When I heard that the Israelis had killed Hamas founder and "Spiritual Leader" Ahmed Yassin, several thoughts immediately ran through my head.

The very first thought was, "Good!"

Second, it occurred to me that the Israelis just applied the Bush doctrine. This is no different from our earnest desire to capture; or preferably convert Usama bin Laden into strawberry jam on a Afghani hillside.

As I listened to the Palestinian reactions, I was bemused.

"Words cannot describe the emotion of anger and hate inside our hearts," said Hamas official Ismail Haniyeh, a close associate of Yassin.

How is this different from the anger and hate you have expressed for the last several decades, in the form of suicide bombs in buses, restaurants and hotels? And planned by Yassin?

Hamas said Israel had "opened the gates of hell"

Really?

The Palestinian Authority said in a statement that "Israel has exceeded all red lines with this cheap and dirty crime,"

How is this cheaper or dirtier than say, using young women with explosive belts to sneak into Israeli towns to kill the innocent? Or putting bombs in ambulances? At least the Israelis target people who are actually responsible for murder.

[Palestinian] Cabinet ministers stood as Arafat recited a Muslim prayer for the dead. The Palestinian leader, referring to Yassin, then added: "May you join the martyrs and the prophets. To heaven, you martyr."

Palestinian Prime Minister Ahmed Qureia said the Palestinians have lost "a great leader," and called the attack on Sheikh Yassin a "dangerous, cowardly act".

If the Palestinians believe that this person was a great leader, a martyr, and destined for heaven, as they evidently do:

...then they are completely outside the pale of civilization.

It also occurred to me that the Palestinians have a peculiar understanding of the nature of war. They have, through their actions and words, declared war on the state of Israel. They bomb Israel's citizens, they call for the destruction of the Jews who inhabit it. Yet when their enemies fight back, they whine in surprise at the perfidy of the Jew. How dare those evil Jews kill a man, an elderly man in a wheelchair! Nevermind that he is responsible for the deaths of hundreds of Israelis. Are they really that naive? Of course not, but they do know that that sort of whining will find a sympathetic ear amongst certain sorts of people in the west.

One snippet from the BBC had a no doubt unintentional grain of truth. PA mouthpiece Saeb Erekat said the only way to stop violence was to "end the occupation of Palestinian territories." When you remember that the Palestinians also claim the land that Israel currently sits on, this reveals what they are all about.

[wik] This NRO article by Joel Rosenberg offers some useful thoughts.

RKK Energiya, the Russian space company, has announced plans to design a replacement for the venerable Soyuz capsule. Given sufficient funding, the company says that it can have the new capsule flying in five years.

The new capsule, dubbed "Clipper," will have twice the passenger capacity of the old Soyuz, and weigh twice as much. Further, it will be reusable up to 25 times, a significant improvement over the single use Soyuz. While the article does not specifically mention it, I presume that since they're calling it a capsule, the vehicle will not be winged, and will hard land (slowed by parachutes) on the ground like the current model.

At least someone's thinking ahead.

I've given up counting the number of things that I do that are haardous to my health and well being. But this one, I think I'll just have to ignore:

Aspartame Kills.

[wik] As an added bonus, not only is aspartame lethal, it's Don Rumsfeld's fault! Republican conspiracy! Worldviews confirmed! Nefariousness proved! Ack.

This Wall Street Journal editorial is well worth a read.

Steve Waite over at Commonsense and Wonder links to a Weekly Standard article by Stephen Hayes that lays out some evidence for a significant connection between Saddam's regime and bin Laden going back to the nineties.

OSAMA BIN LADEN and Saddam Hussein had an operational relationship from the early 1990s to 2003 that involved training in explosives and weapons of mass destruction, logistical support for terrorist attacks, al Qaeda training camps and safe haven in Iraq, and Iraqi financial support for al Qaeda--perhaps even for Mohamed Atta--according to a top secret U.S. government memorandum obtained by THE WEEKLY STANDARD.

The memo, dated October 27, 2003, was sent from Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Douglas J. Feith to Senators Pat Roberts and Jay Rockefeller, the chairman and vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee. It was written in response to a request from the committee as part of its investigation into prewar intelligence claims made by the administration. Intelligence reporting included in the 16-page memo comes from a variety of domestic and foreign agencies, including the FBI, the Defense Intelligence Agency, the Central Intelligence Agency, and the National Security Agency. Much of the evidence is detailed, conclusive, and corroborated by multiple sources. Some of it is new information obtained in custodial interviews with high-level al Qaeda terrorists and Iraqi officials, and some of it is more than a decade old. The picture that emerges is one of a history of collaboration between two of America's most determined and dangerous enemies.

According to the memo--which lays out the intelligence in 50 numbered points--Iraq-al Qaeda contacts began in 1990 and continued through mid-March 2003, days before the Iraq War began. Most of the numbered passages contain straight, fact-based intelligence reporting, which some cases includes an evaluation of the credibility of the source. This reporting is often followed by commentary and analysis.

Not that I needed additional justification, but this would be one more reason to feel good about what we've done. I think that over the next several months, we might begin to see increasingly rapid progress in the war on terror.

In the Belmont Club post I linked a while back, Viva Los Pepes, Wretchard talks about "tearing down the mountain" - a deliberate process of slowly destroying a network from the bottom up to get at the (presently) invulnerable bad guy at the top. We used this technique against the drug cartels in Columbia to get Pablo Escobar, and it looks as if it worked with Saddam, may pay off any moment with Zawahiri, and perhaps soon with bin Laden himself.

And one reason that we are able to do this is the intelligence information we are gaining from captured Iraqis.

[wik] From Kathy Kinsley at On the Third Hand (I got the blog name right this time! I'm not such a complete idiot as to get my blog hostess' blog wrong twice in one day.) we get a link to another story about Iraq-Al Qaida links, this one from the Bill Gertz and Rowan Scarborough at the Washington Times.

We have obtained a document discovered in Iraq from the files of the Iraqi Intelligence Service (IIS). The report provides new evidence of links between Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden.

The 1993 document, in Arabic, bears the logo of the Iraqi intelligence agency and is labeled "top secret" on each of its 20 pages. The report is a list of IIS agents who are described as "collaborators."

On page 14, the report states that among the collaborators is "the Saudi Osama bin Laden." The document states that bin Laden is a "Saudi businessman and is in charge of the Saudi opposition in Afghanistan. And he is in good relationship with our section in Syria," the document states, under the signature "Jabar."

The document was obtained by the Iraqi National Congress and first disclosed on the CBS program "60 Minutes" by INC leader Ahmed Chalabi.

A U.S. official said the document appears authentic.

