The Ice Axe

2003-04-10T08:57:00.000-04:00

V.D.H. Strikes Back. Victor Davis Hanson skewers Maureen Dowd today.

It might be neat between cappuccinos to write about leaders getting "giddy" about winning a terrible war, or thinking up cool nicknames like "Rummy," "Wolfie," and titles like "Dances with Wolfowitz," but meanwhile out in the desert stink thousands of young Americans, a world away from the cynical Letterman world of Maureen Dowd, risk their lives to ensure that there are no more craters in her environs--and as a dividend give 26 million a shot at the freedom that she so breezily enjoys.

Priceless.

2003-04-09T02:08:00.000-04:00

How dare they. I read this story about the hundred or hundred-and-fifty Iraqi children who were imprisoned in northeast Baghdad, and all I could think was, How dare they. Not the Iraqi regime. We know the horrors they perpetrate. The meat hooks. The plastic shredders. The hot metal rods. How dare anti-war protesters tell us we have no business being in Iraq. How dare they. How dare they tell us it is immoral and unjust to free these people. Would they rather see these children rot away in these cells and cages? Maybe certain folks think this war is a failure of we don't find WMD. I think we will--and soon--but this war would have been just if the goal was only the removal of Saddam Hussein because of his reign of terror. It is worth it just to see these people freed. Just look at the faces on these people, oppressed for so long, free at last, at long, long last. These people who talk about human rights and dignity, about peace, about the "evil" US--what do they say to these pictures, these horrifying images, of torture chambers and rape rooms? And what about the children's prisons? Are they willing to acknowledge that their "peace" would have left these innocent children, and myriad other human beings, in jail--for no reason except that they prayed to much, or yearned for freedom, or didn't join the party? How dare they speak of peace. A peace bought with the freedom and dignity of a people is no peace at all. It is a sham.

2003-04-07T04:53:00.000-04:00

"Chemical Ali"...Dead. No longer a threat to America or her friends and allies. Nor to the Iraqi people.

2003-04-07T01:16:00.000-04:00

Today's Lileks Fix. Lileks is in great form today. On video games, war, and "video game wars":

I've played three games in the last ten months, each a first person shooter with all the usual flaws and uncomfortable moral dilemmas. I had no moral qualms with Return to Castle Wolfenstein - frankly, Nazis who are attempting to build an army of cyberzombies are just asking for some of that sweet, sweet lovin' you only get from a Tesla-coil powered energy weapon.

Priceless. And hilarious. (Interestingly, today's FoxTrot plays on a similar theme.) But there's more. It's serious. And a great point:

I remember what Robin Williams, the intermittently amusing hairy-backed hyperbabbler, said last week about Bush: "He's like 'We have to get rid of dictators,' but he's pretty much one himself."

If someone invaded America tomorrow, how many big public posters would they have to tear down? How many airports and hospitals and highways would they have to rename?

How many statues would they have to topple?

Or how many hundreds of human remains would they find in cardboard boxes? Or how many death squads would they find roaming the country?

2003-04-06T15:00:00.000-04:00

Sunday Thoughts.

Perchance he for whom this bell tolls may be so ill as that he knows not it tolls for him....all mankind is of one author and is one volume; when one man dies, one chapter not torn out of the book, but translated into a better language; and every chapter must be so translated. God employs several translators; some pieces are translated by age, some by sickness, some by war, some by justice; but God's hand is in every translation, and his hand shall bind up all our scattered leaves again for that library where every book shall lie open to one another...

No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main. If a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as well as if promontory were, as well as if a manor of thy friend's or of thine own were. Any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee. --John Donne, from Meditation XVII

The bells for our war dead have been sounding, and the scenes are all too familiar--flags clutched, held to the breast, the hot tears of loss, knowing that a husband or wife, son or daugther, mother or father, will not return, the puzzled faces of the young who sense the grief and yet still want to write daddy another letter. The survivors' lives have been narrowed by their loved ones' noble sacrifice in a just cause. We, the rest of us, those who watch at a distance, are diminished, too, by the deaths of these heroes, these American heroes. We are less, our country is less, for the passing of these soldiers. The bells will peal yet again this spring afternoon, as another soul departs. And when we hear those solemn bells that break our silence, we know they toll for us. And we, too, mourn.

2003-04-06T14:18:00.000-04:00

The Tightening Vise. This map tells the tale.

2003-04-06T01:52:00.000-05:00

The Clausewitzian View. In Vom Kriege, Clausewitz discusses the point at which victory arrives--which he says "results from the superiority of one side," physically and psychologically. During war, various factors enter the equation, adding or decreasing strength. If Clausewitz's criteria are any judge, we seem to be accruing strength as the war progresses. He lists seven causes of additional strength:

1. The losses suffered by the defending forces are usually heavier than those of the attacker.
2. The defender's loss of fixed assets such as magazines, depots, bridges, and the like, is not experienced by the attacker.
3. The defender's loss of ground, and therefore of resources, from the time we enter his territory.
4. The attacker benefits from the use of some of these resources; in other words, he can live at the enemy's expense.
5. The enemy loses his inner cohesion and the smooth functioning of all components of his force.
6. Some allies are lost to the defender, others turn to the invader.
7. Finally, the defender is discouraged, and so to some extent disarmed.

Of course, certain factors work to decrease strength. To that end, Clausewitz also names five causes of loss of strength for an invading army:

1. The invader has to besiege, assault or observe the enemy's fortresses; while the defender, if he has previously been doing the same, will now add the units so employed to his main force.
2. The moment an invader enters enemy territory, the nature of the operational theater changes. It becomes hostile. It must be garrisoned, for the invader can control it only to the extent he has done so; but this creates difficulties for the entire machine, which will inevitably weaken its effectiveness.
3. The invader moves away from his sources of supply, while the defender moves closer to his own. This causes delay in the replacement of his forces.
4. The danger threatening the defender will bring allies to his aid.
5. Finally, the defender, being in real danger, makes the greater effort, whereas the efforts of the victor slacken off.

Some food for thought from the master, as victory seems to near.

2003-04-06T00:39:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Day. "Frankly, what irritates me the most are these blow-dried Napoleons that come on television and, in some cases, have their own agendas." --House Majority Leader Tom "The Hammer" Delay, on Gen. Wesley Clark (ret.)

2003-04-06T00:32:00.000-05:00

Why I'm going to miss Michael Kelly. Words such as these, from a post-9-11 column:

We remember that love of country is a wonderful thing; that it is not incompatible with a liberal society but rather the great force that binds together that society. We are reminded that our values are not the values that the civilization-trashers of Hollywood join the civilization-haters of the Taliban in ascribing to us, the values of "Fear Factor." We remind ourselves, as David Letterman did, that our real values are the ones that led hundreds of firefighters and police officers to risk and lose their lives. We are, we learn again, brave and compassionate and strong. We are good people and we have built what is in fact "a just and fair and decent place," and we will preserve this place from those who would destroy it.

2003-04-06T00:27:00.000-05:00

Gulf War II: The Movie. Samizdata has written a summary, complete with cast, of just such a film. Their choice for Kofi Annan nearly sent me out of my chair.

2003-04-05T15:55:00.000-05:00

"We either kill them or they give up." The Republican Guard is no longer a cohesive fighting force.

2003-04-05T15:18:00.000-05:00

Kelly's Immortality. Martyrs' Day is up to 58 on Amazon.com.

2003-04-05T12:50:00.000-05:00

"We are United States soldiers and we're here to protect you and take you home." More on the Lynch rescue.

2003-04-05T03:02:00.000-05:00

Yale Profs on War. Donald Kagan has a new book coming out in May. Well, not entirely new. It's a one-volume abridgement of his classic of his four-volume history of the Peloponnesian War: The Outbreak of the Peloponnesian War, The Archidamian War, The Peace of Nicias and the Sicilian Expedition, and The Fall of the Athenian Empire. The Peloponnesian War has much to teach us, and so does Kagan.

Victor Davis Hanson has a nice review in April's New Criterion, although the article is not online.

A rising star among military historians, Mary Habeck also has just had a book published (based on her Yale dissertation), The Storm of Steel: The Development of Armor Doctrine in Germany and the Soviet Union, 1919-1939.

Worth a look if tanks are your thing.

2003-04-05T02:24:00.000-05:00

Michael Kelly, RIP. I was saddened to learn of the death of columnist and editor Michael Kelly while reporting in Iraq. I looked forward to his columns in the WaPo--always insightful, sometimes angry (some obituaries are saying "caustic" and "savage"), but always well written. What I didn't know was that he was also a first-rate reporter. That had started to come out in his more recent columns, filed from the front lines, but I had no idea, for example, that he rose to fame as a reporter in the first Gulf War in 1991. I will soon (I hope) be reading his book on those experiences, Martyrs' Day. (The book, as of this writing, has climbed to 109 over at Amazon. It's unfortunate that many people will discover his writing now that he will produce no more.) I have also spent some time with those articles written back in 1991 for the New Republic. Some particularly stunning excerpts:

The one-sidedness could be seen in the air. In the nighttime raids, the anti-aircraft fire would begin a few minutes before the bombers came, in scenes of incandescent hysteria and beauty, the tracer shells tracking lovely curves, and Ss and parabolas of orange-red light against the backdrop of a blacked-out city skyline. Only every fifth or sixth shell was a tracer, which created a spacing that gave the ack-ack trails a pleasingly deliberate, almost lazy look. You could see the tracers hit their apogee and then explode in delicate bright-white starbursts, like the better sort of fireworks. You could hear the defense too, in a big sweeping wash of noise, the sharp staccato bursts of the lighter guns punctuated by the thuds of the big ones. ("Blitzed," TNR, February 11, 1991)

Captain Douglas Morrison, 31, of Westmoreland, New York, headquarters troop commander of 1st Squadron, 4th Cavalry, 1st Division, is the ideal face of the new American Army. He is handsome, tall and fit, and trim of line from his Kevlar helmet to his LPCs (leather personnel carriers, or combat boots). He is the voice of the new American Army too, a crisp, assured mix of casual toughness, techno-idolatrous jargon, and nonsensical euphemisms -- the voice of delivery systems and collateral damage and kicking ass. It is Tom Clancy's voice, and the voice of the military briefers in Riyadh and Washington. ("Highway to Hell," TNR, April 1, 1991)

