It is, it seems, impossible to escape the anti-Americanism that runs through the London Independent like some rancid stream. Here, buried deep in a review of a movie that is itself hardly a paean to the US, we find this charming comment:

“But this would be to ignore the veiled criticism of America, once the country that prided itself on being a refuge to the tired and poor but more recently the scourge of immigrants and aliens.”

A scourge?

Robert Brandon, the, er, ‘chair’ of Duke ‘University’s’ philosophy department has now come up with a reply to his critics. It’s worth reading, but let’s take a look at a few of the points he raises.

“There seems to be a widespread perception that professors reward students for agreeing with them and penalize those who disagree with them. That has certainly not been my experience; not as a student, nor a professor.”

Ah well, Professor, could that be, perhaps, because you have always surrounded yourself with those prudent enough to subscribe (at least publicly) to the smelly little orthodoxies of today’s academy?

But is there any bias in the way that Duke hires its teaching staff? Brandon doesn’t think so. To his credit, he is honest enough to acknowledge that its faculty does lean to the Left, but:

“The claim is that we liberals only want to hire other liberals. The process for hiring faculty in our university is largely decentralized. The hiring units in universities are departments, not the administration. I did not presume to speak for other departments, but I did categorically deny that there was any such bias in the hiring practices of Duke's philosophy department. None of us would want such a bias to be there, and in virtually all cases there is no mechanism for it to be there.”

That’s an argument, I suppose, but , thinking about it for a moment or two, it fits entertainingly uncomfortably with the case for mandatory ‘diversity’ usually made by academics in universities such as Duke. I don’t know where Professor Brandon stands on that particular issue, but supporters of affirmative action generally regard a heavy preponderance of one ethnic group or one sex within an institution as undeniable proof of prejudice. Following that logic, the same should be true of a teaching staff heavily skewed towards one ideological point of view. Any thoughts on that, professor?

What really is nonsense, however, is this claim:

“Typically, we know nothing about the candidates' politics until after they are hired.”

Oh come on, professor. In your discipline, a quick glance at a candidate’s publications, fields of interest and so on will be more than enough to reveal his or her political leanings. You don’t need to look for a bumper sticker.

Brandon also wonders why so many academics lean to the Left. Hmmm, tempting though it may be, the old jibe (“those who can’t do, teach) is not the sole explanation. Still, Brandon has raised an interesting topic, but one for another time, so I’ll just conclude with this remark from the professor:

“There is a statistical association between the qualities that make for good academics and those that lead to left-leaning political views.”

Well, Dr. Brandon, that depends on what you mean by a ‘good’ academic.

From a reader:

Mr. Goldberg:

You got the title wrong when you said "WATCHBLOG DENIES ANY LINK TO KERRY RUMOR"

In actuality, Watchblog claimed all of the credit for the Kerry rumor (claiming Drudge stole it).

What they denied was that the site's proprietor, who is the link to the Clark campaign, had any involvement.

They sent us this:

Your report of conspiracy theories regarding WatchBlog, its founder Cameron Barrett and the Kerry affair rumor have no basis in fact. Cameron Barrett turned the management of WatchBlog over to me back in October when he went to the Clark campaign. Cameron has had absolutely no role in WatchBlog operations, nor has he written anything on WatchBlog since then. Cameron's only role since October of 2003 with WatchBlog is that it is his server which hosts the software which WatchBlog runs on.

The writer who broke the story on Feb. 6 on WatchBlog, SoL, is known by me personally and he has no contacts with Cameron Barrett and has told me his source was a media insider having no connections with the Clark campaign. Drudge stole the story some 6 days later and called it a scoop. The story has been on WatchBlog for 7 days now. These are the facts from the source. If you are interested in publishing facts, publish this email. If like Drudge, you are just into promoting ratings through misinformation, by all means wastebasket this factual feedback on the conspiracy theory of a connection between WatchBlog's founder and the Clark Campaign and the stolen story by Drudge.

These facts can be backed up by the editors and writers of WatchBlog who now number more than 40.

David Remer
Managing Editor, WatchBlog

Russian womanhood has been scarred by the country's extraordinary popular reliance upon abortion as a primary means of contraception -- with the abortions in question conducted under the less-than-exemplary standards of Soviet and post-Soviet medicine. As one expert (Murray Feshbach) has noted, "approximately 10 to 20 percent of [Russian] women become infertile after abortions, according to numerous reports." Add to this the explosive spread of potentially curable sexually transmitted infections. According to official figures, the incidence of syphilis in 2001 was 100 times higher in Russia than in Germany.

