is over. There's something terribly vieux chapeau about those calls for Germany to get a seat on the Security Council. Never mind that, if Europe is to have a single foreign minister, it seems curious that it needs three UN vetoes: the truth is that Germany, entering a demographic death spiral and an era of political instability, will never be an economic powerhouse again." Insert own race-concious joke here The Independent reports UK Foreign Secretary Jack Straw's defense of shaking hands with brutal Zimbabwean dictator Robert Mugabe: "After he was filmed meeting Mr Mugabe by BBC2's Newsnight programme, Mr Straw said: 'I hadn't expected to see President Mugabe there. Because it was quite dark in that corner, I was being pushed towards shaking hands with somebody just as a matter of courtesy and then it transpired it was President Mugabe'." Don't vote for me, vote against my opponent This is, essentially, the case for Kerry, which is really nothing more than a case against Bush. And James McEnteer, author of Deep in the Heart: The Texas Tendency in American Politics, buys it. Writing in the Los Angeles Times he says: "This year's choice between two Yale Skull and Bones multimillionaires would seem another futile exercise. Except that George W. Bush has shown enough contempt for most Americans to deserve ours. His reckless fiscal policies have weakened our country and impoverished many citizens. His Iraq war — based on lies — has killed and wounded thousands, with no end in sight. Yet he and his friends and family in and out of government continue to profit handsomely from those fiscal policies and that war. Enough already. In the film A Perfect Candidate, a minister admonishes his parishioners not to wait for 'a perfect candidate' or they will never vote for anyone. But we need not wait. George W. Bush is the perfect candidate to vote against." It should be noted that McEnteer habitually finds Republicans worthy of voting against. He admits that he either doesn't vote (1976 and 1996) or votes against the Republican (1972, 1980, 1984, 1992, 2000), so you might want to consider his animus toward Bush, whom he called the smirking jerk of the 2000 campaign, when weighing his advice. I say tomaeto, you say tomahto ... You say combating terrorism, I say driving the Jews into the sea ... I share Trudeaupia's concerns about the news that Saudi Arabia is hosting an anti-terrorism conference: "I'd like to think that they're starting to take the problem seriously, but something tells me that what they really have in mind is a festival of Israel and America-bashing." A conflict of interest comes to an end The family of Major League Baseball commissioner Bud Selig appears to have finally sold the Milwaukee Brewers. I have never understood how the former owner of the Brewers was allowed to run baseball while his family continued to control the team. Selig always defended himself by noting he stopped receiving a salary from the team he bought in 1970 (the Seattle Pilots) and moved to Milwaukee. I am sure he was entirely indifferent to the millions that his daughter stood to gain or lose depending on the salary caps he proposed, the idea of eliminating the Minnesota Twins and moving Milwaukee from the American to National League. Divide an issue enough times and it won't register on a poll at all The Chicago Tribune/WGN poll of Illinois voters included data on Republican supporters in the state including their ranking of "several traditional Republican issues." The poll found that "31 percent of GOP voters said military defense was at the top, 23 percent said moral and family values and 19 percent said taxes and government spending. Though Keyes and his supporters have sought to make opposition to abortion the core of his campaign, only 12 percent of GOP voters said abortion was the issue of most concern to them. Meanwhile, only 4 percent of Republicans identified gun-owners' rights, another hot button issue for the GOP right wing, as the issue they care most about." Neat how they divided abortion and moral/family values. If they had separated moral and family values even further with another choice such as same-sex marriage, the 23% would have been smaller, just as concern for taxes and government spending was diminished by the fact that 6% of respondents said the most important issue was "big government" which is really a tax and spend issue. It is probably safe to assume that there is a lot of overlap and that for some pro-lifers, moral and family values encompasses abortion but also reflects their broader concern about the moral dilapidation of society. Note that together, the two concerns would be the priority of 35% of GOP voters, making it the most important issue for Republicans in this election. But that doesn't fit the Tribune's narrative that social issues are costing Alan Keyes, and perhaps other Republicans, the election. Arghhhh! II I just watched CNN for 20 seconds which about equals the total amount of time I've watched the "news" network since the GOP convention. Aaron Brown said that his show will be broadcast from Seattle, Washington, Portland, Oregon, SF and LA, California, and Las Vegas, Nevada so that CNN could get to know the issues that Americans outside the "Washington-New York bubble) care about. Yes, the Left Coast and Sin City are America now. Funny how the people stuck in the Washington-New York bubble consider Los Angeles and San Fran and Las Vegas to be typical of the rest of America. I wonder, sometimes, if Brown et al have even ever heard of Tulsa, Oklahoma or Rockford, Illinois, Pierre, South Dakota or Gary, Indiana, let alone think of broadcasting from any of these cities in fly-over country. Arghhhh! Law and Order has a Iraqi war theme tonight. I am so sick of politics in my entertainment that I was even displeased by former Senator Fred Thompson's character defending the clash of civilizations thesis that I subscribe to. It was amusing, however, to see real-life 9/11 Democrat and actor Ron Silver depict a lawyer who plays on people's anxieties about the liberation of Iraq. Proof that Jimmy Carter is an idiot If further proof where needed, the former president writes in the Washington Post: "The Carter Center has monitored more than 50 elections, all of them held under contentious, troubled or dangerous conditions. When I describe these activities, either in the United States or in foreign forums, the almost inevitable questions are: 'Why don't you observe the election in Florida? and 'How do you explain the serious problems with elections there?' The answer to the first question is that we can monitor only about five elections each year, and meeting crucial needs in other nations is our top priority. (Our most recent ones were in Venezuela and Indonesia, and the next will be in Mozambique.) A partial answer to the other question is that some basic international requirements for a fair election are missing in Florida." He then lists the "problems" he has observed in the Sunshine State. John Kerry's campaign must be in trouble if they already making excuses for losing Florida. Over to you, Conan Conan O'Brien to get Jay Leno's slot in 2009. So I guess that means Conan will be making fun of either Hillary Clinton or Jeb Bush or Bill Owen. Another victory in World War IV And further proof that the liberation of Iraq was not a distraction in the War on Terror: Five more Taliban leaders captured. Joe Clark on Paul Martin Joe Clark, CTV reports, told the network's Question Period public affairs show, the two key questions for him about Martin are "Can he govern?" and "What does he want to do?" Answers: Better than Clark and about the same as Clark. Senate predictions National Review's John J. Miller is still predicting a gain of two in the Senate for the GOP. I think President Bush is going to have coat-tails and believe his analysis is correct only if the presidential election is a squeaker -- which it won't be. I'm still predicting the GOP with a net gain of at least four. What would Lennon do? My fellow Shotgunner Justin Bogdanowicz (better known as The Meatriarchy) has a wonderful post on John Lennon's hypocritical disciples: "Who knew that John Lennon fans were such ardent supporters of the death penalty??: '... if Chapman is released after 24 years in prison, some Lennon fans have already threatened to take action. News of the parole hearing has spread on the internet and dozens of websites have been filling up with messages from fans around the world, many already promising to take revenge on the man who gunned down Lennon on 8 December 1980 as he arrived at his New York apartment building off Central Park. "Chapman should be executed. I would gladly get rid of him myself," wrote a fan from Finland on one website. Another fan has already set up an online petition to have Chapman's parole denied. It is already full of messages that show Chapman's safety outside jail would be difficult to maintain. "If Mark David Chapman is let out of jail, he wouldn't last a day. There are too many people who want him dead," wrote a New York-based female fan.' I'm thinking of a new version of an old Lennon classic: 'all we are saying let's kill him fast' I suppose they are all wishing the crime was committed in Texas instead of New York now? Hypocrites." Sunday, September 26, 2004
Author finally gets the acclaim he deserves This Washington Times review of William Trevor is a welcome exception to the rule that daily newspaper must generally pan or outright ignore serious contemporary fiction. (No, that is not always an oxymoron.) Debra Bruno begins her review of A Bit on the Side: "Although William Trevor is one of the greats, he doesn't always get the fanfare he deserves, not in this country at least. Perhaps that's because he's such a quiet writer, taken up with subtle things. He concerns himself with the flow of language in a sentence and on the page, as rhythmic and continual as waves lapping the shore." Trevor's The Hill Bachelors is the only collection of short stories I have agreed to review (for the Halifax Herald in 2002, but unfortunately the review is not on this computer). Trevor is a pleasure to read because he is a wonderful and non-political writer; like Henry James, a delightful and elevated style is his worldview. Bruno writes of one of the stories ("Solitude") in Trevor's latest collection in which: "a child accidentally witnesses her mother's tryst with her lover. That moment, along with the child's vehement revenge, changes the girl and seems to be the reason she remains a solitary person for the rest of her life. What's lovely in all of Mr. Trevor's portraits of solitude, though, is that they don't necessarily represent unmitigated sadness. Instead, there seems to be a beauty and dignity in lives that are chiefly lived alone. While none of these characters is a hermit, many manage to live in the midst of others and maintain their sense of isolation and difference." I have not yet read A Bit on the Side, but the reason that many of the characters who live alone in Trevor's stories are not sad is that he undertands the difference between solitude and loneliness, the former being an act of the will, the latter a condition about which one has little or no control. Trevor's writing is subtle, so he doesn't make that point by having some psychiatrist or professor make it but by illustrating it. Apparently so much so that Bruno may have missed it. Damned if you do, damned if you don't That sums up what politicans on the right are up against in the editorial boards of most daily papers. The Boston Globe questions the motives of Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's announced unilateral albeit limited and tactical disengagement from the Gaza Strip. The Globe complains that Sharon's plan is a different road map to peace than that of the Bush administration. But why does it matter if it is a different road map as long it can get you to the same place: peace. The Globe complains that this progress is too slow: "Path-breaking as Sharon's withdrawal plan and its rationale may be, however, they fall short of what Israelis and Palestinians need to end their destructive conflict." The perfect can be the enemy of the good and the Globe now sides on an impossible compromise in favour of this practical small step to de-escalating the potential for violenc and thus come closer to ending the conflict. Bloggers do it better And not just journalism (ahem, Mr. Rather) but the stuff of whole US agencies and departments. Regnum Crucis points to shortcomings of the U.S. State Department's list of countries where al Qaeda has operated. Suspicion is confirmed -- Bush cultivates buffoonish image Although hardly unique with this opinion, I have long argued that President George W. Bush is no dummy although he brilliantly allows people to think he is. Dan Payne, a Democratic media consultant, writes in the Boston Globe and offers advice (20 separate items) for Senator John Kerry for the debate with the president this week. Among this is this one: "Respect this guy. Atlantic's James Fallows reviewed tapes of Bush debating Ann Richards in 1994 Texas governor's race. 'The Bush on this tape was almost unrecognizable,' he wrote. 'This Bush was eloquent. He spoke quickly and easily. He rattled off complicated sentences and brought them to the right grammatical conclusions. He did not pause before forcing out big words or invent mangled new ones'." (Nearly) Everything you wanted to know about the Darfur crisis and more The American Anti-Slavery Group has an excellent collection of links to stories on the genocide in Sudan at their iAbolish website including "Arabizing Black Africa" and "Arab militia use 'rape camps' for ethnic cleansing of Sudan". Worth checking and checking often despite its reluctance (from what I see so far) from using stories that make explicit reference to Muslim perpetrators (preferring to focus on the Arabness of the oppressors). Profiles in religious irrelevance The BBC reports that Anglicans in Manchester launched "a pilot scheme to attract people back to church - by offering a bar of fair trade chocolate to every worshipper." Not only is the church trying to bribe people into attending its services, they're trying to do it the politically correct (read: the Anglican) way. 70,000 invitations were sent to former church-goers as part of the "Back to Church Sunday" program in which the fair trade chocolate was offered. Ah, but it about more than filling the pews. The Right Reverend Nigel McCulloch, Bishop of Manchester, said the church is trying to bring "justice and fair trade across the world." Bishop McCulloch continues: "When people come and receive the chocolate they discover it is not just a gimmick, it's not an ordinary kind of chocolate fondant. This is a piece of fair trade chocolate. The point then to make is that church isn't just about going to a cosy club, it's about belonging to an organisation which has a job of trying to bring justice and fair trade across the world." Yes, that about sums up the mission of the Anglican Church in 2004. Nordlinger on Memogate From Jay Nordlinger's Impromptus column on Friday: "I'm not elated that CBS News is a Democratic nest. But I'm elated that it is now exposed as such. If I had my way, our Big Media would be neutral, dispassionate: newsy. But if they're going to be partisan, better that they be seen that way." Continuing victories in World War IV The Los Angeles Times reports Pakistani police have killed Amjad Hussain Farooqi, a top al Qaeda operative wanted for his alleged involvement in the kidnapping and beheadinf of Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl and two assassination attempts in 2003 against President Gen. Pervez Musharraf. The Times reported Pakistan's information minister said Farooqi "had shouted in Urdu, the main language in Pakistan, that he'd prefer death to capture. The suspect also pointed to the sky and shouted: 'I fulfilled my promise to Allah'." Two other suspects were captured; Pakistan has arrested more than 600 suspected terrorists since September 11, 2001. Last 90 minutes to get great deal on my book I've noted the deal -- no S&H costs to you -- if you order Jean Chretien: A Legacy of Scandal, before midnight. This is the last reminder. Blogs are responsible for MSM's sloppy journalism Eric Deggans of the St. Petersburg Times proves that one must be an idiot to land a "media critic" newspaper job today. He writes: "And instead of destroying network news, the blogs' influence in Memogate seems to be speeding up the news cycle - inspiring big news outlets to jump on stories quicker and vetting blockbuster stories for accuracy." Please. And what is Deggans' excuse, then, for getting his facts wrong about Jonah Goldberg writing for The New Republic Online? (Hat tip to The Corner) The terrorists are the enemy, not those who confront such evil Charles Moore has a must-read column in the Daily Telegraph on the wrong people getting blamed for the blood-shed in Iraq, most notably the spilt-blood of Westerners. Moore begins: "In his agony and under duress, Kenneth Bigley, the engineer from Liverpool who has been kidnapped in Iraq, made what he said was an appeal on behalf of the people of Iraq: 'Would you like the Germans or any other country walking down the street with a gun, in England, in Scotland? I don't think so.' Yet the man who forced Mr Bigley to make the appeal, the man who has already personally beheaded the two American hostages, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, is not an Iraqi himself, but a Jordanian. If anyone is, he is the 'German with the gun' on the streets of Iraq. Zarqawi wants foreign-led fanatics to enslave the Iraqi people, persecuting anyone who disagrees with them, particularly the majority Shia community. He wants to create a state like that run by the Taliban in Afghanistan, having worked with bin Laden there. He sees murder as the key instrument of policy, as a religious duty and as a pleasure." Dangerous knowledge gets around About those Iraqi scientists with "dangerous knowledge" that Mahdi Obeidi wrote about in the New York Times (and which I noted here), the Daily Telegraph reports that Syria is in negotiations with Iran to offer safe haven for the aforementioned Iraqi nuclear scientists that found their way to Bashir al-Asad's terrorist paradise. I'm sure Asad is motivated purely by his quest for Middle East peace and not his deep desire to have America consider other locations for their War on Terror tour. Bono is the greatest person ever This past year, U2's Bono has spent more time on the political party convention circuit than the tour circuit. Using the fact that Bono will address the Labour Party convention (as will Bill Clinton and Nelson Mandela), The Guardian reports the singer/songwriter is the most influential celebrity in the world of politics and the most successful politician in the world of music. Bono has had his praises song by Colin Powell, Paul O'Niell and Jesse Helms. He has visited Pope John Paul II and counts the president of Harvard as an unofficial advisor on the African AIDS crisis and relief of third world debt. While denying that Bono was responsible for convincing the G-8 to take greater action on third world debt, the paper says it would not have happened without Bono's pressure on the G-8 leaders in 1999. Not surprisingly, the Guardian did not report that last year Bono addressed the Liberal convention that crowned Paul Martin Canada's prime minister. Perhaps they fear that he will have the same effect on Tony Blair's electoral success as he had on Martin's. But there