They decided to keep the baby and contacted the local hospital, as Melissa had only taken the first of two pills as part of a chemical abortion.

At first they were told the foetus would not be affected, but the next day they discovered it would be.

"They said, 'It is too late - it has already starved the baby of oxygen. She will have to come in for the procedure or she will miscarry anyway in three or four weeks.' She was quite upset," Mrs Smith told BBC News.

A reader takes me to task for this remark in a posting on Friday: "Elizabeth Dole, a woman astonishing only in her mediocrity… is now, quite incredibly, a Senator."

“Come now. You're surprised a mediocre person is in the Senate? Have you seen her colleagues? Some of them are so high-chair poundingly stupid that medicority is a virtue that causes them to tremble with envy.”

He’s right. Just take some sample names, Rodham, say, or Specter, Klansman Byrd, or even that half-wit who is so worried about smoking in movies, and you realize that, in the absence of any vacancies for teaching staff in a third-rate kindergarten, Elizabeth Dole has ended up in just the right place for her rather modest array of talents.

This time in Communist China:

”Chinese television presenters have been told to stop dyeing their hair, exposing too much flesh and using English words in a government campaign to shelter young Chinese minds from the pernicious influences of sex, violence and foreign ideas.”

Maybe Peking should ask the FCC for advice.

The recent violence among Thailand’s Muslims was, given the traditionally tolerant nature of South-east Asian Islam, something of a surprise. Now the Thais are pointing fingers, and, yes, it turns out that the Saudis have been vomiting their bile across yet another previously pleasant part of the planet.

”Hidden a few kilometres down a remote country lane in the heart of Thailand's troubled deep south - where a Muslim separatist uprising has left more than 200 dead this year - is the multi-million-dollar new campus of the Yala Islamic College. With more than a dozen Arab teachers from across the Middle East and a seemingly endless flow of funds from Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Kuwait, Yala has become the most obvious manifestation of what critics here say is an "Arab threat."

Qatar? Kuwait? That’s disappointing. But who runs Yala?

”Yala Islamic College is run by Dr Ismail Lutfi, a Thai graduate of the hardline Wahhabi Imam Muhammad Ibn Saud Islamic University in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. He has an estimated 8,000 followers in key Islamic posts throughout the south, and the 1,500 students at the college are taught a hardcore Wahhabi interpretation of Islamic law in the Arabic language.”

Wahhabism is, quite simply, a cancer on humanity, and ‘Saudi’ Arabia is its source. Draw your own conclusions.

Martin Jacques is, with poor, dim Will Hutton, one of the sillier commentators on the British Left. As someone who edited Marxism Today he is, you would think, not best placed to give moral lectures to the rest of us. Unfortunately, Jacques, clearly, does not agree. Here he is on how the horrors of Abu Ghraib have eroded supposed claims by the West of a monopoly of both virtue and modernity. Leaving aside the point that in the West we live in a society that ceaselessly denigrates itself while at the same time promoting the imagined moral wisdom of a host of shamans, seers, holy men and other charlatans chanting their nonsense from the Himalayas to the Amazon, and leaving aside too the notion that arguing that the Western way is the best way forward (it is, in case you were wondering) is inconsistent with an understanding that Western civilization is, like any creation of men, deeply flawed, the most instructive aspect of Jacques’ piece is what he has to say about the contrasts between East Asia and the USA. For Western self-hatred it takes some beating.

Here’s Jacques on America: “President Bush claimed last week: "People seeing those pictures didn't understand the true nature and heart of America." On the contrary, they are an integral part of its "true nature and heart": a society that was built on the destruction of the indigenous peoples; that practised racial segregation until 40 years ago; that still incarcerates many of its young black people; that killed hundreds of thousands of Vietnamese; that has a messianic belief in the applicability of its own values to the rest of the world; that is willing to impose its model by force; that believes itself to be above international law. These too are American values. In this light, the behaviour of the US forces, nurturing a deep sense of racial superiority combined with a disdain for international law, is entirely predictable.”

Jacques roster of villains includes Michael Ignatieff as well as General Custer. He’s in trouble for saying that "The movements of national liberation that swept through the African and Asian worlds in the 1950s, seeking emancipation from colonial rule, have now run their course and in many cases have failed to deliver on their promise to rule more fairly than the colonial oppressors of the past." And later: "For every nationalist struggle that succeeds in giving its people self-determination and dignity, there are more that only deliver their people up to a self-immolating slaughter, terror, enforced partition and failure."

Ignatieff is, of course, right but Jacques, the (former?) Marxist sees it differently. “Historically speaking”, he claims that Ignatieff’s argument is, “nonsense. Asia is home to 60% of the world's population and has few failing states: in East Asia, where one-third live, there are almost none, and many extremely successful ones.”

Good God, where to start? How about with the fact that Ignatieff was writing about Asia and Africa? I don’t see any successes in that latter continent with the possible and, I fear, temporary exception of South Africa. And as for Asia, well let’s look at the region “historically speaking”. If Ignatieff can condemn the US today for the defeat of the Native Americans over a century ago, he needs to explain why the communal slaughter that defaced Indian, Pakistani and (later) Bangladeshi independence are no longer relevant to looking at those countries today, and he needs to linger for a moment on the reality of a Chinese state built on the bones of the murdered tens of millions. Or maybe he would like to tell us about Indonesia and ‘the year of living dangerously’ or, a decade later, the slaughter of the East Timorese, or, further North, the Cambodia of the Killing Fields and concentration camp (oh, sorry, ‘re-education’ camp) Vietnam, or Taiwan, perhaps, and the lengthy oppression of that island’s native inhabitants…

Or if it’s racism (certainly, and tragically, still a problem in the US, although far less than in the past), Jacques wants to discuss, perhaps he should see how minority peoples fare in Asia, or perhaps he should visit occupied Tibet…

The point I’m making, of course, is not to say that the West is perfect. It’s not. But whitewashing the crimes, tragedies and failures of other cultures in an attempt to denigrate America and the rest of the West is either dishonest or ignorant. Take your pick, but remember that Martin Jacques was a Marxist for a long, long time.

Over at the often interesting, if regrettably leftwing, blog, Harry’s Place, there’s more on Jacques’ piece. It’s long (but who am I to criticize that?), but well worth reading and, in particular, the last paragraph is worth repeating here:

”It is the duty of those of us who believe that the Arabs deserve better lives than they presently endure to do all we can to hasten the victory of the democrats and modernisers in Iraq and to challenge the pernicious nonsense which dresses up economic backwardness and political tyranny as an authentically 'Asian' condition wherever such arguments raise their ugly heads. Those who wittingly or unwittingly cheer the backward facing factions in Iraq today condemn their fellow humans to poverty, backwardness and misery.”

After the revelation that photos published by the rabidly-anti war Daily Mirror purporting to show prisoner abuse in Iraq by British troops were obvious fakes, the newspaper has fired its (largely unrepentant) editor. The Daily Telegraph 'mourns' his passing.

"... Morgan waded far out of his depth when he took the decision to publish photographs purporting to show soldiers of the Queen's Lancashire Regiment kicking and humiliating defenceless prisoners in Iraq. Far too late, the publishers of the Mirror admitted last night that those pictures were a "calculated and malicious hoax". The damage - and it was terrible damage - had already been done.

"Morgan may indeed have believed, at the time when he published them, that the photographs were what they pretended to be - although almost every expert who saw them, military and photographic, raised the gravest doubts about their authenticity from the first glance. At best, Morgan allowed his hunger for a good story to obscure his judgment. At worst, he was guilty of a wildly irresponsible gamble. His protestations, as recently as yesterday, that it did not really matter whether or not the pictures were genuine, because they had "revealed a can of worms", were nothing short of contemptible.

"It is no exaggeration to say that Morgan's decision to publish those fake photographs put thousands of young British lives at risk in Iraq, and has jeopardised everything that our Servicemen have sacrificed so much to achieve. What may have seemed like a bit of a game to Morgan was a matter of life and death in Iraq. The Mirror is well rid of him."

Amen.

