Cato the elder

Why We Need A Third Party

2005-06-30T17:05:00.000-05:00

Let's just say you should scroll down for an explanation:

The recent poll results from Democracy Corps just show we need a third (or even fourth or fifth) party in America. Having only two is an abomination. Parties are what America is all about. Besides, having only two means there are never any parties on my block. If you let me form a party myself, that will soon change.

Furthermore, note that neither party is addressing the real concerns of America. I understand that both parties say they want a drug-free America, but like P.J. O'Rourke said, if that's the case then I want my free drugs now. And don't tell me I'm confusing two different kinds of parties. Have you ever seen a political convention or a candidate addressing his supporters on election night? Streamers, confetti, balloons, alcohol. Count me in. We need as much of that as possible.

Wrong Patient, Dr. Ferguson

2004-09-16T17:49:00.000-05:00

Has George W. Bush Killed Off Conservatism?
Andrew Ferguson
Bloomberg
(9/14/04)

[...]As a guide either to governing or to politicking, conservatism is over, finished, kaput. [...]

The ``laundry-list'' technique that Bush used in that long first half was perfected by Clinton. And it is more than a rhetorical trick. The laundry-list speech, consisting of brief summaries of one program after another, is uniquely suited to a style of governing, and a philosophy of government, that Bush has happily embraced. [...]

Call it the omnicompetent state. Clinton didn't invent it, of course, but he was its pre-eminent salesman, even when he announced, as he did in his 1996 State of the Union address, that the ``era of big government is over.''

[Bush's] recent Medicare expansion alone, by some estimates, will cost $2 trillion over the next 20 years. And several speakers at this month's Republican convention -- including Education Secretary Rod Paige and retired General Tommy Franks -- boasted that for many programs (special education and veterans affairs among them) Bush had spent more in four years than Clinton had in eight. [...]

After opening his convention speech with a promise to ``restrain federal spending, reduce regulation'' and create a ``simpler, fairer'' tax code, Bush promised, in the next paragraph, to ``double the number of people served by our principal job-training program and increase funding for community colleges.''

In the paragraph after that, he said he would create ``opportunity zones'' by adding new provisions to the tax code.

Then he said he would ``offer a tax credit to encourage small business'' and ``provide direct help,'' also known as money, to low-income Americans to buy health insurance. [...]

Also, he'll build health centers in every community in America, and 7 million more homes in the next 10 years, and ``provide a record level of funding'' for education.

Don't forget Pell grants for the middle class, and early intervention programs for kids. And a new reform -- medical savings accounts -- that will further complicate the tax code.

Then he promised to simplify the tax code again.

At the end of his laundry list, Bush made an artful pivot. He attacked his opponent, John Kerry, for ``proposing more than $2 trillion in new federal spending.''

Those Democrats are such spendthrifts.

Like Clinton, Bush pretends all this frenetic governmental activism is revolutionary -- uniquely adapted to our unprecedented new era. (Every era thinks it is unprecedented.) There is much talk about ``expanding choice.'' Underlying it, however, is an idea that's not new at all: the citizen as client, a consumer who fulfills himself by coming to rely on the blandishments of government.

For reasons that aren't clear, Bush insists on calling his approach ``conservatism.'' Surely we can find a more accurate term. Has ``Clintonism'' already been taken?

Interestingly enough, Ferguson comes out with this article at the same time Ramesh Ponnuru of National Review is arguing that Bush's State of the Union speech contained a practical plan for crushing American liberalism and pissing on its corpse. Ferguson is wrong, Ponnuru is right. The expansion of Medicare was painful but you can bet it was going to happen anyway with over 70% of the public supporting it even when informed of the drawbacks. The choice for Republicans was either to make the best of it while they could or let the Democrats demagogue the issue and hand their butts to them in the future. Bush seized the moment and got us health savings accounts, which should do something about exploding health costs by lessening third-party payments.

Many of the other spending increases during the Bush administration have been unnecessary, but Bush has probably governed about as conservatively as he possibly could have, considering the divided electorate. Bush has gotten us fast-track trade authority and significant tax cuts, while working on reforming Social Security, cutting our bloated civil service down to size, and quite possibly completely overhauling the old income tax system (Stephen Moore points out that Bush's piecemeal and stealthy steps towards either a flat tax or a consumption tax have been brilliant).

Ferguson doesn't mention it here, but another frequent conservative complaint is that Bush supported steel tariffs. This is a chapter-and-verse example of how some conservatives are reluctant to engage in the dirty but necessary work of politics: Bush agreed to the tariffs as a bargaining ploy to receive fast-track trade authority, which conservatives have wanted for years. Bush received the authority, then used the looming prospect of a trade war as a convenient excuse to ditch the tariffs, thus cutting our losses. The strenuous criticism of Bush over an issue that no longer matters lends credence to the old stereotype of conservatives as the stupid party; truth be told, conservatives ought to give Bush a medal for pulling this off.

Bush's policy of making government more accountable to the people -- of subverting already-existing government policies to promote personal independence, of turning sheep into shepherds -- deserves at least a certain measure of awe. Modern liberalism cannot survive circumstances where people clearly perceive a link between their freedom to choose and their economic circumstances. Again and again, in both domestic and foreign policy, President Bush has lauded human freedom both for its power to liberate and for its power to serve. The Republic will be well-served by his re-election.

Just In Case You Think the Media Really Has the Goods on Bush...

2004-09-09T20:57:00.000-05:00

Go here, here, here, and here. We'll see if those mea culpas keep coming (scroll down all the way).

Bush Bad, Murderous Ideology Good

2004-09-09T20:47:00.000-05:00

Harkin: Bush Lied To America
TheIowaChannel.com
(9/9/04)

Iowa Sen. Tom Harkin had a strong reaction to newly released records about President George W. Bush's service in the Texas National Guard.

On Wednesday, CBS' "60 Minutes" reported that records kept by Bush's former commanding officer show Col. Jerry Killian was pressured to give Bush positive evaluations.
Bush told reporters that he received no special treatment.

Harkin said these records show that the president hasn't been honest.

"The documentation shows that the president was not being truthful," Harkin said. "The president lied to the American people in the Oval Office when he spoke with Tim Russert. That's why this is news. It goes to the character of George W. Bush."

Tom Harkin doesn't trust our president. Who does he trust? Well, Daniel Ortega, for starters.

Don't Be Fooled By Cheap Imitations!