is a dark side to Bono's political celebrity -- his music (and fans) suffer because U2's albums are released later than promised. And taxpayers suffer, too, as politicians of all stripes suck up to the artist and the causes he makes fashionable. But the Guardian didn't point that out. Norman Cantor, RIP I missed the news of historican Norman Cantor's death earlier this week. So did John J. Miller, who has some good things to say about him. Rick "Dalton" Anderson Token Toronto Star conservative Rick Anderson writes about the idea of having Turkey join the European Union which is fine but his description of the EU leaves a lot to be desired: "This year, the European Union, one of the world's most creative developments in collaborative governance, took another big leap forward..." Creative developments in big government is more like it, Rick. And for Anderson to think that the EU has fostered free trade when its regulations stifle businesses, and fosters freedom when it undermines national sovereignty, proves why Anderson is the Star's house conservative; he is a worthy heir to the place once occupied by Dalton Camp. My review Peace Kills This review of P.J. O'Rourke's Peace Kills: America's Fun New Imperialism appeared today in the Halifax Herald. Peace Kills: America's Fun New Imperialism by P.J. O'Rourke (Atlantic Monthly Press, $31.95, 197 pages) Review by Paul Tuns P.J. O'Rourke is the author of 11 books, all to some extent collections of previously published journalism. He is a political writer and a humourist and unlike most others who mix the two, he is quite deft at doing so. In his latest collection, Peace Kills: America's Fun New Imperialism, he examines the state of the world in many of its recent hot spots in pieces adapted from his Atlantic Monthly articles. O'Rourke begins by describing the average American's disinterest in foreign policy. That is not the same as not being interested in particular foreign affairs -- "You can own dogs all your life and not have a 'dog policy'," O'Rourke says. But what happens abroad should be America's business and Americans should think about it more seriously than it now does. As O'Rourke says, "Americans would like to ignore foreign policy. Our previous attempts at isolationism were successful. Unfortunately, they were successful for Hitler's Germany and Tojo's Japan. Evil is an outreach program." Ouch! Better yet is O'Rourke on the narrow-mindedness of placing peace above all else; he says of "world peace" that it is something "which we can't have anyway if we're going to eliminate human rights abuses, because there's no practical way to get rid of the governments that abuse the rights of people." In other words, you can have peace, but not peace and justice. And even then, the peace will be short-lived. In what is a combination of travelogue and political commentary, O'Rourke recounts the recent history, current situation and the view on the street in such exotic locales as Kosovo and Kuwait, Iwo Jima and Israel. Reporting small incidents -- talking to the natives, observing local customs, commiserating with U.S. forces -- O'Rourke is able make larger observations. For example, reporting on the chaos surrounding the distribution of food to Iraqis during the war, the utter inability the crowd to form a queue or collect rations by number, O'Rourke finds Iraqi society lacking in a necessary pre-condition to a better tomorrow: "The happier parts of the world have capacities for self-organization so fundamental and obvious that they appear to be pillars of civilization." The two strongest chapters are also his most polemical. In one he skewers the peace and justice agenda of 103 Nobel laureates. In their document, he observes, they "roll 'dispossessed,' 'poor' and 'disenfranchised' together as if they have a natural correlation -- like 'ice,' 'cold' and 'beer'." He mocks their call for more treaties to ensure safety -- remember the Kellogg-Briand Pact or the League of Nations Charter, anyone? He finds their 284 words banal, silly and untrue and concludes that even if these are from 103 of the best minds the world has to offer, it is proof that "nothing good ever comes from a committee." In another chapter, he bakes, fries and roasts the gangs of protestors in Washington. Well, actually, the gang of protestors. O'Rourke observes many protests but finds that 1) the same people are at the various outings of outrage and 2) that whatever the announced object of their objection, once everyone is together, it doesn't matter what you're protesting. He finds great humour in people protesting against Latin American dictatorships while wearing Che t-shirts. He says that Act Now to Stop War and End Racism "is a group that awes any fan of acronyms." The peace protests have anti-Israeli protestors, anti-capitalism protestors, anti-globalization protestors, anti-CIA protestors, anti-anti-environment protestors. O'Rourke's 26-year-old research assistant, who can pass as an activist when he has "a couple days' worth of stubble," found a group of university students who were part of an organization whose purpose "was to go to lots of demonstrations." O'Rourke talked to one protestor, presumably not a student, who was wielding a sign that said "Envision a World." The protestor said when he grows up he wants to "join Greenpeace." The man was at least 40. How does such a diverse crowd come together? "Other than a looserish quality," O'Rourke says, they are united by turning "every question into a political question." Not only do they oppose war, they oppose Starbucks and the use of paper; if their t-shirts and placards mean anything, they have turned their religion and sexual preferences into political props. The implication, of course, is that these do-gooders aren't doing any good. After all, what contribution does a person dressed as a fairy godmother on roller skates singing anti-war lyrics to the music of Cinderalla's "Bibbidity-Bobbidy-Boo" make to world peace? O'Rourke's previous collections were sustained hilarious rants against the opponents of capitalism, the largesse of government and the hysteria of the environmental movement. Peace Kills is funny, but seldom laugh-out-loud funny. Indeed, the book concludes with a sobering and touching tribute to U.S. forces who fought at Iwo Jima. September 11 was a wake-up call to take the world more seriously, which O'Rourke does -- still with a smile, but no longer a smirk. Dowd in the dirt again Actually New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd never gets out of the mud, so excuse that "again" in the title. Her latest offering is a cruel column on Iraqi Prime Minister Ayad Allawi, whom Dowd calls President George W. Bush's puppet. Allawi's sin seems to be being thankful to Bush for liberating his country and not being Kerry's puppet. Particulary nasty is her comment: "Actually, being the president's marionette is a step up from Mr. Allawi's old jobs as henchman for Saddam Hussein and stoolie for the C.I.A." Saturday, September 25, 2004
Editorial of the Day The Australian editorializes that Iraq is now the crucible of freedom: "The terrorists who blow up police and power stations, who kidnap - and behead - foreign civilians and who murder innocent Iraqis who get in their way are grotesquely evil. But there is motive in their madness. They are desperate to reduce Iraq to anarchy so the national elections, scheduled for next January, do not take place. They know that when ordinary people, of all faiths, or no religion, have a chance, they will always endorse the politics of individual freedom and personal prosperity and the right to live their lives as they choose. As this year's elections in Muslim Malaysia and Indonesia demonstrate, religious zealots rarely come to power via the ballot box. And adherents of Wahabi Islam, who dream of rule according to the twisted tenets of their perversion of Islam, know national elections in Iraq will be a catastrophic defeat for their cause. The world community must do whatever it takes to ensure they lose. For Iraq to collapse into chaos would convince the terrorists that democracies are weak, unwilling or incapable of defending their values against ideologically motivated enemies. Defeat for democracy in Iraq will mean more Madrids, more mass murders of innocents, like those that occurred in Beslan and Bali, as terrorists act to impose their will on the world." Read the rest yourself. The American Conservative [sic] looks into the future So TAC has moved from the fantasies of the paleocons to outright fiction with Claude Salhani's account of what an Israeli-Iranian conflict would look like: "In a pre-dawn raid, undisclosed numbers of Israeli warplanes, taking off from military airbases in the Negev, destroy Iran’s main nuclear facility at Bushehr. Israel’s armed forces have released no details, but it is believed the planes flew over parts of Jordan, northern Saudi Arabia, and Iraq, refueling in mid-air before reaching their target. Military analysts speculate that the planes must have refueled somewhere over Iraq. During the one-hour raid, Iran claims to have shot down “several” Israeli fighters. Television images show pilots being lynched by furious mobs before Iranian authorities could reach them. The after-effects of the raid shake the Arab and Islamic world. Millions take to the streets demanding immediate action against Israel." Waiting for the UN David Brooks has a devastating column in the New York Times on the UN's fiddling while genocide happens in Sudan. He begins by interspersing the toll of the violence in Darfur with the actions of the United States/inaction of the UN: "Confronted with the murder of 50,000 in Sudan, we eschewed all that nasty old unilateralism, all that hegemonic, imperialist, go-it-alone, neocon, empire, coalition-of-the-coerced stuff. Our response to this crisis would be so exquisitely multilateral, meticulously consultative, collegially cooperative and ally-friendly that it would make John Kerry swoon and a million editorialists nod in sage approval. And so we Americans mustered our outrage at the massacres in Darfur and went to the United Nations. And calls were issued and exhortations were made and platitudes spread like béarnaise. The great hum of diplomacy signaled that the global community was whirring into action. Meanwhile helicopter gunships were strafing children in Darfur. We did everything basically right. The president was involved, the secretary of state was bold and clearheaded, the U.N. ambassador was eloquent, and the Congress was united. And, following the strictures of international law, we had the debate that, of course, is going to be the top priority while planes are bombing villages. We had a discussion over whether the extermination of human beings in this instance is sufficiently concentrated to meet the technical definition of genocide. For if it is, then the 'competent organs of the United Nations' may be called in to take appropriate action, and you know how fearsome the competent organs may be when they may indeed be called. The United States said the killing in Darfur was indeed genocide, the Europeans weren't so sure, and the Arab League said definitely not, and hairs were split and legalisms were parsed, and the debate over how many corpses you can fit on the head of a pin proceeded in stentorian tones while the mass extermination of human beings continued at a pace that may or may not rise to the level of genocide. For people are still starving and perishing in Darfur." And yet despite the UN's inaction, somehow the United States will get blamed. And after this outrage, like when every outrage that occurs, Kofi Anan will insist that the world cannot stand idly by again. Brooks concludes: "Every time there is an ongoing atrocity, we watch the world community go through the same series of stages: (1) shock and concern (2) gathering resolve (3) fruitless negotiation (4) pathetic inaction (5) shame and humiliation (6) steadfast vows to never let this happen again. The 'never again' always comes. But still, we have all agreed, this sad cycle is better than having some impromptu coalition of nations actually go in "unilaterally" and do something. That would lack legitimacy! Strain alliances! Menace international law! Threaten the multilateral ideal!" For the victims in Darfur, Godot is more likely to show up before the UN. WMD in Iraq Yes and no according to Mahdi Obeidi, who worked on the program and is the author of The Bomb in My Garden: The Secrets of Saddam's Nuclear Mastermind. Writing in the New York Times, he explains that Iraq had a WMD program until 1991 (the US liberation of Kuwait) but that it had not been operational since then. But could it have been re-started? Yes, because as Obeidi stated, they still had all that "dangerous knowledge." He says: "Was Iraq a potential threat to the United States and the world? Threat is always a matter of perception, but our nuclear program could have been reinstituted at the snap of Saddam Hussein's fingers. The sanctions and the lucrative oil-for-food program had served as powerful deterrents, but world events - like Iran's current efforts to step up its nuclear ambitions - might well have changed the situation." Admittedly, Obeidi says that sanctions and inspections "made reconstituting the program impossible". And I know the New York Times thinks this is a case against President George W. Bush, but it isn't. Considering for the moment Iraq's support for terrorism (quite aside from 9/11) and the fact that his scientists knew how to develop nuclear weapons was too much risk; wasn't it better to get to those people who had such knowledge. Obeidi says that the U.S. has to do more to ensure that knowledge doesn't get out on the black market and that's true, but Obeidi's column vindicates Bush. The Iraqi nuclear program could have been re-started at any time. Bush made sure it didn't. Quote of the Day A rant can be a beautiful thing, especially when it's Kathy Shaidle doing the ranting. I understand why she had to unload after taping Behind the Story for CTS; I'm a regular panelist and while the staff is great some of the guests I've had to deal with have been a little much. Anyway, in middle of an already great post, this gem: "America is so evil that a black girl from Mississippi is now the richest woman in the country and can score presents for people." Consider that thrown into the wish-I-said-that file. New York Times finds what's wrong with Kerry's campaign Apparently, Senator Jean Kerry (UltraD, France) is losing because he's just so darn smart. Cerebral guy, interested more in public policy than politics, lots of curious questions for his staffers. This is the best example of the Times' Lewinsky treatment of Kerry to date. Jean Chretien: A Legacy of Scandal The deal I have mentioned previously where you don't pay S&H ends Sunday. If you pay over the internet, you'll get a $5 reimbursement check; if you send your order in by mail, date the cheque no later than September 26 and just pay the $26.99. Send cheque or money order to: Freedom Press Canada Inc., P.O. Box 112, Jordan Station, ON L0R 1S0. I have a top five reasons to order the book posted at The Shotgun. But you already know that because I'm sure you check The Shotgun regularly How not to view being pregnant Elisabeth Hasselbeck (who is best known as Elisabeth Filarski on the second season of Survivor), a co-host of The View (where she is the token conservative), announced this week she was pregnant. She said: "I'm nauseous, but I'm fine with that because it's all for a good cause." Since when was pregnancy a cause? Friday, September 24, 2004
Krauthammer on the War on Terror and America's allies abroad Washington Post columnist Charles Krauthammer has a good column on the Australian elections (which are important because Australia is the only country that has fought along-side America in ever war over the last 100 years) and John Kerry's ticking off loyal U.S. friends while courting our ostensible allies. Kerry woos the women Earlier this week, the New York Times reported that President George W. Bush leads Senator John Kerry among women voters, 48%-43%. The Times said that women are "voters that Democrats think are rightfully theirs." So now they need to get them back on-side. The Associated Press reports that the Kerry campaign let Senator John Edwards, their vice presidential nominee, out for the day to talk to the girls in Iowa about safety and security in the post 9/11 world because, well, you know, terrorism is now a women's issue. What Kerry-Edwards apparently doesn't understand is that women may want their sons home from Iraq, but not if that means that terrorists are going to follow them here. The only person more out to lunch on women and the 2004 election than Kerry-Edwards is Naomi Wolf. Her New York magazine column on women and politics -- the candidates' wives, Karen Hughes and GOP use of imagery, is silly as Wolf substitutes the cutesy phrase for penetrating analysis. She betrays a deeply condescending attitude implying that women are falling for the GOP men because their wives are dressed nicely and tell warm stories about their husbands and thus women voters are ignoring issues such as abortion. Does Ms. Wolf really think women are that stupid? Terri Schiavo is not a right to die case Matt Vadum, hardly a pro-life zealot like myself, finds the case of Michael Schiavo trying to kill his nominal wife, "distressing." (Nice under-statement, Matt.) Vadum makes the point that few others have and that Florida's judges have failed to realize: it is not a right to die case because Michael Schiavo does not have the right to choose death for Terri Schiavo-Schindler. I left my cloths in San Francisco Reuters reports that city prosecutors "said it was not illegal to perform naked yoga in the city -- even at the crowded tourist destination of Fisherman's Wharf. As Debbie Mesloh, a spokeswoman for the district attorney's office, explains, "Simply being naked on the street is not a crime in San Francisco." I am somewhat surprised to find that it took this long to make it official. Good news, bad news in World War IV George F. Will wrote in the Washington Post yesterday that there is little that can be done to counter Iran's nuclear weapons program because the United States cannot present a credible threat of force and Tehran has no interest in negotiating. On the other hand, this Washington Times editorial says that it is good news that Indonesian voters rejected Islamic parties and elected former General Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono as president in a landslide. General Yudhoyono has promised to go after Indonesian terrorists with al Qaeda links. Thursday, September 23, 2004