Ten days after what George Bush termed a cessation of hostilities, this road presented a perfectly clear picture of the nature of those hostilities. It was untouched except by scavengers. Bedouins had siphoned the gas tanks, and American soldiers were still touring through the carnage in search of souvenirs. A pack of lean and sharp-fanged wild dogs, white and yellow curs, swarmed and snarled around the corpse of one soldier. They had eaten most of his flesh. The ribs gleamed bare and white. Because, I suppose, the skin had gotten so tough and leathery from ten days in the sun, the dogs had eaten the legs from the inside out, and the epidermis lay in collapsed and hairy folds, like leg-shaped blankets, with feet attached. The beasts skirted the stomach, which lay to one side of the ribs, a black and yellow balloon. A few miles up the road, a small flock of great raptors wheeled over another body. The dogs had been there first, and little remained except the head. The birds were working on the more vulnerable parts of that. The dead man's face was darkly yellow-green, except where his eyeballs had been; there, the sockets glistened red and wet. ("Highway to Hell," TNR, April 1, 1991)

In the old bucolic days the concrete and corrugated tin barns held beasts. Now they hold humans treated like beasts. Each building has been divided into pens, with sheets of tin tied together with twine. The pens fill the barns and the people fill the pens. I counted twenty-three in one ten-by twenty-foot square. The refugees sleep in the pens, on worn and dirty blankets on the concrete floor; the children play in them; the women cook in them, on crude kerosene stoves that are tipsy on the uneven floor. The sick lie still, staring or sleeping, and the others fit themselves around them, in a squalid, squirming zigzag. Rain leaks through the roof and through the windows and doors that are covered only with plastic sheets. The air is fetid and close, rich with the stink of sweat and kerosene and the shit that is everywhere, and that peculiar smell of apple-sweet rottenness that emanates from the lungs and pores of the gravely ill. ("The Other Hell," TNR, May 13, 1991)

The world has lost a fine, fine reporter, whose gifts for describing the reality of war--in all its bloodiness, all its devastation, all its strange, unsettling beauty--were truly great. And because of his loss, the story of this current war will never be complete.

2003-04-03T12:43:00.000-05:00

"Evil men triumph when good men do nothing." Writes columnist Jeff Jacoby to his six-year-old son:

The truth is, Caleb, if it weren't for war, you would not exist. In the spring of 1945, my father was near death in a Nazi concentration camp; he survived thanks to the bombs and bullets of the Allies, who managed to destroy Hitler before Hitler managed to destroy every Jew. Men with guns saved your family from extinction. Never forget that.

2003-04-03T02:29:00.000-05:00

"Fighting to the Death." From the WaPo:

Pfc. Jessica Lynch, rescued Tuesday from an Iraqi hospital, fought fiercely and shot several enemy soldiers after Iraqi forces ambushed the Army's 507th Ordnance Maintenance Company, firing her weapon until she ran out of ammunition, U.S. officials said yesterday.

Lynch, a 19-year-old supply clerk, continued firing at the Iraqis even after she sustained multiple gunshot wounds and watched several other soldiers in her unit die around her in fighting March 23, one official said. The ambush took place after a 507th convoy, supporting the advancing 3rd Infantry Division, took a wrong turn near the southern city of Nasiriyah.

"She was fighting to the death," the official said. "She did not want to be taken alive."

They raise 'em right in places like West Virginia and Alabama and Kentucky. And train 'em right in places like Fort Bliss and Fort Lejeune.

2003-04-02T16:47:00.000-05:00

"No longer credible forces. The Baghdad and Medina divisions of the Republican Guard have been broken. Let us hope that the same can soon be said for the rest.

2003-04-02T16:44:00.000-05:00

She deserves every penny. West Virginia University is apparently offering financial assistance to Pfc. Jessica Lynch, the rescued POW and WV native. Bravo to WVU. I hope they give her a full ride.

2003-04-02T16:36:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Day. "Europeans are antiwar, but they are pro-commerce." --US Lt. Col. Duke Deluca, noting that mines cleared near Najaf had been made in Italy (from the NYT)

2003-04-01T23:36:00.000-05:00

The Media and Iraq. In a NYT story today, citing a senior commander at CentCom: "Those who have lived for decades under what he called Mr. Hussein's totalitarian rule tend to discount, even distrust, American promises of liberation and relief aid." "What he called Mr. Hussein's totalitarian rule"? That description is only the source's opinion?

2003-04-01T18:12:00.000-05:00

Idiot of the Day. Stephen Funk, who joined the Marine Reserves and is now seeking conscientious objector status. He had this to say: "War wasn't a part of it at all for me. I never even thought about it. I thought it would be like Boy Scouts." Something about the Marines' Hymn seems to stick in my mind...what is it...oh, yes: "From the halls of Montezuma to the shores of Tripoli,/We fight our country's battles in the air, on land and sea,/First to fight for right and freedom and to keep our honor clean,/We are proud to claim the title of United States Marine." Maybe he was absent that day? And not only are his comments stupid, but they're offensive. Try telling a real Marine, especially one who has served, or is serving, in war, that the Marines are "like Boy Scouts." Those weren't Boy Scouts who raised the flag on Iwo Jima. They were men. They were soldiers. They were Marines. Mr. Funk would do well to heed these words from the Hymn: "In many a strife we've fought for life and never lost our nerve."

2003-04-01T17:57:00.000-05:00

We owe them much, much more. But the least we can do for the dead is read their names and look at their faces. We owe them that much. And more.

2003-04-01T12:46:00.000-05:00

The New Generation. Among other points about The American Way of War, Victor Davis Hanson says, "Criticisms of the present generation are misplaced. In fact, in this last decade of wars our youth shows signs of being the best fighting cohort of Americans since that of World War II." I have to concur. I myself have been quick to criticize this generation (my own). Having come of age in the boom years, the Clinton 90s, they've been accused of laziness and materialism, of apathy and selfishness. Called the MTV generation, they're said to have no sense of reality or sacrifice, to be obsessed with sex and vulgar music. If the 60s gave us Clinton and others like him, we are told, what leaders will the 90s leave us in twenty or thirty years? Some of this may be true; all of it might be true of some folks.

And yet members of this same generation, maybe 18 to 24 years old, fight for us on the other side of the world--and not simply fight, but fight hard and well. We read the news reports--these men and women are not lazy or materialistic; their understanding of freedom is not passive, and it does not imply license. They give of themselves to this country and to the Iraqi people. We read the names of the fallen, see their pictures. People just like us, just like me. People I might have gone to high school with. People younger than I, too, the freshmen we might have maligned as high school seniors. People it was easy to look down upon because they went to vo-tech to learn a trade, because they didn't want to, or couldn't, go to college. Now dead. For a noble cause. For God and country, for family and freedom. For us. For you. For me. The words that come to mind: Honor. Courage. Duty. Selflessness. A far cry from what we, and I, thought.

It's easy to criticize the young and to heap scorn upon them, and maybe we will always be critical of the youth of every generation. Maybe that's just what we do as a society to make sure the future is secure. No generation, and least of all this one, is beyond reproach. But with a generation that produces those brave men and women who fight for us the world over, we need not worry. The country's defense is in good hands, the best hands possible. Its future, though not certain, is promising. This generation makes it so. And, though I have a far lesser calling than those who serve us at home and abroad, I'm proud to be a part of it.

2003-04-01T12:15:00.000-05:00

From Our Honored Dead. One of the most beautiful things I've read in a long, long time, the last letter home from Army Pfc. Diego Fernando Rincon, 19, who was killed in Saturday's suicide bombing in Iraq:

Hola Mother,

How are you doing? Good I hope. I'm doing OK I guess. I won't be able to write anymore starting the 28th of this month. We are moving out. We are already packed and ready to move to a tactical Alpha-Alpha (in Iraq). Once that happens, there will not be any mail sent out. We will only receive mail that is less than 12 ounces. At least that's what they said. I'm not sure where exactly we're going be at yet, but it is said to be a 20-hour drive in the Bradleys.

So I guess the time has finally come for us to see what we are made of, who will crack when the stress level rises and who will be calm all the way through it. Only time will tell. We are at the peak of our training and it's time to put it to the test.

I just want to tell everybody how much you all mean to me and how much I love you all. Mother, I love you so much! I'm not going to give up! I'm living my life one day at a time, sitting here picturing home with a small tear in my eyes, spending time with my brothers who will hold my life in their hands.

I try not to think of what may happen in the future, but I can't stand seeing it in my eyes. There's going to be murders, funerals and tears rolling down everybody's eyes. But the only thing I can say is, keep my head up and try to keep the faith and pray for better days. All this will pass. I believe God has a path for me. Whether I make it or not, it's all part of the plan. It can't be changed, only completed.

Mother will be the last word I'll say. Your face will be the last picture that goes through my eyes. I'm not trying to scare you, but it's reality. The time is here to see the plan laid out. And hopefully, I'll be at home in it. I don't know what I'm talking about or why I'm writing it down. Maybe I just want someone to know what goes through my head. It's probably good not keeping it all inside.

I just hope that you're proud of what I'm doing and have faith in my decisions. I will try hard and not give up. I just want to say sorry for anything I have ever done wrong. And I'm doing it all for you mom. I love you.

P.S. Very Important Document.

Your son,

Diego Rincon

How people, now and in the past, could not support these men and women, how they could spit on and curse them, I will never, ever know.

2003-03-31T19:24:00.000-05:00

The Long View. An EXCELLENT piece on history and life during wartime, on the necessity (sometimes) of war and of this war, on the struggle for freedom. One reason this war is right:

[A}ctivist Susan Sarandon...asked, "I want to know what Iraq has done to us." There are two reasons to fight this war. One is so that History will never be able to answer that question. I don't ever want to read about the VX attacks that left 16,000 dead at Atlanta Hartsfield airport. I don't want to see the video of makeshift morgues inside the LA Coliseum as more anthrax victims are emptied from the hospitals. And I don’t want to look at helicopter shots of a blackened, radioactive crater where Times Square used to be, or of millions of dead bodies burning in funeral pyres, like columns of failure, dead from starvation and disease in the worldwide depression that such an attack on New York would produce.

But he author also goes deeper and puts things in historical perspective. He writes of his trip to Civil War battlefields some years ago, and especially of his visit to Gettysburg. This is an excursion I myself have dreamed of making someday--packing the bags and Shelby Foote's trilogy and heading south, and hitting all possible sites. Antietam. Bull Run. Appomattox. Fredericksburg. Cold Harbor, the Wilderness, Spotsylvania. Shiloh. Kennesaw Mountain. It takes a history major, or Civil War buff, to dream such things, but I've often imagined making this tour on my honeymoon (long in the future as it might be). I'll make the trip eventually, but finding the woman willing to spend her honeymoon at Civil War battlefields--that's another story.