A while back, I posted a list of my top five, all-time favorite science fiction novels. A recent conversation made me realize that this needs revisiting. This list originated when my mom asked for a list of the best science fiction, so that she would not need to go through the oftimes perilous process of winnowing the wheat from the chaff.

As Ted Sturgeon pointed out, 95% of everything is crap. Here is the original list:

The Moon is a Harsh Mistress, by Robert Heinlein
Starship Troopers, by Robert Heinlein
Player of Games, by Iain Banks
The Stars My Destination, by Alfred Bester
Mote in God's Eye, by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle
The Dosadi Experiment, by Frank Herbert
Dune, by Frank Herbert
A Fire Upon the Deep, by Vernor Vinge
A Deepness in the Sky, by Vernor Vinge
Ender's Game, by Orson Scott Card
Diamond Age, by Neil Stephenson
Cryptonomicon, by Neil Stephenson
Sundiver, by David Brin
Startide Rising, by David Brin
Lest Darkness Fall, by L. Sprague de Camp
American Gods, by Neil Gaiman
Good Omens, by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett
Mother of Storms, by John Barnes
Killing Star, by Charles Pellegrino and George Zebroski
Doorways in the Sand, by Roger Zelazny
The Greks Bring Gifts, by Murray Leinster
Pebble in the Sky, by Isaac Asimov
The City and the Stars, by Arthur C. Clark

I have never been able to narrow this list down I can only add to it. My top five list, it is large, it contains multitudes.

On further reflection, and by recommendation from Johno, I added these:

Canticle for Liebowitz, by Walter Miller
Hyperion, by Dan Simmons
The Earth Abides, by George R. Stuart
Shockwave Rider, by John Brunner
Voice of the Whirlwind, by Walter Jon Williams
Pattern Recognition, by William Gibson
The Man In The High Castle, by Philip K. Dick
Schismatrix, by Bruce Sterling
Snow Crash, by Neal Stephenson

Here are some new ones:

Norstrilia, by Cordwainer Smith
Bring the Jubilee, by Ward Moore
The Lensman Series, by E.E. "Doc" Smith
Cities in Flight, by James Blish
Tactics of Mistake, by Gordon R. Dickson

And as an added bonus, and actual list of five, for fantasy:

Lord of the Rings, by some guy, think his name begins with "D"
Freedom and Necessity, by Emma Bull and Steven Brust
American Gods, by Neil Gaiman
Age of Unreason series, by J. Gregory Keyes
The Earthsea Trilogy, by Ursula K. Le Guin (and I do mean trilogy)

[wik] Here's a link to another page with a good top 100 list.

[alsø wik] Ted points out that Orson Scott Card's Pastwatch: The Redemption of Christopher Columbus is a damn fine novel, and I agree that it is an oversight. He also gave me a couple new titles to hunt down. If anyone has any suggestions for the list, please leave them in the comments, and I will make additions to the list as needed.

In a blow to those who think slippery slopes don't exist-- and in a spine-crushing suplex to decency, common sense, and responsible government-- the city of Port Orange, FL has outlawed outdoor smoking on public property when kids are present.

That's right. If you're in the park, and even one scabby-kneed diaper-wearing drool factory is around-- even if said drool factory is thirteen and ho'ed up like Britney Spears-- you're in trouble. You get three warnings. Then you get up to 60 days of jail.

I'm of two minds about smoking bans. My libertarian side opposes them unequivocally, but my opportunistic side absolutely loves that I can go out to a bar without reeking like an ashtray for twelve hours afterwards. I mean, loves it. I love it. Love it.

Love. It.

Here's a question-- in towns that ban smoking in bars and restaurants, why can't the town government regulate smoking like they do booze? If city hall issues, say, 300 liquor licenses, why can't they draw up and issue 100 smoking licenses too? That way we would ensure that the spirit of the law-- that patrons and workers not be automatically exposed to dense clouds of toxins-- is observed, while at the same time giving those people who do enjoy cancer the opportunity to do so.

He handed over the book. It was more than I could have ever dreamed. A 3-ring binder, reeking of cigarettes, bursting with over 500 pages of sweet, sweet schizo goodness.

The front page reads, in giant letters:

THIS IS ONLY 1/4 OF THE WRITTEN MATERIAL I HAVE BEEN SENDING YOU AND OTHER LAW AGENCIES

...and from there, it descends into madness.

Michelle Leder has a good story at Slate about the new revolution in corporate reporting. Many companies have (wisely) jettisoned the content-free and expensively glossy annual report, instead choosing to just mail their 10-Ks to investors (10-Ks are a warts-and-all report filed with the SEC). At the same time, many companies are throwing everything into the 10-K-- every dubious consulting contract, every golden parachute, every ludicrous perk-- in an effort to show how transparently forthright and upstanding they are, our good corporate citizens of America.

Leder points out the benefit for us investors-- for those of us with strong eyes and time to kill, the footnotes to these new beefy 10-Ks make for fascinating reading.

After all, corporate crime is often a matter of degree, not transgression. At what point does strategically socking funds away in a Cayman subsidiary to ensure liquidity in a currency crisis become strategically socking specific funds away in a Cayman subsidiary for limited periods to duck out on paying US taxes? It's all in the footnotes, kids. All in the footnotes.

[wik] Speak of the devil! Also in Slate, Daniel Gross tells us why private company jets are gateways to corporate, um, perfidy. There's a whiff of anti-privelige sentiment in the piece, but why shouldn't there be, given the premise?

Policy wonks and political geeks worldwide are celebrating the 25th Anniversary of C-Span's first broadcast on March 19, 1979. That day, the inaugural broadcast was a speech by Al Gore, described in this article as "characteristically wooden."

C-SPAN, happy birthday. You have brought joy to my life, and sleep when I needed it.

From The Times:

"I believe these actions by Bush administration officials to block Mr. Foster from providing Congress the true costs of the prescription drug bill clearly break federal law," said Senator Frank R. Lautenberg, Democrat of New Jersey and the lead author of the letter. Mr. Lautenberg added, "The questions that need to be answered are: how many administration officials knew about it, and who in the administration gave the order to conceal the information?" Mr. Scully has denied threatening to fire Mr. Foster, but has confirmed telling him to withhold some information from Congress. Republicans accuse Democrats of exploiting the controversy for political gain. "My view is, it's much ado about nothing," said Representative Jim McCrery, Republican of Louisiana.

How much more friggin' plain does it have to be, McCrery? Scully has confirmed that he told the actuary to withhold from Congress critical information about the costs of a program. Let it be said, here and now, that McCrery is a dishonest, partisan asshole. I feel so much better knowing guys like him are in the GOP.

Just a note to all the desperate people who keep emailing me - I am not this buckethead:

I will however autograph pictures if you enclose a stamped, self-addressed envelope.