A reader notes:

There are some significant difference between broadarick and Burket. The two people that Burket relies upon for corroboration say he is a liar and the people Broadarick told about the rape support her story. That all goes toward crediblity, doesn't it?

From a reader:

Mr. Goldberg:

You provided a link to Instapundit pointing out how Barrett lied.

I would point you to this article by Tim Noah over on Slate, in which he bemoans what is happening to Kerry, sarcastically decribing how to smear someone. I notice this:

"In lieu of actual evidence, it's sufficient to find the accuser believable. That was Wall Street Journal editorialist Dorothy Rabinowitz's justification for running with the story of Juanita Broaddrick, who claimed that Bill Clinton raped her."

A cynic like me would point out how the entire story regarding Barrett involved the reporters finding the accuser believable in lieu of actual evidence.

Why do you think Mr. Noah didn't write a similar piece on the anatomy of a smear against President Bush when it had been all over the media, and instead wrote one in response to the Kerry allegations which the media has barely touched?

Well, I've put up a dozen of the last 14 posts. I'm gonna go write a very special G-File now. Back in a bit.

From a very depressing story in the IHT: :

Anti-Semitism is so prevalent in some of the housing projects that ring Paris and other major French cities that "it's become infused into the language," according to Barbara Lefebvre, a history teacher at a French public school.
.
"Just about every week I see students in my class - where there are no Jews - insulting each other by saying, 'Stop it, you Jew.' Or 'No, you can't borrow my pen, it's not yours, Jew.' Or if their pen is broken they'll say: 'What's wrong with my pen? It's a Jew.'
.
"When you point it out, they say, 'This is just a way of speaking.'"

The Retired Texas National Guard Lt. Col who's accusing Bush of having sanitized his military record has had run-ins with the National Guard before. On December 21, 2001 the Austin-American Statesman reported that Burket was one of the leading "disgruntled" guardsmen to oppose Bush's appointment of Daniel James III to run the Air National Guard. James is the son of the first four star African-American general was appointed to run the Texas National Guard by Bush in 1997. From the story:

James said he was notified by an Air Force inspector general soon after his Oct. 3 nomination that allegations against him had caused the Air Force to begin a review of his tenure in Texas.

James said he believes at least 10 former Guard members who served under him at Camp Mabry are trying to block his appointment. He blamed years of strained relationships with them. Most of the men did not embrace his leadership when he took the job, he said, and others are angry because they were bypassed for promotions.

Some of the former Guard members acknowledged sending letters protesting the nomination to the Senate Armed Services Committee and filing reports listing alleged incidents of mismanagement with the U.S. Air Force, the supervising authority of the Air National Guard. They declined to provide copies of the reports and letters, as did the Armed Services Committee.

One of the most vocal detractors is Chief Warrant Officer Harvey Gough of Dallas, now retired from 30 years in the National Guard. He has been locked in dispute with James for at least two years, culminating with a lawsuit Gough filed against James in a Travis County court in January 2000. Gough alleged he was subjected to ethnic slurs in 1998 by members of James' staff and accused James of retaliating against him by court-martialing him for insubordination without an appeal hearing.

The suit was dismissed earlier this year after a judge said Gough's complaint belonged in military review boards. That decision is being appealed.

Gough said that when he learned of James' nomination, he quickly mobilized other disgruntled soldiers. One is Lt. Col. Bill Burkett of Abilene, who acknowledged that he sent two letters to the Air Force and the Armed Services Committee.

Burkett also has a lawsuit against James on appeal, alleging that Guard officials prevented him from getting medical care at Dyess Air Force Base near his home when he returned from a mission in Panama because of a management audit report he filed.

I'm sure this reader is right. And many other emailers have also told me to beware any email which begins "As a lifelong Republican...." But I would add that I doubt it's just letter's to the editor and emails to bloggers. I'm sure C-Span callers and others have played this game too, on both sides of the aisle. What's different is that people are publicly advocating it, saying lying is a good thing. The Clintonian rot sinks ever deeper. Anyway, the letter:

I am not surprised by the actions of Moby and others of the liberal/leftist persuasion. I wouldn't expect less of them. But did you ever consider that maybe their tactics are also aimed at the various "letters to the editors" pages of the daily newspapers? and not just to the blogosphere?