In how good shape is Bush for November? Good enough that Karl Rove is talking about victory to the Washington Times and predicting coattails. He also said that many, if not most of the so-called Battleground States are not battlegrounds anymore. Or as Mark Steyn writes in The Spectator, "The so-called ‘battleground’ this election season is all Democrat states." Gum chewers latest victim of big government Reuters reports: "Bubble-gum blowers beware: Ireland is mulling a tax on chewing gum to fund the cost of cleaning the sticky stuff from its pavements." A government commission suggests a 10% tax on gum, which could raise 4-5 million euros for Irish coffers. However, could this be fought on the grounds that there will be a disproportionate impact on women? Rather has much to answer for Over at the Daily Standard on Tuesday, Noemie Emery had some questions for Dan Rather in light of his apology for using unauthenticated (which is C-BS for fraudulent) memos. Just a sample: "We would also like to know something more about the way your stories are structured. We understand that numerous people disputed both the content and authenticity of these disputed memos, talked to you repeatedly, and referred you to others, none of whom ever appeared on air. We wonder if anyone ever told you that when there appear to be two sides of a story, it is common to mention them both. There are two situations in which it is customary to present only one side of a disputed story, and neither one is called journalism. One is in court when making a case to a jury, and the other is when making a case for a candidate in a campaign. Which did you imagine yourself to be in this case, a prosecutor or a campaign official?" I hope Ms. Emery does not hold her breath waiting for answers. Every inch of Arab land is Muslim holy space Stephen Schwartz apparently doesn't understand that any place a Muslim is, if he is wanted by Western forces, is deemed holy and thus off limits. We must respect that space. All sarcasm aside, Schwartz has a detailed column at TCS on Saudi Arabia as holy space which concludes: "Claims about Christian intrusion onto the 'sacred soil' of the Saudi kingdom are political propaganda, not theological argument, whether they are made by Bin Laden, Buchanan, or the bigots of the Wahhabi establishment. They should be disregarded as such, and most certainly should not be the basis of state policy by the Western powers." There is a lot information for those of you interested in the question of what is Muslim holy soil and why all of Saudi Arabia does not count as such. If I was a Tory (and I am), I'd be worried Living in Unmentionable Times posts the lyrics to a song John Tory commissioned Bobby McFerrin to write. Here's a sample: "Here's a little song I wrote, about John Tory who wants your vote, don't worry, be Tory In your town you have some trouble, but in Toronto our need is double, don't worry, be Tory now don't worry be Tory (yeah)" Oh, yeah, Tory now has my vote. Catching up Yes, this is a week old but it is amusing. From Living in a Society: "Current price of gas: $0.80 per litre. Current share price: $61.65. Total value of stock: $3.04 billion. Selling off a crown corporation to cover the expense of a new health-care deal: Priceless." Over at the NCC blog Gerry Nicholls had a great week batting Ichiro Suzuki like going for four for four on John Tory, union dissention on NAFTA, Dan Rather's shoddy journalism and an excellent piece on Canada's bilingualism fanatic (read the column to which Gerry links). Who is Maurizio Bevilacqua? If you are the one person who cares about Maurizio Bevilacqua who is not named Maurizio Bevilacqua, then you have to check out J. Kelly Nestruck. On the Fence is all over Maurizio Bevilacqua but JKN is wrong to say Maurizio Bevilacqua is campaigning to replace Paul Martin although he is not wrong to say Maurizio Bevilacqua is upset on not getting a cabinet post. And yes, I do like saying the name Maurizio Bevilacqua although I suppose it would be an impediment to national political success in Canada. Canada is 2004 for hippy David Mader had the same thought when he read this: "There are plans for a bronze monument and a festival in Canada to honor U.S. draft dodgers -- and many Americans aren't glad to hear it. The project is called 'Our Way Home.' Its director says it was done to honor what he calls 'the courageous legacy of Vietnam War resisters.' He says it also pays tribute to Canadians who helped those Americans resettle in Canada when they fled the draft." I thought that there was already a Canadian monument to honour draft dodgers -- the Canadian university system. Half of the male professors in the history department at the University of Waterloo when I was there in the early 1990s were draft dodgers -- and no, it didn't colour their teaching of history. This monument and festival is shameful. Breathing easier For two reasons. The first, is that this month's production of The Interim is complete. The October issue will be up in about two weeks and it includes stories on John Tory winning the leadership of the Ontario PCs, Paul Martin's judicial appointments and double standards and gay bathhouses. The second, and more important, is that the New York Yankees clinched a playoff spot. Wednesday, September 22, 2004
Do you know what your kids are listening to? All sane people had hoped that Avril Lavigne's 15 minutes were up, but apparently not. In the latest edition of Maxim, she says she likes to use the f-word, is just discovering the joy of skirts and is attracted to guitar players. And then there's this: "Lavigne also says she's been unfairly portrayed as 'an angry girl who's pissed off all the time.' Her last fight, she adds, was months ago when another woman confronted her about her music in a bar. The woman got 'up in my face,' so she kicked her in the crotch." As long as she had a good reason for committing assault, kicking a woman in the crotch is not sign of being an angry girl. Tuesday, September 21, 2004
The Star's classy bitch Toronto Star media critic and true blonde Antonia Zerbisias on Bush: "Does nothing stick to this guy, who has yet to come clean about his alkie, Vietnam-evading past?" Nice and expected. Remember that one when she lectures Fox News on the tone of their coverage. The continuing idiocy of Robert Scheer Los Angeles Times columnist Robert Scheer says that real conservatives should vote for Senator Jean Kerry (UltraD, France). Scheer opens his innocuous column thusly: "If they were true to their principles, moderate Republicans and consistent conservatives would be supporting John Kerry. Instead, their acquiescence to the reckless whims of George W. Bush marks a descent into that political abyss of opportunism where partisanship is everything and principle nothing. How else to explain their cynical support for this shallow adventurer, a phony lightweight who has bled the Treasury dry while incompetently squandering the lives of young Americans in a needless imperial campaign?" Well, perhaps conservatives don't see Bush's foreign policy as shallow adventuring. Perhaps they understand that it was not Bush but the escalating costs of entitlements that have "bled the Treasury dry." Speaking of cynical and phony, this was never a concern for liberals until Bush came to power. And never did they publicly worry about Bill Clinton's shallow adventures, using the military 1) more often than any other president in the 20th century and 2) using military operations to distract America from his Oval Office adventures. The argument that conservatives should not support Bush can be made but it is a stretch to say that conservatives should then support Kerry. But Scheer never makes anything like a conservative case against Bush, perhaps because such a worldview is so alien to him. Too sick to be allowed near a ballot box Question from a headline on a Health Day News story: "When Are People Too Mentally Ill to Vote?" Answer: When they register Democrat. Kids are expensive Especially when you violate China's brutal one-child policy as a couple in Shenzhen are assessed a $94,250 (US) "social fostering fee" for having more than one child. They lose the right to use their house, which illustrates that trading with China has done little to advance the cause of human rights or protecting private property rights. Possible Kerry link to Memogate AP has the story of two key Kerry aides (former Bill Clinton chief of staff Joe Lockhart and former senator Max Cleland) contacting fake memo source Bill Burkett. Monday, September 20, 2004
Suicide stats could lead to more regulation This is a little late, but two weeks ago The New Scientist reported: "Suicide kills more people each year than road traffic accidents in most European countries, the World Health Organization is warning. And globally, suicide takes more lives than murder and war put together, says the agency in a call for action." There are, according to the report, an estimated one million suicides a year. NS reports, "The most common methods for committing suicide include swallowing pesticides, using firearms and overdosing on painkillers. Curbing access to these methods is a crucial factor in preventing suicide." The United Nations is interested in an international gun ban; the WHO's warning could serve as ammunition to re-start that campaign. (Cross-posted at The Shotgun) Dan Rather's apology We now know what the BS stands for in CBS. Here is Dan Rather's apology with my interpretation of what he really means. Dan Rather said: "Last week, amid increasing questions about the authenticity of documents used in support of a '60 Minutes Wednesday' story about President Bush's time in the Texas Air National Guard, CBS News vowed to re-examine the documents in question-and their source-vigorously. And we promised that we would let the American public know what this examination turned up, whatever the outcome." Dan Rather meant: "We were caught using bogus material, material we assumed wasn't true but sure as heck hoped was. We gambled that even if it wasn't true, that we would get away with it. However, in 2004 there are these damn things called blogs and alternative media and FNC -- and the F doesn't stand for Fox. This vast right-wing conspiracy kept the issue alive, distracting America from President Bush's weaknesses as president. As you all know, we initially did not investigate the matter hoping it would all blow over, but it didn't. So we reluctantly examined the issue and, well, you know what? -- the documents were fake but true." Dan Rather said: "Now, after extensive additional interviews, I no longer have the confidence in these documents that would allow us to continue vouching for them journalistically." Dan Rather meant: "Damn, we couldn't authenticate these. We had 'un-named experts' verify that they were okay, but no one bought it." Dan Rather said: "I find we have been misled on the key question of how our source for the documents came into possession of these papers." Dan Rather meant: "We were told that no one would ever discover how dubious our source truly was." Dan Rather said: "That, combined with some of the questions that have been raised in public and in the press, leads me to a point where - if I knew then what I know now - I would not have gone ahead with the story as it was aired, and I certainly would not have used the documents in question." Dan Rather meant: "I thought we could get away with pulling this stunt, but hindsight is 20/20 and obviously we didn't." Dan Rather said: "But we did use the documents. We made a mistake in judgment, and for that I am sorry. It was an error that was made, however, in good faith and in the spirit of trying to carry on a CBS News tradition of investigative reporting without fear or favoritism." Dan Rather meant: "You know, we knew they weren't real, but we used them for a higher good: defeating George Bush. We made a mistake in execution and this tactic didn't work. We will be more careful in the future in co-ordinating our anti-Bush campaign with Team Kerry." Dan Rather said: "Please know that nothing is more important to us than people's trust in our ability and our commitment to report fairly and truthfully." Dan Rather meant: "There is nothing more important than defeating George Bush. The next time we pull something like this, we will do a better job. After all, America deserves the best forgeries available." One week left in book deal Order Jean Chretien: A Legacy of Scandal in the next seven days and Freedom Press (Canada) Inc., will send you a check for $5 to reimburse you for the shipping and handling charges. And you won't be disappointed with this examination of Jean Chretien's real legacy: the centralization of power, the scandals and their cover-ups, the patronage, the lack of ministerial responsibility/accountability and, most importantly, the pursuit of power at all costs. With Tory at the helm, PC has a whole new meaning An email dispatch today from Giuseppe Gori, leader of the Family Coalition Party, refers to the Ontario PCs as the Pseudo-Conservative Party. I wish I came up with that. Sunday, September 19, 2004
Kerry is the best debater ever! The Washington Post reports that sources say there will be three presidential candidates debates and one vice presidential candidates debate. In an effort to lower expectations, Matthew Dowd, Bush-Cheney 2004 chief strategist, said Kerry "is very formidable, and probably the best debater ever to run for president ... I'm not joking ... I think he's better than Cicero." Even understanding what Dowd was trying to do, I just lost all respect the guy. A good question for Paul Martin Calgary Grit writes: "Paul Martin says he won't intervene in the NHL lock-out. This begs the obvious question about a Paul Martin negotiated collective bargaining agreement: Would the Montreal Canadiens be exempt from the salary cap given they play in a distinct society?" Gates' simplified and stupid black and white world Harvard's Henry Louis Gates Jr., a guest columnist at the New York Times, purports to know the moment when the black vote began to migrate to the Democrats: "The moment when the Republican Party lost black America can be given a date: Oct. 26, 1960. Martin Luther King Jr., arrested in Georgia during a sit-in, had been transferred to a maximum-security prison and sentenced to four months on the chain gang, without bail. As The Times reported, John F. Kennedy called Coretta King, expressing his concern. Richard Nixon didn't." It all sounds nice and fits into HLG Jr's tidy little worldview of liberals good, conservatives bad, but one imagines that the issue of blacks joining the Democratic plantation is a little more complicated than that. Indeed, Gates notes Nixon's southern strategy, which wasn't employed for another eight years, as contributing to the GOP loss of black support and which seems a more likely candidate for blame for turning blacks into automatic Democrats. It is unlikely that black America knew that JFK called Coretta King and that Richard Nixon did not and it buggers credibility that even if it had that they abandoned the Republicans over it. Before 1960 they were given a 20-point margin to Democrats; in the 1950s, Dwight Eisenhower garnered just 40% of the black vote. The rest of the column actually goes downhill from the opening as Gates blames Republicans for courting the white vote in a way that drives blacks to the Democrats at which point the Democrats can take blacks for granted. He then goes on to say that if the Republicans became a black-friendly big-tent party, it would drive away racist (he doesn't use the word but he certainly implies it) white voters. Such are the standards (read: agenda-driven journalism/scholarship) at the Times and Harvard. Russians got the memo that one is never to actually blame the perps Near the end of an article on Vlad Putin's post-Beslan power grab, The Economist reports: "Muscovites are admittedly not a balanced sample of the country at large, but it says something that, in an opinion poll after Beslan by the Moscow-based Levada Centre, just a third of those questioned thought the terrorists 'bear responsibility first and foremost' for the attack..." There are certainly problems with the way Moscow has dealth with Chechnya and how Russian authorities deal with hostage situations, but the fact that so few Moscovites would think that the actual terrorists do not "bear responsibility first and foremost" illustrates that modern ways of western thinking have infected Russia, too. Lawyers would be licking their chops if this was successful Reuters reports: "A Spanish man tried to have his wife charged with domestic abuse because she refused to have sex with him on five consecutive days, Spanish newspaper El Sur reported on Friday." The judge wisely tossed out the case, perhaps considering that there would be no end to the litigation. The Ontario PCs and their dismal future In 2002, Ontario Progressive Conservatives chose their former Finance Minister because Ernie Eves was an electable moderate, especially compared to the then current Finance Minister Jim Flaherty. In October 2003, the PCs lost more than half their seats and their right to govern. Last night the same party chose another electable moderate, John Tory, who edged out Jim Flaherty. Assuming the same rate of success, the party will be fighting for official status in the next legislature. Living in Unmentionable Times has a post on Tory's victory: "Tory is a centrist hence it will be interesting to see what alternatives he offers Ontarians to the Liberal government of Dalton McGuinty. So far he talked about not making promises that he cannot keep, a new deal (more $) for the city of Toronto, and scrapping McGuinty's hated "health premium" tax. Unlike his leadership opponents Frank Klees and Jim Flaherty who had both outlined specific policy ideas during the campaign, Tory spoke in generalities and used feel-good platitudes. I suppose we should wait and see prior to passing further judgment." Matt Vadum passes judgment immediately: "By picking a so-called moderate (who by American standards is probably slightly to the Right of Ted Kennedy) that party won't be able to present itself as a refreshing, credible alternative to the idiotic Liberal Party that now rules Ontario and whose buffoonish leader, Premier Dalton McGuinty, is widely despised throughout the province after having broken major election promises including a vow not to raise taxes. John Tory, who recently LOST --yes, LOST!