2004-09-01T22:44:00.000-05:00

Former Dean campaign manager Joe Trippi thinks the GOP is deceiving the public:

Here at the Republican National Convention, you can tell with each passing day just how formidable, disciplined and unabashedly deceptive the Bush campaign will be as it wages political war with John Kerry. [my emphasis]

Trippi apparently wasn't at a certain political convention last month, where Le Partie Democratique -- most of whose partisans consistently rank national security near the bottom when asked to prioritize a list of national issues -- tried to sell the American people a cock-and-bull story about how tough they were on defense issues. Sorry, Joe -- those Republican clothes just don't fit.

Want to Read John Kerry's Anti-American Ravings for Free?

2004-08-26T16:28:00.000-05:00

Go here and read his introduction and epilogue to The New Soldier, a book published by Vietnam Veterans Against the War in 1971.

Then consider two quotes:

"We will not quickly join those who march on Veterans' Day waving small flags, calling to memory those thousands who died for the "greater glory of the United States." We will not accept the rhetoric. We will not readily join the American Legion and the Veterans of Foreign Wars -- in fact, we will find it hard to join anything at all and when we do, we will demand relevancy such as other organizations have recently been unable to provide. We will not take solace from the creation of monuments or the naming of parks after a select few of the thousands of dead Americans and Vietnamese. We will not uphold traditions which decorously memorialize that which was base and grim."

-- John Kerry, from the epilogue to The New Soldier

"I'm John Kerry, and I'm reporting for duty."

-- John Kerry, first line of presidential nomination acceptance speech, 2004 Democratic National Convention

One-Question Sanity Test

2004-08-26T14:16:00.000-05:00

If you can read this article and truthfully imagine the media asking such questions about their coverage of Bush's time in the National Guard, please see a shrink before you hurt yourself or others.

Another Day Closer to Victory...

2004-08-26T12:56:00.000-05:00

The Brothers Judd have a number of good stories up about John Kerry's rapidly sinking presidential hopes. First up, ABC's The Note (third item down) mentions that Kerry wants to debate Bush every week. This is, of course, the classic sign of a campaign that knows it's in trouble: only losing candidates demand debates because they are behind and have nothing to lose; winning candidates avoid them because they can cause potential stumbles.

Next, the Los Angeles Times has Bush pulling ahead in their latest poll. Whoever heard of a candidate getting a surge before his party's convention?

And finally, there is good reason to think that the Current Employment Statistics study (i.e. "the payroll study") by the Bureau of Labor Statistics has been underestimating job growth for quite some time (even the BLS itself is starting to take notice of the problems with its survey). No matter how much the Democrats scream about The Worst Economy Since Herbert Hoover™, their traction with the public is going to be severely limited if people see a good economy with their own eyes.

What else does this leave the Democrats? Caterwauling about the awful war that's been disappearing from the American radar screen ever since June 28th?

Bottom line: From here on out, it's Miller Time.

"Who Cares about Human Rights When We've Got a President to Dethrone?"

2004-08-26T12:37:00.000-05:00

Making Excuses
Nat Hentoff
The Washington Times
(8/16/04)

When Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle and Democratic National Committee Chairman Terry McAuliffe, along with jubilant Democrats, appeared at the Washington premier of Michael Moore's"documentary," "Fahrenheit 9/11," I began to realize that some of us in this divided nation are living in a different, surreal world. Mr. Moore, for example, has said of the terrorists in Iraq:

"They are not the enemy. They are the revolution, the Minutemen, and their numbers will grow -- and they will win. Get it, Mr. Bush?"

Even the news media are unthinkingly describing murderous bombers, beheaders and assassins as "the insurgency." Historically, that phrase often had an honorable connotation, especially in America. George Washington and Samuel Adams were insurgents. Why not just call the jihadists and their allies by their rightful names: homicidal terrorists?

Meanwhile, the growing chorus keening that this is a needless war includes not only Democratic strategists and acolytes, but also Ralph Nader. Fervently joining them are such selective antiwar groups as MoveOn.org and the International Action Center. Have any of such fierce organizational opponents of the Iraq war called for free elections in Cuba or Zimbabwe, as they, in effect, scorn the actual coming of free elections in Iraq? [...]

There are days when I wonder if I'm having a bad dream. "Fahrenheit 9/11," for example, is playing in Cuba to large audiences long conditioned to distorted propaganda.

And, on July 1 of this year, Albert Hunt, the resident liberal on the Wall Street Journal editorial pages, wrote: "For many Iraqis it's a more dangerous country than even (under) the brutal Saddam regime."

Does he include the families of those whose Saddam's regime murdered, who continue to sift through the mass graves hoping to find the identifiable shards of those bodies? [...]

When Saddam's prisons were briefly opened up while Saddam was still in power, there was disclosure in the American media of the gouging of eyes of his prisoners and the raping of women in front of their husbands for whom the torturers wanted to extract information.

But even now, when much more of Saddam's atrocities have been disclosed, a reporter from the New York Observer asked folks on the street if they could say anything positive about Saddam.

In the July 12 Observer, quite a few could. An editor of an arts magazine said of Saddam: "He's committed. Actually, he's not duplicitous. I think he's very much open about what he believes and what he will do with his power, which is actually unlike Bush, who is incredibly duplicitous and lies."

A pity this woman couldn't have voted for that murderously committed leader of his people while Saddam was -- unopposed -- on the ballot in prewar Iraq.

Note how a horrified Hentoff wonders if he's having "a bad dream" when he sees so many Americans protesting the liberation of Iraq. I occasionally read articles by other principled leftists who comically fail to understand why their fellow liberals have been so vehemently against a war of liberation. A conservative would correctly respond that the reigning passion among most war opponents is opposition to America, not freedom for other peoples.

As regards opponents of war, I've long thought the true indicator of their feelings comes from their consistent failure to protest nasty regimes whose behavior does not implicate America. This sort of things runs rampant in the "mainstream press": A few years ago, Time magazine ran an article comparing the pope to Fidel Castro, which caused George Will to remark that liberals appear constitutionally incapable of disapproving of a communist the way they disapprove of, say, Joe Camel.

After the Vietnam War ended, a leftist war opponent started a petition protesting the actions of the Communist governments in Southeast Asia and sent it around to her old buddies in the antiwar movement. As I recall, about 30% of them signed it. I would consider that figure to be roughly representative of the percentage of pacifists and leftists who truly care about human rights abuses regardless of the party committing them. Of course, those are the folks most likely to drift rightward over time. Hentoff is in good company.