More and more I am reading such letters that begin with something like "I am a life-long Republican" or "I voted for Bush in the last election" that then go on to list the litany of sins perpetrated by the current administration.

Letters such as these may well influence the non-blogosphere since their carry the cachet of the daily snoozepaper. I've noticed that these letters don't have the same amount of vitriol that a liberal/leftist writer would use, but they have got me thinking.

I don't agree with everything going on the Bush administration, but I sure wouldn't write a letter complaining about it to the local news.

According to the experts , George W. Bush is, is, is "looking for votes!"

Update: This link was broken before. It's been fixed.

Until now, I've always used the phrase "Lying for Justice" to describe how environmenatlists, racial hucksters and other leftists seem perfectly willing to make up "crises," racist incidents (from Tawana Brawley through the epidemic of racial hoaxes on college campuses) and the like in order to mobilize society in a "progressive" direction (this will be a big subject of my book, btw). Well, now we have Mobyism. The rock singer recently explained to the Daily News:

"No one's talking about how to keep the other side home on Election Day," Moby tells us. "It's a lot easier than you think and it doesn't cost that much. This election can be won by 200,000 votes."

Moby suggests that it's possible to seed doubt among Bush's far-right supporters on the Web.

"You target his natural constituencies," says the Grammy-nominated techno-wizard. "For example, you can go on all the pro-life chat rooms and say you're an outraged right-wing voter and that you know that George Bush drove an ex-girlfriend to an abortion clinic and paid for her to get an abortion.

"Then you go to an anti-immigration Web site chat room and ask, 'What's all this about George Bush proposing amnesty for illegal aliens?'"

A couple of weeks ago, several liberal bloggers announced that they wanted their readers to deliberately make up fake emails and send them to NR because they found the real emails we were posting in the Corner too unhelpful to their cause. So far they've all been way too stupid to fool us, but that could change. And now, last night, Andrew Sullivan received an email that he -- and I, and a lot of our mutual readers -- think was made up.

Whether it was or wasn't, it now seems safe to predict that the Moby-Moore fringe of liberalism is ratcheting-up it's ends justify-the-means approach to political discourse. Get ready for the Age of Mobyism, it won't be pretty.

Andrew Sullivan frets that that the Republicans might be behind the Kerry story and he posts a long letter which more or less takes it as a given that they are. I agree that it would be bad and stupid if the GOP was behind this. And I agree that we have more important things to argue about right now. (And I agree with Rick that the Republicans should shut up about the whole thing).

But why Andrew is so credulous is beyond me. The Republicans I've talked to today, including one in the administration, all think that the timing of this story doesn't really help Republicans much. That may be right or wrong, who knows, they certainly didn't know anything about the origins of this story. But we know from that Craig Crawford email that Chris Lehane has been "shopping around" the story for a while and that Clark himself has been alluding to Kerry's "intern" problem (I'm hearing it's not really an intern, by the way, but that's entirely unverified). How exactly does that sound like a Republican-driven story?

Sullivan's correspondent frets that the Republicans are once again "taking us down the Lewinsky path. Well, two points about that. First of all, the person -- the only person -- who took us down that path was Bill Clinton.

Second, as for the meaning of that whole episode I've long disagreed with Andrew's
interpretation of the whole Lewinsky scandal. His "Scolds" piece in the New York Times magazine moved the whole "conservatives are obsessed about sex" storyline very far down the field and in my opinion did considerable damage to the conservative cause. And while he may have been right about some conservatives, he painted with way too broad a brush, in my opinion. For example, he wrote "For the new conservatives, the counterattack on homosexual legitimacy is of a piece with the battle against Presidential adultery." And, as someone who was pretty deeply involved in the Lewinsky battles, I can say that was simply untrue in my own experience.

Regardless, maybe Andrew knows something that gives credence to his fears that the GOP is behind this. But it sounds to me like he's getting ahead of himself.