But Gettysburg's battlefield I have frequently walked, and Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain has been one of my favorite Americans and, quite truthfully, one of my heroes for some time, probably since I saw Gettysburg. I wrote an essay about him in eighth grade, arguing that he saved the Union at Gettysburg. My adolescent mind might have taken the point a bit far, but he did much for the cause of Union and freedom, as Whittle points out. He did much, indeed, in the face of tremendous adversity, against the odds. The movie makes this point well, especially when, low on ammunition, Chamberlain (Jeff Daniels) orders the bayonet charge. Chills still shoot down my spine when he shouts, "BAYONETS!!!" (How many times I've replayed that scene, I don't know.) On my last venture to the battlefield, now two summers ago, I specifically sought out the 20th Maine's position. After hiking around the Round Tops, my friends and I finally came upon the marker of the 20th's actual position, which is set back deeper into the woods than the larger, more impressive monument to the regiment. Two small, simple pieces of stone mark the left and right of the position. "20th ME. INF'Y, EVENING, JULY 2." And you just stand their, in awe really, knowing that there, the extreme Union left, hinged the fate of the battle and maybe the war. Brave men fought and died there, and a brave man--a professor--led there.

Today more brave men (and women now) again fight for freedom, for this country, for us. In many ways, it's an old story for Americans. Americans have been there before, at home and abroad, fighting and dying for freedom. Concludes Whittle:

But of one thing I am absolutely certain. Despite all the switches in the rail yard, there is a flow and a direction to history that cannot and will not be denied.

It is the slow, uneven, grasping climb toward freedom. There are markers on Little Round Top, on the beaches at Normandy, and in the sands of Nasiriyah that show us where men have fought and laid down their lives, and willingly left their wives without husbands and their children without fathers, all for this idea. It is an idea bigger than they are, bigger than self-centered movie stars, bigger than cynical and bitter journalists, bigger than Presidents and Dictators, bigger, in fact than all human failure and miscalculation.

It is the idea that people--all people--deserve to live their lives in freedom. Free from fear. Free from want. Free from despair and hatred.

My country has, again, taken up that banner, and the behavior of our young men and women under unimaginable stress and provocation have filled me with fierce and unremitting pride. We fight, nearly alone, alongside old and true friends, British and Australian, themselves decent and honorable people, long champions of freedom who have their own Waterloos and Gallipolis and cemeteries marked with fields of red poppies, rolls of sacrifice and honor that should fill all American hearts with pride. For friends like this are worth having, and I will always prefer the company of one or two solid, dependable friends over legions of fashionable and trendy and unreliable ones.

And someday, centuries from now, in the world we all hope for but which only a few will fight for, all of this death and destruction will be gone. All that will be left will be small markers in green fields that were once deserts, places where Iraqi families may walk someday with the same taken-for-granted sense of happiness and security I had in Pennsylvania and Virginia.

And perhaps they will read the strange-sounding names, and try to imagine a time when it was all in doubt.

It's long, but read the whole thing.

2003-03-31T18:40:00.000-05:00

Stupider Like a Fox? Sparked by an NPR story saying, "Life imitates art, if you can call a Fox prime-time TV show 'art,'" Lileks has the goods on the FNC Iraqi Freedom logo, and on the general decline of The Simpsons. Plus, he has this great observation:

Perhaps most accurate metaphor for this war occurs whenever the news runs a feed from an Arabic language station. Our crawl runs in one direction; theirs runs in the other. You almost expect the crawls to twine like DNA and start fighting - and in that case, the English language would lose. Arabic is so spiky. However lovely the poetic sentiments might be, it still looks like knives and swords to me.

I'd never thought of it before, but Arabic does look like knives and swords.

2003-03-31T18:09:00.000-05:00

The Human Side of War. There's so much going on in Iraq right now that it's difficult to keep apace--the troop movements, the skirmishes, the bombardments. Of course, that's important and interesting stuff, particularly to a student of military history, as I consider myself to be. But I've found myself, at least in recent days, most captivated, and most moved, by the stories about the "human" side of things--the interactions between US troops and Iraqi civilians. These accounts are important since so much of our strategy is based upon being greeted as the liberators we want to be (and are). But they are also fascinating in what they tell us both about the Iraqi people and our own troops.

For example, there were several articles in the NYT today covering the Iraqi civilians: "Warily, Iraqis Get Acquainted With Marines" and "US Troops Meet Iraqis Peacefully" and "Candies and Aspirin for Those Who Fled Their Embattled City".

The depth and, at the same time, the simplicity of these folks (mostly Shiites thus far) and their feelings toward the US are striking. On one hand, they are somewhat wary of the United States--not, it seems, out of the "usual" Arab-world resentment over imagined oppression at the hands of so-called imperialists, but because of the US's turning its back on the Shiite revolt in 1991. The fear of being abandoned once again, or the notion that the US won't "finish the job" this time around, appears in several of the articles. One young Iraqi said, "If the Americans want to get rid of Saddam, that's OK with me. The only thing that would bother me is if they don't finish the job. Then Saddam will come back, like he did in 1991." On the other hand, these people--long oppressed, long suffering--just want the most basic of things: food and water, medical treatment, their water pumps fixed. Said one of our boys: "These people don't care about Saddam Hussein. They just care about getting by." Securing the support of Iraqis will no doubt require more than candy and Tylenol. But it seems that many positive strides can be made simply be re-assuring these people that we have come to liberate them, that we will finish the job, that we will not, or ever again, turn our backs on them. Their support and trust won't and can't be won overnight. But these small things, laid as a foundation for larger efforts to come, shouldn't be underestimated

A final word concerning our troops: It goes almost with saying that the success of the liberation, and its reception, depends upon them. The picture of our soldiers that has consistently emerged is one of caring and humane people, selfless and giving. In short, exactly what we have come to expect from our men and women in uniform. They know their mission. Almost without fail, those who are asked realize that they are liberating an oppressed people, that that is their task. They take time to listen to the Iraqis, to fix their broken water pumps, to provide medical care--all while the threat of suicide bombers and soldiers disguised as civilians looms. They give their own food to the Iraqi people, even at the risk that they might go hungry should they get lost in the desert (as two soldiers recently did). Much depends upon them, as it always has. And, like always, we have no reason to doubt them and the success of their mission.

2003-03-30T13:18:00.000-05:00

At War Post-a-Note. If you haven't done so, check out NRO's page of pictures and messages from friends and family of our troops. It's almost overwhelming.

2003-03-30T12:36:00.000-05:00

Coalition of the Whining. About pessimists in the media and elsewhere, Mark Steyn is right on target, as usual.

Civilian casualties? So low that Western correspondents in Baghdad can personally visit each one.

The seething ''Arab street''? The sleeping giant that Anglo-American imperialism would supposedly provoke? The largest Arab demonstration to date was a fifth the size of the last anti-American protest in London. When the Arab street is more somnolent than a leafy Wimbledon cul-de-sac, you can safely disregard it.

The ferocious Republican Guard? Broken down into free-lance urban commando units, apparently. Not a good idea. You can't turn an orchestra into 40 soloists.

Iraqi TV's still on the air? Great. Why take it out when it provides the best window on Saddam's physical well-being, or lack thereof?

Humanitarian catastrophe? Oh, come on, you guys tried that in ''the brutal Afghan winter,'' and it was all hooey back then.

They'd just love for this to turn into another Vietnam, wouldn't they?

2003-03-30T12:27:00.000-05:00

Rallying for the Troops. In Miami. In Cleveland. In Honolulu. In Louisville. Near Savannah. In Jacksonville. A big one in Harrisburg. Even in San Francisco. It warms my heart, it really does.

2003-03-30T12:00:00.000-05:00

Supreme Command. "President Keeps the Battlefield Close at Hand," reports the NYT. The President asks the write questions, watches the news reports, and receives daily three-hour briefings. On the decisions of March 19:

With his closest advisers surrounding him, Mr. Bush spoke to General Franks and the other commanders in the field by videoconference and asked each if they had everything they needed to win. Then the president gave the order, an administration official said, concluding with "may God bless the troops."

"May God bless America," General Franks replied, as Mr. Powell, the chairman of the joint chiefs during the first gulf war, reached out and lightly touched the president's hand...

2003-03-29T16:40:00.000-05:00

Preaching to the Choir. Gary Hart is scheduled to be in New Haven tonight at 7:30. I'm tempted to go and do some real journalism. Then again, given the audience that an event billed as an anti-war speech is sure to attract, it might not be the best place for a person of my persuasion. We'll see.

UPDATE: I didn't go after all. I got wrapped up in writing a column, and when I finally checked a clock, it was after 7:30. Oh well.

2003-03-29T14:23:00.000-05:00

Why am I not surprised? "French Rallies Against War Shift Focus To Israel." Police were on hand this time in order to prevent a repetition of last week's beating of left-wing Zionists. Disturbingly, young Arabs--no older than 15--chanted, "We are all Palestinians, we are all Iraqis, we are all kamikazes!"

2003-03-29T13:01:00.000-05:00

How Americans Wage War. An amazing article in the NYT today, "Haunting Thoughts After a Battle." Beyond speaking to my life-versus-death thoughts of the day, it points to how justly and humanely we are waging this war. Said one soldier with a Grave Registration Team that was rounding up Iraqi dead and placing them in body bags along with personal items for identification purposes:

Basically we did the same thing with the Iraqi dead that we would have done with American dead.

Meanwhile, US forces found four of their comrades, executed by Iraqis and buried in a shallow grave near Nasariyah.

The NYT article also paints an utterly moving portrait of our troops, who reluctantly but without hesitation kill Iraqis who attack Bradley armored vehicles with AK-47s. Some quotes from one of our soldiers:

I mean, I have my wife and kids to go back home to. I don't want them to think I'm a killer.

When I go back home, people will want to treat me like a hero, but I'm not. I'm a Christian man. If I have to kill the other guy, I will, but it doesn't make me a hero. I just want to go home to my wife and kids.

We can and should be truly proud of them, and to many of us, regardless of their humility (or maybe, in part, because of it), they are heroes.

2003-03-29T12:31:00.000-05:00

The Cult of Death. It turns out Jay Nordlinger had some words about the culture of death in yesterday's installment of Impromptus.