"Take Off Your Earrings, Roger -- We've Got Work To Do"

2004-08-26T12:07:00.000-05:00

A Canvasser's Journal
Tom Gogola
The Nation
(8/19/04)

The top-ten responses given by passersby to this New York City street canvasser working for the Democratic National Committee's "Beat Bush" fundraising campaign:

"I love Bush!"
"We love Bush!"
"Why don't you people get a clue already?!"
"Fuck off!"
"Fuck you!"
"I licked Bush this morning."
"Beat Bush? Got a stick?"
"Beat Bush? I'm going to shoot the motherfucker!"
"Politics suck"
"Kerry's a fag."

I was standing under an awning on 8th Avenue between 52nd and 53rd streets in Manhattan, and having a tough go of "Beating Bush" with my canvasser's clipboard; most pedestrians scampered right on by with barely a glance in my direction. [...]

The crew was not happy to be out here, and I, as "team leader," shared their unhappiness. We had already lost the young Polish-American student who'd been assigned to the group. She claimed female troubles moments after we deployed, gave me her clipboard, and was never seen or heard from again (at least I never saw her again). I was left with two teenage boys, one wearing flip-flops (with nary a whiff of irony) and boasting an eyebrow piercing, who wore his red DNC shirt like a hat. He was just about the last person you'd give your money to, and hardly anybody did. Both kids were just out of high school (local fancy-pants schools) and were headed off to college in the fall. By 2:00pm they had raised between them something like 20 bucks and were trying to cajole me into an early bailout. They took long lunches; they recognized as I did that this was a wet and wearying fund-raising scenario compared with the big DNC blowout at Radio City Music Hall a few nights previous. [...]

At least as I experienced the Bush Beating youngsters, they generally were not jaded, world-weary, misanthropic or cynical. Skeptical, yes, and some seemed particularly out-front radical, even beyond the obligatory flesh-piercing and rampant multiculti joie de vivre. But some were so self-centered that I wanted to smack them. [...]

At the Whisky, the requisite slamming of tequila shots would commence, and the endless fillings and refillings of pitchers of beer, all guzzled lustily in the aftermath of another hot day pounding the pavement for elite Democrats. Summertime flings would be launched, canvassing war stories told and retold, there was dorm chat and chants of "Four More Beers!" There were always a couple of cherubic, Olsonish blonde girls wearing those fashionably tacky early-eighties-style skirts that seem to be everywhere this summer; there were earnest former Deaniacs fully committed now to the Anybody But Bush program; there was Abdul, who was going to Howard Law in the fall. I liked Abdul because I could joke with him about Howard's lousy affirmative action policies and he didn't report me to Al Sharpton.

Drinking and "saving democracy" go hand in hand, since, after all, canvassing is one of the most thankless job known to humankind, and it takes a certain kind of personality to be able to stand the work day in and day out without going postal. You must be deaf to verbal abuse and theatrical in some measure; I can do the latter but I'm lousy at the former. For this reason, I burned out after two weeks. They swore at me, I swore right back. They gave me the finger, I flipped the bird in their face. They'd say, "We looove George Bush." I'd offer my sarcastic condolences. This is very bad canvassing form though the tart-tongued Mrs. Heinz Kerry might have approved.

Furthermore, you've got to be able to deal with being totally ignored by the vast majority of passersby, and you must be ready to indulge and engage that angry and gullible old local lefty paranoid who's (hopefully) still got a few dollars' worth of grief to unload on George Bush. They love Nader and Dean and want to blab all afternoon about it, but you've got to wrap it up quick and make the grab for their wallets. These people are in no short supply in New York City, and also provided the worst liberal-bonehead response of all when asked if they wanted to help Beat Bush: "Oh, don't worry, we're going to beat him this time."

I wouldn't be so smug about that if I were you.

Mr. Gogola's account of his fellow volunteer snotnoses highlights a general problem that some liberal Democrats have: they'd like to act up as much as possible but rightly fear having the American public see their gooniness on full display.

"Perplexed"

2004-07-16T02:21:00.001-05:00

Godless Americans Group Announces Endorsement of Kerry-Edwards
Press release
Godless Americans Political Action Committee
(7/14/04)

A newly formed group encouraging political action on behalf of “Godless Americans” has announced that it is endorsing the Sen. John Kerry for president and Sen. John Edwards for vice president in the 2004 national elections.

Ellen Johnson, Executive Director of the Godless Americans Political Action Committee, said that the Kerry-Edwards slate was “the clear choice over President Bush, who has spent the last four years eroding the separation of church and state, ‘packing the courts’ with judges who ignore the First Amendment, and imposing a de-facto Religion Tax through the federal faith-based initiative.”

Johnson said that the PAC grew out of the November, 2002 Godless Americans March on Washington that brought thousands of nonbelievers to the nation’s capitol for a rally on the mall.

“There are nearly 30 million Americans who describe themselves as having no religion,” said Johnson. “This includes Atheists, Freethinkers, Secular Humanists, Rationalists and others who have little or no voice in our political process, and who are often ignored by the major political parties.”

“We intend to change that.” [...]

Johnson said that the Kerry-Edwards slate was “the best alternative to four more years of George Bush and Pat Robertson running the country.”

Fifty million people freed from theocratic tyranny must not be enough.

Neither America Will be Voting for Edwards

2004-07-15T01:37:00.000-05:00

Edwards' Life Clashes With Campaign Message
David Gelernter
Los Angeles Times
(7/11/04)

Sen. John Edwards of North Carolina seems like a decent and likable man, the political equivalent of a handsome, slightly under-ripe bunch of bananas, just the thing if you are looking for bananas and can't find any ripe ones, or don't know the difference. But I can't believe the public is going to buy this act. Last week, I heard an admiring TV pundit explain, to general agreement from his fellows, that Edwards' "two Americas speech" is his No. 1 asset, followed closely by his self-made-man, up-from-the-working-class life story. The problem is, they cancel each other out.

That "two Americas" stuff suggests a country divided by a barricade, with the poor stuck on one side and the rich living it up on the other. [...]

Edwards' life story shows that his message is false. If your story is "poor boy makes good," your message can't possibly be "this is a two-part nation where poor boys are prevented from making good." [...]