-- an election to become mayor of Toronto, is bland and has no particular beliefs, much like McGuinty. Plus, in case I haven't made it clear enough, the guy is a LOSER. Why would party members pick a fellow who can't even win a municipal election?" Why? The cult of moderation, in which Canadian conservatives seek the approval of the Toronto Star editorial board and the CBC. Too bad that 1) conservative parties will never sway either of these entities its way and 2) that even if they were, these entities together do not have enough voters to deliver a government. The Ontario PCs deserve what they get next election; unfortunately, the people of Ontario deserve better. Anti-Michael Moore book reviewed Here's my review of Michael Moore is a Big Fat Stupid White Man that appears in today's Halifax Herald. Michael Moore is a Big Fat Stupid White Man by David T. Hardy and Jason Clarke (Regan Books, $32.50, 246 pages) Review by Paul Tuns Michael Moore is a multimedia leftist activist phenomenon, whose books become bestsellers and whose documentaries -- oops, that should be "documentaries" -- lead public debates. Of late, Moore has become a one-man Bush-bashing machine, whose Dude, Where's My Country argues that the war on terror is a Bush administration gambit to further its control over America and whose Fahrenheit 9/11 became the first documentary to gross $100 million. As a propagandist -- and that is the most accurate description of Moore -- he is brilliant and effective. The problem with watching his documentaries or reading his books are that there is just enough truth (or at least believability) in them to lend them credence but also so many untruths as to make them dangerous. It is necessary, then, to have a book that brilliantly and effectively dissects Moore's work. Unfortunately, David T. Hardy and Jason Clarke's Michael Moore is a Big Fat Stupid White Man is not up to the job. Hardy and Clarke hold various jobs but their primary qualification for writing this screed is that they (independently) run two anti-Moore websites (www.Moorelies.com and www.Mooreexposed.com). And therein might lie the problem; what works in the form of short, snappy salvos, what passes as insightful web-based journalism, does not necessarily translate well into the book format. Instead of sustaining an argument against Moore, the authors launch invective and ad hominem attacks on him. Time after time, when examining Moore's body of work, from Roger and Me to Bowling for Columbine, from Downsize This! Random Thoughts from an Unarmed American to Stupid White Men...and Other Sorry Excuses for the State of the Nation, and even Fahrenheit 9/11 (which wasn't released when the book was published, although they guessed what would be in it), Hardy and Clarke take the low road, using the same methods that Moore employs in his hatchet jobs and misleading documentaries -- the use of innuendo, incomplete or non-contextual quoting, guilt by association, the repetition of a single fact rather than the development of a logical argument and fancy slight of hand arguments. One can imagine effectively demolishing Moore employing his own methods but Hardy and Clarke are amateurs; if one is to use Moore's own techniques against him, one must be at least as good as the target to get away with it. Hardy and Clarke are not. The authors rightly accuse Moore of reducing "a deeply complex issue into a few snappy sound bytes [sic]." But that is exactly what Hardy and Clarke do. They insist that Moore is narcissistic and that he borrows heavily from his previous works. And then the authors make the point again and again and again. It's true and at first it's even funny. But continuous reminders that Moore is a liar and self-absorbed are not rebuttals to Moore's fundamental dishonesty, buttressed as his work is by unethical editing of interviews and selective use of "the facts." The book is at its strongest when the authors expose such editing and place interviews and speeches (notably of Charlton Heston in Bowling for Columbine) in context. Unfortunately, these episodes are few and far between. However, there are times when the book achieves what it ought to, most often in the half dozen pieces of previously published essays by other authors including the Manhattan Institute's Kay Hymowitz's dissection of Moore's hypocrisy of selling himself as a middle class slob while being so contemptuous of the American middle class or Andrew Sullivan's explanation that there is no coherence within Moore's work because they are all large, sustained rants. However, both essays undermine other Hardy and Clarke arguments. Hymowitz says that Moore's appeal is based on his humble Flint, Michigan roots which he had long-ago abandoned while Hardy and Clark say such roots are phoney in the first place; Sullivan says there can be no coherence, whereas Hardy and Clark search for inconsistencies and insist that every mole hill is a mountain. As the author of one of the republished essays says, "uninformed readers and viewers tend to believe everything he says." Hardy and Clarke should have spent less time scoring cheap debating points against Moore and engage his fallacious arguments factually and logically in much greater depth. As the authors say, Moore is seductive. He "makes the whole anti-U.S. tirade entertaining and popular" especially among European Leftists and "college kids who feel drawn to Moore's cartoonish brand of passionate 1960s liberalism." But all this makes the job of rebutting Moore's lies, exposing his dishonest techniques and calling him to account eminently important. Unfortunately, Hardy and Clarke's unserious effort disappoints, but perhaps that is to be expected from a book entitled Michael Moore is a Big Fat Stupid White Man. You don't have mail This is an interesting article by former Washington Post reporter Bill McAllister about the state of snail mail in America. While I'm not sure if I agree with his analysis of what needs to be done to revitalize the U.S. Post Office -- or even if it needs revitalization -- it is fascinating to see how America's relationship with the Post Office has changed. A few of what CNN persists in calling factoids. So-called junk mail makes up a larger portion of mail that households receive. Perhaps that is because "in 2003, first-class mail dropped by 3.3 billion pieces." Furthermore, the Post Office still requires 700,000 employees -- almost as much as the Pentagon. And that the Post Office was a cabinet-level department until Richard Nixon booted it out of the cabinet in 1971. It's an rewarding read. Steyn describes why the UN sucks in one sentence From Mark Steyn's Sunday Telegraph column: "In Sudan, the civilised world is (so far) doing everything to conform with the UN charter, which means waiting till everyone's been killed and then issuing a strong statement expressing grave concern." Saturday, September 18, 2004
Last word on Ontario PC leadership race Maybe I should start the Paul Tuns echo effect. Thursday, my column on the leadership race of the Ontario PCs runs in the TorStar-owned Kitchener Record. Today Toronto Star columnist Ian Urquhart writes about the battle for the soul of the Tories. I'm just kidding, of course. It is an issue that is clear to almost everyone who is not a John Tory supporter fixated on the idea that Tory is the only Tory who can beat Dalton McGuinty and the Liberals in 2007. Here's hoping that conservatism beats progressivism today in the PC leadership race. Hold onto your wallets On the heels of the $41 billion, 12-year promise to fix health care until the next election, the feds now turn their attention to helping cities. Maybe $5 billion over five years. Most unsurprising headline of the weekend From the Globe and Mail: "Gangsters' victims seek haven in Canada." Or, never mind; I take back the sarcasm. I thought it said Gangster's seek haven in Canada." This is actually news. A women's issue feminists are notoriously silent about The Los Angeles Times reported this week a heart-rendering story about rape as weapon in the genocide in Sudan: "A July report by Amnesty International documented 500 cases of rape in the Darfur region of western Sudan, and added that because of the taboo on discussing rape, that number is probably only a fraction of the total. A UNICEF report said 41 girls and teachers were gang-raped in the village of Tawila alone in February while others were abducted as sex slaves. There were reports the women were branded like cattle." Ben Stein writing in the current American Spectator says that mass rape has been used extensively in the last century of war but that (Western) feminists have had little to say about it. Shame on them. Is there anything more dehumanizing of women than this view expressed by Mohammed Ibrahim Mohammed, who is described as "a community leader from Karande village"? -- "A girl who's a virgin is like the standard, brand new. It's like a car. With a girl who is raped, it is like she is secondhand." I understand that he is probably making an observation and not expressing his own viewpoint. I also eagerly await feminists bringing this barbarity to the attention of the world community. This may help: Louise Arbour, former Canadian Supreme Court justice turned UN human rights chief, said the level of "sexual violence" (feminists terminology, but okay) is intolerable. I guess that means the UN will take nine years to figure out what to do. The UN continues to debate while women get raped as a matter of course in the conflict in Sudan. A small clue to why the UN is dysfunctional Consider the lead of this AP story that illustrates upon what the international organization's ability to deal with the crisis in Darfur rests: "A U.N. Security Council vote on whether to threaten sanctions against Sudan hinged on China and other opponents who fear that the specter of punishment could ruin efforts to end a crisis that has killed more than 50,000 and spawned 1.2 million refugees." China, like other tyrannies, see no reason to establish the principle that the United Nations should act to actually help people who suffer at the hands of their own government. Friday, September 17, 2004
Is swearing a crime So asks Adam Daifallah. Fair question that nonetheless misses the point. It is unseemly for anyone to use the kind of language that Mike Harris allegedly used during advance voting for the Ontario PC leadership race. Here's the Toronto Star story: "Harris has been given until next Monday to apologize or face possible expulsion from the Vaughan-King-Aurora Conservative Riding Association. He also faces a lawsuit launched by riding president Gabe Spoletini. 'It was the kind of language you would expect from a sailor, not a former premier,' Spoletini said. Spoletini said the incident occurred Monday when Harris, who lives in Woodbridge with his girlfriend Laura Maguire, became irate over being asked for the required two pieces of identification at the advance poll, including one that showed his address and signature. 'I heard yelling ... and I heard him say "Just give me the f------ ballot" and then he grabbed it from the woman who was the DRO (the deputy returning officer),' Spoletini said. 'I said, "What's going on here?" He turned around and said, "You can challenge my f------ ballot, you jackass." I said, "Don't be an a------" and he said to me "You're the biggest a------ of them all".'" Daifallah is correct to note that this "story is ridiculous." He adds: "According to a Harris spokesperson, he was actually asked for a 3rd piece of ID, which is why he got upset. Why the former Premier of the province is being asked for extra ID is beyond me. I'd be inclined to believe Harris. Mr. Spoletini, the riding president, doesn't exactly have a stellar track record." Granted Spoletini doesn't have a stellar track record but there are two facts that should be noted that shine some light on this issue. The first is that Harris and Spoletini apparently do not get along. For the sake of this story, the details are irrelevant. The second is that Harris' ID apparently did not prove he was a resident within the riding association in which he was attempting to vote. I think that this is a cheap publicity stunt motivated, perhaps, by revenge on the part of Spoletini but at the same time there is enough blame to go around. More than one way to skin an animal rights activist J. Kelly Nestruck makes an excellent point that the knuckleheads who criticize the documentary Casuistry: The Art of Killing a Cat don't seem to realize: "I hate defending this Casuistry: The Art of Killing a Cat documentary all the time, because I keep hearing that it's a pretty thin pic. Still, it must be done. Folks: Making a documentary about a bad thing is not the same as doing a bad thing. Also, the film does not show the tape of Kensington the Cat's torture and death. Calmez-vous." These thin-skinned nuts should just go home and shut up. From what I hear, not only are they missing the point of the film, they are giving it some much undeserved publicity -- all the while advertising their own stupidity. Emphasizing the 'C' in PC This column appeared in the Kitchener Record on September 16. Party should be less progressive, more conservative By Paul Tuns The battle for the leadership of the Ontario Progressive Conservatives is also a battle for the heart and soul of the party. It is not just about who will lead the PCs in the next election but which ideas the party will put forward as it tries to recapture Queen's Park. As leadership contender and former Treasurer Jim Flaherty has said, "There are two different traditions in the party and both have been successful at different times." The two traditions, of course, come from the adjective and the noun of the name of the party that Flaherty, Frank Klees and John Tory hope to lead. Tory, like Ernie Eves and William Davis, belongs to the progressive tradition. Flaherty and Klees, like leader under whose leadership they came to power in 1995, Mike Harris, are conservative. Tory is a moderate, the vague description conservative party members who are not very conservative. Tory has emphasized procedure over principle. He wants to make government programs run smoother rather than make them smaller. Tory pays lip service to conservative principles but almost always adds the qualifier that they be "open to new ideas and balanced in its approach." His "balanced approach" is not likely to endear him to the party's mostly rural and small town, small-c conservative base. He began his campaign telling a Toronto rock radio station that now is the time to invest in Ontario's schools and hospitals and that tax cuts had to wait. What good is a conservative if he can't at least support cutting taxes? Announcing his leadership campaign in May, Tory said he didn't "think there is enough being done to address either the root causes of crime," which is hardly a conservative sentiment. He supports gay marriage and is ambivalent about educational choice and private health care. Tory is the front-runner and he seems poised to turn the party back to its Davis-era progressive roots but two former Harris-era cabinet ministers stand in his way. Klees and Flaherty are, at the very least, inclined toward conservatism. Both oppose same-sex marriage, support choice in education, and are open to competition in the health care system and further tax cuts. Flaherty supports a get-tough-on-crime agenda based on the successful fixing broken windows theory of fighting crime. As Harris' former treasurer he implemented the Education Tuitition Tax Credit in 2002 that empowered parents in the educational decisions they make for their children, reinforcing the primacy of parental responsibility in the schooling of their children. Flaherty would introduce a level of competition in Ontario's health care system. Maintaining that the province will continue to fund health care, he says that private facilities should play some role. Klees has been even bolder in the area of reforming health care, which he has made a centrepiece of his campaign. Moving beyond the old debate that focused on how much money to pour into health care, Klees says medical services should be contracted to independent clinics to increase capacity and alleviate pressures from public providers. He also wants to make it easier for foreign-trained medical professionals to practice in Ontario, a policy that would address one of the health care system's most pressing needs, the shortage of staff to provide health services. Klees said that "individuals who have the resources, who make the choice to access that service through a private alternative ... Should have that option." John Tory accused Klees of opening the door to "two-tier health care." Eventually, Tory grudgingly moved toward a position that is more open to, but hardly embraces, more private delivery of health care services. With a week left in the campaign, he was still saying, "Ontario needs a sustainable health care system where users pay for services with their OHIP card, not their credit card." Klees and Flaherty have offered new ideas that build on the Common Sense Revolution. They support fundamentally challenging the way government operates and changing the relationship between citizen and state, advocating innovative thinking, not tinkering on the margins. Tory, on the other hand, offers new processes of governing rather than new ideas for policy. A long-time backgroom strategist, Tory thinks that his job is to come to a viable program after the proper consultation process. This is hardly the stuff of leadership. Andrew Ferguson recently described in New York the need for and success of "Repo Republicans," such as Ronald Reagan, Arnold Schwarzenegger and Rudy Giuliani. At the national, state and municipal level they were elected following the dismal tenures of failed liberal Democrats, coming in and radically changing the course the government. Reagan reasserted American power abroad, Schwarzenegger brought California back from the brink of bankruptcy and Giuliani made New York safe. In many ways, Harris did the same thing in 1995, when Ontarians realized that they needed not to just temper the excesses of five years of NDP rule but to reverse them. He cut the welfare rolls, lowered taxes and scrapped quotas. After four years of Premier Dalton McGuinty, voters will likely want to change directions in 2007. Tory is McGuinty lite. The gist of Tory's complaint about McGuinty is not that his policies are bad for Ontario but that the premier has not been honest. Flaherty and Klees note McGuinty's broken promises but offer credible alternatives. The PC caucus, party faithful and voters don't need two liberal choices on the ballot in 2007. To remain relevant and viable, the Progressive Conservatives must emphasize the second part of their name, not the first. Colin vs. Kofi Colin Powell has challenged Kofi Annan's assertion that the liberation of Iraq was illegal. The Washington Times reports: "Powell said the Constitution gives the United States the right to act in its own self-defense without U.N. approval, but argued that the Iraq war itself was justified by Saddam's 'material breach' of a string of earlier U.N. resolutions on his weapons programs. 'What we did was totally consistent with international law,' he insisted." Democratic a--holes Democrats tear up a family's Bush-Cheney '04 signs making their three-year-old daughter cry. Really nice. Isn't that negative campaigning? Krauthammer dissects Kerry's Iraq position(s) According to the headline on Washington Post columnist Charles Krauthammer's piece today, Jean Kerry has nowhere left to flop. In the first sentence, Krauthammer encapsulates why Kerry will lose to Bush and lose on the issue of Iraq: "If the election were held today, John Kerry would lose by between 88 and 120 electoral votes. The reason is simple: The central vulnerability of this president -- the central issue of this campaign -- is the Iraq war. And Kerry has nothing left to say." Kerry has said it all and Krauthammer goes through in as much detail as an 800-word column allows what they were and why Kerry changed his position so frequently. So why did Kerry change positions on Iraq? In a word politics. So Kerry, whom Krauthammer says voted his dovish conscience in the 1980s, has taken the political low road since 9/11. He thought it would be politically popular to support the war but then he needed to move left to beat Howard Dean in the Democratic primaries and then he dodged right when he thought he had the nomination wrapped up and now he's ducking left again ... The U.S. doesn't need a president for which you need a scorecard to know where he stands presently on an issue. Selective reporting The Globe and Mail (and a bunch of other websites) reports on the latest Pew poll that shows the presidential race in a dead heat with Bush leading Kerry 47%-46%, ignoring the Gallup poll (released at the same time) that shows Bush leading Kerry by 14 (54%-40%). Subscribe to Business Report I'm not sure if my October cover story on the Liberal Party's jihad against private care will be available online. You can subscribe to this excellent biz and politics magazine, featuring commentary by Dave Rutherford (radio host), Gerry Nicholls (National Citizens Coalition), Catherine Swift (Canadian Federation of Independent Business) and Bruce Winchester (Canadian Taxpayers Federation), plus great guest columns (Ralph Klein, Randy White), plus some business reporting by yours truly. The magazine is a lot of fun and deserves support. Also, if Canadian football is your thing, Canmedia Inc., the publisher of Business Report, will begin publishing the official CFL magazine in early 2005. GOP's Senate prospects Writing in Enter State Right, Bruce Walker outlines a dreamy outcome for the November Senate elections -- a collection of ifs that all go well that would result in a massive gain of eight or more seats for the Republicanss. Repeat: if everything went the GOP's way. But not everything will. Still, I think Walker is more right than NRO's John J. Miller, who has long predicted a net gain of two Senate seats for the Republicans. (Oh yes, you can read Miller's previous predictions here and here and here.) He concedes the Republicans will lose Illinois, but that is made up for by the pickup in Georgia where the seat is being vacated by DINO Zell Miller. While that is a net loss of a conservative vote, it practically guarantees the Republicans control of the Senate. However, none of Miller's predictions took into account President George W. Bush's upswing in the polls, which are likely to help Republican senatorial candidates pick up Louisiana, North Carolina and South Dakota and keep Alaska, Colorado and Oklahoma. Add the pickups of Florida and South Carolina, and you have a net gain of five. Impressive but hardly the massive sweep that Walker can picture; California, Nevada and Washington are out of reach for the GOP. What else am I up to I have a bunch of posts over at The Shotgun, all on Canadian politics. Check it out. And buy my book Jean Chretien: A Legacy of Scandal and Freedom Press (Canada) Inc. will reimburse you $5 to cover the shipping and handling. Getting sick of this announcement? If enough of you buy the book, I won't put it up anymore. If this sells well, my next one should be ready for mid to late 2005. Sad day for democracy Taiwan's bid to regain a seat at the United Nations was rejected by the world body. The Associated Press reported: "Taiwan lost its bid for representation in the United Nations for the 12th year Wednesday, with no country objecting to the General Assembly president's call to reject a request from the island's supporters to place the issue before the world body's 191 member states." To repeat, not one. Shame on Washington on this issue. Rationally irrational voters Daniel Henninger concludes his Wall Street Journal column today thusly: "But the President can write off one well-decided lady at the seniors center. She will never vote for George Bush. How come? 'Personally, I never liked his father'." I recall George F. Will once noting that a Republican in the 1960s (either Nixon or Goldwater, obviously) would not get the support of one voter who declared his fervant opposition to Herbert Hoover. Really, how different is that than Western Canadian voters refusing to support the Liberals because of Pierre Trudeau's policies? Not much. And, I think, equally justifiable. Thursday, September 16, 2004