I've run across two interesting comments on the US Congress, neither of which are very flattering. The first is from John Derbyshire of the National Review:

"In all Cases affecting Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls, and those in which a State shall be Party, the supreme Court shall have original Jurisdiction. In all the other Cases before mentioned, the supreme Court shall have appellate Jurisdiction, both as to Law and Fact, with such Exceptions, and under such Regulations as the Congress shall make."

(My italics.) So in a Case not "affecting Ambassadors" etc. — let's say, oh, a case in which some citizens have chosen to dispute the ancient and customary definition of marriage — the Supreme Court has jurisdiction only if the Congress has not declared that particular Case an Exception under the aforementioned Article, and if Congress has made explicit Regulations declaring that the Court does indeed have such jurisdiction. Hmmm. So this issue I have been reading so much about, of renegade federal judges legislating from the bench, is really not an issue at all, since Congress could just forbid them to take the relevant Cases! Does anyone in Congress know this? Why don't they act on it?

The second is from Marginal Revolution, where Tyler excerpts from this Washington Post article:

In fundamental ways that have gone largely unrecognized, Congress has become less vigilant, less proud and protective of its own prerogatives, and less important to the conduct of American government than at any time in decades. "Congress has abdicated much of its responsibility," Nebraska Sen. Chuck Hagel said in a recent conversation. "It could become an adjunct to the executive branch."

...Though it occasionally resists an executive-branch proposal, Congress today rarely initiates its own policies. Few members speak up for the institutional interests of Congress. "The idea that they have an independent institutional responsibility, that the institution itself is bigger than the individuals or the parties, doesn't occur to the bulk of [members] for a nanosecond," said an exasperated Norman Ornstein of the American Enterprise Institute, a longtime student of Congress.

It occurs to Rep. David Obey of Wisconsin, the ranking Democrat on the House Appropriations Committee. He said that the House has given up the meaningful exercise of its powers by largely forfeiting its oversight role and abandoning all discipline on the federal budget.

These two comments take the same problem from different sides. The Post article points out, correctly, that the relative strength of the three branches of government have waxed and waned over the last two centuries. The Supreme Court was almost non-existent until Marshall became Chief Justice. Congress was far more important than the President at the beginning and end of the 19th Century. But over the last quarter century and more, Congress has been on the wane and not so much due to encroachment from the other two branches, but because Congress has willingly surrendered its constitutionally granted powers.

Both liberals and conservatives have pilloried the Supreme Court for its intrusions into politics. Judicial activism and federalism have been rallying cries for the right, and the left has advanced many of its goals through court rulings. That the courts are able to do this, though, is only because the Congress allows it. A pernicious trend over the last half-century is Congress’ increasing unwillingness to consider the constitutionality of its own legislation. Rather than think difficult thoughts like, “Does the Constitution allow us to pass this law?” the Congress passes anything that passes through its airy head, confident that the Supreme Court will sort it all out. Over a long enough stretch of time, this becomes habit – and the SC comes to believe that these sorts of rulings are its primary focus.

And as Derbyshire pointed out, the Congress has important and wide-ranging powers to regulate the courts, and to decide what matters are for political consideration by the elected legislature, and which are appropriate for judicial review. Most of the recent conflicts on the big issues have been between the executive and the judicial branch, with Congress playing dead in the middle, hoping that no one will notice that they are doing nothing to help solve the problem.

By passing whatever laws they see fit, and leaving all considerations of constitutionality to the courts (the best recent example is campaign finance reform) Congress has departed significantly from the letter and intent of the constitution. Aside from the departments of defense, state, and the treasury; how many of the activities of the executive branch are authorized by the constitution, beyond vague handwaving at the commerce clause?

Which brings us to an even greater abdication of responsibility. Congress is granted the exclusive power by the constitution to pass laws, levy taxes, declare war, and so on. However, most of the laws that affect our day-to-day lives are not actual laws passed by Congress, but rather federal regulations written by bureaucrats in the executive agencies and departments. Congress has ceded a large part of its lawmaking power to the executive branch, and it has done so consciously.

Similarly, the War Powers Act in large part cedes the constitutional responsibility to declare war to the executive. While the President has traditionally (and rightfully) had a fair degree of leeway in this regard, explicitly giving up the right to in effect declare war is troublesome.

Congress no longer performs the kind of oversight that is their primary responsibility. The President and the executive branch exist in large part to “take care that the laws be faithfully executed.” The most notably, the Congress has failed to exert proper oversight in budgetary matters. But this laxity spreads over pretty much every area that the Constitution puts in their care. And as the Post article notes, rarely do we see any initiative arising from Congress – almost every major issue comes from the President or the courts.

If we have an imperial presidency, it is in large part because we have a weak and vacillating Congress. If we have overreaching activist courts, it is a natural result of Congressional abdication of power. And this state of affairs seems unlikely to change in the near future.

Check this out! If you're a Federal employee who just happens to like a little buggery on the side (in the time-honored prep school tradition), that's cool. In fact, if you're a Federal employee who attends Gay Pride parades, goes to the bathhouses, looks for dates at Dupont Circle, and goes out clubbing until 3AM in a mesh shirt and a banana-hammock, that's cool too. You just better not be, you know, gay.

Gay and lesbians in the entire federal workforce have had their job protections officially removed by the office of Special Counsel. The new Special Counsel, Scott Bloch, says his interpretation of a 1978 law intended to protect employees and job applicants from adverse personnel actions is that gay and lesbian workers are not covered.

Bloch said that the while a gay employee would have no recourse for being fired or demoted for being gay, that same worker could not be fired for attending a gay Pride event.

In his interpretation, Bloch is making a distinction between one's conduct as a gay or lesbian and one's status as a gay or lesbian.

"People confuse conduct and sexual orientation as the same thing, and I don't think they are," Bloch said in an interview with Federal Times, a publication for government employees.

Bloch said gays, lesbians and bisexuals cannot be covered as a protected class because they are not protected under the nation's civil rights laws. 

"When you're interpreting a statute, you have to be very careful to interpret strictly according to how it's written and not get into loose interpretations," Bloch said. "Someone may have jumped to the conclusion that conduct equals sexual orientation, but they are essentially very different. One is a class . . . and one is behavior."

My head hurts.

Slashdot has a story about a company called Vocera who have invented, and use successfully on a daily basis, Star Trek-style communicator badges.

I am torn between elation at the prospect, and horror that someday soon the hellborn technology known as Nokia Walkie-Talkie will be replaced by an even more ubiquitous, irritating, and socially invasive way for people to talk remotely and at great volume about hair appointments, reality television, sporting events, and the two chicks they scored with last night that may be causally linked to the discharge of today.