In November we will once again have the privilege of exercising our most precious right as citizens – the right to vote. Our choices will be made from among an array of candidates who take a variety of positions with regard to many important issues. In the midst of what could be a difficult and confusing exercise it is very important to remember that not all issues are of equal gravity. As men and women of good will we strive to achieve true justice for all people and to preserve their rights as human beings. There is, however, one right that is “inalienable”, and that is the RIGHT TO LIFE. This is the FIRST right. This is the right that grounds all other human rights. This is the issue that trumps all other issues.

The November elections will be critical in the battle to restore the right to life to all citizens, especially the unborn and the elderly and infirm. As a result of the pro-life efforts of countless Americans the number of abortions performed in our country is now declining for the first time since the appalling Supreme Court decision of 1973 that made it “legal” to kill our children. We cannot allow the progress that has been made to be reversed by a pro-abortion President, Senate or House of Representatives. Neither can we permit illicit stem cell research that makes use of aborted babies. Any movement to promote and legalize euthanasia must be halted. Our votes have the power to stop these abominations.

There must be no confusion in these matters. Any Catholic politicians who advocate for abortion, for illicit stem cell research or for any form of euthanasia ipso facto place themselves outside full communion with the Church and so jeopardize their salvation. Any Catholics who vote for candidates who stand for abortion, illicit stem cell research or euthanasia suffer the same fateful consequences. It is for this reason that these Catholics, whether candidates for office or those who would vote for them, may not receive Holy Communion until they have recanted their positions and been reconciled with God and the Church in the Sacrament of Penance.

They're obviously confident that they won't be asked to leave. If that's the case, why not make a PR statement affirming the willingingness of the U.S. to respect Iraqi sovereignty after the June 30 handover?

Conservative sure are in full panic mode these days. Relax.

The rotten apple, it seems, does not fall far from the rotten tree. David Boies III is a lawyer who, to throw another metaphor into the invective, has crawled out from under some stone in Virginia to lead (USA Today reports) a pack of attorneys filing lawsuits against a number of drinks companies. Boies? A familiar name? Yup. David Boies III is the son of David Boies II, Gore’s old hack.

The claim itself? That Coors, Heineken and others have run advertisements targeted at ‘underage’ drinkers. Well, while it’s perfectly true that some of their commercials may indeed happen to play well with the younger crowd, that’s because their appeal is, you know, pretty broad. Lip quivering with maidenly indignation, Boies III (or one of his flunkeys) whines that "in one (Bacardi) ad, a scantily clad young woman is standing on a bar stool pouring a shot of rum down the front of her chest while a young man licks the rum off her exposed midriff.” Well, I can’t speak for 19-year-olds, Boies old chap, but that’s a not entirely unattractive image to some older folk too.

In its greed, its cant and its worthlessness, Boies III’s lawsuit is perfect for our times. Doubtless, it has a shot.

It’s also worth noting that one thing, apart from Boies III’s shamelessness, that has made such litigation possible was the idiotic increase in the nationwide drinking age to 21. This, of course, was a Reagan-era aberration forced through by his useless transportation secretary, one Elizabeth Dole, a woman astonishing only in her mediocrity, who is now, quite incredibly, a Senator.

Dear Peter,

Clive James is Australian.

Cheers.

The book of my enemy has been remaindered
And I rejoice.
It has gone with bowed head like a defeated legion
Beneath the yoke.
What avail him now his awards and prizes,
The praise expended upon his meticulous technique,
His individual new voice?
Knocked into the middle of next week
His brainchild now consorts with the bad buys,
The sinkers, clinkers, dogs and dregs,
The Edsels of the world of movable type,
The bummers that no amount of hype could shift,
The unbudgeable turkeys.

From a reader:

Hi Jonah. To your reader who asked about a good book on Che Guevara, Jon Lee Andersen's "Che Guevara: A Revolutionary Life" is probably the best. Andersen is objective throughout, and is particularly good at describing Che's intransigence and brutality during Castro's show trials shortly after the revolution. From what I know there are no really critical books about Che, but Andersen's is the best-researched (access to Che's widow, documents in Cuba, etc..), and the most balanced. It does a good job of demystifying the romantic image of Che, but it also recognizes those aspects--such as Che's charisma--that made even the Cuban-American CIA operative who oversaw his murder in Bolivia in 1967 feel a sense of admiration towards him.

The missus and I are going to London the week after next on a mixture of business and vacation. Anybody have really good restaurant suggestions? We've been to London before -- it's even where I asked the Fair Jessica to stoop to marrying me -- but we always feel like we're missing gastronomic opportunities.

1) I am in constant, longterm, search for examples of the following premise: Politicians on both sides of the aisle are unwilling or incapable of arguing that an idea is good even though it's not supported by the American people. If they propose a policy they insist that it be phrased to the public in such a way that polls show it is favorable. If social security reform is a good idea, it should be regardless of whether or not Americans support it, right? Unfortunately, we have a chicken-or-egg situation where reforms cannot be sold until they are popular and they cannot be popular until they are sold.

2) Serious critiques of Pragmatism, John Dewey, William James etc. preferably from avowed philosophical approaches, i.e. Libertarians on pragmatism, conservatives on it, Marxists, etc.

3) Any good essays that actually define, programmatically, ideologically or philosophically the American "Old Right" by which I mean the pre-WWII right. I've read quite a bit on the subject and the group still seems like a grab-bag of different personalities.

4) Contemporary and historic examples of "lying for justice" -- be it environmentalists exaggerating environmental threats, racial hoaxes on campus, etc.

5) And, as always, examples of absurd arguments ad hitlerum, i.e. arguments where the Nazis, Fascists or the Holocaust are compared to minor budget cuts, opposition to affirmative action etc.

As always, please send book-bleg responses (with appropriate subject headers) to JonahResearch@aol.com

From a reader:

I'm generally willing to give Nick Berg's dad a free pass on his bizarre commentary. I literally can't even complete the thought of my son being murdered in the way that his was. I think it would just about drive me insane, and I wouldn't be operating rationally, and its likely that I'd say some crazy things, too. And I think that is what is happening with Nick Berg's dad, so I don't want to see people harshly criticize someone suffering as deeply as he is.

But the question is, if we can agree that the guy is being
(understandably) irrational, then why are people putting microphones in
front of his face??? Once his comments are out there, which are
perfectly consistent with the sort of things that ANSWER, etc. has been
saying all along, I think it needs to be refuted and exposed for the
silliness that it is. I don't want it to be done, but the news
organizations who are putting his comments out there are almost forcing
our hands. Why not let the Berg family mourn in at least some amount of
privacy? I suspect its at least in part because the media likes the
anti-Bush message.

Sends Air Conditioners to Iraq.

One note: I have every reason to believe this is a real and generous outfit and I'm just saying this as a generic commentary rather than anything like criticism or even suspicion about Op AC. Don't assume that I've -- or anybody else -- has taken the time to check out whether groups like this are on the up-and-up. I wouldn't post a link to anything I thought wasn't kosher, but that doesn't mean I've vetted the places either.

From a reader:

Jonah,

As an active duty Army officer, I agree with one of the emails – it is the officers’ fault. One of the reasons an officer gets paid more, saluted, called ‘sir’, etc, is that he is ultimately responsible for the actions of his troops. Everyone from Karpinski on down should be canned – end of career, at a minimum.

Your Marine friend, however, is somewhat off base. While I do agree that the Marines as a whole hold to a higher a level of discipline (lots of factors for this, but not the time to go into it), the soldiers were at that low level of discipline because they are reservists. The Guard/Reserve simply has lower levels of standards in every area, from entry to retention to promotion. I said to my wife as soon as I saw the first picture, before I knew who they were. “Those are guard or reserve.” Putting reserve units in these kind of situations is a bad idea. It’s one thing to put them in Iraq doing support – another thing entirely to have them doing full time prisoner control.

From a reader:

Jonah,

I'm also suffering from the same line of thought about Nick Berg, though I'm hearing on the news this morning that while the father is clearly a wingnut, the son supported the war and the FBI investigated and cleared the Moussaoui connection. But assuming that he was the Iraqi Lori Berenson, and like you, I hope he wasn't, the implication is more perverse than the point you made: that they killed a do-gooder because he was easier to catch. I think the larger point is this: they sawed the head off someone who agreed with them because he was an American (and, likely, a Jew). What on earth would they do to the Americans who don't agree with them?