Edwards' whole campaign shtick suggests he's a regular guy, just plain folks, a slob like us. So if he got over this barricade (or barrier or whatever it is), why can't anyone who really wants to? Answer: Anyone can, and everyone knows it. [...]

[H]ow exactly is this retired trial lawyer going to convince anyone or his dog that he has the answer to unemployment? That is rich. How many people have been thrown out of work because of exorbitant insurance rates forced by lawsuit terror — rates that close down businesses while obscenely rich trial lawyers get richer? [...]

Yet Edwards is on to something, in a way. Consider this proposition. "There is something out of whack about the connection between the U.S. economy and U.S. society. The wiring is fouled or the pipes are cracked or something, because the wrong activities (like trial lawyering) keep getting encouraged and rewarded. We need to think this problem through and solve it."

That I believe. What I can't believe is that Edwards will ever say it.

He is unlikely to say: "Ladies and gentlemen, why in God's name should I have made so unbelievably much money as a trial lawyer while gardeners, architects, policemen, civil engineers, physical therapists and Marine lieutenants make so (relatively) little? [...]

Nor is he likely to say: "Look at the Democratic presidential ticket, ladies and gentlemen; now look at the Republican ticket. Four rich candidates. Given that Democrats are the party of campaign finance reform, I'm hardly in a position to point out that our screwball campaign finance laws have turned every politician in the country into a money-grubbing beggar, unless he is too rich to have to bother; before long only multibillionaires will dare run for president.

"And speaking of money-grubbing: I'm hardly in a position to preach sacrifice — but isn't there any way to get more of our brightest young people to pass up law degrees or MBAs and become Talmudists, priests, physicists, archeologists?"

Two generations ago, nearly any married woman who felt like it could stay home and actually rear her own children. Today she's practically got to be married to a trial lawyer to afford it. Anyway, that's what people believe. Is this supposed to be progress? Why?

These are "liberal" questions. Too bad there are no liberal (or conservative) politicians with the cojones to ask them.

Here's a scary thought: How many Americans would become trial lawyers if they didn't have consciences?

Get This Guy a Spot at the Dem Convention

2004-07-01T22:34:00.000-05:00

Key excerpts from Saddam in court
BBC News
(7/2/04)

Saddam Hussein: How can you judge me in advance when I have not yet been tried? These are charges and not crimes. I demand lawyers. Do you have a law certificate and since when have you been recognised as a judge, after the occupation or before that?

Judge: Since the days of the previous regime and until now. The coalition authority asked me to hold this trial.

Saddam Hussein (laughing): Then you are trying me by order of the invasion forces. By what law are you trying me?

Judge: I am trying you in accordance with the Iraqi law.

Saddam Hussein: Then you are trying me by the law that I enacted. You are trying me by a law that I approved and ratified.

Saddam Hussein: I do not want to make you feel uneasy, but you know this is all theatre by Bush to help him with his election campaign. The real criminal is Bush.

Michael Moore has taught you well, Obi-wan.

In Case You Didn't Already Know...

2004-06-29T19:23:00.000-05:00

Paul Krugman is a pathetic lowlife.

Soon to be Off-Air America

2004-06-28T16:01:00.002-05:00

Is Franken Really Beating Limbaugh?
Byron York
National Review Online
(6/28/04)

In recent weeks, Air America, the startup liberal talk-radio network, has claimed early ratings success in the battle against conservative talk-show host Rush Limbaugh. The network says that Al Franken, host of Air America's O'Franken Factor, which airs on station WLIB in New York City, beat Limbaugh, whose program appears on WABC, in New York in the key audience demographic of listeners age 25 to 54. [...]

The early ratings — they were not actually ratings but extrapolations made by Air America from preliminary-ratings data — spurred a lot of enthusiastic talk among Air America supporters. [...]

There are no definitive measures for the time Air America has been in operation since its premiere March 31. Arbitron, the radio-ratings service, publishes quarterly ratings. The first quarter of 2004 — January, February, and March — was before Air America went on the air, and the second quarter — April, May, and June — is not quite finished.

But there is some information about Air America's audience that is available now. In addition to its standard quarterly measure, Arbitron keeps track of rolling three-month ratings. For example, along with the January/February/March quarterly rating, Arbitron compiles a preliminary February/March/April rating and a March/April/May rating. Those measures provide a glimpse of how the ratings are progressing between the standard quarterly periods. [...]

In the January/February/March period, a time when WLIB broadcast its old Caribbean music and talk format, the station earned a 1.3-percent share of the New York audience in the time period from 10 A.M. until 3 P.M., placing it 25th among the New York market's radio stations. During that time, WABC earned a 4.4-percent share, making it tied for fourth place in the market.

In the February/March/April period, which measured two months of the old WLIB format and one month of the new Air America format, WLIB earned a 1.6-percent share of the audience in the 10 A.M. to 3 P.M. time slot, ranking 23rd in the market. WABC earned a 4.9-percent share, ranking third.

In the March/April/May period, which measured one month of the old WLIB format and two months of the new Air America format, WLIB again earned a 1.8-percent share of the audience, putting it tied for 22nd in the market. WABC earned a 4.9-percent share, putting it tied for third place.

These numbers cannot be precisely compared to the demographic figures in the ratings claimed by Air America. Nevertheless, they suggest that Air America was likely premature in claiming victory over WABC and Limbaugh. More will be known on July 16, when Arbitron releases its final ratings for the second quarter of this year.

Whatever its ratings, Air America's more serious problem at the moment is financial. Last week the Wall Street Journal published a devastating account of what appeared to be gross financial misrepresentations by some of the network's founding executives (they have since left the company). The bottom line is that Air America appears to have far less money than it originally claimed.

The situation is so serious that radio experts suggest the network will have to abandon its current business plan if it is to survive. Specifically, Michael Harrison, editor of Talkers magazine, says Air America must stop insisting that stations air its entire day of programming and instead offer specific programs, like The O'Franken Factor or The Randi Rhodes Show, to stations that might want to air them.

"The answer is clear," says Harrison. "Get rid of the idea of the network, take the best shows — Franken, Rhodes, and maybe [Janeane] Garafalo — and syndicate them....They have to come around to it soon, or they're going to run out of money."