As an addendum to Johno's post on the Scopes Monkey Trial for the new millennium, here is a picture of the Right Honorable County Commissioner J.C. Fugate, image courtesy of our good friend Norbizness:

And to think, some people thought the movie Joe Dirt was a parody. Sheesh.
 

As I mentioned in the comments to this post by Buckethead, I have a solution to our asteroid near-miss problem. Collateral benefits would include a missile defense shield and an invincible interstellar American army to extend our foreign policy ideals to Tattoine and beyond.

What, you ask, could this magic solution possibly be?

One word:

SU - PER - MAN

Turns out the Scopes Monkey people hate gays, too! This just in: Rhea County, the same Tennessee County that entertained us with the Scopes Monkey Trial almost 80 years ago are back for a second round, this time to ban gays. No, you misunderstand. Not to ban gays from doing things like marrying and wearing thongs in public... they want to ban gays.

Rhea County (search) commissioners unanimously voted to ask state lawmakers to introduce legislation amending Tennessee's criminal code so the county can charge homosexuals (search) with crimes against nature.

"We need to keep them out of here," said Commissioner J.C. Fugate, who introduced the motion.

County Attorney Gary Fritts also was asked by Fugate to find the best way to enact a local law banning homosexuals from living in Rhea County.

Well, at least we know where they stand. With a lot of people, they just won't put it out there like this. I just hope they realize that this law is hopelessly retrograde, paranoid, blinkered, hateful, un-Christian, unconstitutional, and a whole bunch of other stuff too, not to mention completely and utterly un-fabulous.

[wik] I propose a film starring Hugo Weaving: Priscilla, Queen of the Hill People.

[alsø wik] This just in: Jonah Goldberg can be a real douchebag sometimes.

[alsø alsø wik] A commenter at Michael Totten's site wonders, "[a]s for 'crimes against nature,' I suppose this would include levitation, time travel and moving faster than the speed of light?

Me, I thought they meant the Third Law of Homodynamics.

[wi nøt trei a høliday in Sweden this yër?] Craig at "Cha3n" parses Jacob Levy's post against one by Eugene Volokh on the legality of officiants of gay weddings saying "By the power vested in me by [yourstatehere]," when in reality everyone knows that [said state] vested no such power. Craig ends up dropping some mad science:

Assume arguendo that the Rhea County officials know that this legislation will be troubled from the start. The push for it can still be valuable - in similar ways to the minister's knowingly false statement. First, this push suggests a disagreement with the decision in Lawrence. If Lawrence is to ever be overturned, it will be because people passed laws knowing that a conflict loomed. Second, and perhaps more invidious, such a push for futile legislation may be incredibly effective in creating an environment in which no homosexual person wants to live. This is a successful push for publicity, even if it is a failed push for law. Codification is not the goal - exclusion of homosexuals is.

He's right, and somehow that makes Rhea County's move even more sleazy.

A 100 foot asteroid will pass within 26,500 miles of the Earth this evening. That distance is just beyond the geosynchronous orbit occupied by communications satellites. NASA says that there is no chance the rock will hit the Earth, this the closest recorded near miss we've seen. Asteroids about this size are estimated to pass this close on average once every two years, but this is the first time we've detected one ahead of time.

We really, really need to expand the Spacewatch Project so we can get a little more warning shold a bigger asteroid come a little closer.

By way of Andrew Ian Dodge, we find another gay online quiz. Not that there's anything wrong with that. This quiz is very similar to the traditional two-axis political scheme often used by Libertarians to trick the unwary into thinking they're libertarian. But it has one advantage: they give you a cool, pirate style map instead of a boring graph.

Commonsense and Wonder links to the mounting evidence of France's corrupt and nefarious involvement in the Iraq's oil industry.

the French interest in maintaining Saddam Hussein in power was spelled out in excruciating detail. The price tag: close to $100 billion. That was what French oil companies stood to profit in the first seven years of their exclusive oil arrangements - had Saddam remained in power.

Read the whole thing, as they say.

A while back, Ross posted a graph taken from a Paul Krugman article, and used this as a stick to beat up on the Bush administration. I have nothing in principle against beating up on the administration, but at the time I read Ross' post, it didn't seem quite right to me. Not being a super economic wiz, I couldn't put my finger on it, nor did I have to hand the references that would have helped. But, coming belatedly to the rescue are the economic genii at Marginal Revolution. (Of course, the belatedness of the rescue is entirely my fault for falling behind on my blog reading.)

This is the original graph, from Krugman:

Ross claimed that this must be evidence of gross incompetance, or of lying. There is a third option, though. Marginal Revolution gives another chart, with a larger timeframe:

MR contributor Alex Tabarrok says:

With this graph it becomes clear that the CEA has in essence been predicting a return to trend. Obviously, the CEA has been wrong, employment has not returned to trend, but that surely tells us more about the peculiar nature of this recession than it does about corruption at the CEA.

Has political progaganda taken the place of professional analysis? Indeed.

Remember to go to Marginal Revolution for all your economic needs.

Last week an Australian news outlet reported the planned opening of a new brothel in Brisbane.

The punchline? The director of the new venture is already a government employee, Nicole Mair, a "highly paid Queensland Health professional". The director position (a position I think I am unfamiliar with- sounds a little too B/D for me) only requires 4 hours a week, so she won't have to quit her job. Since she is already professionally familiar with icky stuff like hygiene and fluids, she feels she can set new standards in model whorehousery.

Ms. Mair promises hers will not be a "sleazy" brothel, but "valid (?), with ethical workplace standards, and the girls will work in a high-quality environment." Amen sister, cuz I am sick and tired of paying top dollar for underperforming whores. She will also be responsible for education, whatever that means in a brothel.

She also asserts that 1/3 of the ground floor chambers will be reserved for disabled customers, the only brothel in Brisbane to do so.

As skeevy and peculiar as it sounds to Yankee ears (I mean, can you imagine the state surgeon general running a whorehouse on the side? Um, legally?), thinking it over I just can't say anything bad about this project.

Ace of Spades provides this link to a news page covering the Iranian protests. Instapundit of course has a post with more links.

As a sort of follow-up to Johno's I, Excrement post, slashdot is saying that the sci-fi channel has greenlighted a miniseries based on Ursula K. LeGuin's Wizard of Earthsea trilogy/tetralogy whatever.

That series is on the very short list of fantasy that I like. It is probably too much to hope that the TV version will not be excrement.

[wik] Spielberg and Tom Cruise are going to make a movie version of War of the Worlds. Its a total crapfest!

[alsø wik] After a closer reading of the article I linked above, I noticed that Paramount has tapped Robert Rodriguez to make a movie out of Edgar Rice Burroughs' classic novel A Princess of Mars. It really is a crapfest - though of all these projects, this one has the best chance of not being a steaming pile of poop.