Fixing the health care queue all in good time About $5.5 billion of the $41 billion over the next 12 years the feds are ponying up for health care will go to reducing waiting lines. But that funding is spread over a decade. Furthermore, the deadline for the provinces to set waiting time guidelines is December 31, 2005. In other words, it could take a decade to fix the problem of the distinctly Canadian problem of waiting too long for diagnosis and treatment, and 15 months just to think about how work out the details, all of which is, to put it plainly, longer than many Canadians have to wait. More good news for Bush 1. 318,000-member Fraternal Order of Police endorsed the President. 2. Buried deep within this AP story, Gallup has Bush up by 14 over Kerry (54-40). Why I'm sad IDS was booted from Tory leadership It has been I while since I have even mentioned British politics but this column by Ian Duncan Smith in The Spectator is further proof that the party lost a principled and bright leader when they replaced him last year. IDS makes a strong case why the Conservatives should be more supportive of the United States. I'm also extremely impressed that IDS called the West's enemy by its name: global Islamic terrorism. But then again, he is just an MP now and is less restricted in what he can say. Here are a couple of the money 'graphs. The first on the United Nations and its defenders: "The protesters who marched through New York two week ago under the banner of Michael Moore were united solely by a negative. The Bush-haters have neither a plan nor a purpose. Their sophistication has become sophistry. Their panacea for global politics is to pray-in-aid the United Nations, the body which for 12 years stood by as Saddam Hussein flouted its every resolution, and whose officials — as now appears — were engaged in the systematic corruption of the oil-for-food programme, channelling funds into the pockets of Saddam’s own relatives. This outrage has gone scarcely reported, while Michael Moore makes lucrative hay with some disconnected allegations, pointing in contradictory directions, about the Bush family’s business interests." The next defending neo-cons: "The Right ... has a strong message of hope. As a result, it is the driving force of US politics. And driving the Right is a group much misunderstood in Britain: the ‘neocons’. They earned the prefix not only because they have applied a new twist to conservatism, but because they are new conservatives themselves. The original neocons — the intellectuals like Myron Magnet and Marvin Olasky — were former liberals and leftists who, as is famously said, were ‘mugged by reality’. The left-liberal remedy has not worked, and a new one must be tried. This is most apparent on the domestic front. The neocons believe that their mission is to take their creed into the no-go areas. Their conservatism isn’t restricted to questions of tax and defence. They match a commitment to the war on terror with a commitment to a more effective war on poverty. The dream of LBJ’s Great Society — the huge expansion of state welfare in the 1960s — delivered a nightmare of alienation, ghettoisation, broken families, drug addiction and welfare dependency. Under the influence of the neocons a new approach has been adopted. In New York Rudi Giuliani showed what happened when conservatism is applied at street level: petty crime is not tolerated, and major crime falls. Nationally, Republicans showed what can be done when work, not welfare, is expected of citizens: unemployment and teenage pregnancy fall and enterprise and marriage increase. Conservatism in America is not the philosophy of stasis, resistance to change and the slow management of national decline. The Republicans have become the party of radical solutions to deep-seated problems." Hayek was right, or Why the blogosphere works Great piece in Tech Central Station today by Michael van Winkle on how the decentralized, non-command structure of blogging makes it an effective method of journalism. He says that despite the complaints that the internet spreads partisanship lies and misinformation, the decentralized system of thousands (if not millions) of bloggers is more reliable and outperforms command "systems that rely on central direction." Perry de Havilland at Samizdata elaborates on this point by way of a metaphor: "I frequently hear 'Oh blogs, they don't really have any influence' and 'What real difference do blogs make?' - Individually it is certainly true that popular blogs like Samizdata.net or even Godzilla-blogs like Instapundit are dwarfed in numbers of eyeballs they attract by major newspapers and TV networks... but just as a single piranha is not so fearsome a beast, a large school of them is another thing all together." Democracy ain't just for neocons, is it? Max Boot has an excellent column in the Los Angeles Times looking at the advantages of democracy based largely on the writings of several liberal-leaning individuals. Boot concludes that while the Pat Buchanans and Paul Krugmans of the world now question the wisdom of assisting the spread and the development of democracy that the only real discussion is not whether we pursue such a policy but how. In the post-Cold War world, I couldn't agree more. Wednesday, September 15, 2004
Buy this book Order my book Jean Chretien: A Legacy of Scandal before it is published before the end of the month, and Freedom Press (Canada) Inc. will send reimburse you for shipping and handling. In it I examine how Chretien dealt with scandal and how we -- conservatives, the media and voters -- let this happen. It is a political Aesop's Fable, a morality tale that should be read so that we understand how dangerous the relentless, petty, arrogant pursuit of power is for Canada. Here's what Edmonton Journal colunnist and National Post editorial writer Lorne Gunter has to say about my book: "In a refreshingly candid book, full of worthwhile historical and contemporary insights into Canadian politics, Paul Tuns has laid bare the sad, empty, arrogant, corrupt legacy of the Chretien years---the broken promises, the greed and the power for power's sake. It's hard to come away from feeling good about Canada's recent past, but it is possible to come away hopeful of a better, Liberal-free tomorrow." Please order your copy today. NHL lockout From what I hear on talk radio, most hockey fans think that both NHL owners and players are at fault. But I see no reason to fault players for taking the contracts owners offer them. Owners say they are losing money but no owner if forced to pay mediocre players million-dollar contracts. The real problem with the NHL is that because of over-expansion it is putting out an inferior product compared to 20 and 30 years ago. Owners' eyes lit up with exorbitant expansion fees, blind to the eventual effect of needing 150 or more additional NHL-caliber players. Canadians scoff at teams in places such as Atlanta, Carolina, Nashville and Tampa, but it is not their locations that is the problem; it is the lack of superior talent to man anything more than a 21-team league. Attempting to address the issues surrounding players' salaries without addressing what truly ails the NHL will mean that the league will be in a similar lockout/strike situation in the very near future. If an owner cannot make money, he can sell or fold his team. Perhaps the owners should buy back four or five teams immediately (at a modest price -- if so many teams are losing money, what can the franchise be worth?), close them and distribute the talent. This will improve the product on the ice but it will also slow down the growth in salaries as fewer teams will be competing for existing talent, thus limiting the ability of players to demand higher prices for their labour. But the chances of that happening appear to be as likely as NHL hockey being played before Christmas. Memogate The Los Angeles Times has a balanced editorial on CBS's use of fraudulent memos regarding George W. Bush's Texas Air National Guard service and concludes with questions about the only issues that now matter in memogate: "But who fed a seeming ringer to CBS, and why did the network fall for it?" If Kerry were to win Fortunately, this is not a concern, but formerly funny Jon Stewart returns to his humourous self for the conclusion of his interview with Amazon.com: "Amazon.com: What would a Kerry administration mean? Stewart: JOHN KERRY PLANS TO RAISE TAXES ON OUR TROOPS IN ORDER TO SUBSIDIZE FREE, GAY HEALTH CARE FOR TRIAL LAWYERS AND TERRORISTS.... THEN ABRUPTLY SWITCH TO THE OPPOSITE COURSE." (Hat tip to Calgary Grit) More good news for Bush The Associated Press reports that "President Bush has been solidifying his gains in states that once were dead heats, forcing both parties' campaigns to alter strategies as the electoral battleground shrinks." The story says Bush's campaign strategy this week is to put a number of "battleground states" (which probably now numbers 10, not 17, 18 or 21 as previously expected) including Colorado, Missouri, Arizona, North Carolina, Arkansas and Louisiana out of John Kerry's reach. Bush won all six states in 2000 but they were considered among Kerry's best chance, outside of Ohio and New Hampshire, to snatch a state away the president. The story also reports that Maine and Washington seem to be favouring Kerry and Bush is cutting back his advertising there. (Yet the Kerry campaign is increasing advertising in Maine, a sign that his support in the New England state is not that strong.) Bush, however, is strongly targeting four states that Gore won in 2000: Minnesota, Pennsylvania, New Mexico and Michigan. Polls in Minnesota and Pennsylvania are mixed, New Mexico seems to favour Bush and Michigan is leaning Kerry. Overall, positive developments for Bush-Cheney 2004. Killing is the cure The Globe and Mail (the paper now charges for premium material) ran a column yesterday by Anthony Westell that argued that health care costs could be reduced if more people would just die. He wants to do it with a minimum of pain, but unless I missed the irony, Westell seems to seriously advocate euthanasia as a cure to spiraling health care costs. (Cross-posted at The Shotgun) Blogosphere 3, MSM 0 Even if CBS does not recant or Dan Rather resign, bloggers have destroyed the credibility of both. By my count, this is the third major story in just under two years that was driven by blogs, the others being Trent Lott's resignation and the firing of Jayson Blair from the New York Times. Writing for The New Republic, Andrew Sullivan has some thoughts on why the blogosphere moves stories: "Blogging's comparative advantage has nothing to do with the alleged superior skills of bloggers or their higher intelligence, quicker wit, or more fabulous physiques. The blogosphere is a media improvement because the sheer number of blogs, and the speed of response, make errors hard to sustain for very long. The collective mind is also a corrective mind. Transparency is all. And the essence of journalistic trust is not simply the ability to get things right and to present views or ideas or facts clearly and entertainingly. It is also the capacity to admit error, suck it up, and correct what you've gotten wrong. Take it from me. I've both corrected and been corrected. When you screw up, it hurts. But in the long run, it's a good hurt, because it takes you down a peg or two and reminds you what you're supposed to be doing in the first place. Any journalist who starts mistaking himself for an oracle needs to be reminded who he is from time to time. CBS News has failed on all these counts. It did shoddy reporting and then self-interestedly dug in against an avalanche of evidence against it. Rather can blather all he wants about the political motivation of some in the blogosphere--but what matters is not bias but accuracy. His attitude, moreover, has bordered on the contemptuous; and the blogosphere has chewed him up and spat him out. He has acted as if journalism is a privilege rather than a process; as if his long career makes his critics illegitimate; as if his good motives can make up for bad material. The original mistake was not a firable offense. But the digging in surely is. It seems to me that when a news anchor presents false information and then tries to cover up and deny his errors, he has ceased to be a journalist. I'd like to say that Dan Rather needs to resign from his profession. But, judging from the last few days, he already has." Tuesday, September 14, 2004
Next stop: Syria If evidence were needed that the U.S. liberation tour should head west from Iraq, there is this report that Syria tested chemical weapons on human beings earlier this year: "Syria tested chemical weapons on civilians in Sudan's troubled western Darfur region in June and killed dozens of people." I guess that means there is no doubt about the country's possession of WMD. (Hat tip to K-Lo in The Corner) Gwynne Dyer is such an environmentalist Crowd: How much of an environmentalist is he? Me: So much so that he recycles his old books. Okay, that was awful, but I'm in an awful mood. I'm trying to read the latest book by everywhere columnist Gwynne Dyer (he's like Mark Steyn but he's not funny, can't write and is wrong on every issue). I'm reviewing War: The New Edition for the Halifax Herald which they assigned to me last week. From what I've seen, the new edition is no improvement over the old edition but nearly two decades have passed since Dyer released it the first time and there are numerous conflicts to add to his book to prove his thesis that "war is not in our genes." I agree, but I'm less optimistic about the ability to eradicate violent conflict. Anyway, this book is horrible and while I typically read books for review in two or three days, this one is going to take a bit. Blogging might be light for the next few days. Unless I use blogging as escape. Help Townhall The indispensible conservative clearinghouse (columnists, think tanks, news, etc...) Townhall.com needs your financial help. If can, please do. Anti-Christian, Liberal smear tactic Kathy Shaidle reports that last week she taped her first appearance on Faith Journal, a show on CTS, on the topic of "Do Christians get a raw deal in the media/society?" Shaidle said of course Christians do and noted that "the Warren Kinsella/Stockwell Day/'He thinks The Flintstones is a documentary' incident of song and story." Feeding into this anti-Christian sentiment allowed the arrogant, power-hungry Liberals to get away with their smear campaign. As I note in my book Jean Chretien: A Legacy of Scandal, the former prime minister would do anything to hold onto power and thus destroying his political opponents was easily justified. Here is a part of chapter five of my book that looked at the 2000 federal election: It has been said that the 2000 election “was the Liberal hatchet-men’s finest hour.” The hatchet-man par excellence was Warren Kinsella, a lawyer and bulldog political operative who, more than anyone, vilified Stockwell Day and made him look ridiculous. Day himself ran a woeful campaign. That he would not campaign on Sundays helped the Chretien Liberals (and their willing accomplices, the media) portray Day as a dangerous fundamentalist. But the coup de grace was the CBC airing of a “documentary” on Day’s Christianity that ridiculed his religious beliefs, including his views on creationism. The federal Liberals, like most voters in Alberta, knew of Day’s social conservatism. In the 1980s he had been the pastor of an evangelical church. As a member of the provincial legislature in the 1990s he opposed the extension of new and special rights to homosexuals, opposed taxpayer funding of abortion and expressed his concern about the content of books that were being taught in schools. He also believed in creationism. In other words, Day was like millions of other Canadians in the views he held. “Fundamental Day,” a CBC documentary by Paul Hunter, covered what was actually quite well known ground to those who were familiar with Day’s history, but it provided the Liberals with an opportunity to paint their primary opponent as a radical fundamentalist. As Kinsella wrote in his defence of attack and demolition campaigning, Kicking Ass in Canadian Politics, the airing of the documentary was so “important” because it addressed issues and themes that the Liberal Party wanted to address but couldn’t. Kinsella knew, as most wily political strategists do, that it is best to let the media lead and then jump into the fray. Immediately after the documentary aired, Kinsella called Francois Ducros, the prime minister’s director of communications, and Cyrus Reporter, chief of staff to then Health