Every day, we see one of David Pryce-Jones's points borne out: that the Arabs are in the grip of a death cult, glorifying acts of murder--the more spectacular and gorier, the better--and rejecting life....Pryce-Jones is right about something else, too: Unless the Arab world frees itself of its death cult and its psychosis, no peace is possible, and anything like a normal life is out of the question, for Arabs.

Pryce-Jones is the author of an excellent history of the Arab world, The Closed Circle. In an article in the AIJAC Review, he roots this death cult in the high place that shame and honor have in Arab culture.

2003-03-29T11:38:00.000-05:00

Fighting for a Culture of Life. Not surprisingly, Iraq has apparently adopted suicide bombing as part of its military strategy, killing four Marines near Najaf this morning and declaring that "it will be routine military policy." Just one more indication that this is an enemy--a terrorist enemy--that does not value life. We are fighting for much in this war. Among everything else, we are combatting the culture of death that has swept the world. We fight on the premise that every human life has value and meaning. While the enemy blows itself up, shoots its own civilians and uses them as human shields, forces soldiers to fight with guns to their heads, and executes POWs, we enter Iraq with an all-volunteer force that brings food and water to civilians, that bombs only military targets (even if that means a slower, longer conflict), that treats even enemy soldiers humanely and carries their wounded to safety for treatment.

2003-03-29T02:34:00.000-05:00

"War is God's way of teaching Americans geography." When the war first started a week and a half ago, one of the first things I did was to tear myself away from the TV and crack open the old atlas. Names like Basra and Umm Qasr and Faw and Mosul were rolling off the tongues of reporters (often not so easily) and scrolling across the screen, leaving me curious. Fortunately, I also have a stack of old National Geographic map inserts, and among them was one from 1991 titled "The Middle East." As the conflict progresses and troops move on several fronts and in multiple directions, it becomes difficult to place all the attacks and bombings and clashes geographically. Lucky for us, several sites are doing an excellent job putting out maps of the war.

The Spokesman-Review publishes a map a day, chronicling the key events of the day, as well as keeping a tally of casualties.
GlobalSecurity.org has a ton of great information, covering a broad range of topics. With a lag of a day or two, they've been posting maps of Iraqi Freedom showing general troop movements and clashes. They also have some very nice maps of Iraq that depict the country's administrative divisions, topography, population density, and religions. In the coming days, the maps of Baghdad will no doubt prove quite useful.
If you want to see exactly how units break down (i.e. into mechanized infantry, armoured cavalry, air assault, etc.) and where they are, and if you're fond of NATO symbology, then this is the map for you.

(The quotation, FYI, comes from Ambrose Bierce.)

2003-03-29T00:48:00.000-05:00

Back in Business (for now, at least). After a four-month hiatus, without fanfare, I return to the blogosphere--tentatively but with hope for a longer lasting effort. Much--too much, in fact, to hope to play catch-up--has transpired these past months, and there is much on my mind. And not just Iraq. But that, of course, looms large, and so I will deal with it largely. I'm not precisely sure what direction this will now take, though I suspect it might veer in a more news-based direction. And a color-change might also be in the works--something about the red, green, and white rubs me the wrong way. Then again, I obviously don't have much of an eye for color as it is. We shall see. But, for now, it's good to be back in blogdom.

2002-11-21T08:50:00.000-05:00

The Kalashnikov at 55. "Everybody's favorite gun" celebrates its 55th anniversary this week. Well, not everybody. Despite my fascination with the Russian assault rifle, I've always been partial to the M-16. Bo Crader of the Weekly Standard compared the two about a year ago, here and here. The M-16 gets somewhat mixed reviews next to the AK-47, although my dad, who served in the Army some time ago, always speaks very highly of the American infantry rifle. From Crader:

Heasley's verdict: "In my opinion the M-16 in the hands of a well trained soldier is a more effective weapon than the AK-47, which is designed for the less sophisticated 'soldier.' "

"The M-16 is a super-accurate rifle," explains Steve Shriner, a spokesman for Soldier of Fortune magazine. "It's a superior weapon for sighting and accuracy. [It] dominates firefights, but, in combat, it's six one way and half a dozen the other." Point well taken. Choosing a weapon is a luxury few can afford when Charlie's gotten through the wire or Osama bin Laden's head pops into your field of fire.

2002-11-21T08:33:00.000-05:00

Le Beaujolais Nouveau 2002 est arrivé. That is all.

2002-11-20T05:13:00.000-05:00

The Evil Cellular Telephone. Robin Wallace doesn't like cell phones, and neither do I.

And then there are the friends and family who whip out their phones and dial up, or answer a call from, someone else when they're supposed to be dining, visiting or driving in a car with you. Or the people who will no longer agree on any definitive social plans, responding to every attempt to nail down a specific time or place with, "Well, just call me on my cell." Or the people who call you from their cell phones while they're driving, and make you hang on while they drive through tunnels and mountains and the connection fades in and out.

Maybe we can't [figure out that it's bad manners] for the same reason a close friend of mine wears her cell phone and pager strapped around her waist like a gun holster, swaggering into rooms under the technological weight of her own importance. A generation ago, she might have been the woman swathed in jewels and furs. Maybe technological devices are the jewelry of the new millennium, and what good is having them if you can't flash them around? How better to prove to the world you really are somebody than to be in constant demand by an unseen dialing throng?

Scenarios we all know too well. Cell phones are absolutely everywhere. Every Tom, Dick, and Harry walking down the street have them glued to their ears. Nary does a day pass that a class is not interrupted by the annoying musical ring of one of these portable nuisances. More than that, people now conduct conversations, previously held in private, in public places--planes, trains, restaurants, supermarkets, etc.--revealing embarrassing details about their lives. I agree that in an emergency they might be useful--a broken-down car, maybe, or an injury out in the park; and maybe even for certain professions: doctors, top government officials. But beyond that--and maybe I'm old-fashioned (ok...no "maybe" about it)--what legitimate purpose do they serve? Do people really need to be able to be contacted at all hours of the day, anywhere in the world? Is it really so important that someone be reached immediately, right then and there? Can't callers wait fifteen minutes, or an hour, or half a day until you get home? Are people afraid they're going to miss something? What did people do five or ten years ago when cell phones were a luxury or were simply "car phones"? I guess patience is no longer a virtue.

Wallace will be buying one this weekend, and there's where I go my separate way. I will not now or ever be purchasing a cell phone. If people need to contact me, they can simply wait until I get home and can answer my home line or send me an e-mail (I'm not that far gone). I've inherited from my old man a repugnance for the sound of a ringing telephone (although mine is somewhat less extreme: he's actually disconnected the phone once or twice), and, no, thank you, I would rather not have a piece of plastic strapped to my waist and ringing at odd hours of the day.

2002-11-20T03:04:00.000-05:00

The Final Word (?) from Minnesota. James Lileks has the goods, yet again, on that Wellstone memorial/rally:

Everyone is sick of the election rehash, and sicker still of the Wellstone memorial story, but: one detail needs relating. Got it first hand the other day from someone who attended. As they were waiting for the event to begin, they noticed a big beach ball bouncing around the crowd, traveling up the stands and down, back, forth. A beach ball.

Who brings a beach ball to a memorial for a dead man? Can you imagine standing in the garage, keys in hand, patting your pockets for wallet and sunglasses, thinking have I forgotten anything for this somber event? Oh, right! An inflatable sphere the crowd can bat around for fun. It’s not a memorial service without one.

I’m surprised no one dove from the stage after their eulogy, and surfed the crowd to the concession stand.

2002-11-20T02:49:00.000-05:00

Enter Stage Left. Algore's fixin' to run again, says Michael Kelly in a wonderfully caustic column. Interviews, a book, self-inflation....it all adds up. He's back, and he's moving left. But I don't think this is a new Algore by any means at all. He's the same old opportunist that he's always been. Finding few Democrat leaders speaking out, he began inching left with his anti-war speech some months ago. Now that the Democratic party is decidedly heading left, Algore's going all the way and beating his liberal buddies to it: socialized medicine. Go for it, Al. Not only will I enjoy seeing him get trounced in '04, but it'll be good to have Algore--and his daily changing opinions and personae--to kick around some more.

2002-11-19T18:38:00.000-05:00

Fashion Sense. Some teenage girls are asking stores to carry more modest clothing. Good for them.

2002-11-19T18:33:00.000-05:00

Quote of the Day. "People go kind of crazy when they see us pointing arrows. I call it the tree-hugger factor." --Mark Ellenberg, President of the Bowfishing Association of America, from "As Bowmen Hunt, Surfers Feel Like Targets"

2002-11-18T02:26:00.000-05:00

Monday Morning Polemics. Vox Day is never one to hold any punches. Today, this Libertarian Southern Baptist goes after Republicans:

Have these Republican whores accommodated the wishes of their strongest allies, the Christian Right, by drawing on the support of more than 70 percent of the populace to ban the disgusting and murderous abomination that is partial-birth abortion? No, they don't wish to appear extreme. Are they willing to fire the bureaucratic losers who totally failed in their responsibilities to defend the country on Sept. 11? No, it's more important to avoid offending Saudi Arabia and other financial supporters of violent Islamic expansion. Do they speak out against clerics calling for the mass extermination of Jews? No, instead they condemn Jerry Falwell and Franklin Graham.

Republicans seldom do as they promise, nor do they ever live up to their professed ideals.

Now, I'm not close, or even on the road, to abandoning the Republican Party; I dislike libertarianism almost as much as I loathe liberalism. But Day's are sentiments with which I can agree, although I do think the party does sometimes live up to its ideals. When will the GOP stop playing games with these important, literally life-and-death issues? This business of skirting issues seems to be an all-too-familiar tactic of the Bush administration (as much as I love the guy) and especially of the Rove political machine (and I'm convinced it exists). First, for example, it was wavering on immigration and granting amnesty to illegal immigrants--all in an apparent effort to court the Hispanic vote. And now it's this disgusting aversion to taking a decisive and, yes, potentially divisive stand on abortion. It's great to oppose abortion, as the Republican platform does and as most of its members and elected officials do, but what's that belief worth if you're not going to put it into action, especially when you're in control? In the wake of the election, Trent Lott, a man who has in the past been prone to placating Democrats in the Senate, declared that the partial-birth bill would be brought up, which reportedly was cause for grave concern over at the White House. Like it or not, the Christian Right is the GOP's base (do Ralph Reed and Georgia ring a bell?), and I get the feeling that the administration might be taking their support for granted while trying to broaden the base with minorities and soccer moms. And withholding funds from international organizations that support abortion, while important, just isn't going to fire up pro-lifers. These people aren't likely, as a result, to become libertarians, but they are likely to stay home next time around. And in a country that is so closely divided, even considering the recent victories, that could be a critical blow.