By way of Interested Participant, it comes to our ears that we have another Kennedy Family/dead woman/car in the water thingy going. Hope Sheridan, is the former mother-in-law of Michael Skakel, a cousin of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Skakel, you will recall, is doing a long stretch for the murder of Martha Moxley.

Divers found Sheridan's car Monday afternoon after a sheriff's helicopter noted two faint parallel marks at the end of a retention pond.

The car was submerged in about 15 feet of water 75 feet from shore. Sheridan's body was found on the passenger side, Detective Keith Harmon said. He said there were no skid marks on the grassy area going into the water.

As the Interested Participant noted:

I personally have found my driving expertise is seriously impacted when I sit in the passenger seat. There's probably $ome way to convince the authoritie$ that Hope $heridan accidentally drove 75 feet into the ocean while $eated in the pa$$enger seat.

Police do not suspect foul play, and are considering this an accidental death.

It's just dangerous to be related to, to date, or now even be related to someone who marries a Kennedy. American Royalty, my lily white ass. From bootleggers to Nazi sympathizers to mob bought elections to fat drunken senators to date raping scions to pilot error; this family is a vomit stain on our national necktie.

Here's a gem from Randall Robinson, link via marcland, who was kind enough to link us the other day, and has a good post on the Iran situation. (Follow the link to see the story.)

In this fascinating Hollywood Reporter article, Martin Grove discusses how Mel Gibson defied to conventional Hollywood wisdom in the development and marketing of his film, The Passion. And more to the point, how defying that wisdom will earn him between a third and a half billion dollars.

Minister Ross sends word from the dreary depths of the code mines, informing me that work is sucking the life out of him. He has no time for blogging, he doesn't even sleep! He begs anyone who sees him toiling away in a noisome cubicle to simply put him out of his misery.

He also sends this cryptic diagram, saying that it explains what his satanic masters have forced him to do:

Ross says that this is a diagram of an optimized query graph for service performance computation. To me, it looks like a high tech pentagram, suited only for summmoning denizens of the deepest pits of hell. Either that, or my company's org chart.
 

Howard Dean has blamed the Madrid bombings on President Bush.

Nedra Pickler, Associated Press, 3/17/2004

WASHINGTON -- Former Democratic presidential candidate Howard Dean said yesterday that President Bush's decision to send troops to Iraq appears to have contributed to the bombing deaths of 201 people in Spain.

I guess it's too much of a stretch to blame the bombings on, you know, the terrorists who planted the bombs. Rank Jackassery. Kerry's people rapidly backpedaled from the claim, made on a conference call organized by the Kerry campaign. Asked about the comment on his campaign plane Wednesday, Kerry said, "It's not our position." Well gee, that's good.

Dean clarified his comment last night, saying belatedly that there is no justification for terrorism and called the Madrid bombing, "a despicable act." If that's the case, why blame it on Bush in the first place?

Check this out. A very good read.

You can argue all you like about the lack of WMD, and all the attendant bullshit surrounding them - but the United States has clearly performed a good and noble act in liberating Iraq. We have eliminated a tyranny, we have freed a people.

The antiwar position can dance all it likes, but when it comes down to it, if you didn’t want the war you wanted Saddam to remain in power. The left used to criticize the right (correctly, in some cases) for support of dictators. Now, the left's kneejerk opposition to anything that the US does is support for islamofascism, and for police states that oppress their own people.

When the US does something stupid or cruel, all thinking people should oppose it. But when the United States moves to eliminate tyranny, to liberate millions, we should be applauding, not waving forty year old signs and wearing giant puppet heads.

Further, the perfect is the enemy of the good. No human endeavor is perfect. To scream that the sky is falling (quagmire!) everytime something goes wrong is frankly retarded. Criticism is good, when it is intended to correct. We have made mistakes in Iraq, but we have also corrected them. We improve. But much of the criticism aimed at US actions in Iraq seems to have the goal of ending, not improving. At convincing the American public that Iraq is a disaster zone (quagmire!) where American soldiers are being killed to no good purpose.

It pisses me off.

Johno's last post, Is Tehran Burning? raises some important questions. And not just regarding the remarkable silence of the major media outlets on events in Iran, Syria, and public opinion in Iraq. But first, the media issue:

Consider that our political leadership has committed the United States to a wide-ranging war on terror - not just those responsible for the 9/11 attacks, but terrorists in general and the nations that support them. Is the media so blinkered that they cannot perceive that this means that several other countries are crucial to the success of this endeavor? We know that America has adopted a policy of change in the Middle East (and elsewhere) and we named the initial targets - Iraq, Iran and North Korea. To be sure, there is extensive and largely negative coverage of the war in Iraq, but that story is so obvious that even the media knows to cover it.

Why nothing on Iran except for occasional stories about Iran's nuclear program? It is well known in the blogosphere that the Iranian people are deeply unhappy with their government, and that there have been huge protests, and now violent unrest. You'd think that someone at CNN would make the connection between the libervasion of Iraq and the hopes and actions of the Democracy Movement in Iran, or at the very least scratch their heads and ask questions.

Nothing on Syria. Little on the violence in Saudi Arabia. The rationale behind Qaddafi's flip obscured. Nothing on death camps and misery in North Korea. Little of substance on the nature of the new Iraqi constitution. (Clueless had a great piece on that recently. These are important stories in their own right, but they are double plus important in relation to the big story, America's (and 33 other nations) war on terror. This failure in reporting is stupendous, monumental and nearly incomprehensible. It is also a big reason why some people don't get what's going on. The war on terror is a big thing, with big goals. If people don't realize, because they are never told, that the invasion in Iraq has resulted in the dismantling of Libya's WMD programs, and is a large factor in the push for democracy in Iran, why would they support it, when all they see is dead American soldiers in Iraq?

We have had many successes in the war so far. The recent bombings in Madrid were a dire setback. But the media refuses to cover the war as it actually exists.

Another issue is raised in a comment on the Michael Totten post that Johno linked:

How screwed up is it, by the way, that the most irrationally exuberant folks for Iranian liberty are at The National Review?!!!

What a weird and twisted thing the political spectrum has become these days. The Party of Kissinger and Buckley under the Bush Administration is, in the recent words of George Will, serving out Woodrow Wilson's third term.

In terms of party politics and history, something pretty monumental may be going on here. The Democratic Party from the days of Wilson up through the days of LBJ was clearly the Party of anti-isolationism. Vietnam shook this interventionist streak to the core but I always conceived of it as being a temporary thing. But I'm really not so certain, anymore. Maybe it's just the poor luck of not having a Democrat in the White House when 9/11 happened but you gotta admit, the Democrats are closer today to being an anti-war party than they've ever been.