And for my part, the father's most troubling comment was that al-Qaeda are "probably as bad" as Bush and Rumsfeld. Not for nothing, but I've seen what happens to a family when a child dies and there is a great deal of anger. But when my brother died, my father didn't take the opportunity to make political comments about the drunk driver who killed him. Didn't do it, couldn't have done it at the time. Grief usually subsumes politics, and in cases like this, the anger is usually directed at...oh, I don't know...how about the guy with the knife?

Know anybody (if not yourself) who can recommend a good book on Che Guevara to an NRO- and NRODT-reading, Simpson-loving, Derbyshire-loving, commie-hating guy? I'm looking for a bio that is fair and honest, but also comes down solidly on the side of "this guy was a mass murderer and Stalinist thug." Maybe the Corner could help? I'm trying to save a 14-year old, Che-infatuated know nothing from making an ass of himself.

Best to you and the family.

There were really two shows last night. Up until ten minutes left, it was easily an A-, possibly even an A. Although there were too many loose ends to wrap up in one episode, it did what sitcoms were supposed to do: make you laugh—and with only one sex joke!

However, in the wake of the somewhat schmaltzy ending, I'd probably knock it down to a B+ overall--much superior to Friends but not on par with Newhart or Cheers. Had they really thrown us for a twist—Frasier going back to Cheers and Lilith, or Diane, or even ending up with Roz—I would have been much more impressed. But all in all, a classy finale worthy of television’s most honored comedy series.

I'm begining to get the feeling -- I suspect like a lot of people -- that Nick Berg may have had some similarities to such folks as Rachel Corrie or Lori Berenson .

The connection to Zacarias Moussaoui, the 20th hijacker, is too coincidental. They went to the University of Oklahoma together and the FBI had investigated Berg because Moussaoui had used his email account. Berg carried around anti-Semitic pamphlets. Berg was apparently something of a leftwing peacenik and his parents apparently belong to ANSWER. Travelling around Iraq alone the way he did is just odd. See the Philly Inquirer's story for more.

Then there's Berg's dad who's anger is understandable, but whose anger at America is getting more than a bit odd. The soundbite I find most troubling is the one where he says how al Qaeda was dumb for killing him because he was their, and Iraq's, best friend.

Obviously, I have no idea what really happened out there, but I'm getting this sneaking suspicion that Berg was suffering from a taste of radical chic in his desire to go to Iraq, travel to all the hotspots alone and help out over there. I doubt he was a would-be terrorist or anything like that. But it wouldn't surprise me if his murderers had first taken him in not as a hostage but as a dupe of some kind. I hope I'm wrong. But even if I'm not, in a way this makes his murder all the more gruesome. Murdering a do-gooder because he's easier to catch is even more repugnant.

UPDATE: I misspoke here, as numerous readers have pointed out (and as I did in post above). Berg's parents were apparently peaceniks, there's no evidence I've seen that Nick Berg was. I apologize for misstatement.

It’s been a week of international crisis and domestic political tension, so what was Senator John Ensign, a ‘Republican’ from Nevada, busy doing? He was attending hearings of the Senate’s Commerce Committee, hearings that he had called. The topic? The supposed threat to the nation represented by smoking in the movies. Fatuous, pointless, dumb? Of course, but one of the Senator’s aides explained the rationale, and, yes, yes, it was, oh, you know, well, let’s allow the aide to speak for himself:

"Children are being influenced by the presence of smoking in movies.”

Sigh.

Via blogger Radley Balko

Note: Just so you know, I don't want to be a conduit for inter-service debates about which is the best. Anyway...
From a reader:

Jonah

I read the argument that NCO's train folks to OBEY orders and to disobey an unlawful order is unthinkable. Every Marine Officer, as do other services' officers, swear allegiance to the Constitution, whereas NCO's swear to obey the lawful orders of superiors. That is NOT a subtle distinction. Officers must have a proper grounding in what the constitution allows the services to do. NCO's must understand what officers may do.

I can't speak for the Army, but in the Marine Corps, Marines are taught to think. There are distinct differences in philosophy in the services, which is a saving grace for our country instead of the General Staff unified system of other countries. Each service brings strengths to the country and counteracts the slothful ways of a monopoly.

In the Army, anything that is not explicitly stated is not allowed, whereas the Marines believe that anything that is NOT explicitly disallowed is available. The difference is that one has to understand what you are doing and that judgement is honed with experience.

Without undue bragging, one can see the differences in how effective the services have been in accomplishing their missions. Similarly, one can see the differences in disciplinary efforts. I am sorry that anyone would commit the offenses alleged, yet I am not surprised that the Marines have not had the same degree of issues as have been shown in recent days. All Marines are taught the basic skills of security of gear and of POWS during their basic training.

Somehow, despite my falling out of airplanes five times and thus getting my jump wings, I am not convinced me that the letter that you posted properly convey the ability of junior soldiers, airmen, sailors, Coast Guardians, or Marines to understand and to obey lawful orders and to know the difference of those that are not.

From a reader:

I spent ten years in the military, two years as an
officer platoon leader in the parachute infantry, and
it annoys me a bit when I hear people say that you can
disobey an illegal order.

The army trains its soldiers from day one to obey
orders unhesitatingly. Most NCOs would have the ass
of any soldier who said, "Well, Sergeant, I think I'm
going to have to let that order pass since it seems
illegal to me." Most soldiers wouldn't even think of
trying it on for size.

I saw one order disobeyed when I was in the army and
that was when a new replacent battalion commander
ordered one of our rifle companies to move into an
area where there was a major wildfire and an enormous
amount of unexploded ordnance. As soon as it was
explained to the major, he backed off.

These enlisted men/women deserve some punishment, but
the real miscreants are the officers. No excuse.
Either they authorized this nonsense, created the
environment where it could flourish or were so
delinquent in their duties that they didn't spend
enough time with their people to know what was going
on.

Hang 'em high!

From a reader:

Jonah, As repellant as the new Abu Ghraib photos and videos sound, they at least make it less probable that this goes up the chain of command. I can conceive of officers telling guards to frighten or humiliate prisoners to soften them up for interogation. (I'm not saying that's what happened, but it's at least plausible.) But ordering guards to have sex with each other in front of prisoners? That's the weirdest "torture" I ever heard of. It might reinforce Muslim attitudes about Western decadence, but I don't see it eliciting much information.

I was reading through a very interesting discussion at Instapundit on how the media is obsessed with Abu Ghraib, while Americans are concerned with Nick Berg -- and it got me thinking. Now, I agree with all the people who say that we should hold Americans to a higher standard than we do our enemies. And, I even agree that the American press should be more concerned by the abuses of its own government than the actions of foreign governments or individuals.

But I keep thinking of a point made by Bret Stephens, the editor of the Jerusalem Post, when asked why Israel keeps killing members of Hamas when it's so "counter-productive." He said something to the effect of (paraphrasing from memory):

"I think it's an odd sort of racism which assumes that Arabs are like cockroaches or insects and that they have no regard for their own lives and that we can kill terrorists forever and it will do no good because there's an infinite supply of Arab murderers." He went on to say something like "We don't believe all Palestinians are interchangeably animals who want to murder women and children."

Now, I am butchering what he said but I think I've got the thrust right. At the time, I confess, I thought it wasn't a particularly good argument (and I still think it has some flaws). But when I look at the coverage -- or lack thereof -- of Nick Berg's murder versus the coverage of Abu Ghraib, I can't help but shake the feeling that the American press thinks Arabs are savages and therefore it's not a big deal -- or a good idea -- to remind Americans of that fact.

Indeed, this was part of my initial criticism of CBS's release of the Abu Ghraib photos; it seems like the press is gung ho to make Americans look savage whenever possible and, conversely, to make those they consider to be savages look like decent misunderstood victims.

When it comes to murderous Third Worlders, it seems the press suffers from the soft bigotry of low expectations.