To look at it from an economic point of view, this has all the earmarks of a "demand-pull" story. The whole hep political world spends a week saying: "Only a big ol' sex scandal could stop Kerry now!" There's a low-level not-so-scandalous rumor involving sex and Kerry and the magic word "intern" that's been kicking around for a while. Demand's so strong it pulls in whatever's out there in the way of supply, and thanks to Drudge, it's now a "story" that "rocks the campaign."

I may be wrong, but it sure looks bogus to me.

From ABC's " The Note ":

" RNC Chairman Ed Gillespie speaks at the Washoe County Lincoln Day Dinner in Reno, Nev., today and the gloves come off again, with regards to Sen. Kerry.

The Note has a preview:

"One of Senator Kerry's campaign consultants was recently quoted in the New York Times saying, 'Everything is on the table&Everything.'

"We know that 'everything' means taking slanderous charges against the President of the United States, funneling money to shadow organizations in voter suppression tactics, and spreading lies on the Internet."

"It's only February and they have made it clear they intend to run the direct the dirtiest campaign in modern presidential politics. This is because they don't want a debate on the issues, and they don't want to run on Sen. Kerry's record. I guess I can't blame them for that."

"We as a party can not sink to their level. We must stick to the truth in this race."

Simpsons movie on the way.

FROM SESAME STREET TO PENNSYLVANIA AVE: BIG BIRD AND FRIENDS RUFFLE FEATHERS ON "THE WEST WING"

Special Episode Set To Air on NBC, Wednesday, March 3rd

Burbank – February 12, 2004 – Members of the Sesame Street Muppets will make their first-ever guest appearance together on a primetime series when they visit The White House on NBC's "The West Wing." The episode will air Wednesday, March 3, 2004, 9:00 –10:00 p.m. ET.

Big Bird, Elmo, Zoe and Rosita make their debut when President Bartlet (Martin Sheen) enlists C.J. (Allison Janney) to help improve the First Lady's image. Abbey (Stockard Channing) embraces C.J.'s suggestion to work with the Muppets and show the public that she's a First Lady who is also a working doctor. The White House staff and their children are abuzz when Abbey films a public service announcement in which she gives the beloved Elmo a check-up.

Her views on marital fidelity: "I don't think I could have coped so well" with a mate's philandering as Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) has. "I used to say to my husband, my late husband, 'If you ever get something I'll maim you. Not kill you, just maim you.' And we'd laugh, laugh, laugh." Heinz adds that she has never had any reason to suspect either of her husbands. "Not for one day, because what I expect of them, they have a right to expect of me. Maybe I'm into 18-year-olds." At which Heinz's campaign handler, former political journalist Chris Black, cautioned bleakly: "That was a joke."

Some very quick thoughts before I run off to lunch:

1. Personally, I don't relish another one of these "debates" over adulterous sex by a Democratic politician. Not because I condone it or anything. But, I'm just exhausted with the topic. It is entirely possible, and perhaps probable, that most Americans will view it the same way and this story will have few legs.

2. And, we do not know if the story is true yet. I am sure the Drudge story is true to the extent that he's accurately reporting that others are investigating it. But the underlying story may not be as juicey as it sounds. Or, it may be much, much jucier, but nobody will talk on the record, killing it.

3. Assuming there's a kerfuffle coming, I'm delighted that this is coming out in the primary and not the general election because I'm fairly confident that Republicans don't have their fingerprints on the story and that would be impossible to deny -- regardless of the facts -- if this came out during the general election.

4. It will be fascinating to see how Howard Dean and John Edwards talk about the issue. They have one obvious point to their advantage. Because Kerry's campaign is based almost entirely on the "electability" issue they can go after Kerry on those grounds while at the same time denying the underlying offense is "anybody's business." Hence they will be able to say something like "those nasty Republicans will unfairly exploit John Kerry's private mistakes. I think that's terrible, but we have to face reality and run the best candidate we can. John Kerry's damaged goods."

5. I'm going to lunch.

Gosh, I hope she keeps defending John Kerry. I particularly like this line, "Any attempts to link Kerry to me and make him look bad with that connection is completely false."

Um, does that mean any attempts to link him with her to make John Kerry look good are true? And if so, how exactly does one link a Democratic candidate to Hanoi Jane for the purposes of making him look good?

Seriously, if Kerry can be linked to Fonda to make him look good, presumably he can be linked to her period. Besides it's not up to Jane Fonda to judge whether such links make him look good or bad. Her links to the North Vietnamese, for example, made her look good to some people and bad to others. You can't declare that just the bad impressions are "false."