Granted, they're not running George McGovern but even in 1972 there was a large contingent of "Cold War" hawkish Democrats in Congress. I can't think of a single Democrat in Congress today that is both a bona-fide liberal and a bona-fide hawk. The Scoop Jackson wing of the Party is officially dead and The New Republic increasingly reads like a journal out of time.

As you look back through history you have to recognize that the Democratic Party of 1934 had more in common with the Republican Party of 1864 than the Democratic Party during that same time. The parties had profoundly flip-flopped in 70 years. Another 70 years later I'm wondering if the same thing isn't happening, again.

Obviously, I don't think its so strange that movement conservatives are gung ho for liberty. That is one of the greatest contributions of the neocons to conservatism - the move beyond mere anticommunism to a policy of active support of liberty. The pursuit of realpolitik is not well suited for a republic. But idealism can have pragmatic benefits. The spread of liberty - political and economic - has clear benefits for the security and prosperity of the United States. Further, it's the right and moral position to take.

From the perspective of that commenter, we have the odd situation of conservatives pushing for liberation, and liberals coddling dictators. We no longer have any need for coddling dictators. During the cold war, resisting the spread of communism was arguably more important than fostering democracy right then. And I think it was. And in many cases, those nations that did not go commie eventually became democracies anyway. South Korea, Taiwan and Chile are examples of this. But now, without the threat of communism, we need to work to support democracy movements, especially in the Middle East.

And Iran should be our first target. At the very least, we should be giving cell phones, computers, printers, advice and public support to the Iranians who are opposed to the theocratic government. If need be, we should think about arms and military support. Iraq is one model for spreading democracy, and seems to be working relatively well. Iran gives us an opportunity to use another model, and one that might have more applicability around the world.

[wik] Thanks to Loyal Reader Mapgirl for pointing out that I mistook an entire nation for one of my favorite foods. Now corrected. However, Mapgirl should be aware that spell check only chimes in when you misspell a word, not when you use an inappropriate, but correctly spelled word. Like she did: “you should turn of any spellchecking feature.” Bricks/glass houses yadayadayada.

Michael Totten has two sources that say yes!

Interesting, and Michael is right-- when Tehran falls, whenever that is, the press will treat it as a "Holy Shit! How Did That Happen?!?" moment, because they've done a piss-poor job of handling developing stories in the Middle East.

Hey, and how messed up is this? The ABC poll that everyone and their brother blogged about yesterday-- the one that said that Iraqis in general are pretty OK with how stuff is going, though they didn't dig the war so overmuch-- got a long favorable piece on NPR yesterday, but nearly nothing that I could see on other broadcast news outlets. NPR came to the table, and CNN didn't?

According to this CNN article, Poland's NATO Ambassador Jerzy M. Nowak said, "If it is necessary, we will continue leading the multinational division. We are prepared for that even if Spain is not able to fulfil its promise." Poland has led the multinational division of over 9000 troops from 24 nations since last September. Spain was scheduled to take over in July of this year.

My respect for the Poles has grown immensely over the last year or two. They get it, they realize what oppression and terror are, and the need to fight it. Polish PM Leszek Miller told a news conference:

"Revising our positions on Iraq after terrorists attacks would be to admit that terrorists are stronger and that they are right (to pursue attacks)."

Damn straight.

Link fromThe Smallest Minority via a post on Hell in a Handbasket, which I went to because he left a comment on Murdoc's Blog, which I just blogrolled. Ain't technology grand?

Today is my dad's birthday. So wish the elder buckethead a happy birthday between your relief at passing through the Ides of March unscathed and your anticipation for drunken excess on the Feast Day of St. Patrick.

Coincidently (or not...) Murdoc Online is celebrating his first blogoversary today. Keep up the good work! Murdoc has had some excellent stuff in the past especially in the realm of military affairs, and we are confident that he hasn't run out of good thinks to think. So confident, in fact, that I'm adding him to the blogroll. Cheers!

I saw that title, and knew instantly that it was written by ol' Ted Dalrymple, that polyanna prison doctor from Manchester.

A fun read, though, as always.

Reading around the wondrous interweb, I have found a few interesting bits on the Madrid Bombings and the subsequent victory of the socialists.

Mark Steyn offers this:

For the non-complacent, the question is fast becoming whether "civilised society" in much of Europe is already too "undermined". Last Friday, for a brief moment, it looked as if a few brave editorialists on the Continent finally grasped that global terrorism is a real threat to Europe, and not just a Bush racket. But even then they weren't proposing that the Continent should rise up and prosecute the war, only that they be less snippy in their carping from the sidelines as America gets on with it. Spain was Washington's principal Continental ally, and what does that boil down to in practice? 1,300 troops. That's fewer than what the New Hampshire National Guard is contributing.

Its disturbing to that even our allies are not exactly chipping in for the big win. Remind me, why do we bother trying to get the support and help of the "world community" when it's still us holding the bag and paying the tab?

Distinguished Miltary Theorist Edward Luttwak has a fascinating article over at the Globe and Mail:

It is a matter of record that Osama bin Laden and other Islamists identified Spain as a priority target years before the Iraq war. Under Muslim law, no land conquered by Islam may legitimately come under non-Muslim rule. For the fanatics, Spain is still El Andalus, which must be reconquered for Islam by immigration and intimidation. So even if the bombs were placed by Islamists, the claim that Spain was only attacked because of Mr. Aznar's support for the Iraq war is utterly false.

Even if hard evidence were to be found that ETA was responsible after all, it would be too late: The Spanish political community has failed the test of terrorism — it has bowed down to the violence of the few, allowing them to dictate their will to the millions. There are bound to be serious consequences, because openly demonstrated weakness always invites further attack.

For one thing, Spain still rules the enclaves of Ceuta and Melilla on the North African coast, which Islamists view as Christian colonies on Muslim soil. Having seen what bombs can do, they might well be tempted to see if a few more bombs can induce the Spanish to surrender the two enclaves. No democracy ever found safety in surrendering to aggressions, large or small.

Wretchard from the Belmont Club chimes in with Dark Night of Spirit. He offers some troublesome thoughts on the strategic implications of the realignment in Spain.

The appeasement which so amuses the French may not be so funny when played by the Spaniards. For Spain, in concert with America and France, shared the watch of North Africa. And since that is where many Al Qaeda have moved, as the Madrid train bombing carried out by North Africans proves, Europe will find their relative danger increased far more greatly than the Americans, who can comfortably lose the Spanish contingent in Iraq. The loss of a solid Spain, while an annoyance to America is a catastrophe for Europe. Iraq is far from America but Spain is close to France.