From a reader:

Dear Jonah, As your (former?) Navy reader states, the most disturbing aspect of the Abu Ghraib scandal is the involvement of NCO's (non-commissioned officers, or sergeants) in these incidents. Since the Revolutionary War, NCO's have been the conscience of the military and the upholder of it's standards, as well as the enforcers of discipline. These individuals, if they are indeed guilty of committing these acts, have betrayed military law, their honor and the honor of all NCO's. You might be interested to know that in a court martial, NCO's usually get the harshest sentence for a given offence. Everything being equal, they will serve more jail time than an officer or lower enlisted. Another little known fact is that while the jury in a court martial is usually composed of officers, an enlisted defendant can request that NCO's are on the jury. This is not a good idea, as NCO's are more likely to vote for conviction and the maximum sentence allowed than officers. By the way, in the Army, jail is called the stockade, not the brig ( a Navy term).

Derb - I've got to finish two columns (can't you tell by how much I'm procrastinating in the Corner?), but I've got to say I'm surprised. Considering your views on "buggery" alone, I would have assumed you would have disapproved of the actions of the Abu Ghraib guards. I certainly agree with you that there's a whole separate scandal which isn't getting enough attention -- the outrageous stupidity of allowing cameras into these prisons for any reason whatsoever (a point I've made from the begining).

But, barring some new -- and unlikely -- evidence, this certainly sounds like a bunch of sadistic perverts abusing prisoners for the joy of it and not for much else. "Kicking" prisoners to find out what they know is one thing, trying to film your own violent porn movie with POWs is quite another. The coverage may be overblown and their may be more to the story, but I think we make a huge mistake -- tactical and moral -- if we pretend that this wasn't a very, very bad thing.

I've gotten a bunch of email asking me to distance myself from Derb's comments about Abu Ghraib. My guess is that they've mostly been driven by Andrew Sullivan's outrage. I have no desire to get in the middle of their differences. But let me say:

A) I didn't get the impression that Derb was actually saying he believes that the Abu Ghraib perps should have kicked the prisoners more and that they deserve only 30 days in the brig. Rather, he was saying that was one of his "emotional states." There is a difference of course between one's gut reaction and ones intellectual conclusions. My feelings about, hmm, the whole Arab world are sometimes driven by passions elicted by a very narrow subset of statements and actions from terrorists (as well as Arab newspapers, Arab leaders, Arab apologists etc). But I also know in my heart and my head that these emotional states should not be translated into policy.

However, B) if that is Derb's actual conclusion and not his temporary emotional state, then I think Derb's wrong. And we can have that debate if necessary.

Here's the link to the conversation/interview I had with Rep. Chris Cox. It was a weird sorta thing, I must say. But Cox was very, very charming and very smart. Clarification: He misspoke about NRO's traffic -- we don't get 2 million visitors a day (it's more like per month on a good month), and our readership is greater than the combined circulations of all the major political print mags (TNR, NR, Weekly Standard, Washington Monthly) but the way he said it, it sounded more grandiose than it is.

Kathryn -- In the first months of my job as Ben Wattenberg's research assistant, Ben brought me to a party in New York where I ended up in a situation where I had to shake Vladimir Pozner's (SP?) hand. Remember him? He was the Soviet flunky with the perfectly accented english who Phil Donahue thought was the most brilliant man in the world. I was new to my job and I didn't want to cause a scene around Ben. But I've regretted shaking his hand ever since and not saying something particularly biting. When I told a friend I shook Pozner's hand he immediately replied "How long did it take to wash the blood off."

I always thought something along those lines would have been perfect.

Jonathan Rauch -- the very, very smart journalist -- has an excellent essay excerpted from his new book Gay Marriage : Why It Is Good for Gays, Good for Straights, and Good for America in the current issue of Reason (which I read on the shuttle down from Boston).

I have Rauch's book here, but I haven't had a chance to read it with all of the other things going on these days. But I have to say that this essay is really wonderful. I may be particularly impressed because it reads almost as if it were ained directly at me. My case against gay marriage has never been particularly religious (which has annoyed a lot of readers) and it has never been particularly grounded in social science (which may or may not annoy the Kurtzites) and it's never been bound-up in anti-homosexual animus (despite what various gay readers and bloggers assert or suggest).

My case has always been explicitly Burkean and Hayekian; you don't tear apart an institution which serves as a granite-spine to social arrangements overnight. Here's how I put it at the conclusion of one my earlier
spats with Andrew Sullivan three years ago:

Marriage is an ancient, bedrock institution born thousands of years before anyone even knew how to spell democracy. It is impossible to even guess how many other institutions it supports. As Friedrich Hayek noted, such institutions are the real storehouses of human knowledge: "[M]ore 'intelligence' . . . is incorporated in the system of rules of conduct than in man's thoughts and surroundings."

And that's why I'm willing to wait a while longer — to muddle through as we sort all this out — before we radically redesign marriage. If Andrew is right about gay marriage, waiting is no doubt unfair to gays seeking to have their monogamous relationships legitimized by the state. But it was Edmund Burke — the champion of temperamental conservatism — who noted that sometimes we "must bear with infirmities until they fester into crimes." Indeed, the conservative must point out that the beaches of history are littered not only with the human wreckage of bad ideas rushed out too quickly, but with the wreckage of good ideas rushed out too quickly as well.

Anyway, Rauch's essay attacks precisely this point from within the Hayekian framework rather than from without and he does a very good job. Ultimately, I think he misses the mark a few places, but it's an impressive effort nonetheless. When it's online and I have a bit more time, I'll try to respond at length in a G-File (way too inside-baseball for the syndicated column).

[Note: I accidentally deleted this, so if you linked to this post earlier, the link won't work]

Here's the 2003 article from the (formerly pro-war) Atlantic about torture by Mark Bowden I mentioned earlier. I didn't think it was his best stuff, but it was very good and very informative nonetheless. Anyway here's his conclusion:

"The Bush Administration has adopted exactly the right posture on the matter. Candor and consistency are not always public virtues. Torture is a crime against humanity, but coercion is an issue that is rightly handled with a wink, or even a touch of hypocrisy; it should be banned but also quietly practiced. Those who protest coercive methods will exaggerate their horrors, which is good: it generates a useful climate of fear. It is wise of the President to reiterate U.S. support for international agreements banning torture, and it is wise for American interrogators to employ whatever coercive methods work. It is also smart not to discuss the matter with anyone.

If interrogators step over the line from coercion to outright torture, they should be held personally responsible. But no interrogator is ever going to be prosecuted for keeping Khalid Sheikh Mohammed awake, cold, alone, and uncomfortable. Nor should he be.

From a reader:

I used to work in a ship's brig so I know a bit about abusing prisoners. Basically, if young men are allowed to exert authority without supervision, they will try to put all of their charges through boot camp. The problem is, the thrills escalate. That is why you need intervention.

I have no problem with beating prisoners, per se, regardless of Geneva or anything else. However, killing or maiming people is flat out wrong, and that includes attacks by dogs.

The grossest part of the Abu Ghraib thing were not the beatings or the humiliations but rather the sexual element. This was simply depraved. Note that there were two senior mid-30's non-commissioned officers who appear to have directed traffic here, they are responsible not only for the sexual abuse of prisoners, but also depraving the morals of their junior enlisteds (cf. Drudge today on Pvt England).

In addition to the propaganda damage of what they did, they have also damaged the reputation of the Army (anyone want to let their little girls become MP's now?) as well as exposed themselves as dangerous perverts (would you want these senior enlisteds as your neighbors?). They should do SERIOUS brig time. 30 days won't cut it. They are dangerous.

Look, when the Abu Ghraib abuses came to light, I was as outraged as anybody and said so. One of the main reasons the Abu Ghraib absues seem so bad is that they are so gratuitous. They look like people having fun being cruel for cruelty's sake. But enough of all that.

Now it seems the press is going to start another round of America-bashing over the treatment of top al-Qaeda leaders. Here's how the NYT begins:

WASHINGTON, May 12 — The Central Intelligence Agency has used coercive interrogation methods against a select group of high-level leaders and operatives of Al Qaeda that have produced growing concerns inside the agency about abuses, according to current and former counterterrorism officials. Advertisement

At least one agency employee has been disciplined for threatening a detainee with a gun during questioning, they said.

In the case of Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, a high-level detainee who is believed to have helped plan the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, C.I.A. interrogators used graduated levels of force, including a technique known as "water boarding," in which a prisoner is strapped down, forcibly pushed under water and made to believe he might drown.