Minister Allan Rock. Kinsella, Ducros and Reporter were part of the Liberal Party’s election campaign communications team and as Kinsella recalled, Reporter said the CBC program was “what we’ve been waiting for.” Kinsella said in his book that believing in creationism is politically irrelevant, that Day has a “constitutional right to believe in whatever he desires,” and that an individual’s “religious views [are] immaterial to his fitness for public office.” In theory. In practice, however, if a politician tears down the wall of separation between his own beliefs and what he does in office, there is a problem. (One might wonder: do Chretien, Kinsella and others act on something other than their own beliefs? Why are secular beliefs better than religious ones?) Author David Frum has said that many liberals have no problem with religion as long as it is meaningless; something one practices for an hour or so on the weekend and ignores the rest of their week. But Kinsella condemned Day and others for attempting “to infect the public agenda with their religious views.” Instead of attempting to understand Day’s religious beliefs – and perhaps even engaging in a serious debate about the role of religion in public life, or even how Day’s specific views might play out in the public square -- Kinsella and his crew thought it was better to mock those views, and by extension, the views of all Canadian Christians who shared Day’s positions. During the election, Kinsella was a regular panelist on CTV. On November 16, with just a little more than a week left in the campaign, the Liberal strategist went to the studio with a gym bag, the contents of which would end the CA campaign and Day’s leadership. Near the end of the segment, Kinsella dismissed a direct question and got ready the gym bag that had been seated beside his chair. He had prepared a stunt with Ken Polk and John Milloy of the Liberal election “war room” that would clinch the public perception of the CBC’s “Fundamental Day.” Kinsella said: “Valerie [Pringle], you say you want to talk about the past week. Let’s do that. In the past day or so, we have learned that Stockwell Day apparently believes that the world is 6,000 years old, Adam and Eve were real people and – my personal favourite – humans walked the earth with dinosaurs. Valerie, I want to remind Mr. Day that The Flintstones was not a documentary.” And, pulling a stuffed purple Barney dinosaur out of his gym bag said, “And this is the only dinosaur that recently co-existed with humans.” Recalling the incident in his book, Kinsella said “Of all the things I have done in politics, over many, many years, probably nothing has had the impact of those few seconds on Canada A.M.” Not only had Kinsella and his accomplices raised the spectre of Day’s religious views “infecting” the public square, they created the perception “that he was a kook.” As then National Post columnist Paul Wells said, “The transformation of Mr. Day from Stock to Laughingstock, was complete.” Kinsella defended his stunt claiming “Canadian voters had no desire to elect a prime minister who would attempt to stick his religion in their faces.” This, despite the fact Day seldom brought up religion (or abortion or homosexuality, for that matter) except in answer to the incessant questions of reporters. Order Jean Chretien: A Legacy of Scandal in the next week and Freedom Press (Canada) Inc., will send you a cheque for $5 along with the book to reimburse you for the shipping and handling. Zell answers his critics Yesterday in the Wall Street Journal, Zell Miller responded to criticism of his keynote speech at the Republican convention a few weeks ago. Especially liked this 'graph: "And my critics love to point out that I had nice things to say about John Kerry when I introduced him to a Georgia Democratic dinner in 2001. That's true and I meant it. But, again, timing is everything. I made that introduction in March 2001--six months before terrorists attacked this country on Sept. 11. As I have said time and again, 9/11 changed everything. Everything, that is, except the national Democrats' shameful, manic obsession with bringing down a commander in chief. John Kerry has been wrong many times, but he's never been more wrong than in his failure to support our troops and our commander in chief in this war on terror." Monday, September 13, 2004
Idiot Hall of Fame It's been a while since anyone has been inducted into the Idiot Hall of Fame here at Sobering Thoughts, but the Toronto Star's Carol Goar established her bona fides today. In a rambling column about the U.S. presidential election she seems to make the point that if there was more subsidized housing (liberals now call it "affordable housing") in the United States, the recent hurricanes would have been less of an ordeal for Floridians. Goar quotes University North Carolina historian Louis Perez's (I presume) empirical observation that, "People of means build solid structures and people without means live in frail ones and hurricanes have a way of finding the people without means." In the next paragraph, Goar says, "Yet barely a word was heard on the campaign trail about the lack of affordable housing in the state that Governor Jeb Bush, brother of the President, calls 'paradise'." It is dirty to link the damage wrought by the hurricanes, let alone the hurricanes themselves, that have recently ravaged the Sunshine State to President George W. Bush. But it is just plain idiotic to approvingly quote any notion that hurricanes seek out the poor. Welcome to the Hall of Fame, Ms. Goar. Sunday, September 12, 2004
Nothing honourable in a civility that requires dishonesty I did not comment on Michael Novak's recent column at NRO on John Kerry in which he described the senator as "honourable." It was, I thought, a gesture that Novak felt was required in civilized discourse while advocating his position that Kerry has been less than truthful about his tour of duty in Vietnam. But in reading Novak's defense of the use of the term honourable, even though he makes the argument I suspected he would make, I am no longer persuaded that he should have used the word honourable. Novak writes in The Corner: "An impressive number of people have written me to question why I went out of my way in a recent column to say that John Kerry was 'an honorable man.' They point to his 1971 betrayal of his comrades still fighting in Vietnam, and his calling his comrades murderers, rapists, in the tradition of the armies of Genghis Khan. It was a big stretch, but I made myself write 'honorable,' as a step toward healing the awful breach that has opened up between political parties in the U.S. I hate what Kerry did then, and I also hate his exaggerations and fantasies about his own behavior in the last three months of his time in Vietnam. It is right for me and others to hold him to account for that behavior, since it was he who put it before us to judge. Still, in argument I want to stipulate at the beginning that men on both sides are honorable men, and then judge their behavior in that light. I admit, faced with Kerry's record thirty-some years ago, it feels to me that I am bending over backwards. Others need not go so far. But sooner or later our society does need to get back to the level of civility that concedes each other's honor and integrity, at least as a starting point, and I am willing to keep making gestures in that direction." I think the charity that Novak shows in calling a liar "honourable," in calling a man who made vile charges against the men he now exploits as his band of brothers a man of integrity, is deeply and profoundly mistaken. Novak wants to begin his column stipulating that Kerry has honour and integrity while arguing that he in fact peddles exaggerations and fantasies, which I guess are words that men conducting civilized discourse call lies. Novak implies that if the Swift Boat vets are telling the truth, then Kerry is not. Is basing a central theme of one's campaign on a lie honourable? Novak offers this explanation of his use of the term honourable in conjunction with Kerry but one gets the feeling that he knows he is wrong. Putting such wrong-headed civility ahead of truthfulness is a mistake Novak should not fall for and a error in judgement he most likely regrets. Kerry is an economic girlie man who will lose in November Thomas Bray has an excellent column in the Detroit News in which he describes the Kerry Democrats as girlie men on economic issues -- protectionists, redistributionists, welfare statists. Now, George W. Bush isn't quite the manly budget president that Bray might like him to be, but what do Americans want: an opportunity society or the opportunism of fear-mongering Democrats? Hope or hopelessness? A society that moves forward together through individuals striving to move ahead or speeches about a divided America that needs government to make everything right? Bray says that Kerry has positioned himself so that he cannot exploit Bush's own economic girlishness and that with even Michiganers spending like there is no tomorrow (a sign of economic optimism that should be bad news for Democrats), so the President will likely win re-election in November. Holding McGuinty to account Ontarians for Responsible Government, a project of the National Citizens' Coalition, says the lyin' premier's agenda must be opposed. In its recently launched advertising campaign they say: "Dalton McGuinty won the last election in part because he promised not to raise taxes. He broke that promise. The Liberals actually hit Ontarians with the largest tax hike this province has seen in 11 years. He also promised not to raise taxes without a referendum. He broke that promise too. Now he says we can’t afford a referendum. In other words, the problem with Dalton McGuinty isn’t just that he is assaulting your wallet, although that is bad enough. The real problem is that we have a Premier who won’t keep his word." Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty has 1,117 days left to lie to the province, so ORG has their hands full. CFRB's Bill Carroll said last week that no matter what Dalton McGuinty does over the next three years, he won't live down his image of being a promise-breaking liar. I don't entirely agree with that; if Ontario's premier comes up with a massive new government program that captures the imagination of middle class voters, all will probably be forgiven. Short of that, we'll have Premier Jim Flaherty or the third installation of the Ernie Eves/Dalton McGuinty regime in Premier John Tory. This is exciting I just received an email from my publisher who tells me that we've just sold the first copy of my soon-to-be-released book Jean Chretien: A Legacy of Scandal. If you order before the book is released (the last week of September), Freedom House (Canada) Inc., will reimburse your shipping and handling charges. Headlines ignore subtlety I know that is always true but this one in The Independent was cause for excitement: "Labour faces catastrophe at election, warn MPs." That is until I read the fine-print, also known as the actual story. The paper reports: "The party chairman, Ian McCartney, issued a warning yesterday to Labour supporters that there will be no "comfort zone" in next year's general election. In an article for the magazine Parliamentary Monitor he wrote: 'Any sign of complacency in this campaign plays straight into Tory hands'." The leftist Liberal Democrats will also alter their electoral strategy to target vulnerable Labour MPs. Furthermore, these signs of vulnerability, "put immense pressure on Alan Milburn after his controversial appointment last week, when he supplanted Gordon Brown as Labour's chief election strategist. Alice Mahon, MP for Halifax, said: 'If we don't win a majority of more than 80 seats then Alan Milburn will have failed. Gordon Brown delivered two magnificent majorities of more than twice that size'." So the Labour government is in serious trouble but insiders are still talking about an 80-seat majority? Non-science in service of politics American Heritage defines scientific method as: "The principles and empirical processes of discovery and demonstration considered characteristic of or necessary for scientific investigation, generally involving the observation of phenomena, the formulation of a hypothesis concerning the phenomena, experimentation to demonstrate the truth or falseness of the hypothesis, and a conclusion that validates or modifies the hypothesis." Now consider that as your read this Los Angeles Times editorial which reports that the Union of Concerned Scientists will release a study tomorrow "explaining the ways global warming is changing California" as they predict "a rise in average summer temperatures of up to 5.5 degrees by mid-century, far higher than previous studies have projected. Even the scientists' most optimistic scenario, a temperature rise of only 2 degrees, could cause a host of economically damaging effects, such as the premature ripening of wine grapes." Now that is fine and anyone who wants to expound such a theory is most welcome to but the UCS cannot pretend it is science. How, may I ask, have they observed or tested their global warming theories? Their hysteria about rising temperatures -- a hysteria that has been around for more than two decades now, and an exercise in Chicken Littlism that followed the hysteria in the mid-1970s about global cooling -- is merely a hypothesis. We should not make public policy based on an unproven hypothesis except in limited circumstances (for example, using smaller jurisdictions such as states, provinces and municipalities as laboratories in education, health and social welfare policy). It is too bad that editorial writers such as those as the Times are seduced by the scientific-sounding pronouncements of lofty-titled groups such as the Union of Concerned Scientists, even as they criticize Congress for its fidelity to what the LAT itself calls junk science, namely the belief in global warming as a natural phenomenon. The field of battle is shrinking Bad news for Kerry. Fewer states seem up for grabs. Reports are that he is scaling back campaign operations in a number of supposed battleground states which I guess means that he is surrendering them to President Bush (Louisiana, Arkansas and Tennessee and perhaps Missouri). I'm also told that Kerry is scheduling more stops in states considered strongly Kerry which means one of three things: they are not as strongly Kerry as people suspect, his support is very thin in those states or he wants to guarantee more friendly audiences and get positive coverage from friendly local media that will set the tone for national coverage. Regardless of the reason, it is not a positive development for Kerry. The Washington Post reports, "Democratic strategists privately acknowledge that only a significant change in the overall race will put some of the states Kerry sought to make competitive back into play. Democratic hopes for victory in Missouri have diminished sharply, as well." The gist of all that has happened in the last two weeks is that the CW is that Kerry must win either Ohio or Florida to have any chance to win. But, as usual, the CW is wrong because it assumes he will not lose any of Gore's states from 2000, which is highly unlikely. The best chance for Kerry is that he picks up one Bush state -- New Hampshire and all of its 4 Electoral College votes -- and indeed I think this is the only state other than Florida that Kerry has any chance to move into his column. However, Bush has a good chance to win Iowa, Wisconsin, New Jersey and Pennsylvania, perhaps even Michigan. That would mean well over 320 Electoral College votes for Bush. I'm predicting that short of any major development (a terrorist attack, an unforeseen economic development such as a doubling of the unemployment figures or -5% economic growth, etc...) Bush will win with around 400 EC votes, with Minnesota, Oregon and Washington also moving to the GOP column and Democrats forced to defend Maine, Vermont (yes, Vermont) and California (recent polls have it within single digits). Easy victories for Kerry will be few -- Illinois (where Kerry gains from Barack Obama's coat-tails), Maryland, Rhode Island, Hawaii and his home state. Latest Halifax Herald review Is of Roy Woodbridge's The Next World War: Tribes, Cities, Nations, and Ecological Decline, is entitled "The latest chicken little," and can be read here. Here's a taste: "Woodbridge's two challenges are to convince the reader that there is imminent ecological catastrophe and that his solution will work. There is a problem with the first challenge and that is that others have made the same warning. Environmental doomsayers, most famously Paul Erhlich, have predicted a series of eco-catastrophes - the population bomb, mass famine, a global ice age, global warming, the disappearance of natural resources - none of which has proved true. If one recalls, or goes back and reads the environmental predictions of the 1960s and 1970s, the end of the world was nigh. In his 1968 book The Population Bomb, Ehrlich stated unequivocally, 'The battle to feed all of humanity is over. In the 1970s the world will undergo famines - hundreds of millions of people are going to starve to death.' Rachel Carson in her 1962 book The Silent Spring predicted pesticide use would lead to an epidemic of cancer, yet today, according to the U.S. National Cancer Institute, less than two per cent of all cancer is related to pesticide and environmental causes whereas tobacco use and diet accounts for 65 per cent of cancer cases. In the 1970s, environmental Chicken Littles ramped up their dire predictions. Now it could be that the environmental doomsayers of the '60s and '70s are less Chicken Littles than Leon Trotskys, of whom it is said (by supporters) that proof of the Russian revolutionary's farsightedness is that none of his predictions have come true yet. Woodbridge says of the predictions of yesteryear's environmentalists, it may be 'too soon to judge'." (Crossposted at The Shotgun) What to say on September 11 There was not much to add, other than more outrage -- at the perpetrators and to those who continue to deny the significance of the date or realize that September 11 is the December 7 of World War IV. But others said as much and as useful as it would be to use the date as a vivid reminder of the stakes of the current war, I prefer not to, at least directly. Instead there are indirect reminders about the necessity of the war on terror, the defeat of Islamofacsim, that respect the dignity of the dead. The first was to remember the dead and this website has a list of the casualties. Other sites have more information about the victims, information that further humanizes what can otherwise become a mere number -- "almost 3,000 dead." The second is to remember the families of the dead, including an estimated 3,000 children who lost at least one parent in the September 11 attacks. Shortly after September 11, my office received the verified story of a Connecticut church which had nearly 200 children whose families' lost at least one parent. I'm at a loss for words when I hear about things like this and perhaps appropriately so. Friday, September 10, 2004