2002-11-18T00:46:00.000-05:00

Academic Freedom. InstaPundit links to a story about a popular and talented professor at Brooklyn College (in the CUNY system) being denied tenure, apparently on the basis of a new requirement in some tenure processes, "collegiality." This professor, Robert David Johnson, apparently criticized a post-September 11 panel that included no supporters of the US or Israel, and he also--gasp!--suggested to a hiring panel to focus on applicants' skills rather than sex. The New York Sun reports here and here. A group of notable professors have come to Johnson's defense, including Yale's very own Donald Kagan. Kagan (far and away the best professor at Yale) has taken some unpopular stands himself, including advocating, while dean in the early 1990s, a Western studies program and making criticisms similar to Johnson's after 9-11-01 (expressed in a Yale Daily News column). Of course, Kagan was tenured long, long ago and, indeed, was recently appointed Sterling Professor of History and Classics, the university's highest honor.

As far as I know, this hasn't been too much of a problem at Yale. However, back in 1999-2000, the History Department did deny tenure to a young professor for vague reasons (something regarding publication of his dissertation, but not his scholarship or teaching, per se). It was well known that the fellow was a Marxist and denied that the Cold War happened, but this surely couldn't have been too unsettling to the left-leaning faculty. Even worse, though, he had criticized some of the department's procedures and its favoritism, as well as the teaching methods of senior faculty member John Lewis Gaddis, who relies heavily on videotapes in his Cold War lectures. It was rumored that the department's ruling cabal, including Gaddis and Paul Kennedy, stonewalled his tenure. The controversy was short-lived, and the professor left in 2001. But his claims about the department, if true, are certainly troubling. (In defense of Prof. Gaddis, I must say that his class is an appropriate balance of lecture and film and that the videos greatly enhance the material.)

2002-11-17T05:03:00.000-05:00

Telling it like it is. "It's hard to run on your record when you don't have a record. And it's hard to run on your vision when you don't have a vision." --Sen. Zell Miller

2002-11-17T04:30:00.000-05:00

Sex, Lies, and Theology. Religious Left Watch offers some keen insights into promiscuity and sexual morality, adducing the disturbing Religious Declaration on Sexual Morality, Justice, and Healing. The crux (maybe that's not the best word, all things considered) of the statement is this (which RLW also quotes):

Our culture needs a sexuality ethic focused on personal relationships and social justice rather than particular sexual acts. All persons have the right and the responsibility to lead sexual lives that express love, justice, mutuality, commitment, consent, and pleasure. Grounded in respect for the body and for the vulnerability that intimacy brings, this ethic fosters physical, emotional, and spiritual health. It accepts no double standards and applies to all persons, without regard to sex, gender, color, age, bodily condition, marital status, or sexual orientation.

This is dangerous and upsetting on so many levels I don't know where to begin. I'm troubled by this notion that people have a right and responsibility to engage in sexuality in precisely this manner. I know that society now reads our Constitution and laws broadly, but where does it say that we are allowed to--and must--have sex? By what law are we entitled to pleasure? Malcolm Muggeridge, in his typically sardonic way, described it thus:

The doctrine behind this great dedication to sex is that sexual indulgence, being part of the pursuit of happiness, is part of the American heritage. Fortunate citizens of the Land of the Free are as entitled to sex as they are to the vote.

And he wrote that in the 60s. The idea of a right to sex is clearly nothing new, but to have a responsibility to practice this type of sex is. (In fact, this is the first time I've come across such a suggestion.) And I really don't know quite to make of it, beyond its utter absurdity.

Conspiculously absent from this litany of the qualities of "ethical" sex ("love, justice, mutuality, commitment, consent, and pleasure")--as well as from popular conceptions--are unity and procreation, the touchstones of traditional Christian sexual morality. I guess we're not responsible for assuring the continued existence of humankind. Rather, consent is the defining characteristic of modern secular morality, which is being adopted by liberal faith denominations; it is, to them, the only element that makes sex morally good or bad. This "orthodox secularism," as Robert George calls it, permits all forms and varieties of sexual relations, just so long as there's consent. When adherents of this morality do oppose (usually weakly) promiscuity, it is not because of the moral damage it wreaks but rather the danger of disease or unwanted pregnancies (a point which George also makes)--both of which are alleviated by safe sex (contraceptives, sex ed, etc.) and by abortion-on-demand, which can be justified, according to this statement, by faith.

The declaration is also indicative of the emphasis liberal morality places on the body, assuming that body and soul (if even acknowledged to exist) are somehow separable. This ethic further assumes that "respect for the body" will lead to "spiritual health" while ignoring the intense spiritual harm that promiscuous sex, pursued merely for maximum physical pleasure, causes. Of course, this focus on the flesh isn't surprising--a sexual ethic which enshrines pleasure must be body-centered.

It can't be denied, either, that this statement, as RLW says, seems to justify sex with children. After all, "no double standards," right?

One more point (and there could be many, many more). The declaration calls for "theological reflection that integrates...insights about sexuality from medicine, social science, the arts, and the humanities." I don't want to suggest that ignorance of medical breakthroughs produces sexual bliss (still, forced to choose, I would take faith over medicine any day), but what can the other three possibly contribute to a theological reflection on sexuality? That traditional sexual morality is a means of oppression used by the elite white male patriarchy, as the social sciences teach us? That inserting bull whips into the body and flinging fecal matter around are creative acts of beauty, as modern art demonstrates? That animals are appropriate partners and that infants are permissibly killed, as some strains of philosophy, the center of the humanities, argue? Maybe centuries ago, long before social science, the arts and humanities may have been fruitful fodder for reflection. But, even then, the very best of art and literature, with some exceptions, drew from theology, rather than the other way around.

I had suspected but never fully realized how deeply the sickness of our culture penetrated even religion.

2002-11-16T15:24:00.000-05:00

Shameless Skanks. Michelle Malkin on "underdressed" (that's putting it mildly, isn't it?) young girls:

"Well, where's her mama?!" That's exactly the question I ask myself whenever we encounter some young Aguilera look-a-like and her friends hanging out at the mall with their thong straps glittering out in the open, their hip-huggers succumbing perilously to the forces of gravity, their noses and eyebrows and tongues marred with metal, and their faces plastered with red light district makeup.

Where were their mamas--and dadas--to teach them that slutty is not sexy? Gutter talk is for vagrants, not for young ladies who want respect from the world. Promiscuity isn't a sign of maturity. It's a sign of self-loathing. Being "comfortable in your own skin" doesn't require having to bare every last inch of it in public.

From Madonna, to Britney and Christina, to the under-dressed teens at the mall, legions of girls have been raised to believe that letting it all hang out is the only true path to womanhood. Christina Aguilera is a sad symptom of this cultural zeitgeist. Stripped of her inhibitions and sense of self-restraint, it's much too late for mama to put her peep-show-profiteering daughter's shirt back on.

This naked truth cannot be disguised: The era of radical feminist sexual liberation has produced a generation of shameless skanks.

Exactly. And still we wonder why kids the young have sex at ever earlier ages. Are there words to describe a culture that permits and encourages slutty attire and behavior? I'd suggest "paralyzed," but that implies a sort of stasis, and "regression" really falls short, too--going back in time might actually be good in this case. Perhaps "decadent" captures it best, or "infested," or "rotting."

2002-11-15T18:53:00.000-05:00

A Stupid White Man. I visited Michael Moore's site today, as I sometimes do, to check for his latest screed. And much to my amazement, he has taken down his pre-election rant, in which he said Bush and Republicans would receive a drubbing. Glenn Reynolds mentioned it last night, which I must have missed. And fear not, Rachel Lucas has preserved Moore's piece in the hearty fisking she gave it last week. Geez, and I thought only Republicans and corporate executives distorted the truth.

2002-11-15T17:47:00.000-05:00

Cruisin' for a Bruisin'. Iraq fires on allied jets over southern no-fly zone. Again, I say, take 'em out.

2002-11-15T17:43:00.000-05:00

Another Victory. Republicans win control of North Carolina House after recounts confirm two victories (including the defeat of the sitting Majority Leader).

2002-11-15T01:15:00.000-05:00

"Armey of One." Fred Barnes on the departure of Dick Armey. We're losing a good bit more this year, too:

Armey is part of a troika of influential conservative Republicans who are leaving Congress at the end of the year. Senator Jesse Helms of North Carolina has been the backbone of the conservative forces on Capitol Hill for three decades. Senator Phil Gramm of Texas has been the brains, debating for conservative issues so effectively that liberals fear taking him on. And Armey is the theorist, the policy wonk who hates politics but loves calculating the marginal impact of tax rate cuts on individual income.

2002-11-15T00:53:00.000-05:00

In Whose Name? James Taranto, who writes the Best of the Web Today for OpinionJournal, has been listing some of the "names" that have appeared on the Not in Our Name petition. Here are some that I was able to mine out:

Du Mba Sanostrich of the "Neville Chamberlain Society for Denial of the Obvious"
Adolf Schicklgruber, "Künstler, Wien, Österreich" (FYI: Hitler's father was born illegitimately and bore the name Shicklgruber for some years until he finally took his father's name "Hitler." Hence, instead of Adolf Hitler, we could have had Adolf Schicklgruber, whose absurd name may have changed history.)
Ida Rutherbee Blind, "Pres., Concerned Citizens Against the Teaching (or Learning) of History
Cray Z. Fuchs, "Professor; University of Leftist Idology (sic); nude model"
Jonathan S. Tuttle, "US Army, Capt., 4077 Mobile Army Surgical Hospital" (M*A*S*H* fans should recognize that one.)
Litton Mandrake, "Supreme Court Judge, State of Connecticut" (The was Craig T. Nelson's (COACH!) character in The Skulls.)
Weldon M. Rumproast, "Self absorbed fool; comfort to enemies of US"
Al Koholic, "professor of mixology"
I.P. Daley, "Urologist"
Ima Yousfel Edeeaht
Durt Eeter, "famous liberal archetype"

2002-11-14T13:42:00.000-05:00

Can't they get by on $150,000? The Senate voted itself a pay raise yesterday--or, rather, defeated a motion that would have stopped the automatic 3.1% increase. I'm all for compensating our legislators and making it worthwhile for good people to serve. But come on. Not getting a raise isn't going to put any of these people in the poor-house. And of course, this was voted on in the lame-duck session, with only 36 senators willing to stand up against the hike. I'm no fan of Russ Feingold, but God bless this guy. He makes these motions every year, only to see them fail, and he turns down the raises year after year. Unfortunately, few others are so principled.