My response? Good. I would be far more upset to learn the CIA was being prevented from using coercive techniques against these people. Now, I don't want permanent, cruel physical torture to be used -- unless truly absolutely necessary (ticking bombs and all that) -- but if Khalid Shaikh Mohammed finds his stay with the CIA to be the worst thing that ever happened to him, I say "Wahoo! look at my tax dollars at work!"

More from the Times:

Defenders of the operation said the methods stopped short of torture, did not violate American anti-torture statutes, and were necessary to fight a war against a nebulous enemy whose strength and intentions could only be gleaned by extracting information from often uncooperative detainees. Interrogators were trying to find out whether there might be another attack planned against the United States.

If that's a fair description of what's going on then this is no scandal, this the reporting of news most Americans assumed was going on already and I bet you the store they'd be more upset if it stopped.

We bragged publicly that we would avenge the mutilation of those four contractors at the hands of Fallujah's thugs. We told the world we would not stop until the city was cleansed of insurgents. And, of course, we swore we would never negotiate with terrorists.

What did we actually do? We negotiated with terrorists, re-empowered Saddam's thugs in uniform and ran away as quickly as we could go. The Marines insist they could have won, had they been allowed to fight. That's unquestionably true, but, as North Vietnam's senior general once pointed out about a different war, it's also irrelevant.

The diplomats claim we backed down to spare the innocent people of Fallujah. But they didn't lift a finger as the city's Arab fanatics drove out Fallujah's Kurdish population. And how does it benefit the average citizen to leave gunmen in control - protected now by Ba'athist thugs who tell us mockingly that there "aren't any foreign fighters in the city"? Right. And there are no politicians in Washington.

Our threats have begun to sound as hollow as those made by Khadafy in his prime. Our power means nothing unless we are willing to use it decisively. The truth is that those heroic young Marines who died in the initial combat encounters in Fallujah lost their lives for nothing. Frightened, politicized leaders squandered the advantages gained by their sacrifice.

And our enemies are telling the Muslim world that they fought the U.S. military to a standstill. For once, they're telling the truth. It doesn't matter that they won politically, not militarily. They won.

From a reader [I cleaned up the f***ing classy language and withheld his name]

Jonah:

"Several of us concluded afterwards that this may have been the first time
the guy had ever heard someone say anything bad about multiculturalism in
his life and he was almost panicked about it."

"concluded?" Or did you mean to say: "thought up something pissy and quasi
clever to make fun of some kid who didn't agree with us." ??

Allow me to share something with you: If I am ever unfortunate enough to
engage you in conversation, and I end up rolling my eyes at you, it won't be
because you've "blown my mind" with your brilliant and invigorating new
perspective. You can feel free to ASK me why I'll be reacting the way I am,
and I'll be MORE than happy to explain it to you, you fatuous blowhard.

It's a small thing, but a telling one I think; the fact that wingnuts such
as yourself are able to babble freely about Liberal "elites" and their
"arrogance" and "snobbery," and then, without even missing a BEAT, can turn
around and unselfconsciously write snide little catty diatribes about
quaint, precious, twee lil' liberal college students and the hilarity of
their ignorance. "Wussiness?" The tone of some of your s***t is right up
there with a middle school girl's diary.

And hey, JG, I don't care how many Homer Simpson references, semi-witty
asides, or pseudo-hip cultural nods you dress up your extreme right wing
polemics in - they're still radical, hateful, disingenuous, exclusionary
and, more importantly, profoundly wrong.

Keep up the f****d-up thinking though! Just giving aid and succor to my boy
John Kerry. As more and more people get a whiff of what it is you and yours
are selling, the more they're realizing that what looks like duck s**t and
quacks like duck s**t...

All the best,
[Name withheld]
Ann Arbor, MI

p.s. Do I think that the snide, arrogant tone of MY own email somehow
discredits my argument? Perhaps. :-) Although I AM better looking than
you, so I do have a little more leeway when it comes to acting like a
hypocritical prick.

I think Kerry's statement that his first choice for Sec Def would be McCain makes a lot of political sense. Kerry very much wants and needs to communicate that he's not the soft-on-defense John Kerry the GOP (rightly) says he is.

What's annoying is that this, too, constitutes another installment of the Kerry flip-floppage tale. Maybe I'm wrong, but there's simply no way to reconcile the John Kerry of the primaries or of the 1980s and 1990s with a John Kerry who would appoint a hawk like John McCain as Secretary of Defense. I mean compare their voting records over the last few decades. They may get along well and they agreed on reconciliation with Vietnam, but they come from two entirely opposed outlooks. It's a cheap and easy but smart ploy.

An Email:

Dear Mr. Goldberg,

On behalf of the Bowdoin College Republicans I would like to give you my sincerest thanks for speaking last night. The talk was incredible, and many people that I have recently spoken with have told me that this was one of the best lectures that they have heard during all their years at Bowdoin. Thanks again for a truly wonderful event and we would be more than happy to have you come talk again at any time.

Regards,
Alex Linhart
Chairman Bowdoin College Republicans

Andrew Sullivan -- and lots and lots of readers -- chastise me for this assertion in today's column: "Well, CBS' scoop has gotten someone killed and there will be more deaths, on both sides, as a result of this story before it becomes history."

Let me say a couple things. As I said yesterday the news about the Berg execution came in after I'd sent off my original column. I thought there was no way to run that column without mentioning such a monumental development in the story. So I quickly revised it. I stand by that column and my assertions, but if I had to do it over again I would have written the above sentence a bit differently. I take Andrew's point that these thugs were murdering Americans long before these photos came out and I agree that the thrust of much of the coverage is outrageous to the extent it makes it sound like the Abu Ghraib abuses turned Zarqawi & Co. into murderers. They were murderers before and they would be if none of this ever happened at Abu Ghraib. I wasn't clear on the fact that they had held Berg hostage for as long as they did. And one would have to be very naive to believe that Berg's chances of survival were not already slim once they kidnapped him.

All of that said, the release of these videos created the incentives and opportunity for Berg's assassination. Moreover, my larger point still stands. The release of those photos caused more damage than they did good and it is almost impossible to believe that more Iraqis and Americans will not die because of them. The irony -- if the reporting we're hearing is accurate -- is that the Berg beheading may be having the opposite effect in Iraq. I'm not sure I trust all of the reports quoting Iraqis saying how horrified they are, but if that's true it does demonstrate once again how unintended consequences are the most predictable consequences when people try to shape public opinion with horrifying images. And no, that is not an attempt to draq anything like moral equivalence between "60 Minutes" and al Qaeda. The former made a mistake, the latter committed murder (many times).

Note: I cleaned up a couple typos in the original post.

Am I right in being a little bothered by the use of the word "beheading"? To me, a beheading is a very standard removal of one's head by expert use of sword or guillotine. What happened to Nick Berg was a grisly slaughter, perpetrated by ham-handed, knife-wielding amateurs, hardly the relatively humane capital punishment one thinks of when using the term "behead".

I must add my voice to the mass of uniformed military folks who are disgusted by the behavior (documented in photo's and on discs now) of those 'so called' soldiers at Abu Ghraib. They can be thankful that I will not be sitting on their courts-martial juries. They, and their immediate command personnel would be in Leavenworth already, if I had my way. And what infuriates me even more is that I have a niece serving in the Guard in Kuwait right now. I worry that people in the region who may have been on our side, or at least neutral, have now been handed a reason to be angry and possibly strike out against anyone they see in uniform. So the noble and brave are at more danger because of the stupid.

And I can't count the number of briefings I have had to endure on the "Law of Armed Conflict" since I started serving. Not that that really adds anything to good old common sense, which these people seemed to lack. That, and a sense of shame.

I had a very good time. I'm sitting in my room at the Brunswick B&B, using the laptop and taking advantage of the wireless internet. I was originally worried about staying at a B&B as I am not really a B&B person and I was dreading having to discuss knitting with a bevy of 800 year old women over scones. But this place is very cool.

Even cooler was the gift basket waiting for me when I arrived, pepperjack cheese, pretzels, nuts and a bottle of single malt scotch. Kerry DuPont, the Cornerite who worked so hard to get me up here in the first place, understood that there are certain medicinal products one cannot do without. She is a great American.