Amusingly, this runs directly counter to one of the most popular excuses lefties cited for their lack of success in talk radio: That liberal radio shows sandwiched between conservative shows or embedded within nontalk formats are unable to sustain listener attention. The "solution," they told us, was to hijack a station and construct an all-leftist, all-the-time format. Now that their beloved "people" aren't tuning in, one can speculate that they will feel free to petition the government -- or George Soros, who is almost as wealthy -- for funds. If they fail to do that, their only recourse is to return to the formula that paid such craptacular dividends for Jim Hightower and Mario Cuomo. No wonder these goofs despise the free market.

Nix Prix: Kix Blix To Styx

2004-06-28T16:01:00.001-05:00

Hunger, global warming as worrying as WMD -Blix
Reuters
(6/28/04)

Hunger is a bigger concern for many people than the spread of weapons of mass destruction (WMD) and the world should keep such security risks in perspective, former chief UN weapons inspector Hans Blix said on Monday.

Blix led the U.N. search for alleged Iraqi biological, chemical and ballistic arsenals until it was cut short by the U.S-led invasion of the country last year.

He has criticised Washington and London for going to war without the express approval of the U.N. Security Council and has said the two probably knew then that they were exaggerating the threat posed by Iraq in making their case for war.

"One might get the impression from governments and media in the U.S. and Europe that the risk that reckless groups and governments might acquire weapons of mass destruction is the greatest problem facing our world today," Blix said in a speech to Vienna's Diplomatic Academy. [...]

Blix quoted British Prime Minister Tony Blair as saying that that risk was an "existential issue", but said there were other equally pressing problems.

"Let us not forget, however, that to hundreds of millions of people around the world, the big existential issue is hunger, and also that wherever you live on this planet, the risk of global warming and other environmental threats are existential" Blix said.

I'd say this guy is venturing outside his area of expertise, except that he hasn't demonstrated any expertise that I've noticed.

Cutting Off Nose, Spiting Face Department

2004-06-28T16:01:00.000-05:00

Scans uncover secrets of the womb
BBC News
(6/28/04)

A new type of ultrasound scan has produced the vivid pictures of a 12 week-old foetus "walking" in the womb.

The new images also show foetuses apparently yawning and rubbing its eyes.

The scans, pioneered by Professor Stuart Campbell at London's Create Health Clinic, are much more detailed than conventional ultrasound.

Professor Campbell has previously released images of unborn babies appearing to smile.

He has compiled a book of the images called Watch Me Grow. [...]

The images have shown:

From 12 weeks, unborn babies can stretch, kick and leap around the womb - well before the mother can feel movement

From 18 weeks, they can open their eyes although most doctors thought eyelids were fused until 26 weeks

From 26 weeks, they appear to exhibit a whole range of typical baby behaviour and moods, including scratching, smiling, crying, hiccoughing, and sucking.

Until recently it was thought that smiling did not start until six weeks after birth.

Walking? I never knew a blob of protoplasm could do that.

Meanwhile, in a related story:

More than 40 million legal abortions have been performed and documented in the 30 years since the U.S. Supreme Court declared abortion legal. The debate remains focused on the legality and morality of abortion. What's largely ignored is a factual analysis of the political consequences of 40 million abortions. Consider:

• There were 12,274,368 in the Voting Age Population of 205,815,000 missing from the 2000 presidential election, because of abortions from 1973-82.

• In this year's election, there will be 18,336,576 in the Voting Age Population missing because of abortions between 1972 and 1986.

• In the 2008 election, 24,408,960 in the Voting Age Population will be missing because of abortions between 1973-90.

These numbers will not change. They are based on individual choices made--aggregated nationally--as long as 30 years ago. Look inside these numbers at where the political impact is felt most. Do Democrats realize that millions of Missing Voters--due to the abortion policies they advocate--gave George W. Bush the margin of victory in 2000?

Mr. Eastland goes on to analyze the data in detail. There is certainly some room to quibble with his interpretations of the facts (i.e., If abortion had continued being illegal, how many of those abortions would have occurred regardless?), but there can be little doubt that legalized abortion has cost the Democrats voters and almost certainly lost them the 2000 election. Nice going, Donks.

"No Evidence" The Democrats Know What They're Talking About

2004-06-21T16:16:00.000-05:00

9/11 panel: New evidence on Iraq-Al-Qaida
Shaun Waterman
United Press International
(6/20/04)

The commission investigating the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks has received new information indicating that a senior officer in an elite unit of the security services of deposed Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein may have been a member of al-Qaida involved in the planning of the suicide hijackings, panel members said Sunday.

John F. Lehman, a Reagan-era GOP defense official told NBC's "Meet the Press" that documents captured in Iraq "indicate that there is at least one officer of Saddam's Fedayeen, a lieutenant colonel, who was a very prominent member of al Qaida."

The Fedayeen were a special unit of volunteers given basic training in irregular warfare. The lieutenant colonel, Ahmed Hikmat Shakir, has the same name as an Iraqi thought to have attended a planning meeting for the Sept. 11 attacks in January 2000, in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. The meeting was also attended by two of the hijackers, Khalid al Midhar and Nawaf al Hamzi and senior al-Qaida leaders.

Lehman said that commission staff members continued to work on the issue and experts cautioned that the connection might be nothing more than coincidence.

When "experts" say a connection like this might just be a coincidence, you know it's time to break out the noisemakers and send somebody on a beer run.

The Gipper Versus The Zipper

2004-06-21T16:11:00.000-05:00

AP Poll: Most Americans rate Reagan superior to Clinton
Will Lester
Associated Press
(6/21/04)

Most Americans say Ronald Reagan, who died this month, will be remembered as a better president than Bill Clinton, who is trying to improve his image with a new autobiography, according to an Associated Press poll.

Bringing down a slave empire versus bringing down an intern: Yeah, I'd say this one's settled.

You Are Being Lied To

2004-06-21T00:20:00.000-05:00

The 9/11 commission does see an Iraq link
Jack Kelly
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
(6/20/04)

On Thursday, the lead headline in the Post-Gazette was "Saddam, al-Qaida Not Linked. Sept. 11 Panel's Conclusion at Odds with Administration." In the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review that day, the banner headline read: "9/11 Panel Debunks Saddam Link. Report: No Evidence of al-Qaida Ties."

This was false, as the chair and vice chair of the 9/11 commission hastened to make clear.

"Were there contacts between al-Qaida and Iraq? Yes. Some of them were shadowy, but they were there," commission Chair Thomas Kean told reporters on Thursday.