John - My point isn't that you can't pick a boring VP. George HW Bush was boring. Al Gore (versions 3.1 thru 9.6) was boring. But the Veep needs to balance-out what a candidate is missing or put forward a theme. I agree Gephardt would help in the Midwest and if he could assure Missouri, that's a strong argument for him. But Gephardt multiplies the dull white liberal guy factor of the Kerry candidacy. While I diagree that people saw Cheney as boring (I think they saw him as having mega gravitas), getting a boring Veep didn't hurt Bush because Bush needed a heavy-hitter to round out his ticket. Yes, I know, Gore didn't round-out the Clinton ticket so much as reinforce it -- new generation of leaders and all that. But the insight Clinton had was that the Veep pick was a way to launch a theme, convey an image. Bush did that in 2000 with Cheney by picking a guy from Wyoming in that he wanted to signal the frat party in Washington would be over if the GOP won. If Kerry picks Gephardt what will the the message be? Tired dull Democrats who oversaw the demise of the Democratic Party take one last stand?

Hey, I could be wrong because I'm analyzing this badly, or I could be wrong because Kerry makes the wrong decision. I hope it's the latter.

From a reader:

Mr. Goldberg, I am a Democrat. While I don't like George Bush, his policies or this current Republican Administration I also completely relate to what you said about Kerry. He is not an inspiring or commanding figure. In fact I think he is phony, and I believe that he will have a difficult time relating to the average American voter in November.

But I also believe Kerry will ultimately win in 2004, because Bush has successfully alienated not only virtually every Democrat in the country, but also many 'independent' and Republican voters. I believe enough of the country is angry or disaffected enough for him to loose. I pray everyday that he will move back to Crawford, TX permanently.

Anyway, thanks for your great article about Kerry.

Balko responds to Ramesh and me.

John - Your piece this morning is very good and very helpful in terms of laying out the pros and cons of the Veep contenders. But I do not buy the Gephardt prediction either. You can pick a Washington insider when you're a Washington outsider. But when the top of the ticket is pure beltway politician -- I mean he's taken more special interest money than any other Senator for fifteen years -- adding another beltway pol doesn't make that much sense. It certainly makes some, as you point out. You'd have to go back to LBJ to find an all-insider presidential ticket.

And remember Dean's fired up a big chunk of the base by running against the business-as-usual crowd. Gephardt is the distilled essence of business as usual. He oversaw the loss of the House to the Gingroid Barbarians, for Pete's sake. He's perhaps the only major Democratic politician other than Kerry who's duller than Kerry -- that is since Gore has lost the ability to modulate the pitch of his voice. The Democrats really, really need to fire-up their base, excite the media, etc. I just don't think Gephardt fires up anybody except Teamsters in St. Louis.

I am in the military and stationed overseas (not in Iraq or a forward deployed location), we have the pleasure of listening to NPR as part of the Armed Forces Network radio programming--they do give us Rush Limbaugh in the evenings so at least I feel like it's even. For the most part NPR doesn't bother me--although subversive in their means--at least they don't yell and every now and then there is a good story. Although they do have to do away with all that "authentic" background noise during their stories. If I hear one more person stacking boxes, breathing heavy, or the sound of seagulls on the coast--I'm going to scream. WE GET IT--you're tying to keep it real. Anyways on my way back from lunch I heard Bob Edwards morning edition. On it he was interviewing a reporter about President Bush's guard service record. IT WAS ABSOLUTELY OFFENSIVE TO GUARD AND RESERVE PERSONNEL! I realized that the media attention on the service record shows no deep though or true flushing out of the entire issue. THEY COMPLETELY MISUNDERSTAND WHAT IT MEANS TO BE GUARD OR RESERVE SERVICE MEMBER. Here is a copy of the e-mail I am sending to Mr. Edwards for your review (I think it explains my thoughts the best):