As for the speech itself, the crowd seemed to like it quite a bit and I had a lot of fun. There were a lot of non-students at the event, including the entire Republican club of Brunswick which I believe held its montly meeting at my talk and numerous Cornerites.

My only disappointment was the relative wussiness of the few liberal students who showed up -- and decided to speak up. In response to my riff about CBS and the Abu Ghraib photos, one very tall liberal guy seemed like he was going to cry about my hypocrisy over not objecting to the photos of the "murdered" Uday and Qusay Hussein. Another kid who clearly thought I was evil for giving a negative connotation to the word "multicultural" couldn't muster the gumption to question me on it except to roll his eyes and ask me if I could "talk about that further." Several of us concluded afterwards that this may have been the first time the guy had ever heard someone say anything bad about multiculturalism in his life and he was almost panicked about it.

My general impression of Bowdoin is that it's a very good liberal arts school in Maine, with all of the predictable determination to make itself less good through political correctness and the rest. It definitely has one of the best college cafeteria's I've ever seen (they claim it's ranked number 1 in the US).

Brock's statement has the tiniest kernel of truth to it but only enough to make the dishonesty all the more poignant. One reason you can be a conservative-journalist-for-life is that there are so few career opportunities for conservatives outside conservative circles. The New Republic, The Washington Monthly, The American Prospect, Mother Jones etc are stepping stones to rewarding careers at Time, Newsweek etc. It's not impossible to get a job at the New York Times after working for a conservative journalistic organization, but it definitely makes it harder. And while, yes, television gigs are still possible, you must accept that you will only be speaking for conservatives for the rest of your life rather than actually offering analysis. Jeff Greenfield gets to offer "analysis." Conservatives get to talk after someone says "And now for a conservative point of view." Indeed, the only sure-fire way to be treated respectfully by the liberal establishment is to prostitute yourself, admit your a liar and recant and renounce everything about the right you were ever associated with. It worked for Brock.

Regardless, it wouldn't surprise me if some conservative outlets have responded by compensating talented people for the fact that by taking jobs in conservative journalism, you've closed many doors to jobs outside conservative journalism. But I can see why Salon, which has spent, what? Fifty? A hundred times more money than NRO has is fixated with job security since they always seem on the verge of going under. In this case, conservatives don't have built-in job security because of their vast wealth, they have more sensible business plans because of they can't afford not to.

SALON: You write about the conservative cradle-to-grave jobs network that goes along with the think tanks, opinion journals, magazines, radio shows and syndicated columns, and book deals and speaking fees. It sounds pretty cushy.

DAVID BROCK: It is. There's every financial incentive in the world to stay in the conservative movement forever. That [network] allows the conservatives the freedom and the confidence to devote their attention to influencing the mainstream without actually becoming a part of it. It also means that when young people are trained they can stay -- it's not an up-or-out situation. You have very senior people editing magazines who can have families. And, again, it's sustained support. Editors of conservative magazines aren't out trying to raise money. The money is there; the cash reserves are in the bank.

"I have to disagree with you when you say that being more outraged by the outrage over the abuse than by the abuse itself is a 'moral mistake.' It certainly could be, but it isn't obviously so.

"If the outrage over the abuse results in the US scaling back operations in Iraq, releasing dangerous prisoners, becoming timid about future operations, and taking other steps that result in the U.S. appearing to be bin Laden's infamous 'weak horse,' then the outrage over the abuse has done more harm than good, and almost certainly does more harm than a few naked homoerotic pyramids and a man on a leash.

"Those responsible for these abuses will be punished in a manner consistent with due process, and I am confident that whatever wrongs were committed will be righted. But Congressional showboating, political posturing, and media hype all traveling under the banner of 'outrage' serve only to harm American objectives, soldiers, and civilians.

"Nothing excuses the way these prisoners were treated, but that's in the past. The fact that American soldiers made terrible mistakes in the past is no justification for making worse mistakes in the future in an expression of 'outrage.'"

My response: I certainly agree that some American soldiers' misdeeds do not justify making mistakes now. To cut and run would indeed have worse human consequences than their misdeeds, but given the differences in intention behind the actions I would not call it a "worse mistake"; I wouldn't compare the two as "mistakes" of the same kind. I would also say that if the abuse leads to exaggerated or misdirected outrage that then leads to cutting and running, the blame for that outcome has to be apportioned among the abusers and the outraged, not all attributed to the outraged. Finally, if the morality of actions is going to be evaluated wholly in terms of their consequences, then Inhofe's comments still fail the test since it is quite predictable that they are not going to help the war effort.

In the field, chaplains face serious challenges helping soldiers coping with stress and loneliness stay morally straight. Retired chaplain Dave Peterson, whose first tour of duty was in Vietnam, says the bitter experience of that war taught him that command leadership has to establish conditions that make it easier for troops to live up to high standards of behavior: "I concluded that one reason we can't get past the Vietnam experience is because so many people broke their moral code, and got into sex and drugs and things like that. America lost part of its soul in Vietnam. There was bad leadership." Serving on Gen. Norman Schwarzkopf's staff in Desert Storm, Peterson helped the general draft the Islamic-sensitive code of conduct strictly forbidding drugs, alcohol, pornography, and prostitution among Desert Storm forces. Despite this -- in fact, he believes, because of it -- Peterson says he has never seen troop morale higher.

The blue star banner hanging from the mantel in the package for Iraq photo is the emblem that inspired a great organization called "The Blue Star Mothers of America". I am as proud of my wife for being an active member of this organization as I am of my son for serving in the Navy. ... This organization could use a bit of publicity to assist them with all of the good works they do for our troops.

Today you reprinted in the Corner some reactions to the Abu Gharib story from readers actually deployed in Iraq. I've just returned home from my Iraq rotation: when I was there, I worked for a unit that (among other things) interrogated high-value detainees -- the "deck of cards" and others. Not only did we have no abuse problem, we had just the opposite: our MP's were too nice to the detainees. It was sort of a reverse Stockholm Syndrome. We had to screen some raw documentary footage for the MPs, showing them explicitly the sort of atrocities committed by the former regime. After that they understood that no matter how friendly and harmless they might seem now, these guys are seriously bad dudes who did some seriously evil things. Of course we still had to treat them humanely and wouldn't have dreamt of doing otherwise, but we also didn't want the detainees forgetting that they were in prison, not a slightly down-market summer camp or retirement home.

Why was Abu Gharib different? Lots of reasons, probably -- but from my own experience, which included working with detainees and MPs and interrogators, I can say that the abusive behavior by the guards there was not only atypical but exactly the opposite of what I saw.

Shortly after the attack Arab television stations al-Manar, al-Jazeera, al-Arabia, and Abu Dhabi, as well as foreign networks, broadcast footage of masked, armed Hamas and Islamic Jihad terrorists parading the streets of Gaza displaying body parts of the dead soldiers, their weapons, and pieces of the wrecked APC. Al-Jazeera showed Islamic Jihad members holding up the head of one of the soldiers. Israel Television Channel 1, rebroadcasting the footage, electronically obscured the head.

Lileks writes :

Whoa! This is interesting – I shame Reynolds into not shaming the rest of us with his prolixity, and his suggestion that he may post 38 times a day instead of 52 suddenly gives others a reason to step back. Exxxxcellent. Once my Thuggees dispatch Jonah Goldberg, I will rule the web. Everything is proceeding exactly as I had planned.

That doesn't worry me that much. My flying monkeys can intercept his Thuggees well before they get inside the perimeter. But when you scroll down the page, you will discover that his dog looks like he could be my dog's grandfather. As I am in Maine, you will have to wait for me to post an eerily similar photo of Cosmo. Could it be that a race of super dogs are working behind the scenes of the blogosphere? What if these wolfie-dingo looking dogs are really pulling the strings like that supercomputer in the background of Neuromancer and we'll only discover their power after it's too late? Could this Bananaphone thing we both seem to be into be a subliminal suggestion from our canine overlords to break our wills?

In response to many, many emails: Yes, the tragic irony of the Berg beheading on the heels of my column arguing that CBS shouldn't have aired the Abu Ghraib pictures is not lost on me. I had to recall my new column for tomorrow in order to take this terrible event into account. Now, I've got to get ready for my speech here in Bowdoin tonight. But I'll be chiming in here later about all of this.