"There were connections between al-Qaida and Saddam Hussein's government," said commission Vice Chair Lee Hamilton. "We don't disagree with that. What we have said is that we don't have any evidence of a cooperative, or a collaborative relationship between Saddam Hussein's government and these al-Qaida operatives with regard to attacks on the United States [italics added]. So it seems to me that the sharp differences that the press has drawn, that the media has drawn, are not that apparent to me."

Since the Bush administration has never claimed that Saddam had a role in planning the 9/11 attacks, or earlier attacks on the USS Cole, the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, the Khobar Towers bombing, or the 1993 attack on the World Trade Center, there is essentially no difference between what the commission said in its staff report, and what President Bush has been saying all along.

In Friday's paper, the PG made no mention of what Kean and Hamilton had to say about the erroneous reporting of the day before.

The Post-Gazette and Tribune-Review were by no means alone in getting the story wrong. The erroneous PG story Thursday was from The Washington Post. The story we ran Friday, headlined "Bush, Cheney Defend Linking Iraq, al-Qaida" -- which avoided mentioning that both the chairman and co-chairman of the 9/11 commission agreed with Bush --was from The New York Times.

Television news was worse. MSNBC's Keith Olbermann began his broadcast Wednesday night with the announcement: "Memo to the vice president: 9/11 commission finds, quote 'no credible evidence,' unquote, of any link between al-Qaida and Iraq." CBS's John Roberts said the Bush administration "took a devastating hit when the 9/11 commission declared there was no collaborative relationship between Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden. The report is yet another blow to the president's credibility."

Anti-anti-Saddamism
William Kristol
The Weekly Standard
(6/28/04 issue)

Perhaps John Kerry simply made the mistake of believing what he read in the New York Times. There it was, the lead headline on Thursday, June 17: "Panel Finds No Qaeda-Iraq Tie." Or perhaps he read the Los Angeles Times headline: "No Signs of Iraq-Al Qaeda Ties Found." Or the Washington Post: "Al Qaeda-Hussein Link Is Dismissed." Or maybe he was watching CBS News the night before, as John Roberts explained that "one of President Bush's last surviving justifications for war in Iraq" took "a devastating hit" as the 9/11 Commission "put the nail in that connection" between Saddam and al Qaeda.

So Kerry pounced. No matter that this coverage ranged from tendentious to false. The Bush administration, he claimed, "misled America." "The administration took its eye off al Qaeda, took its eye off of the real war on terror in Afghanistan and northwest Pakistan and transferred it for reasons of its own to Iraq." And "the United States of America should never go to war because it wants to; we should only go to war because we have to." [...]

This is surely a major moment in the presidential race. John Kerry had, until last week, been running a disciplined general election campaign, carefully suppressing his left-leaning foreign policy instincts, soberly emphasizing his commitment to fighting the war on terror and to seeing through the effort in Iraq. Then he couldn't resist the temptation to jump on the (misleading) press accounts of the (sloppy) 9/11 Commission staff report, in order to assault the Bush administration on the issue of terror links between Saddam and al Qaeda.

The Bush administration has fought back. President Bush explained on Thursday, "The reason I keep insisting that there was a relationship between Iraq and Saddam and al Qaeda is because there was a relationship between Iraq and al Qaeda." [...]By the end of the day, 9/11 Commission chairman Tom Kean and vice chairman Lee Hamilton were emphasizing that the commission had never said Iraq-al Qaeda links did not exist. Nor, Hamilton explained, did he "disagree" with Cheney's statement that there were "connections between al Qaeda and Saddam Hussein's government." The New York Times, having asserted on Thursday that the commission's report "challenges Bush," failed on Friday to report this statement of Hamilton's.

Now, as Stephen F. Hayes points out elsewhere in this issue, the staff report is an unimpressive document. It is sloppy and contains errors of commission and especially omission. It doesn't even attempt to deal with the reported presence of an Iraqi official, Ahmed Hikmad Shakir, at a 9/11 planning meeting in Kuala Lumpur in January 2000. It concludes that Mohammed Atta was not in Prague to meet an Iraqi intelligence agent in April 2001, based largely on the fact that his cell phone was used in the United States during those days--even though we know that the plotters shared cell phones among themselves, and that the cell phone in question would have been useless in Europe. (The report says nothing, meanwhile, about Atta's two unexplained but well-documented trips to Prague the previous year.)

But however blame may be apportioned between the commission's staff report and the media's tendentious coverage of it, Kerry has chosen to enter the fray. So we can now have the fundamental debate the country deserves: Does Kerry deny what the Clinton administration consistently maintained, what the Bush administration asserts, and what appears utterly clear--that Saddam Hussein had ties with terrorists and terrorist groups, including al Qaeda? That Saddam "created a permissive environment for terrorism," as a spokesman for British prime minister Tony Blair put it? No one else denies that the man who mixed the chemicals for the 1993 World Trade Center bomb, Abdul Rahman Yasin, came from and returned to Baghdad, where he lived for the next 10 years. Does Kerry? [...]

Suddenly, last week, the choice and the stakes in the presidential race became clearer.

There was a link between Saddam and al-Qa'eda
Melanie Phillips
London Telegraph
(6/20/04)

To the anti-war lobby, it was cause for jubilation. "No Qa'eda-Iraq tie" crowed The New York Times. "White House misled the world over Saddam" exulted our own Independent. And presidential candidate Senator John Kerry claimed that the Bush administration had "misled America over the need for war".

The excitement was over a preliminary assessment of evidence about al-Qa'eda by the US commission investigating September 11. The only problem was that the press coverage was untrue. The report does not rule out links between Saddam Hussein and al-Qa'eda. On the contrary, as the commission's chairman, Thomas Kean, confirmed: "There were contacts between Iraq and al-Qa'eda, a number of them, some of them a little shadowy. They were definitely there."

As so often in the coverage of Iraq, those who make the (illogical) claim that there was no such contact and therefore no cause for war saw in this report only what they wanted to see.

They read the words: "We have no credible evidence that Iraq and al-Qa'eda co-operated", and claimed official confirmation that no links had existed. But the report actually says: "We have no credible evidence that Iraq and al-Qa'eda co-operated on attacks upon the United States" - not that they never dealt with each other. On the contrary, it says they did deal with each other, particularly in Sudan.

In any event, the report is hardly authoritative. [...]

The main question [...] is why it devoted only one paragraph to the Saddam/al-Qa'eda link and ignored most the evidence amassed by Stephen Hayes in his recent book, The Connection. For while none of this is conclusive, it makes a powerful case. [...]