Mr. Edwards- Sir I have always considered you an even handed reporter of most situations and in addition you are always well read and knowledgeable about nearly every issue. However, your story this morning about the President's guard service record disappointed. Your show, in addition to the most recent media coverage, does not understand the basics about what service in the National Guard or Reserves means. It is NOT full time active duty. Guard members shuffle their training exercises, extra details, and required training throughout the year in order to maintain their guard status. In addition their are several layers of service--full-time, part-time, active duty reserve, and active duty guard. Guard members will often bounce back and forth between different statuses--active, inactive, etc...--throughout their careers. They truly are "citizen soldiers" that supplement the active duty military in peacetime and wartime. Many guard and reserve members spend much more time as "civilians" than as "military members." With recent events the necessity of calling up so many more guard and reserve personnel has switched that paradigm--many now spend a lot of time being "military members" and less time as civilians. So while you have reported in the past about the trauma to communities and families caused by the activation of guard and reserve communities--you do not see the connection between that anxiety of being called to full time active duty (when one is used to being a part-time guard member) and what the President did. It is obvious from his pay statements and medical records that the President was serving a part time guard requirement--like many of his counterparts did and continue to do. Rather than explain these nuances or fully explain the story this morning--you got into the specifics about dental records. Rather than look at all sides, you see one detail. It appears to me that the story was designed to convince the listener that President Bush was not serving his military requirement. The unfortunate bi-product of that report was to communicate to those individuals who proudly serve as part-time guard members (and there are a significant number) that there service is not good enough.

Sincerely, [NAME WITHHELD]

On the slim chance that you get to read this--along with the other 200 e-mails you get a day--please do not refer to my name. This is my opinion and not the opinion of the military. Thanks for leading the way on the corner--you all keep many of us in the military going!

One final note. In order to become a fighter interceptor pilot, President Bush had to complete Undergraduate Pilot Training. UPT--as we call it--is the most demanding training program in the Air Force and one of the most demanding flight schools ever created. It is a year long brutal trail by fire. The washout rate when he went through was probably about 30% (and these are college educated highly skilled motivated people). I don't have any hard data on that, but that's about the historical washout factor. The T-38 would have been his last training jet and is still considered on of the most difficult aircraft to land due to its high approach speed and large amount of power. Your brain has to think at about Mach 5! They just don't graduate people from pilot training because their fun to be around--you have to pass numerous checkrides and EVERY SINGLE FLIGHT is graded--(upwards of 37 separate times). If you can't do it--you're gone. How's that for a free market, conservative program?

Thanks for listening to the rant!

"I never meant to say that the Conservatives are generally stupid. I meant to say that stupid people are generally Conservative. I believe that is so obviously and universally admitted a principle that I hardly think any gentleman will deny it."

Brandon is, clearly, a bigot, not a gentleman. For a definition of a stupid conservative, however, I'll offer this: a stupid conservative is a conservative who gives any money to Duke 'university'. Alumni, please note.

The headline reads: "Greenspan Says Economy Improving but Risks Remain"

The lede:

The Federal Reserve's chairman, Alan Greenspan, offered his most optimistic outlook for the economy today since taking over the central bank in 1986. And he gave no indication that the Fed was at all inclined to begin raising short-term interest rates anytime soon.

An email about my article on NRO today:

One part toward the end gave me pause:

"We had gone to war for our own interests, [Krauthammer] said, not for the freedom of Afghan women. Now this was a kind of hypertrophic realism. From the principle that a nation should follow its interests it does not follow that it is in its interests always to make its case in terms of its interests. "

Perhaps I misunderstand, but you seem to give support for a Kissinger-style
policy of disinformation regarding the country's intents. Restated: What is
truly in the nation's interests does not always sound good when placed
against the backdrop of standard liberal values, so therefore, the president may find it desirable to disguise his true intentions under the cloak of
liberal values.

I must take exception, and state that such a stance can only hurt the
administration. Among other things, it was this sort of policy that led to
the "credibility gap" of the Vietnam-era presidents, and is leading to the
resurfacing of that exact same charge against the current administration. I
have yet to see the exact term "credibility gap" resurface in the major
media, but they are dancing around the term, and it is only a matter of
time. It is not a charge of lying, per se, but rather one that denotes
untrustworthiness on the part of the president's spokesmen.

Call me a liberal idealist, but I believe that if classified information is
not at stake, the president as well as his competitors should be as
forthcoming as possible with their intentions and ideas. Massaging the truth
is tempting and may work in the short term, but ultimately, it may render a
president as powerless as it did LBJ and Nixon in their final months.

My response: I was not primarily arguing here that American administrations should dissemble a