2002-11-13T22:42:00.000-05:00

Crimes against humanity. From Kenneth Pollack's The Threatening Storm (p. 123):

This is a regime that will gouge out the eyes of children to force confessions from their parents and grandparents. This is a regime that will crush all of the bones in the feet of a two-year old-girl to force her mother to divulge her father's whereabouts. This is a regime that will hold a nursing baby at arm's length from its mother and allow the child to starve to death to force the mother to confess. This is a regime that will burn a person's limbs off to force him to confess or comply. This is a regime that will slowly lower its victims into huge vats of acid, either to break their will or simply as a means of execution. This is a regime that applies electric shocks to the bodies of its victims, particularly their genitals, with great creativity. This is a regime that in 2000 decreed that the crime of criticizing the regime (which can be as harmless as suggesting that Saddam's clothing does not match) would be punished by cutting out the offender's tongue. This is a regime that practices systematic rape against its female victims. This is a regime that will drag in a man's wife, daughter, or other female relative and repeatedly rape her in front of him. This is a regime that will force a white-hot metal rod into a person's anus or other orifices. This is a regime that employs thalium poisoning, widely considered one of the most excruciating ways to die. This is a regime that will behead a young mother in the street in front of hre house and children because her husband was suspected of opposing the regime. This is a regime that uses chemical warfare on its own Kurdish citizens--not just on the fifteen thousand killed and maimed at Halabja but on scores of other villages all across Kurdistan. This is a regime that tested chemical and biological warfare agents on Iranian prisoners of war, using the POWs in controlled experiments to determine the best ways to disperse the agenst to inflict the greatest damage.

He runs with the worst of them. Do these "No Blood for Oil" and "Not in Our Name" people know whom they're defending? Probably. And they probably don't care either. Even ignoring the WMD, this is reason enough, at least for me, to take him out. And they can do it in my name, too.

2002-11-13T17:53:00.000-05:00

I was kind of hoping for a Kalashnikov. But I guess I'll take the Dragunov Sniper Rifle...precise, efficient, one-of-a-kind. (And NO, I do not condone the Beltway Snipers.)

Which Firearm are you?
brought to you byStan Ryker

2002-11-12T17:48:00.000-05:00

Stung by Losses, Party Buzzes About Its Leader. By now it's old news that Terry McAuliffe is in dire straits. But this description of Clinton was priceless, I thought: "toxic to many swing voters." He's repugnant to me, too, but I guess all those straight-Republican ballots don't qualify me as a swing voter.

2002-11-12T16:00:00.000-05:00

Ashamed to Be a Yalie. Yesterday, at this fine university, Students for Justice in Palestine set up a mock terrorist checkpoint--complete with military-style uniforms and cardboard rifles--and stopped students and demanded ID. I'm flabbergasted..and appalled. Just one more reason why I despise demonstrations and protests. And these leftists with their Berkeley-type shenanigans are darn lucky I didn't pass through that part of campus. Here's a good simulation: walk into a cafe or club, leave a backpack in the corner, walk out, and then watch as the crowd becomes hysterical and runs out, not sure whether this sack contains explosives or not. Of course, this really wouldn't work so well here in the US since it requires years of terrorism to condition such a response. Or how about one of those dead-for-a-day things high schools like to do around prom time in order to increase drunk-driving awareness? Go to a dining hall and pick about twenty random people--"You're dead." "You were blown to bits." "You, too." Then pick another fifty--"You've been wounded." "You now have shrapnel in your intestines." "You've lost a leg." "You're blind for life." Find about a thousand others--"You've lost a friend or loved one." And for everyone else--"You must now live in fear."

2002-11-12T15:44:00.000-05:00

In Defense of "Privatization." WFB on political word choice. Here's the money sentence: "The word 'privatize' seemed to convey greed and risk and submission to Snidely J. Whiplash, the snaky character who sneeringly ties helpless damsels across the railroad track."

2002-11-12T15:30:00.000-05:00

Drudge Approaches One Billion. The Drudge Report will reach one billion hits today. It's the first site I read in the morning and the last before I go to bed at night--and a hundred times in between. Congrats.

2002-11-11T22:55:00.000-05:00

Defending the Flag. Support the Citizens' Flag Alliance, which is advocating a flag desecration amendment.

2002-11-11T15:12:00.000-05:00

Patriots. "What pity is it/That we can die but once to serve our country." --from Joseph Addison's Cato, Act IV, scene iv

"I only regret that I have but one life to lose for my country." --Nathan Hale

2002-11-11T14:54:00.000-05:00

Too often true. "Posterity who are to reap the blessings will scarcely be able to conceive the hardships and sufferings of their ancestors." --Abigail Adams

2002-11-11T14:44:00.000-05:00

Pro Patria Mori. From The Bard:

Old men forget; yet all shall be forgot,
But he'll remember with advantages
What feats he did that day. Then shall our names,
Familiar in his mouth as household words,
Harry the King, Bedford and Exeter,
Warwick and Talbot, Salisbury and Gloucester,
Be in their flowing cups freshly rememb'red.
This story shall the good man teach his son;
And Crispin Crispian shall ne'er go by,
From this day to the ending of the world,
But we in it shall be remembered--
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother; be he ne'er so vile,
This day shall gentle his condition;
And gentlemen in England, now a-bed,
Shall think themselves accurs'd they were not here;
And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks
That fought with us upon Saint Crispin's day.
--Henry V, Act IV, scene iii

2002-11-11T12:33:00.000-05:00

Historical Atlas. Wars, Massacres, and Atrocities of the Twentieth Century depicted graphically by death toll. The table of contents links to graphs of other events of the 20th century, as well as to maps, showing various elements of the world (e.g. types of government, technology, etc.). Extremely interesting. (Via James Robbins at NRO; his Veterans Day column on the remaining World War I vets deserves a read, too.)

2002-11-11T00:43:00.000-05:00

Veterans Day 2002. Please take some time today to remember our men and women, dead and alive, who defended our nation, our lives, and our freedom throughout America's history, as well as those who are currently fighting around the world for us. I'm proud--each and every day, but especially today--of the veterans in my family: my great-grandfather and grandfather, both now deceased, who served in the Navy during World War II; my other grandfather, still with us, who fought in the Army Air Force in the Pacific; and my dad who served, in peacetime, as an Army Ranger. I pray that my service might not be needed, but should it be, I could imagine no greater honor than to fight for this great land of ours. To my grandfathers and to all our veterans, past and present, I dedicate this poem. May we never break faith with them.

"In Flanders Fields"
by John McCrae

In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.

2002-11-10T13:48:00.000-05:00

Conradiana. "The white man gazed straight before him into the darkness with wide-open eyes. The fear and fascination, the inspiration and the wonder of death--of death near, unavoidable, and unseen, soothed the unrest of his face and stirred the most indistinct, the most intimate of his thoughts. The ever-ready suspicion of evil, the gnawing suspicion that lurks in our hearts, flowed out into the stillness round him--into the stillness profound and dumb, and made it appear untrustworthy and infamous, like the placid and impenetrable mask of an unjustifiable violence. In that fleeting and powerful disturbance of his being the earth enfolded in the starlight became a shadowy country of inhuman strife, a battle-field of phantoms terrible and charming, august or ignoble, struggling ardently for the possession of our helpless hearts. An unquiet and mysterious country of inextinguishable desires and fears." --Joseph Conrad, "The Lagoon"

2002-11-10T13:44:00.000-05:00

Pelosi Labeled Pragmatic, Inclusive. ...and liberal...very, very liberal.

2002-11-09T14:53:00.000-05:00

The Left against Democracy? By their rhetoric, the Left claim to be (small-d) democrats. That is, of course, unless the demos, the people, vote contrary to Democrats' wishes. A case in point is Ross Baker, who simply cannot believe what the American people did on Tuesday. The Republican victory was a slim one, indeed, and any perceived mandate must be approached warily. But it was a clear endorsement of the president and his agenda--not free reign to legislate without restraint, but an approval of the president's general course of action. Baker's column reads like one of Ms. Streisand-Brolin's ghost-written "truth alerts," although the man is a professor of political science. And having already dissected Barbra's response, I won't give Mr. Baker the same treatment--they just make it too easy. Let me just mention one thing. Baker cites in disbelief the fact that 21 of 24 and 230 of 246 NRA-endorsed Senate and House candidates won on Tuesday. It's actually kind of humorous that he has himself in such tizzy--how could people actually support the right to bear arms?!?! So absurd is the thought to him that he casts aside any notion that Americans actually support gun rights and attributes the result to the Marxist phenomenon of "false consciousness"--the people have been deceived into surrendering their true interests and adopting someone else's. Where have we heard this before? Oh, yes. Demonstrators in Hungary in 1956 and Czechoslovakia in 1968 couldn't possibly have wanted freedom; they were fooled by "reactionaries." And the Soviets brutally put down the resistance. (Strategic reasons factored in, as well.) But, hey, if that's the company the Left wants to keep, I'm not going to stop them.

2002-11-09T13:33:00.000-05:00

A Happy Time (well, at least not for Babs). Barbra Streisand-Brolin has finally posted her response to the election. It sure took her long enough. I guess she had to wait until she read enough of Krugman and Kristof to know what to think.

It is a sad time. The Democratic Party was not able to articulate a clear message - was not able to convey the very real and very many differences between the two parties. They did not allow the American people to make a meaningful choice. They never articulated what it was we were voting for, and in doing so they failed to motivate their base to go to the polls. The Republicans, on the other hand, spoke directly to their constituency and gave them a reason to vote.

"Not able to articulate a clear message"? That's exactly right, Barbra, and you did your part to guarantee as much. You "endorsed" every single Democratic candidate for House and Senate, including pro-life, anti-tax, pro-war, and, dare I say, even conservative Democrats. Boy, that'll sure fire up the base. And it takes more than the Republican base to win elections. The GOP spoke directly to the middle, to the independents, and gave them a reason to vote, all while also appealing to their traditional constituencies. Oh, if only you had held one more gala, sung an extra song, sent one more fax, fallen for another internet hoax--the party would surely have been victorious then.