In the end, the very nature of the War on Terror ultimately means that Europe needs America more than America needs Europe. The global jihad means that attacks on Europe can be planned and launched from geographical locations far beyond the reach of their defense forces. That could be ignored while Europe remained convinced that it would not be targeted. But now the doubt grows. And if the contingency eventuates, neither France nor Spain have the mobility or the means to pursue their foes into the uttermost reaches of Central Asia, the deserts of Africa or the teeming stews of the Southwest Asia. That deficiency can only be addressed by a sustained program of European defense spending --- and it will not. Zapatero has cast away the very thing that he may need and which he can neither afford nor beg.

Eurosocialism, by hitching its wagon to the fortunes of militant Islam has put itself at it's mercy. That is the definition of surrender, whose fine print the Continent will soon be familiar with. A disarmed, politically correct and supine Eurosocialist society can only exist where other free men guard their borders. By dismissing the guardians and capitulating to the jihadis the Eurosocialists have struck at the very root of their own existence. Lenin once remarked that capitalists would sell him the noose he would use to hang them. But that was before Stalin poisoned him.

And this piece from Blogcritics

And regarding the Iraq accusations, does anyone notice the screaming, grand irony of al Qaeda claiming that their justification for mass murder in Spain is the Spanish government's support for the war in Iraq? I thought al Qaeda and Iraq had nothing to do with each other. I thought Iraq had nothing to do with the War on Terror.

I thought al Qaeda's excuse for blowing the shit out of thousands of innocent people around the world was to further the cause of extreme Islamic fundamentalism: the war in Iraq, from their perspective, only aided the cause of Islamic fundamentalism since Islamic fundmentalism, and any other kind of religious political expression, was ruthlessly supressed by Saddam. Al Qaeda should be damned cheerful about the removal of Saddam and should be thanking any country that helped make it so, not blowing up its trains.

Terrorists cannot be appeased, negotiated with, reasoned with, or have their attention deflected elsewhere as a matter of any governmental policy: the only appropriate governmental policy is direct confrontation, unambiguous condemnation and aggressive pursuit and elimination of terrorists and their accomplices and enablers. Anything else is giving in to fear and wishful thinking.

It is being reported on command post and elsewhere that there ahve been recent uprisings in both Syria and Iran, apparently inspired by the American libervasion of Iraq.

This Command Post, er, post talks about the 14 Syrian Kurds who were killed in rioting and clashes with Baathist security forces. The Free Arab Forum is reporting that there is a small but violent uprising in northern Iran, where demonstrators apparently took over the local security force headquarters.

These events are not being reported in any of the mainstream media. Over the last couple years, I can count on one hand the number of stories I've seen on the Democracy movement in Iran. This is important news, and we should be hearing more of it.

In this newhouse column, Lileks explains better than I can exactly what is wrong with John Kerry crowing about all the love he's getting from foriegn leaders.

"I've met foreign leaders who can't go out and say this publicly, but boy they look at you and say, 'You've got to win, you've got to beat this guy, we need a new policy,' things like that," Kerry said in Florida.

...it's a telling remark. Sen. Kerry might be surprised to discover that foreign opinion doesn't concern your average NASCAR dad, who would prefer America to be strong and disliked than weak and beloved.

...On another level, though, Kerry's remark sounds pathetically naive. Why does he think the Unnamed Foreign Leaders like him best -- because they have America's best interests at heart? They want to mire the United States in the tarpit of the United Nations again, and Kerry looks like the man to wade right in.

The fact that Kerry would boast about this is almost beyond my comprehension. Why should we care what Chirac thinks about who occupies the office? And furthermore, why should we agree with his choice for us, given his behavior towards the US over the last couple years? Remarkable.

From Norway comes a bizarre story about Stalin's crab army. That's right. Stalin's crab army.

See, in the 1930s, the Man of Steel caused some Pacific giant crabs (aka Kamchatka Crabs) to be brought to the waters of the Barents Sea, where they have been living ever since. In the 1990s, for reasons nobody can discern, their population exploded, and since then an army of millions of 25-pound, 3-food-wide crabs have been marching down the coast of Norway, eating anything in their path. In their wake is an underwater desert in which no multicelled living thing is to be found, and apparently the crabs can live off any food source under any conditions. And yes, the Stalin-crabs are red.

Creepy, weird, and troubling. Among other things, the article suggests that the crabs may be partially responsible for the continued low population of cod in the Atlantic, as the crabs seem to eat everything below cod in the food chain. As well as everything else. And at this point, ecologists see nothing standing between them and Gibraltar.

The worst (best?) part? The giant Commie crabs are delicious. Norwegians are caught between horror that their waters are the scene of a veritable piscene holocaust and delight that the perpetrators fetch top dollar and go so incredibly well with a lemon wedge and drawn butter.

Moral of the story: dont f**k with Mother Nature, but really don't f**k with Papa Joe, who seems to have macabre powers of crustaceous revenge from beyond the grave.

This year marks the 50th birthday of the ubiquitous Fender Stratocaster.

The Shreveport Times gives some history, some Strat lore, and some basic engineering concepts associated with solid-body electrics that aren't entirely wrong but will suffice to annoy Johno. It's kinda too bad that Fender isn't as interested in this event for its own sake, as opposed to being an event for selling you stuff with "Fender 50th" logos on it, but I do dig 'em.

I bought an American Classic Strat (as opposed to what NDR termed a "NAFTA-Strat") ca 1995 and have played it exclusively ever since. It doesn't have the ass or tone of a fat Gibson product (nor the price of a Les Paul, Strat's chubbier, warmer cousin), nor the scream of any of your pointy metal models. A Strat does alot of stuff pretty OK though, widely known for good reason as a dependable model. The Times article calls it a "workhorse". Sort of the Ford pick-up truck of guitars I guess.

Happy 50th.

This last weekend, Spoons and Armed Liberal got married. Not to each other, though there's nothing wrong with that. A belated congratulations to both of them!

Rocket Jones has found a new toy. It allows you to do this:

[wik] As has been pointed out by loyal reader Norbizness, Bart made an error in his chalkboard writing assignment. I think its funnier this way, so I will make no effort to correct it.

Phil Dennison has done a very brave and foolish thing: put a song by his band on the internet. They're called The Fragments, and they've written a damn good power-pop song. Go check it out!

With all due respect to my colleagues Buckethead and GeekLethal, who are certainly more schooled in foreign affairs than I, I have to disagree with their concensus that a victory for Spanish socialism is a victory for terrorism.

If the Spanish people's choosing a new government amounts to giving in to terrorists' demands, then what about the US' decision to pull troops out of Saudi Arabia? As I remember, Osama sure had his turban in a twist about those troops in the caliphate! And we just caved to him like the weak-willed infidel running dog traitors to Islam we are.