The book quotes a "well-placed" intelligence source saying: "Bin Laden was receiving training on bomb making from the IIS's [Iraqi Intelligence Service's] principal technical expert on making sophisticated explosives, Brigadier Salim al Ahmed. Brigadier Salim was observed at bin Laden's farm in Khartoum in Sep-Oct 1995 and again in July 1996, in the company of the director of Iraqi Intelligence Mani-abd-al-Rashid-al-Tikriti [to discuss] bin Laden's request for IIS technical assistance" in making bombs.

Hayes quotes another "regular and reliable" intelligence source who said that bin Laden's top deputy Ayman al Zawahiri "visited Baghdad and met with the Iraqi vice-president on 3 February 1998. The goal of the visit was to arrange for co-ordination between Iraq and bin Laden and establish camps in al-Falluja, an-Nasiriya and Iraqi Kurdistan under the leadership of Abdul Aziz." Hayes says that visit coincided with a $300,000 payment from Iraqi intelligence to Zawahiri's Egyptian Islamic jihad, which merged with al-Qa'eda.

Recently, yet more evidence has emerged. The Wall Street Journal reported that captured documents listed one Ahmed Hikmat Shakir as a senior officer in the elite paramilitary Saddam Fedayeen. By an amazing coincidence, an Ahmed Hikmat Shakir was present at the January 2000 al-Qa'eda "summit" in Kuala Lumpur at which the September 11 attacks were planned.

It is of course possible that this was a different Ahmed Hikmat Shakir. However, Hayes reveals subsequent events showed this man was very important indeed to Iraq. Four days after September 11, he was arrested in Qatar and found to possess phone numbers of the 1993 World Trade Centre bombers' safe houses and contacts, as well as information about an al-Qa'eda plot to blow up airliners. But he was released, re-arrested in Jordan and released again (with CIA collusion) - following pressure from Iraq at the highest level. What is the point of an inquiry into al-Qa'eda that doesn't even consider such evidence?

Bill Clinton's administration was absolutely certain that Saddam was in cahoots with al-Qa'eda. It was a given. That is surely why, after September 11, Pentagon officials were obsessed with Iraq. Whether Saddam was personally involved in 9/11 was irrelevant; if he was aiding al-Qa'eda's terror, he had to be stopped. But this has been obliterated from the collective memory in order to place the most malign interpretation possible on the motives of the Bush administration.

Of course, one should be wary of intelligence. But the volume and specificity of these claims surely mean they should be addressed. Yet journalists for whom such nuggets would normally trigger a feeding frenzy astonishingly fail to report them and mislead the public instead. That is because the only story in town is that George W Bush and Tony Blair lied - a blinding certainty that cannot be disturbed by anything so inconvenient as the facts.

There They Go Again
Stephen F. Hayes
The Weekly Standard
(6/28/04 issue)

It's settled, apparenty. Saddam Hussein's regime never supported al Qaeda in its "attacks on America," and meetings between representatives of Iraq and al Qaeda did not result in a "collaborative relationship." That, we're told, is the conclusion of two staff reports the September 11 Commission released last Wednesday.

But the contents of the documents have been widely misreported. Together the new reports total 32 pages; one contains a paragraph on the broad question of a Saddam-al Qaeda relationship, the other a paragraph on an alleged meeting between the lead hijacker and an Iraqi agent. Nowhere in the documents is the "Al Qaeda-Hussein Link...Dismissed," as Washington Post headline writers would have us believe. In fact, Staff Statement 15 discusses several "links." It never, as the Associated Press maintained, "bluntly contradicted" the Bush administration's prewar arguments. The Los Angeles Times was more emphatic still: "The findings appear to be the most complete and authoritative dismissal of a key Bush administration rationale for invading Iraq: that Hussein's regime had worked in collusion with al Qaeda."

A complete dismissal? Only for someone determined to find a complete dismissal. The major television networks and newspapers across the country got it wrong.

By Thursday afternoon, the misreporting had become too much for some members of the 9/11 Commission. Its vice chairman, former Democratic congressman Lee Hamilton, defended Vice President Dick Cheney against his attackers in the media:

I must say I have trouble understanding the flak over this. The Vice President is saying, I think, that there were connections between al Qaeda and Saddam Hussein's government. We don't disagree with that. What we have said is just what [Republican co-chairman Tom Kean] just said: We don't have any evidence of a cooperative or collaborative relationship between Saddam Hussein's government and al Qaeda with regard to the attacks on the United States. So it seems to me that sharp differences that the press has drawn, that the media has drawn, are not that apparent to me.

Hamilton is half-right. The report was far more nuanced and narrowly worded than most news reports suggested. But while nuance is a close cousin of precision, it is not the same thing. And the two paragraphs on the Iraq-al Qaeda relationship are highly imprecise. Statement 15 does not, in fact, limit its skepticism about the Iraq-al Qaeda connection to collaboration on "the attacks on the United States." It also seems to cast doubt on the existence of any "collaborative relationship" (while conceding contacts and meetings) between the two.

[Hayes proceeds to outline in great detail the evidence of links between Saddam and al Qaeda. Do read this if you have the time, dear reader. -- Cato]

When it comes to the broader question of the relationship between Saddam and al Qaeda, the commission cannot be expected to write the definitive history. In the end, it will be up to the Bush administration to make available to the public as much intelligence as possible without jeopardizing sources and methods. Americans are not idiots. They can be expected to grasp the difference between circumstantial evidence and proof; between shared goals and methods and a proved operational alliance. They can accept that not all analysts will agree, and some facts will remain elusive. What they should not have to settle for is the current confusion.

The daily life of an elite media reporter: Get up. Read DNC fax. Parrot. Go to bed. Repeat.

"A Conflict of Visions," Indeed

2004-06-17T16:51:00.000-05:00

Victor Davis Hanson's latest:

Two views are emerging about our post-September-11 world. One is angry, but also therapeutic—and most often embraced by the Left. I think it goes roughly like this. Removing the Taliban in our initial rage might have for a moment seemed necessary, but things now in retrospect have proved not much better than before in Afghanistan and might well get worse. There was no need for the Iraqi campaign. Thus the Europeans and moderate Arabs were right that chaos would result and terrorists multiply in its bitter aftermath. Sharon has only antagonized the Palestinians, set back the peace-process, and made America’s war far more difficult. Mr. Bush’s unilateral rhetoric and vainglorious posture have needlessly offended the Europeans, who now have recently developed a real dislike of the United States and likewise complicated our task.