"I also am -- and have to say, when we talk about the treatment of these prisoners, that I would guess that these prisoners wake up every morning thanking Allah that Saddam Hussein is not in charge of these prisoners. When he was in charge they would take electric drills and drill holes through hands, they would cut their tongues out, they would cut their ears off. We've seen accounts of lowering their bodies into vats of acid. All these things were taking place. This was the type of treatment that they had."

"And I would want everyone to get this and read it. This is a documentary of the Iraq special report. It talks about the unspeakable acts of mass murder, unspeakable acts of torture, unspeakable acts of mutilation, the murdering of kids -- lining up 312 little kids under 12 years old and executing them, and then of course what they do to Americans, too.

"There's one story in here that was in the I think it was The New York Times, yes, on June 2nd. I suggest everyone take that -- get that and read it. It's about one of the prisoners who did escape as they were marched out there, blindfolded and put before mass graves, and they mowed them down and they buried them. This man was buried alive and he clawed his way out and was able to tell his story. And I ask, Mr. Chairman, at this point in the record that this account of the brutality of Saddam Hussein be entered into the record, made a part of the record."

What is the difference between Lomborg's view of humanity and Hitler's? You cannot treat people like cattle. You must respect the diversity of cultures on earth. Lomborg thinks of people like numbers. He thinks it would be cheaper just to evacuate people from the Maldives, rather than trying to prevent world sea levels from rising so that island groups like the Maldives or Tuvalu just disappear into the sea. But where's the respect for people in that? People have a right to live and die in the place where their forefathers have lived and died. If you were to accept Lomborg’s way of thinking, then maybe what Hitler did was the right thing.

CNN set up the interview, and even did a lengthy pre-interview with Suzanne the day before, under the pretense that she would be interviewed alone about the book.



As she waited to go on the air, she was informed that it would be a (five-minute) debate with some woman [Carol Evans, editor of Working Mother magazine] and that her book had made all the ladies at CNN “very angry”

When I left, I felt real hope in the new Iraqi army. Despite its terrible performance till now, one cannot be pessimistic after hearing the way this army is being formed and the way the soldiers look at it. I’m sure it’ll take time, but I’m also sure that we’ll definitely have an exceptionally efficient, small army with great morals and respect for the law and the institution they represent. An army that can preserve peace and order, and protect the constitution once the Iraqi people agree on one.

Things are hot here in a number of ways. It's over 100 degrees now every day and I suppose that will continue through the summer. The prison scandal has a lot of us angry - because of the disgusting behavior and because of the finger pointing and lack of accountability. If one more of these clowns claims that they didn't have proper training or were ordered to participate in this I think I'll be sick. Training doesn't give you common sense or respect for human dignity. If they were ordered to do it and felt it was wrong, where was their report of the conduct up the chain of command? This was a systemic problem that the general running the show admits she wasn't aware of - so many things went wrong here that it is staggering.

They chatted a few moments about a mutual friend; batted why Bush seemed to be adopting the AIDS cause as his own (“They may be a little competitive with us.”), then got down to the long, hard slog that was writing his book…

"The system is not fair at all," said Malik Dohan, the president of the Iraqi Bar Association. "Aside from the question of torture, people are being held for long periods of time without having their cases reviewed by a court."

[Y]ou deliberately left out the SECOND way a person can be considered a POW to make it appear that the four prong test was the ONLY way….[T]hat’s not even close to be accurate. Paragraph 4(a)(2) is what you quoted, of course they [detainees] could STILL BE POWS UNDER 4(a)(1) or (3) for that matter but of course you make it seem as if 4(a)(2) is the ONLY definition of a POW. There's also 4(B)(1) under which they may be considered POWs or to be treated as such.

Are you going to have the decency and admit to this slight of hand or what? Post ALL of Article 4!

There is a lot of commentary that makes clear that to be a member of an "armed force" under 4(a)(1) or 4(a)(3), you must still meet the four criteria in 4(a)(2). The idea of 4(a)(2) was to give irregular forces, such as militias, POW treatment if they conducted themselves according to the standards of normal armed forces, hence the listing of the four criteria. This has been the historical understanding from before even the Geneva Conventions.

Also, an alternate reading makes no sense, because it would allow units of an armed force to systematically engage in the most outrageous, brutal war crimes, to fight by hiding among civilians, to not wear uniforms, etc., etc., and still retain their POW status while militias and volunteer corp had to fight according to a higher standard. Makes no sense because the Geneva Conventions were trying to encourage these irregular forces to operate according to the higher, "armed force" standard by promising POW treatment in exchange.

Just came back from CNN. Aaron Brown let me talk which was crafty of him because I kept stuttering expecting to be cut off. That said I guess it went fine. I stopped worrying about my TV schticks a long time ago. However what is interesting is that I got about ten emails in my mailbox responding to the gig. Seven were positive. One of the negative ones made stupid points about how I'd probably want pictures of Auschwitz supressed and then there were these two:

God, I saw you on CNN. You must be one of the stupidest persons to ever get 15 minutes of fame on national television!!!

Why did Aaron invite you anyway? You eat the same kosher food?

Jesus Christ, go hide in a closet....

And...

Mr. Goldberg,

I thought that you have some professionalism to hide your ulterior motive
and your hidden agenda, but you could not contain your hatred. How about
you and your people stop using the pictures of the Holocaust and the memory
of the holocaust, You are just a poor excuse for a human being and a
disgrace to your profession.

Smoke is coming off this analogy he's working it so hard:

First, our enemies created the suicide bomber. Now, we have our own digital suicide bomber, the camera. Just look at the way US army reservist Lynndie England holds the leash of the naked, bearded Iraqi. Take a close look at the leather strap, the pain on the prisoner's face. No sadistic movie could outdo the damage of this image. In September 2001, the planes smashed into the buildings; today, Lynndie smashes to pieces our entire morality with just one tug on the leash.

The Muslim suicide bomber cries Allahu Akbar, God is great. And what does Specialist Charles Graner--Lynndie's partner-in-crime, the man who appears in several of the torture photographs posing with Lynndie behind a pyramid of naked Iraqi prisoners--do back home in Pennsylvania. Why, his garden is plastered with a legend from the Book of Hosea, about sowing and righteousness and ploughing.

The Million Mom March came up a bit short according to the Washington Post: "The rally lacked the star power, and certainly the numbers, of the first Million Mom March in 2000, when hundreds of thousands of women flooded the Mall on Mother's Day. Organizers this time put the crowd at close to 3,000, a figure that could not be confirmed because police no longer estimate crowd sizes."

Now this is why when I launch an activist group it will be called something like "The Bunch of Dudes Hang Out For [Blank]." Or "More Than A Few Folks For [Whatever]." That way, our crowd size will always meet the advertised number. For example,

"The Bunch of Dudes Hang Out For Cheaper Beer organizers said they were very pleased with their turnout this weekend on the Mall. The police would not hazard an official estimate, but Police Chief Ramsey conceded "Clearly, this was a bunch of dudes hanging out for cheaper beer. They behaved quite responsibily, though a few were surly and lazy when we asked them to leave the Mall and take their 'I drink cheap beer and I vote' signs with them."

I've received a lot of email like this one:

I hereby call for the immediate resignation of Jonah Goldberg from the staff of NRO (or at least his banishment from The Corner) for his reckless disregard for the effects of one of his postings on innocent Corner readers. The offending link was entitled:

“DANG [Jonah Goldberg ]
The badgers are back and they brough their banana phone. This is not World War II code for the troopships leave at midnight.”

Upon clicking on the link one is treated to an absurd but terribly compelling montage coupled with what is certainly one of the catchiest jingles ever inflicted. As you can see, no warning was provided to the reader regarding the debilitating nature of the link. This link has caused this reader and members of his immediate and extended family to suffer through several days of the jingle as nearly-constant mental background music interspersed with involuntary (even spastic) overt recitations of the jingle, or portions thereof, to the embarrassment of all. Presently, there is no hope that the jingle will be exorcised any time soon. The jingle and montage also appears to have caused similar symptoms in even the youngest members of the family. If nothing else, think of the children!