Yes, Spain's political shifts might be cause for worry, but just because a nation does something a terrorist group favors does not automatically mean that the nation has done so to appease terrorists. Or do you really believe that a vote for John Kerry is a vote for HitlerOsama?

Deficit Study Disputes Role of Economy

When President Bush and his advisers talk about the widening federal budget deficit, they usually place part of the blame on economic shocks ranging from the recession of 2001 to the terrorist attacks that year.

But a report released on Monday by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimated that economic weakness would account for only 6 percent of a budget shortfall that could reach a record $500 billion this year.Next year, the agency predicted, faster economic growth will actually increase tax revenues even as the deficit remains at a relatively high level of $374 billion.

The new numbers confirm what many analysts have predicted for some time: that budget deficits in the decade ahead will stem less from the lingering effects of the downturn and much more from rising government spending and progressively deeper tax cuts.

Anybody else as shocked and confused by this turn of events as I am?

Last Wednesday, Spanish Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar was coasting to another victory in the polls. Thursday saw the worst terrorist attack in Spanish history. The Spanish government immediately seized on the idea that the ETA must have perpetrated the attack, the Basque separatist terrorists who have plagued the Spanish for decades. However, several early indicators led many, myself included, to lean toward the proposition that it was the work of Al Qaida or one of its franchises. First, the scale of the attack – far beyond any previous ETA efforts. Second, the ETA almost always gives notice of an attack, usually shortly before – and there was no notification. Third, the MO was quite in line with previous Al Qaida efforts - elaborate planning that was obviously involved, ten bombs timed to go off nearly simultaneously, and using mass transit as the vehicle and target for the attack. The timing was also peculiar – exactly two and a half years after 9/11, and I heard that that is exactly nine hundred eleven days after the attack on the Pentagon and the WTC. (The math adds up. Maybe that’s being excessively numerological, but they go in for that kind of thing.

Of course, now we know about the five men arrested, and the van and the tape and the Koran. The letter that was delivered to the Arabic paper in London. It seems clear that Islamic fundamentalists are indeed responsible. Which posed an important question for Spanish voters. And one that I think that they have answered wrong.

Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, the Socialist who will become the new Spanish PM, has already declared that he will withdraw Spanish troops from Iraq. Withdraw support from the war on terror. In short, join the axis of weasels. But what message does this send to the Terrorists? That the Spanish can be intimidated. Once you give in, once you flinch, the terrorists own you. You’re their bitch. Anytime that the Spanish do something that the terrorists don’t like, you can expect more bombs, not less. Spanish foreign policy will now center on the avoidance of terrorist attacks, which will mean placation, appeasement and kowtowing.

This is a huge defeat for civilization. While we can argue over what is the proper course and what exact methods and goals are appropriate, there is no question that we are fighting enemies of civilization. And those enemies just took out one of our allies as surely as if they had beaten them in a stand up battle.

When I first heard of the Madrid bombings, I said to Mrs. Buckethead that I hoped that some good might come of this evil, that Europe would realize that it is not just the United States that is fighting this war, but that it is a war that all the civilized nations must fight. I thought that perhaps it would be like Pearl Harbor was for Churchill – the moment he realized that the United States would enter the fight. I was wrong to hope that, it seems. The reaction has instead been a perception that had the Spanish not supported the US, they would not have been attacked. While I can see the logic of that view, it completely misses the larger picture.

To the Islamic terrorist, we are not the only Satan. Just the biggest one. Their fight is against the west, civilization, in general. Their fantasy ideology paints the Spanish and even the United States as crusaders, rehashing battles half a millennium in the past. (Battles that they mostly won, for chrissakes.) But Spain collectively decided that short-term safety is more important than fighting against terrorism and the delusional ideology behind it. They’re going to sit this one out.

I fear that should we have another large-scale attack here in the United States, there might be a similar reaction. But I don’t believe that another attack would convince the electorate to give up on the fight. I think if anything, another 9/11 would only strengthen our resolve. I pray that we don’t find out.

[wik] My coworker points out that even if the ETA was not involved in the bombing, we will likely see more bombs from them, not that they see that the electorate can be cowed by successful, horrific terrorist attacks.

[alsø wik] Mark Steyn makes many of the same points. But more clever like, damn him.

"THE bombs dropped on Baghdad exploded in Madrid!" declared one "peace" protester in Spain. Or as Australian Federal Police Commissioner Mick Keelty put it, somewhat less vividly: "If this turns out to be Islamic extremists . . . it is more likely to be linked to the position that Spain and other allies took on issues such as Iraq."

By "other allies", he means you – yes, you, reading this on the bus to work in Australia. You may not have supported the war, or ever voted for John Howard, but you're now a target. In other words, this is "blowback". This is what you get when you side with the swaggering Texas gunslinger and his neocon Zionist sidekicks.

Good stuff, read the whole thing.

The Donald Sensing post that we were talking about back on Perfidy's Gay Marriage Day is now a polished article on the Wall Street Journal's Opinion Page. It makes just as much sense now as it did then.

Plucked from Slate. Is Rove really going to want to get into a war of words?

"God loves you, and I love you. And you can count on both of us as a powerful message that people who wonder about their future can hear."—Los Angeles, Calif., March 3, 2004 (Thanks to Tanny Bear)

"The march to war affected the people's confidence. It's hard to make investment. See, if you're a small business owner or a large business owner and you're thinking about investing, you've got to be optimistic when you invest. Except when you're marching to war, it's not a very optimistic thought, is it? In other words, it's the opposite of optimistic when you're thinking you're going to war." —Springfield, Mo., Feb. 9, 2004 (Thanks to Garry Trudeau.)

"See, one of the interesting things in the Oval Office—I love to bring people into the Oval Office—right around the corner from here—and say, this is where I office, but I want you to know the office is always bigger than the person."—Washington, D.C., Jan. 29, 2004 (Thanks to Michael Shively.)

"More Muslims have died at the hands of killers than—I say more Muslims—a lot of Muslims have died—I don't know the exact count—at Istanbul. Look at these different places around the world where there's been tremendous death and destruction because killers kill."—Washington, D.C., Jan. 29, 2004 (Thanks to Michael Shively.)

"In an economic recession, I'd rather that in order to get out of this recession, that the people be spending their money, not the government trying to figure out how to spend the people's money."—Tampa, Fla., Feb. 16, 2004

"King Abdullah of Jordan, the King of Morocco, I mean, there's a series of places—Qatar, Oman—I mean, places that are developing—Bahrain—they're all developing the habits of free societies."—Washington, D.C., Jan. 29, 2004