Order my book You can now order my book Jean Chretien: A Legacy of Scandal here at Freedom Press (Canada) Inc. If you order in the next week you won't pay shipping and handling. (Actually you will pay shipping and handling but Freedom Press will send you a check for $5 -- its the way the payment options are set up on the website. Sorry, but because of Jean Chretien's broken promise, we still have to charge GST.) Also, to book speaking engagements email ptuns@lifesite.net. Why choice is the wrong euphemism for abortion Actress Ellen Barkin: "I am the mother of a 12-year-old girl and I can tell you unequivocally that if my daughter was pregnant, I would take her kicking and screaming to have an abortion." Here in Toronto, I've actually seen fathers drag their teenage daughters into abortion clinics, as the girl kicked and screamed "I don't want to have an abortion, daddy." Why Bush will beat Kerry, Part 6,759 Charles Krauthammer in the Washington Post: "The Republicans got a bounce out of their convention. The Democrats did not. Why? Elementary. The Republicans had something to say. The Democrats did not. Something always beats nothing." Is Canada's Conservative Party paying attention; find some ideas and bludgeon the Liberals with them, already. Thursday, September 09, 2004
Sowell interview in TAE There is an interview with Thomas Sowell in the September issue of The American Enterprise. One Q&A and then go read the whole thing: "TAE: In one of your books you expressed your belief that double standards and political correctness are opening up a gulf between favored minorities and the rest of the population, with explosive future potential. How do you see the situation now? Sowell: Oh, I think the resentment is there. Affirmative action and so on are great recruiting items for racist organizations. The terrible thing is that the Left doesn't seem to regard polarization as something to be avoided. Polarization enables them to be on the side of the angels. They're not going to suffer the repercussions down the road. Nor will most of the black elites. If we should ever, heaven forbid, reach some kind of race war in this country, the "black leaders" are going to be safely removed from the friction points. The people in the middle of the ghetto who never got anything out of preferences are going to be the ones left to suffer the consequences." Eventually pro-lifers will win According to this column in the Washington Post, conservatives are having kids, liberals are not. Eventually, we'll win. We'd win quicker if, as Rabbi Yehuda Levin urges, every pro-life family had one more child. Asymmetrical information and World War IV Mark Steyn writes in The Spectator that while many in the West are ignorant of Islamofacsism, our enemies are not ignorant of us: "And, if you can't even bring yourself to identify your enemy, are you likely to defeat him? Can you even know him? He seems to know us pretty well. He understands the pressures he can bring to bear on Spain, and the Philippines, and France, too. He's come to appreciate the self-imposed constraints under which his enemy fights -- the legalisms, the political correctness, the deference to ineffectual multilateralism. He's revolted by the infidels' decadence but he has to admit it's enormously helpful: the useful idiots of the pro-gay, pro-feminist Left are far more idiotic and far more useful to him than they ever were to Stalin." A reading list Here are some articles worth perusing. The Los Angeles Times has Lee Seigel's defense of hating President George W. Bush. He finds liberals all too kind toward the president and civilized in its political discourse. Seigel's column is the most uncharitable bit of invective not uttered by Michael Moore. Senator Jean Kerry (UltraD, France) says that Iraq was a distraction in the war on terror -- or what sober-minded people call World War IV -- but he is unwilling even to confront Iran, the largest sponsor and supporter of international terror. Writing in the Los Angeles Times, Max Boot says that President George W. Bush can no longer ignore the threat that Tehran's mullahs present. Boot writes: "Bush has recognized the need for democratization in the Middle East, yet, oddly enough, he doesn't seem to be doing much to help Iranian freedom fighters. Bush's own deputy secretary of State has said that regime change is not U.S. policy. I hope this is just a ruse to hide covert actions, but I fear it's the truth." The Globe and Mail's Naomi Klein complains that post-9/11 the world has become Likudized in its approach to international issues. I guess that's the liberal way of saying the Jews control the world. Klein says world leaders -- Bush and Putin, for example -- are distracted from the evils of globalization and oppressed peoples demanding their independence with their fictitious war on terror. Writing in the New York Times, Richard Pipes says that post-Beslan, Russia should learn the lessons of Algeria. Al-Qaeda strikes against Australia in Indonesia The Guardian has the details. I hope and pray that the Australian voters support Prime Minister John Howard and are not frightened by this obvious attempt to influence the election Down Under which is one month from today. LA Times shocker Even they admit they are surprised that they are coming to the defense of Vice President Dick Cheney regarding his comments that America would be less safe if Senator Jean Kerry (UltraD, France) wins in November. As their editorial notes, that is essentially what Kerry and Senator John-boy Edwards are saying -- that America is less safe with a president at the helm who is distracted by a war in Iraq. On the other hand, it is not surprising at all that the New York Times went into a fit over Cheney's comments, not once, but twice, in an editorial and a Maureen Dowd column. The suggestion that KerryEdwards might not prosecute World War IV to the degree that Bush-Cheney has, is, apparently, beyond the pale. Sobering Thoughts gets noticed My post on Baseball North going south was in the National Post's Blogger's Corner today. (Thanks Marni.) My post on Terry Teachout going on a road trip to Cleveland and Buffalo garnered attention from the man himself. I wasn't making fun of Teachout but rather Cleveland and Buffalo. Maybe I'm wrong; maybe there are cultural contributions from these industrial Great Lake cities. Hey, I can never really get my head around the fact that Chicago, home of slaughterhouses, is also the home of one of the best art museums in the world. (I think Margaret Thatcher said it was her favourite.) Sorry Terry, there was no offense intended. Even though he sliced and diced me, dissing my grammar (and deservedly so -- that last sentence of that post was brutal), I still think his About Last Night blog is the best arts blog out there and one of about only a half-dozen blogs I check daily. The substance of style meets the hospital Virginia Postrel has an interesting post of the future of hospital design -- or at least one model for one clinic. As Postrel notes, "You have to be pretty obtuse to define hospital 'function' without paying any attention to how the environment makes patients feel -- but that's exactly how hospitals have historically viewed the problem." Not surprisingly, she has an observation about the lack of market forces as a contributing factor to the drabness of most hospitals: "This may be yet another case in which the disconnect between consumers (patients) and payers (insurance companies and the government) distorts health care provision." Wednesday, September 08, 2004
Bush v. Kerry In comment about the flip-flop candidate, Kathy Shaidle captures the essence of what President George W. Bush and Senator Jean Kerry are saying about themselves to the voters. Bush: 30 years ago, like millions of other American men, I wasn't too enthusiastic about fighting in Vietnam. Frankly, I just wanted to party. I figured serving in the National Guard, in a unit that could get called up for service but probably wouldn't, was the way to go. But now 3 decades later, I am a changed man. And we live in different times. Kerry: "I served four months in Vietnam, all the while photographing myself for posterity, posed in recreations of my brave actions. I got four medals, and suffered some minor injuries. When I got home, while still a commissioned officer, I testified before Congress on national television that my comrades were rapists and compared them to the hordes of Genghis Khan. I threw my medals or someone elses or just the ribbons over a wall in protest. Then 30 years later I stood at the DNC convention, saluted and declared I'm reporting for duty. I spent more time in the anti-war movement than I did in Vietnam but I choose to highlight my military service. I voted for then against then for any number of military expenditures over the years, showing little consistency." Bush is keeping America safe Senator Jean Kerry (UltraD, France) and other liberal Democrats (but for DINO Zell Miller, I repeat myself) said the liberation of Iraq would do nothing to help make America more secure. They also criticize the Patriot Act as an improper violation of Americans' civil liberties. But consider, for a moment, one of David Frum's points about Beslan: "The attacks should remind us of how remarkably lucky or maybe even effective American security has been since 9/11. Who doubts that al Qaeda would have liked to carry out an attack like this on American soil if they could? It may be that the Bush administration is doing something right." Remember the day after September 11. Everyone said it was not if the terrorists hit the U.S. again but just a matter of when. Most pundits said another strike was likely within a year or so. But President George W. Bush took the battle to the terrorists and their sponsors and consequently made America safer. Richard Brookhiser is right: "... it is never possible to prevent all attacks. We are all marked men and women, and will be for the rest of our lives." However, the fact is the terror network is weaker, has less support and suffers from poorer organization -- all the result of losing their client states and being on the run. Bush has made America safer, if not safe; Americans know that and will reward him in November. Teachout's rules of travel Terry Teachout went on vacation in upstate New York, Pennsylvania (big mistake) and Cleveland (bigger mistake) looking at art and has this post about several rules for traveling his experience taught him. Among his 11 rules, here are my seven favourites: * Never look at great art for more than an hour at a time. After that, your eyes go numb. When that happens, take a lunch break. * One museum a day is enough. * Bring twice as many CDs and half as many books as you think you?ll need. * Unless you're driving an expensive car, don't bother listening to classical music --the road noise will drown out the quiet parts. * In Pennsylvania, all roads are under construction at all times. * If you're driving, either wear a long-sleeved shirt or put sunscreen on your left arm. * Bring your own pillow. You?ll sleep better. Three comments. 1) I almost always wear long sleeves; even during my two cruises in the Caribbean, I wore long sleeves. 2) As someone who sleeps with (at least) four pillows, I always travel with my own. 3) I never bring enough CDs and always bring too much to read. The Monger on the PM Scroll down to the unflattering picture of Paul Martin -- yes, I know, he doesn't take a good photo -- and try not to laugh at The Monger's description of Martin's face. I would add that this is not the first (or second or third) time Martin has had such an expression. I hate it when I agree with the New York Times In its editorial today, the New York Times says that by moving its presidential primary back to June (from March), California is taking a step in the right direction. The paper, like most Democrats today, realize that American liberals get stuck with a candidate like Senator Jean Kerry (UltraD, France) with the warped front-loaded primary system. Of course, the paper doesn't explain its opposition to the front-loaded primary system in exactly those words, but it is a given that Kerry's lackluster performance (and probable loss in November) is the motivation for questioning the wisdom of picking a presidential candidate in a mere six weeks. Required reading on Beslan If you have the time read Dan Darling's post at Winds of Change. He includes a lot of important history and illustrates the links between the Chechen terrorists and al-Qaeda and evidence that these terrorists follow a Osama bin Ladenesque belief that there is a clash of civilizations (Islamic and Christians) because they targeted Eastern Orthodox schoolchildren. In the New York Times, David Brooks writes more bluntly than most (at the Times or elsewhere) about the death cult of Islamic terrorists: "We've been forced to endure the massacre of children. Whether it's teenagers outside an Israeli disco or students in Beslan, Russia, we've seen kids singled out as special targets. We should by now have become used to the death cult that is thriving at the fringes of the Muslim world. This is the cult of people who are proud to declare, "You love life, but we love death." This is the cult that sent waves of defenseless children to be mowed down on the battlefields of the Iran-Iraq war, that trains kindergartners to become bombs, that fetishizes death, that sends people off joyfully to commit mass murder. This cult attaches itself to a political cause but parasitically strangles it. The death cult has strangled the dream of a Palestinian state. The suicide bombers have not brought peace to Palestine; they've brought reprisals. The car bombers are not pushing the U.S. out of Iraq; they're forcing us to stay longer. The death cult is now strangling the Chechen cause, and will bring not independence but blood. But that's the idea. Because the death cult is not really about the cause it purports to serve. It's about the sheer pleasure of killing and dying." And yet, Brooks says, we don't really recognize this, dressing up the organized mass murder of innocent children as mere "tragedies" or completely averting our eyes from the killing. One gets the impression from Brooks, although he does not say it, that one or two more schoolfuls of children and we'll learn to ignore these types of attacks, too. Tuesday, September 07, 2004
Would Shultz have endorsed the science of Mengele, too? Former Secretary of State George Shultz has endorsed Proposition 71 in California which will force the state to spend $3 billion on human embryonic stem cell and clone-and-kill research. (I thought the Golden State was so cash-strapped that it was considering changing its nickname to the Bronze State?) Anyway, Shutlz said, "I don't think of it as an ideological or a political matter ... It's a matter of scientific research." So march on; anything that can be done, should be done. I'm sure most people didn't know this With all the negative media reports from Iraq, I would guess that more people thought American casualties had already surpassed 1,000, a benchmark, so to speak, the U.S. had not reached until just now. No matter what you did, you had a more interesting summer holiday than Teachout I know what Terry Teachout does for a living and what his interests are but his description of how he spent the last nine days does not inspire confidence that he is all that interesting: art museums in Cleveland and Buffalo. No doubt two cities known for its cultural contributions to America. Baseball north on life support So late in the season and the Toronto Blue Jays (oops, "Baseball North") and the Montreal/San Juan Expos have identical records: 57-80. Their 416 winning percentage are tied for fourth worst in baseball. The only thing as pitiful as their records is their attendance; just this week, the Blue Jays got their average attendance over 20,000 a game. In related news, September 10 is the 10th anniversary of the owners calling off the '94 season, the beginning of the end of Major League Baseball in Canada. The Bush bounce Larry J. Sabato's Labour Day Crystal Ball analysis: "The sizeable Bush bounce is a triumph for the president's campaign, contradicting almost all published predictions that, like Kerry, Bush would secure little or no gain in the polls. Pardon our boast, but the Crystal Ball predicted the Bush bounce last Monday in this space. Why did we go out on that particular limb? Because the consensus Beltway wisdom is often wrong, because Bush was due some good luck, and because historically the Republicans usually put on the better, more organized show--something we have personally seen after attending part or all of 16 national conventions, eight on each side." Sabato predicts that by the debates "the Bush-Kerry horserace is again a near-statistical tie, or much more like the CNN/USA Today/Gallup margin than that of the Time or Newsweek poll." Unfortunately for Jean Kerry, the CNN/USA Today/Gallup pull has Bush up by 7 points. Monday, September 06, 2004