Instead of standing up to the Republicans and indicating their differences, the Democrats went along with the president on tax cuts and Iraq- and were voted out anyway. The American people want leaders - they want people who convey a strong message and stand for something. The Republicans have done this well...even though what they stand for is against the interests of most Americans. Now it is time for the Democrats to stop operating out of fear.

I can only ask, once again, why you, Barbra, endorsed those selfsame Democrats who voted for lower taxes and for standing firmly against Iraq. You are right about one thing: the American people do want leaders, and they've found a great one in George W. Bush. And, geez, the Republican party must have the voting public hoodwinked, huh? To force the electorate to vote for them, even though they stand "against the interests of most Americans"--those wily Republicans! Maybe most Americans actually agree with the GOP. Nah, couldn't be.

Because the differences are there. The Republicans are excited to, in Trent Lott's words, "roll" their agenda through the Congress. And it's an agenda all of us will have to live with - for the worse. Tax cuts for the rich, destruction of the environment, a prescription drug plan that covers only a very small percentage of seniors, an inadequate pension reform bill, an overly aggressive foreign policy - that's all on the agenda.

And there is a horde of extremist federal judicial nominees, deemed by the Democratically-controlled Senate as too conservative for confirmation, just waiting to get rushed through the nomination process. These judges are guaranteed to threaten our civil liberties, a woman's right to choose, civil rights and environmental protection. And they will be around long after the president is gone.

Now wait a second here. I thought you wanted to stop operating out of fear, and yet all you want to do is scare people. Hey, if they didn't buy it this time, they'll definitely go for it next time. Right? Fear and lies--that's your strategy, Barbra, that's all you've got. This "tax cuts for the rich" business obviously doesn't work, and, what's more, it's simply not true. I seem to recall my parents receiving their Bush-tax-cut check--and they are a far cry from being rich. And, really, when's the last time Republicans destroyed a natural wonder? Yes, they do support drilling in ANWR, but that can be done safely. And the Alaskan people support it. But I guess you and your Sierra Club friends know what's best for Alaska. Didn't Mary Landrieu support limited oil and gas development in the Gulf of Mexico? Yes, but she's no Democrat, is she, since she voted for that tax cut? That didn't stop you from endorsing her. And then there are those pesky judicial nominees, who must be evil and extremist since Senate Democrats found them "too conservative for confirmation." Actually, only a select cadre of left-liberals thought so and prevented a floor vote, where many of these candidates would have passed with bipartisan support. And their definition of an extremist? Anyone who refuses to find a right to abortion in the Constitution.

So as we move forward, I, for one, will continue to urge the Democrats, even as, or especially as, the minority/opposition party, to be vocal in conveying the differences to the American public. Because this is not the time to give up fighting for what is important. There is too much at stake. The Democrats must once again return to their roots as a strong and directed party fighting for the betterment of the poor, working and middle-class Americans that make up the great majority of our country.

The Democrats who stood up to the president and showed strong opposition leadership were the ones that won on Tuesday. Hopefully, by 2004, the party - and the people - will get the message.

And who were those Democrats who opposed the president with forceful leadership and were victorious? I'm drawing a blank here. And if there were any such people, they most likely won because they were incumbents. But Democrats, do not fear--Barbra's on your side. She's going to be your shadow for the foreseeable future, telling you what's best for America, reminding you what the Democratic party should stand for. If you don't define the difference between the two parties, don't worry, because she will. And she knows. She's a national celebrity, after all. Wait, what was I saying? Democrats, be very afraid.

2002-11-08T19:13:00.000-05:00

Seeing the Truth. Good news from Georgia, where three Democratic state senators have switched parties, giving Republicans control of that body, 29-27, for the first time since Reconstruction. And Governor-Elect Sonny Perdue himself is also a political convert.

2002-11-08T16:31:00.000-05:00

Honor Our Troops. Take a moment to add your name to a Thank You message to our men and women in uniform. It is National Military Appreciation Month, and, of course, Monday is Veterans Day. Show them your support.

2002-11-08T01:41:00.000-05:00

Bases, Left and Right. Peggy Noonan takes a look at Democratic soul-searching and makes a great comparison of the Republican and Democratic bases.

The Democrat's base is left-wing. It is a worse problem for the Democrats than the Republicans' base is for them. The Republican base is simply essentially conservative; Republicans in power are conservative too but less so; they live in what they call the real world. They achieve what they can, explaining to the base what is possible. Sometimes the base gets balky, but mostly it follows. After all, they're all conservatives together.

The problem the Democrats have with their base is that it isn't liberal in the way the Democratic leadership in general is liberal. It is left-wing, and some parts of it are way left-wing. The last socialists are there, the warriors of race and class; there are environmentalists who want to set loggers on fire, people who think George W. Bush killed Paul Wellstone, activists whose only concern in the world is abortion rights, and people who support capital punishment for only one crime, smoking in public. Soon they will demand the death penalty for smoking in private. (Are there radicals and nuts in the Republican base? Sure. But 20 years of observation tells me there aren't as many and they don't have the same clout. Moreover, Republican candidates are somewhat protected from them. The protection comes from the media, which hate nutty right-wingers more than they dislike Republicans.)

The left-wing base of the Democratic party assails its leaders for supporting war in Iraq--they're spineless sell-outs. They vote for Nader. The (non-nutty) right-wing base of the GOP, for the most part, still votes Republican, even when the party compromises on school vouchers or immigration and doesn't push hard enough on abortion. They don't vote for Pat Buchanan. Our government--especially when divided and almost evenly split--requires compromise to function effectively, a process which often produces middle-of-the-road solutions. As a result, left-liberal idealists and utopians, demanding action right here and now, tend to abandon their elected officials; conservatives, attuned to reality and aware of its limitations, are more likely to stick it out, if only because the spirit of the party reflects their beliefs when government does not. Partly, I think this speaks to liberals' (or maybe just ideologues in general?) preference for ideas and conservatives' for principles--in the sense that Metternich understood them: an idea is like a fixed gun in a fortress, able to fire in only one direction, but a principle is a gun fixed on a revolving base, capable of multidirectional fire. The Democratic base, therefore, is much more difficult to accommodate, a particular problem when that party must appeal to increasing numbers of moderate to moderate-conservative voters.

2002-11-08T00:18:00.000-05:00

The Word Is Out. Thanks to Religious Left Watch and Atheist to a Theist for graciously linking to this humble blog. I need not remind you that they are always worth reading.

2002-11-08T00:12:00.000-05:00

The Good Fight. "Only as children of God are we equal; all other claims to equality--social, economic, racial, intellectual, sexual--only serve in practice to intensify inequality. For this reason Your commandment to love our fellow men follows after, and depends upon, the commandment to love God." --Malcolm Muggeridge, Jesus Rediscovered

2002-11-07T23:10:00.000-05:00

Back in Business. The restored Senate leadership:

Agriculture: Thad Cochran (Mississippi)
Appropriations: Ted Stevens (Alask.)
Armed Services: John Warner (Virg.)
Banking: Richard Shelby (Alab.)
Budget: Don Nickles (Okla.)
Commerce: John McCain (Ariz.)
Energy: Pete Domenici (N. Mex.)
Environment: James M. Inhofe (Okla.)
Finance: Chuck Grassley (Iowa)
Foreign Relations: Richard Lugar (Ind.)
Governmental Affairs: Susan Collins (Maine)
Health and Education: Judd Gregg (N. Hamp.)
Intelligence (Select): Pat Roberts (Kans.)
Judiciary: Orrin Hatch (Utah)
Small Business: Kit Bond (Missouri)
Veterans Affairs: Arlen Specter (Penn.)

And to think I once cringed at the mention of Arlen Specter. Come to think of it, I still do (maybe it's that whole "not proven" business), but it's a good cringe compared to my reaction to current Chairman Jay Rockefeller (W. Virg.).

2002-11-07T13:32:00.000-05:00

Spin As He May... (Soon-to-be former?) DNC Chairman Terry McAuliffe responded to the election results yesterday. Several points are worth looking at.

So where do we find ourselves now? Basically the same place we were after the 2000 election. At 50-50. Parity. Not much has changed. As I said, the Republican advantage was a tactical advantage, not an issue advantage. Last night's results simply don't reflect an ideological tip in favor of the Republicans.

Almost but not quite. In fact, the GOP, overall, won 53-47 on Tuesday. And, actually, it was an issue advantage. On the important issues, Republicans had a clear vision and pushed for it. Democrats conceded nearly every issue to the GOP and had nothing but Carville's "it's the economy, stupid" mantra--criticism without a plan.

This election was also fought largely on Republican turf. They clearly had the home-field advantage, with 9 of the 10 competitive Senate races, for example, taking place in states carried by Bush in 2000. But let's take off our Beltway blinders for a second and look at what happened in state races around the country. As I said, it was an extraordinary night for Democratic gubernatorial candidates. Fifty-five percent of Americans will wake up this morning living under a Democratic Governor. We picked up the key Midwestern governorships -- Michigan, Pennsylvania, Illinois and Wisconsin. We flipped governorships in competitive presidential states like Tennessee, Arizona and New Mexico. We won in Kansas, and we scored upsets to elect new Democratic governors in Oklahoma and Dick Cheney's home state of Wyoming.

Come on, Terry, I thought you were going to take those blinders off. 55% of the nation may wake up under Democratic governors in January (not "this morning"), but 100% of the nation will wake up under a Republican House and Senate in about two months and probably, too, in a few weeks when those Missouri results are certified. And let's look more closely at those governorship races. Democrats may have been successful in the Midwest--Pennsylvania is not Midwestern, I should add--and they may have made some gains. But many races were in Democratic states. Hawaii, Massachusetts, Maryland, Rhode Island, Minnesota, and Vermont all went Republican--each one voted for Gore in 2000, with 56%, 60%, 57%, 61%, 48%, and 51%, respectively. Incumbents Roy Barnes in Georgia and Jim Hodges were defeated, and it appears that Don Siegelman in Alabama may also have lost. And McAuliffe's Target #1, Jeb Bush, won a resounding victory in Florida.

Folks, Democrats are in good shape as we look ahead to the upcoming cycle.