Here at home the Patriot Act and certain dangerous new jurisprudence are greater concerns than any prior inability of rounding up sleeper cells. No wonder almost every day an Al Gore, Howard Dean, or Ted Kennedy is screaming or yelling about something. It doesn’t feel good to have so much money, education, and sophistication and still not be able to stop this dangerous course of events—that are the “worst ever,” “unprecedented,” and “a new low” in American history.

The other interpretation is somewhat tragic, largely upbeat about our recent accomplishments, and held by those on the more conservative side. Given the bleak options after the destruction of the World Trade Center, the prior murderous history of Afghanistan, and the depressing landscape of the Middle East, the past three years are nothing short of miraculous: Taliban gone; constitutional government emerging; and a good man like Karzai trying to end fundamentalist terror. Saddam, his sons, and Iraqi genocide are now over with. And despite the daily turmoil, Iraq is likewise inching toward some type of consensual government in less time than was true of a more sophisticated postwar Japan or Germany. There is a good chance that the Israelis will leave Gaza; suicide bombing is vastly reduced; a new fence will give both sides a breather until—and if—a legitimate Palestine government emerges to negotiate final borders.

As far as our “allies” go, Mr. Bush simply tore off the scab of the preexisting wound of Europe-American relations, in which the subsidized protection offered by the United States in the post-Cold War had far earlier led to an array of conflicting passions on the continent, arising out of an increasingly anti-democratic EU, envy, dependency, and resentment. In America proper—without much erosion of our daily ease and freedoms—we have rounded up scores of terrorists and thus so far avoided another mass murder. Consequently, conservatives are more likely to speak in calm tones than either scream for resignations or in wild-eyed fashion cite conspiracies that are destroying America.

How to adjudicate these two conflicting views of the present situation? We cannot. Why so?

The answer is that our interpretations of the present crisis are predicated on our own larger views of mankind itself. The tragic sense accepts us as flawed and thus expects setback, mistakes, and even moral lapses. The therapeutic view in contrast demands perfection right now and thus allows for few, if any, mistakes.

It sounds as if Mr. Hanson has been reading his Thomas Sowell lately.

On to the Next Quagmire

2004-06-17T16:26:00.000-05:00

The Brothers Judd Blog links to this encouraging story about public perceptions of Iraq:

Americans are paying markedly less attention to Iraq than in the last two months. At the same time, their opinions about the war have become more positive. The number of Americans who think the U.S. military effort is going well has jumped from 46% in May to 57%, despite ongoing violence in Iraq and the widening prison abuse scandal. And the percentage of the public who believes it was right to go to war inched up to 55%, from 51% in May.

The new Pew survey indicates that many Americans are becoming less connected to the news about Iraq and possibly more hardened to events there. Just 39% say they are tracking developments in Iraq very closely – down 15 points since April and the lowest level this year. In addition, 35% say that people they know are becoming less emotionally involved with the news from Iraq, a sharp increase from 26% last month.

The poll by the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press, conducted June 3-13 among 1,806 Americans, found lower attention to the war in Iraq even before the death of former President Ronald Reagan dominated the news. Overall, four-in-ten paid very close attention to Reagan's death and memorial service, which is about the same level as interest in former President Nixon's death and funeral a decade ago (36% very closely).

About three weeks ago, I told my younger brother that Iraq was going to be a nonstory by the time the election swung around, due to the fact that a democratic government was slowly being established there. I just wish I'd been smart enough to document this thought on my blog, the way Mr. Judd did on his.

"Tonight on CBS, Another Horror Story from Abu Ghraib..."

2004-06-17T16:07:00.000-05:00

The American Spectator picks up on yet another story you won't find on ABCNNBCBS:

On June 9, Demetrius Perricos announced that before, during and after the war in Iraq, Saddam Hussein shipped weapons of mass destruction and medium-range ballistic missiles to countries in Europe and the Middle East. Entire factories were dismantled and shipped as scrap metal to Jordan, the Netherlands and Turkey, among others, at the rate of about 1,000 tons of metal a month. As an example of speed by which these facilities were dismantled, Perricos displayed two photographs of a ballistic missile site near Baghdad, one taken in May 2003 with an active facility, the other in February 2004 that showed it had simply disappeared.

What passed for scrap metal and has since been discovered as otherwise is amazing. Inspectors have found Iraqi SA-2 surface-to-air missiles in Rotterdam -- complete with U.N. inspection tags -- and 20 SA-2 engines in Jordan, along with components for solid-fuel for missiles. Short-range Al Samoud surface-to-surface missiles were shipped abroad by agents of the regime. That missing ballistic missile site contained missile components, a reactor vessel and fermenters -- the latter used for the production of chemical and biological warheads.

"The problem for us is that we don't know what may have passed through these yards and other yards elsewhere," Ewen Buchanan, Perricos's spokesman, said. "We can't really assess the significance and don't know the full extent of activity that could be going on there or with others of Iraq's neighbors."

Perricos isn't an American shill defending the Bush administration, but rather the acting executive chairman of the U.N. Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission (UNMOVIC) and his report was made to the Security Council. Yet his report didn't seem to be of much interest to a media which has used the lack of significant discoveries to question the rationale for the war.

To paraphrase P.J. O'Rourke, the media will start reporting this sometime during the second Trump administration.

From the "Your Spouse Is Nuts" Department:

2004-06-01T03:42:00.000-05:00

I didn't think you were speaking literally!

We'll Let John Kerry Know About This on November 2nd

2004-06-01T03:21:00.000-05:00

Iraq Situation Improving
Associated Press
(5/30/04)

Despite war and occupation, Iraq has seen a surge in human rights organizations, political parties and independent newspapers -- entities almost unheard of under Saddam Hussein, said a report by an Arab think tank.

The report by Egypt's Ibn Khaldoun Center for Development Studies welcomed the promise of elections, the freedom of expression and independence of the media but was careful not to credit the Americans for the progress.

"Even though all indications of political rights and human rights mentioned in this report clearly illustrate that the situation in Iraq after occupation is much better than Saddam Hussein's Iraq, the truth remains that any situation would have been better than Saddam Hussein," the report said.

Read that last sentence again. Even the Arabs are starting to "get it." Too bad the Democrats don't.