Capitalism provides excellent opportunities for workers -- and pets The economy stinks, the Democrats would have us believe but Don Boudreaux waxes economic about standards of living after reading about specialized services being provided in Fairfax, Virginia. From Cafe Hayek: "On a bulletin board in a Fairfax, Virginia, supermarket, my wife, Karol, noticed the business card of someone who specializes in giving massages to geriatric canines. Talk about the division of labor! Talk about a wealthy society! We Americans are so wealthy that somone can specialize -- or at least try to specialize -- in being a masseuse for old dogs. Not for all dogs, young and old; not for old dogs, cats, and parakeets. No -- for old dogs exclusively. Such specialization not only makes us wealthier, it also is evidence of our enormous wealth. Our family dog -- Priscilla the beagle -- is 13 years old. (Incidentally, she shares a birthday with Hayek: May 8th.) Had Priscilla been born 25 years earlier, or in the Sudan or in Spain or in Senegal, she'd not enjoy the option of being massaged by someone devoted exclusively to her sort. Life is getting less and less ruff." No doubt that many liberals will find this obscene, the kind of consumption that gives capitalism its bad name. But only in America can a person specialize in massaging old pooches and only in America can animals expect that kind of care and attention. Things to think about when thinking about parole In an unusually thoughtful editorial, the Globe and Mail examines parole for "lifers." It makes a number of valid points (noting that any inmate can qualify for parole if "the risk is not undue" is a criteria that is "vague" and "meaningless", that parole is viewed by the penal system as a "calculated risk that careful reintegration ahead of schedule is safer than simply bidding inmates goodbye and good luck at the end of their sentences" and that a life sentence in Canada need not be just 25 years because parole need not be automatic). In short, it sets up the question of re-examining several suppositions about parole very nicely. It also concludes strongly, calling for an investigation into system problems including the quality of the reports on which Corrections Service Canada makes parole decisions, the acceptance of incomplete information in applicants records, the lack of credible data on rehabilitation to support release, the quality of halfway houses, the "lack of weight given to public safety" and "the release of lifers on split decisions." All these issues should be examined. I have two issues with the Globe editorial. The first is with an omission, namely the role of parole eligibility as a way to make prisons safer for both other prisoners and prison staff. This seems to be a mostly forgotten part of any discussion of correctional system reform. There is evidence to support the idea that prisoners are more easily controlled when they can be rewarded with an early release. The second, is the confusing road that the editorial takes to a common-sense conclusion. It strays when it looks specifically at the idea of granting parole to those convicted of life sentences. The basis on which people are let out of jail early -- the calculated risk that careful reintegration sooner rather than being let go at 25 years -- the paper says, makes no sense for lifers. True, but only to a point if one accepts the legitimacy of parole in the first place. Furthermore, as the editorial recognizes, most lifers are not hardened criminals or repeat offenders but murderers who killed family members and others they knew; the likelihood of re-offending is low. That is not to say that they should not serve their time, but if parole is going to exist, this fact should be considered. The Globe goes on to quote a Correctional Service Canada website that paints lifers in mostly favourable terms and concludes that the CSC has a "rosy view of lifers" that "colours the decision-making process" about whether to grant parole or not. But the examples the editorial uses are of people whose calling, it seems, is to a life of crime (Eric Norman Fish, Robert Bruce Moyes, Conrad Brossard). The paper is right to say that lifers are different than other prisoners (and thus parole applicants) but confuses readers by introducing relevant considerations without adequately addressing them. It does not explore what can be done with lifers who do not fit the profile of dangerous offenders or criminals likely to re-offend. I for one would not allow people sentenced to life (at least 25 years) to be eligible for parole until the full 25 years is served and only let go once they have satisfied a unanimous parole board that they 1) are penitent and 2) are not likely to re-offend. Rehabilitation and protecting society, after all, must be subordinate to the purpose of any jail sentence, namely punishment for the wrong-doing. In cases in which a prisoner has not satisfied three parole board members that they are sorry and not likely to commit a crime when released to society, they simply must stay behind bars. The Globe is right to find that the system by which we release (early) prisoners back into society needs reform. But this editorial does only half the job it should. Still, it is hard to recall many other editorials that provide the serious reconsideration the parole system needs, which is precisely why getting such an editorial exactly right is necessary. Labour Day Or, to our American friends, Labor Day. Ted Byfield said a few years ago that the Christian churches have made a huge mistake by not playing up the dignity of work. One church that has never really had this problem are the (faithful) followers of John Calvin. David Warren has a column in the Ottawa Citizen, opening with a line from a Calvinist aunt, from which the whole column flows and the point of which is (as Warren concludes), "We live to work, and in work is our freedom." For that reason, and not to recognize the contributions of organized labour to our polity, we celebrate Labour Day. Still, it would be nice to have an Entrepreneur's Day. Comments Send them to paul_tuns[AT]yahoo.com. I appreciate the more gentle tone of recent emails, but, as always, feedback is appreciated. How Beslan proves the necessity of the Bush Doctrine Mark Steyn writes in The Australian: "PHOTOGRAPHED from above, the body bags look empty. They seem to lie flat on the ground, and it's only when you peer closer that you realise that that's because the bodies in them are too small to fill the length of the bags. They're children. Row upon row of dead children, more than a hundred of them, 150, more, many of them shot in the back as they tried to flee." Steyn says that Vlad Putin's proposal -- to bomb Islamists back to the stone age -- isn't going to work. Neither is Senator Jean Kerry's or Canada's idea of ignoring Islamic terrorism. The only thing that will work is a real tackling of root causes -- bringing democracy, rule of law, etc... to Muslim countries and peoples that do not yet have it -- and expanding the doctrine of pre-emption because (in Steyn's words) "In this war, you can't hold the line against the next depravity." You don't wait for Saddam Hussein to get WMD so he can then use them against you or provide them to terrorists who would do the same. You don't let third world thug states provide support and training to terrorist networks with designs to kill you. And you don't wait until the next time a group of terrorists kill several hundred kids to retaliate. The humane, compassionate and just policy is to kill the killers before they kill hundreds of innocents. Beslan is the latest proof that we are in the midst of World War IV and a wake up call to the world that everyone must take sides. Obviously Zell Miller is not a handicap The media said Zell Miller's performance at the Republican convention was "too hot" and would hurt President George W. Bush. Bush must think otherwise; he's invoking Miller's name in numerous campaign stops. Too many do not understand we are in the midst of World War IV Rod Dreher notes in The Corner: "CNN is reporting that gravediggers in Beslan have been told to prepare 600 graves today, and to be ready to dig even more in the next few days. Six hundred graves, most of them for little children. In Beslan, parents are posting makeshift 'missing' posters around the village, just like New Yorkers did after 9/11. It is breathtaking to see that gesture repeated again, so soon. Is it going to have to happen here before Americans wake up to the true nature of the threat posed by Islamic extremism? I'm afraid so, yes." I vaguely recall John Derbyshire saying (about a year after 9/11) that too many Americans have forgotten that their country was vulnerable to attack on their own soil and was in the middle of a war. He said that a dirty bomb is Disney Land would do the trick. But why do Americans not open their eyes and understand that Beslan could have been Boston? Leftist tolerance Calgary Sun columnist Paul Jackson makes the case for something all conservatives already knew anyway, but is worth repeating: "The Liberal-Left -- whether in the U.S. or Canada -- likes to portray itself as 'tolerant.' The truth is Liberals are tolerant only when you agree with their views. If you have another viewpoint, not only does the Liberal-Left believe it is wrong, it also believes you should not have the right to express that viewpoint. Not even in a free democratic society. Liberals and socialists are smug and hypocritical. ...Common sense might well be the bedrock of Conservatism, while intolerance truly is the hallmark of the Liberal-Left." Reminds me of something William F. Buckley once said: liberals always talk about opposing points of view but are surprised when they come across one. Apparently, the Left is sometimes so surprised by the audicity of another view that they seek to stamp it out. Best Steyn column of '04 Usually this would be a difficult call but his Chicago Sun-Times column yesterday was magnificent. Two 'graphs for a taste but feast on the whole thing later. "Several distinguished analysts have suggested that the best rationale for a Kerry presidency is that it would be a 'return to normalcy' -- a quiet life after the epic pages of history George W. Bush has been writing these last three years. Even if a 'return to normalcy' were an option, I doubt whether John Kerry would qualify. As we saw in those two Thursday speeches, Bush takes the war seriously but he doesn't take himself seriously -- self-deprecating jokes are obligatory these days, but try to imagine Kerry doing the equivalent of Bush's gags about mangled English and swaggering. The president is comfortable in his own skin, which is why he shrugs off the Hitler stuff. By contrast, Kerry doesn't take the war seriously because he's so busy taking himself seriously. If 'return to normalcy' means four years of a grimly humorless, touchy, self-regarding Kerry presidency, I'll take the war." That is amazing punditry. Bang-on and funny. The second (and earlier) paragraph explains in two sentences why George W. Bush is going to win re-election: "So we have one candidate running on a platform of ambitious reforms for an 'ownership society' at home and a pledge to hunt down America's enemies abroad. And we have another candidate running on the platform that no one has the right to say anything mean about him." More progress in World War IV After re-reading Norman Podhoretz's article in Commentary, I've decided that indeed the War on Terror should always be referred to as World War IV, a label I have used but too infrequently in both my blogging and conversations. It may take some time to use it consistently, so please be patient. And patience is what is needed in prosecuting the War on Terror, er, WWIV and and in doing so will achieve small victories such as the reported capture of Izzat Ibrahim al-Douri, Saddam Hussein's former deputy and the highest ranking officer in Saddam's regime that was still at large. Saturday, September 04, 2004
If not a lie, at least unknowable A letter writer to the Los Angeles Times says that many of the people who do not have their healthcare covered by the state or through private insurance are illegal ("undocumented") immigrants. Without a shred of evidence, the writer says that most of America's "45 million" uninsured are in states, such as California, with high illegal immigration rates and adds, "The problem is even worse than it appears because many undocumented workers and their family members exist below the radar of the Census Bureau." But if these people exist "below the radar" how do we know if the problem is worse than our guesses? Hagel is the new McCain The media turned on Senator John McCain this week. We will have to wait and see if their renew their love affair when McCain pursues the GOP presidential nomination in 2008. In the meantime, the media will always have Senator Chuck Hagel, another Republican who loves the ephemeral adulation of the New York Times and evening news broadcasts. In defense of Zell Instead of reporting what Zell Miller said in his keynote address, the media wondered whether it was "too hot" without examining what he was "hot" about. Yes, once again we have the media attempting to tell people what to think instead of what to think about. Michael Ledeen on the controversy of letting the angry Georgia senator vent: "There is still room in American political life for honest passion, and I was frankly very discouraged to see so many of our people openly wondering whether it was a mistake to permit the unwashed to see a man who was angry about seeing his party go down the rathole." Friday, September 03, 2004
American politics model for Canada Adam Daifallah says that the Republican National convention was fun to watch and effective (it was the latter because it was the former). Canadian politicians could learn a thing or two. Read Daifallah's four observations and ask yourself why Canadians (read: the Conservative Party) could not put forth bold ideas, a dynamic convention and professional politicking in a winning combination. Lord Black's ordeal Burkean Canuck has an excellent post on the problems facing Conrad Black. He makes two noteworthy observations. The first observation: "Now, Conrad Black and Barbara Amiel Black have made no secret they enjoy their wealth and the high life it brings. That may not be according to the old WASP sensibility against conspicuous displays of wealth, but it is transparent ... For many opinion leaders, the Blacks' greatest sin is failing to uphold that WASP sensibility, even though many if not most of their critics threw over what created that sensibility a long time ago." Very true and nicely put. It reminds me of the valid criticism of liberals who complain that conservatives are hypocrites -- they, liberals, are criticizing others for not living up to the standards they themselves do not accept. BC's second observation is about Black's critics' motivations: "The principals opposite Lord Black in this conflict have attacked the probity of Lord Black's dealings ... But what seems to fade in the background is the motivation. These are not people who build businesses. They buy what they consider undervalued stock, or they buy into companies with large cash reserves, with a view to making a killing either in the markets on the stock, or by pressuring companies to buy back their stock with the cash reserves at a higher price. Not so good, old-fashioned greed. So in the words of a 16th-century Protestant upon seeing a criminal pass by, who was later martyred for his faith, 'There, but for the grace of God, goes John Bradford.' Just substitute your name for the martyr's." Moral of the story: the love of money is the root of much evil. And Black is not the only villian in this caper. Indeed, I would use that word (villian) to describe his corporate governance facsist critics before I would use it to describe Lord Black himself. John Kerry is a tall, thin stupid white man NRO's The Kerry Spot: "Kerry, just now: 'Now that the president has finally finished his speech…' Finally? Finally, drone-man? My hair has turned gray waiting for you to finish a sentence! 'I have five words for Americans: This is your wake up call!' That’s six, bonehead." And, as Jim Geraghty noted, Kerry even got the fact that the Red Sox are now 2.5 games behind the Bronx Bombers wrong. (Both teams won, so the Yankees remain 3.5 games ahead.) Thursday, September 02, 2004
Media on Zell In its editorial yesterday, the Los Angeles Times painted Zell Miller as an imbecilic show at the Republican convention. Maureen Dowd, the New York Times yuckster-columnist, implied during her interview with Aaron Brown that Miller was picked to deliver the keynote address so that Vice President Dick Cheney wouldn't look so scary when he got up to speak. Media almost uniformly thinks Zell Miller was "too hot." Try impassioned. Try letting it loose after seeing his party betray its principles and country. Try summarizing the views of many Democrats who voted for Reagan in the 1980s when their party lost its head the first time. Best part of Bush speech The first half of Bush's speech was good but dull -- a routine single -- but the second half was better than twice as good as he focused on foreign policy -- a base-clearing double. Fantastic, just what he needed and now cruise to November 2. The best part of the speech came more than three-quarters into it (from the prepared remarks): "In the last four years, you and I have come to know each other. Even when we don't agree, at least you know what I believe and where I stand. You may have noticed I have a few flaws, too. People sometimes have to correct my English I knew I had a problem when Arnold Schwarzenegger started doing it. Some folks look at me and see a certain swagger, which in Texas is called 'walking.' Now and then I come across as a little too blunt and for that we can all thank the white-haired lady sitting right up there." Pure Bush. Self-effacing but genuine. Humorous but not unserious. Finally President George W. Bush has finally outlined how America is winning the War on Terror. It only took a year, but he has finally made the case. If he continues to do this, he'll coast to victory in November. I take back what I said two minutes ago On gay marriage, judges and confusing Hollywood values with American values, Bush is on fire. Bush is boring Earlier this evening, K-Lo wrote, "Before you'all get mad at me for panning the speech at 9:35, I suppose the delivery can make a huge difference." It didn't. Fine ideas, good broad principles but until the last two minutes, a dreadfully boring delivery. Americans prefer their politics/journalism conservative Reuters reports that Fox News had more viewers than any network broadcast of the Republican Convention last night marking "what is believed to be the first time a cable channel has grabbed the biggest audience for a telecast of a single event covered by all the networks." Fox drew 5.4 million viewers, 400,000 ahead of NBC; CNN attracted just 1.5 million viewers, fewer than even MSNBC. Furthermore, the 22.2 million US viewers of the third night of the GOP convention was better than the 18.5 million that the first night of the Democratic convention (featuring Bill Clinton) attracted. Wednesday, September 01, 2004
Gotta get rid of Keyes I have repeatedly raised concerns about Alan Keyes running for the GOP in Illinois because, although he is intellectually exciting and astute, he completely lacks judgement. Rod Dreher agrees in a post in The Corner about with Keyes' latest embarrassment. Senator John Kerry (D, Vietnam) Scrappleface on Kerry: "Mr. Kerry, a Vietnam veteran who is also a U.S. Senator." Very nice. Now that's specific Karen Finney, KerryEdwards has announced, will become the communications director for Elizabeth Edwards. (Good grief, do the candidates' wives really need communications directors?) So who is Karen Finney? According to the press release, "Karen Finney worked as the director of Business Development at Scholastic in New York. She is a veteran of the '92 Clinton/Gore campaign and of the Clinton White House." A "veteran" of the 1992 campaign and the Clinton White House. What did she do there? Or would Bill rather us not know? (In fact, she was, for a while, press secretary to Hillary Clinton.) The upside of having Martinez win the GOP nod in Florida Aside from the fact he is more likely to pickup the Sunshine State's Senate seat for the GOP, he is, according to John J. Miller, likely to increase the Cuban American voter turnout and propensity to vote Republican. This will help President George W. Bush on Election Day, too. What an odd piece of journalism Everyone's favourite media game of pin the blame on the neocon is joined by the Los Angeles Times' Robert Scheer who finds that the Jews, er, hawks in the Bush administration are not friends and allies of U.S. national interests or Israel's. You have read the column, which defies quoting or precis, to understand his "logic." But at least it is a new angle to the Jew-baiting, neoconservative bashing brand of journalism in vogue the past 18 months. Schwarzenegger is the new Clinton Over at No Left Turns, Lucas Morel writes: "With Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger scheduled to speak tonight at the GOP Convention, CNN reports that he 'will tell the delegates how he believes his life story shows the viability of the American Dream.' Why doesn’t it surprise me that the Governator will make himself the focus at a convention supposedly touting the virtues of the Republican Party and its leader, President George W. Bush. We all know Sen. Hillary Clinton is already running for the 2008 presidential election, but I think Schwarzenegger is steadily becoming a Republican version of Clinton and will prove to be more of a liability than an asset to the GOP and its future as a governing majority for the nation. Why? He repeatedly addresses political problems as if individual personalities (like his own) are more important than the principles that inform their decision-making. In short, he cannot stop himself from talking about politics as if it was not political. This undermines public debate by teaching citizens that parties are simply instruments of division rather than principled policy-making. Let’s hope his speech tonight is sufficiently partisan, sufficiently Republican, to persuade voters of the merits of both George W. Bush’s reelection and the two-party system in America." |