Speaking of those blinders... Where've you been, Terry? A unified Republican government may, indeed, make it easier to oppose in 2004, but it is most certainly not a good thing when the media talks about Democrats in disarray, forced to do some soul-searching, when your veteran House minority leader calls it quits, when your Senate Majority leader declares, "This is the worst night I've had." And, yes, Terry, some sources--and not just conservatives--are reporting that your party is "without a national leader." Before you can even think about taking on the Republicans successfully in 2004, all this has to be fixed--not an easy task when the party is going to move leftward and away from the American people in an attempt to define itself. It's going to be a long two years.

2002-11-07T02:07:00.000-05:00

Will Agrees. In my torrent of posts yesterday, I gave mention to Jim Jeffords, who surely looks the fool now, and to Bill Frist, a man on the up and up. George Will had this to say today:

Not all winners and losers were on Tuesday's ballots. Jeffords, who after 34 years in public office as a Republican turned Washington upside down by defecting to support Senate Democrats, now pays the price of his versatility of conviction. And Tennessee Sen. Bill Frist was the chief architect of the Republicans' recapture of the Senate, as candidate-recruiter and resource-allocator. He has made friends among Republican activists and honed skills that may serve him when the president's successor is to be chosen.

Well, great minds do think alike.

2002-11-07T01:12:00.000-05:00

Which Founding Father Are You? Looks like I'm....

Take the quiz.

I think I'm probably closer to John Adams, but, hey, nothing wrong with GW. (By way of Religious Left Watch.)

2002-11-06T12:36:00.000-05:00

Ralph Reed, Ralph Reed, Ralph Reed. Score one for this guy, the GA GOP Chairman. In Georgia: First Republican governor since 1872. Liberal senator defeated. Democratic Speaker of the GA House, a 42-year veteran of that body, its leader for 28 years, and "the most powerful Democrat in Georgia government," ousted. Republican majority in its US House delegation preserved, despite Democrat-led reapportionment. Not too shabby.

2002-11-06T05:00:00.000-05:00

Gingrich's Genius. Bruce Bartlett argues that there has long been a conservative/liberal division in Congress but that it has only become a Republican/Democrat split in recent years as conservative southern Democrats switched party allegiances or as Republicans took over their seats. Bartlett attributes this change to Newt Gingrich:

It was Newt Gingrich who made this happen. For years, Republicans had given a pass to conservative Democrats in Southern states. But he argued that Republicans could never take control of Congress unless they won these seats. Mr. Gingrich then began pressuring these Democrats by putting up strong Republican candidates against them. Once they had to work to get re-elected, most simply retired or became Republicans.

It was Mr. Gingrich's brilliant strategic vision, which said Congress' historical conservative majority could be converted into a Republican majority, that changed the political dynamics. But he was only taking advantage of an existing conservative base in the nation, that had been split between Republicans and Southern Democrats, rather than creating a new conservative electorate.

2002-11-06T04:16:00.000-05:00

If it's any consolation... Republicans have increased their majority in the PA House and maintained it in the Senate--thus ensuring that big-city slickster Ed Rendell will not have free reign in Harrisburg.

2002-11-06T03:09:00.000-05:00

Bush's Achievement.. The NYT sums it up nicely, believe it or not (well, at least in one sentence):

Mr. Bush then risked his own personal political standing by campaigning long and hard for Republicans in close races, energizing the Republican base and reminding undecided voters whose side he was on.

Of course, the choice undecided voters had to make might not have been all that hard--it was either Bush's clearly defined plan for the country or the Democrats' vat of nothing. "They had their chance. They have not led. We will." So said Bush about the Clinton administration, and the same could be said for the year-and-a-half Democratic Senate. Bush has led, and this is his win--and the party's chance to lead. Let's hope we will.

2002-11-06T02:47:00.000-05:00

Replacing Strom. I haven't heard anyone mention this, but we're poised to get a new President Pro Tempore in the Senate, now that Republicans have won control and Strom Thurmond is retiring. Looks like Ted Stevens of Alaska is poised to take over the job.

2002-11-06T02:01:00.000-05:00

Onward and Upward. Republicans have started to GAIN House seats. Plus 2 right now.

2002-11-06T01:57:00.000-05:00

Who's Laughing Now? Not Jim Jeffords, that's for sure.

2002-11-06T01:55:00.000-05:00

Even Sweeter. FoxNews is predicting a Talent victory in Missouri and, hence, the restoration of the Republican majority in the Senate.

2002-11-06T01:51:00.000-05:00

GOP Men of the Night. There are many of them tonight, for sure, and the victorious candidates must rank high. But my vote goes to President Bush, who campaigned extensively with a vision for the country and fired the base up. Don't mess with Texas, and don't mess with Bush. I think Sen. Bill Frist, M.D., who chairs the National Republican Senatorial Committee, has to look pretty good right now, too. If this guy wasn't already going places in the party and in the Senate (I think he was), man, he's a star on the rise now.

2002-11-06T01:33:00.000-05:00

No, the Other One. Republican pro-lifer Steve King (Iowa-5) is going to Congress.

2002-11-06T01:14:00.000-05:00

Somehow, I'm not too upset. Republican Rep. Connie Morella has lost her seat in Maryland's 8th District. Although she was a vote for a Republican speaker and although she served her constituents well, I'm not too sorry to see the liberal Republican head home.

2002-11-06T01:09:00.000-05:00

How Sweet It Is. CNN has just put Republicans, with 19 races still undecided, over the top in the House. Denny Hastert will remain Speaker, and Tom "The Hammer" DeLay will be Majority Leader. Now let's see if we can increase the margin.

2002-11-06T01:05:00.000-05:00

Time To Move South? Well, not quite, although Rendell's election in my home state of PA makes it tempting. Still, the South has proved itself the base of the Republican party. Florida re-elected Jeb Bush, in spite of his being specially targetted by the DNC. Georgia ousted two incumbent Democrats--Sen. Max Cleland and very popular Gov. Roy Barnes, who was rumored to have dark horse potential for 2004. North Carolina elected Liddy Dole to replace Jesse Helms--54 to 45, despite late predictions of Dole's demise. South Carolina replaced the retiring Sen. Strom Thurmond with Lindsey Graham, 54 to 44, and the incumbent Democratic governor was defeated. Louisiana forced incumbent Sen. Mary Landrieu into a (messy) December run-off. In Alabama, the Republican challenger is giving incumbent Gov. Don Siegelman a run for his money--49 to 49 with 97% reporting. And, of course, Texas is Bush Country, but we never doubted that, did we?

2002-11-05T16:13:00.000-05:00

A Mixed Bag...so far. Drudge has put up early exit polls for various races. It's far too early to make any certain predictions, and after 2000, I'm reluctant to believe anything at all until I see the certification form signed by the governor. But for what it's worth:

Minnesota: Coleman up 3 over Mondale
Texas: Cornyn up 8 over Kirk
Missouri: Talent leads Carnahan
Arkansas: Pryor leads Hutchinson easily
North Carolina: Bowles leads Dole
Georgia: Chambliss up 4 over Cleland
Colorado: Strickland leads Allard easily
Louisiana: Landrieu headed for runoff
New Jersey: Lautenberg leads Forrester
South Dakota: Thune up 3 over Johnson
Florida: Bush leads McBride

Looks like we may see some surprises tonight--Georgia maybe?

Meanwhile, Talking Points Memo has also posted some figures (3:49 pm). Just some highlights here: Pryor and Strickland have double-digit leads; Johnson , Mondale, and Shaheen (NH) are all up. Carnahan and Kirk are both down ten. Bowles and Cleland are also down. Doesn't really add too much clarity to Drudge's numbers, although it appears quite likely that Republicans will lose Colorado and Arkansas. Most of the rest remain toss-ups.

2002-11-05T13:01:00.000-05:00

Election 2002 for Dummies. John Fund (always worth reading) has an "hour-by-hour" preview of the election returns, listing states and races by the times the polls close and suggesting possible indicators at each point.

2002-11-04T17:59:00.000-05:00

Quotes of the Day. John Fund has them both in his review of the Coleman-Mondale debate:

The affable Mr. Coleman cleaned Mr. Mondale's grandfather clock.

Mr. Mondale represented an almost perfect time capsule of Great Society liberalism.

2002-11-04T17:52:00.000-05:00

First Test of McCain-Feingold? Robert Alt offers a most astute comment in his election predictions today:

Landrieu (D) won’t make it to 50%, thereby forcing a run-off. What no one has noted is that the run-off will be the first (and in my prediction the only) race in the country to be conducted under the full McCain-Feingold rules. The law kicks in on Wednesday, and the court doesn’t hear the case until December. Thus, even the most unconstitutional provisions--like the restrictions on private groups running advertisements within 60 days of an election--will be in place for this election. This should prove to be very entertaining--particularly if this seat decides the Senate: you will have parties and outside groups likely moving for preliminary injunctions to permit additional spending. Don’t be surprised if the Dems are the first to fire a shot across the McCain-Feingold bow if control of the Senate is at stake.

2002-11-04T14:59:00.000-05:00

Democrats and the Rule of Law. The Yale Daily News is reporting today that a Yale Democratic Party activist and operative is being charged with nine counts of ballot fraud. It's probably not surprising, especially in light of the Democrats' attempts, in recent years, to bypass election laws--e.g. St. Louis (dead voters, dead candidate) and Milwaukee (cigarettes for votes) in 2000, South Dakota in 2002 (more dead voters), New Jersey 2002. The list could go on and on. And with this allegation here in New Haven against a young Democrat, I don't think there's much reason to hope that party will suddenly decide to obey the law; for them, apparently, election laws do not constitute a "controlling legal authority." But the story gets better. Granted, these are just allegations at this point, but I don't know how wise it is to leap blindly to this fellow's defense. But that didn't stop two--a party ward co-chair (everybody is a co-leader of something in these organizations; I think the women's center has at least five "co-coordinators") and the Yale-elected alderman--from coming readily to his defense:

Michael Montano is one of the most ethical, law-abiding people I know. I know this is completely bogus--the worst kind of perversion of justice.

Ah, yes, Montano--only a local activist--has been targeted for persecution for no good reason at all. And the Office of the Chief State's Attorney, the state Elections Enforcement Commission, and the US Postal Inspection Service (who all conducted the investigation) are obviously going on nothing but bald partisanship and personal hatred. But it gets better, this time from the alderman, a Yale junior.

Michael's a real grass-roots progressive working to make this town better. I think it's inexcusable how an honest mistake on his part is being exploited for political gains. I support him fully and believe that he has the best interests of the people of New Haven at heart.

Could there be a better description of the Democratic party in 2002--breaking the law = a grassroots, progressive activity on behalf of the people?