The only solace I have is knowing that Mr. Goldberg also viewed the insidious link and is undoubtedly suffering similar torment as I write.

Me It seems this is a very widespread problem. At least that's what this link indictates. Note: there is a lot of cursing and semi-graphic cartoon violence. Do not play loudly at office or show to your kids without viewing. I say all of this because if I don't, people get very angry.

An email from a friend:

You’re brought up in relation to it on Andrew’s site today. One point worth mentioning: AS was criticizing conservatives for not saying anything about Virginia, which he said had taken an action ‘just as radical’ as Massachusetts. Since when was Massachusetts’s action “radical”? Up until now, it’s just been an overdue step toward civil rights [according to Sullivan]. Also: If conservatives are supposed to condemn right-wing radicalism and Massachusetts is the flip side of Virginia, shouldn’t Andrew have criticized MA? I don’t remember that happening either.

From a reader:

Jonah,

The other major problem with the Algeria example beyond the Frenchification (and
what people couldn't be expected to resist that fate to its dying breath?) is
that the French turned large areas of the country into a free fire zone that
killed 100,000s of Algerians, AND the large number of European colonists there
engaged in vigilante justice/death squad activity. In its brutality, length and
body count Algeria is simply orders of magnitude greater than a dozen or two
American guards behaving criminally. While these pictures and the reality they
represent are doing us grave damage, it seems to me that we have to insist on
the proper context and comparisons to Abu Gharaib just as you quite rightly
slapped down the person who attempted to compare these photos with those of
death camps.

The distinctions here are crucial and must be maintained not primarily for any
political advantage we derive here, but rather to maintain the possibility of
ever being to engage in military intervention with forces that are not composed
of gene-spliced Alan Aldas and Arnold Schwarzeneggers who to the last man
and woman will always and at all times be able to kick ass and cuddle puppies
with equal gusto. By pointing out how most other countries have
conducted themselves much worse when attempting to suppress insurgencies that we will be able to assess Abu Garaib correctly and remember that the perhaps maybe several thousand Iraquis who have endured very rough handling are part of a larger story of not only the millions who've been liberated but even the tens of thousands who would have died (not just been scared, humiliated and
intimidated) if Sadaam had still been in power .

The link goes to a very good article by a died in the hair shirt liberal about
the research in the Secret Police archives by Iraqis she knows who claim that
this last year Sadaam would have killed 70,000 people - not to give Iraq a
better future but simply to make things more secure for him and his sons)

If tens of thousands of deaths under Saddam (or in the case of My Lai - dozens of deaths and even more so in Algeria - hundreds of thousands) is allowed to represent a significant move of the scale versus maybe hundreds (and worst case) up to a few thousand treated badly in detention then we might as well throw in the towel and say we will never try to engage in any intervention again.

IMer: btw, Weekend Update made fun of Ross and Rachel not mentioning baby on final episode
IMer: Tina Fey had a "CHILD NEGLECT" graphic over her shoulder... it was hilarious
KJL: they must read the corner!
IMer: yes, the next topic was something else touched upon in the corner
KJL: DUDE
IMer: you totally write SNL
KJL: that's why it's so lame!

I predicted last week that comparisons of Abu Ghraib to My Lai were inevitable. Lo and behold last night's "60 Minutes" made a direct comparison. Indeed, it's becoming increasingly common on the web. Instapundit noticed it too and he also notices the other talking point -- that this is like Algeria (i.e. the French colonial screw-up in Algeria). The comparison is slightly better than My Lai since the excesses of the Algerian campaign are commonly associated with torture of prisoners etc. However , the analogy is still a monumental stretch since the French were trying to Frenchify the Algerians on a scale we've never dreamed of in terms of "Americanizing" the Iraqis. Algerian school kids had to chant "Our forefathers the Gauls" in the classroom every morning.

There are other distinctions to be made, but I will point to one potential similarity. In succeeding to expel the French, the Algerians made their lives much worse.

I was listening to George Will and Fareed Zakaria really lay into Rumsfeld yesterday on "This Week." Not a good sign for Rumsfeld. But there was one thing that at least sounded to me like a cheap shot. Unfortunately, ABC News' website is lame and there's no free transcript there (or on Nexis) so I can't confirm whether I mis-heard the point or not (I was in the car). But the gist goes something like this:

Rumsfeld said long ago that the Geneva Convention doesn't apply to prisoners caught in the war on terror. Will and Zakaria both got pretty huffy about how the Geneva Convention -- once it was ratified by the Senate -- became the law of the land. So to say that the Geneva Convention doesn't apply is in effect saying that American soldiers can behave lawlessly in the eyes of Rumsfeld. Senator Pat Leahy agreed with everything Zakaria and Will said (which again shows you how bad things are for this White House) though he seemed more eager to blame Abu Ghraib and everything else on John Ashcroft.

Now, Rumsfeld may be wrong and if Will and Zakaria think he is, I'm inclined to agree with them. But they seemed to contort the argument unfairly. Is it really so outrageous to say that if prisoners taken from organizations -- not states -- which haven't signed the Geneva convention, do not abide by the Geneva Convention and blatantly reject the spirit of the Geneva Convention (that's why we call them terrorists) are therefore not entitled to the protections of the Geneva Convention? Obviously prisoners from al Qaeda and the Iraqi Army are different, but it was Will and Zakaria who seemed to be conflating them.

Of course the Geneva Convention is binding on Americans. Rumsfeld's argument, I believe, is that it is not applicable in the case of terrorists apprehended by Americans. The Trading with the Enemy Act is binding on Americans too, but it simply doesn't apply to Americans selling Nerf bats to Belgium. If Americans capture some French soldiers in the coming months -- not altogether inconceivable -- I'm sure the Geneva Convention will apply.

From the Guardian:

"Three young girls in eastern Afghanistan were in critical condition in hospital last night after being poisoned [by Islamic militants]."

Their ‘offense’?

Attending school.

Muqtada al-Sadr, the thuggish ‘cleric’ currently leading an anti-US militia in Iraq has, predictably enough, joined in the condemnation of the appalling abuses in Al Ghraib. Who can blame him? Those incidents are a gift to those opposed to the US presence in that country. Al-Sadr’s credentials as a spokesman for human rights would be more convincing, however, without comments like this:

”BASRA, Iraq - A senior aide of radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr told worshippers during a Friday sermon in southern Iraq that anyone capturing a female British soldier can keep her as a slave.”

The good news about this story is that the Saudi regime seems to be increasingly serious about the terrorist threat, at least when it is within the ‘kingdom’s’ own borders. The bad news could be that the man in charge seems to be the somewhat porcine interior minister, 'Prince' Naif. But wait, this Saudi Sherlock has solved the mystery of Al Qaeda. The organization is, he says, “backed by Israel and Zionism.”

Who knew?

One of the characteristics of substance Puritanism is the cruelty that so often accompanies it. Think, perhaps, of the convict on death row denied that last cigarette in a ‘non-smoking’ prison, or the cancer patient kept from the relief he needs for the pain that consumes him. And then, via blogger Radley Balko, there’s this tale of the last days of Bill Wilson, the founder of Alcoholics Anonymous. Dying of emphysema (Wilson was a lifelong smoker as well, entertainingly, as a fan of LSD) he asked for a couple of shots of whisky to help ease the approach of extinction. It was an entirely reasonable request, but it appalled his biographer, Susan Cheever, when she discovered it. Her “blood” she said, “[ran] cold.” She was “shocked and horrified” at this shocking example of backsliding.

Oh, come on.

The only thing about this story that makes my blood run cold is Cheever’s response to it.

The British ‘Commission for Racial Equality’ is a generally worthless organization with, regrettably, considerable powers at its disposal. Its ‘advice’ has to be taken seriously, and, judging by this Daily Telegraph account of its latest effort, that’s a shame. One proposal in particular has drawn criticism: employers should be compelled to provide “prayer rooms” for their employees. The Telegraph quotes one Muslim who thinks this is all quite absurd.

“Mohammed Hassan, the diversity manager [I know, I know] of the Institute of Directors, said the guidance on prayer rooms, and other elements of the new rules, would place an unnecessary burden on smaller businesses. "I have been employed by small companies for most of my working life. As a practising Muslim I have simply shut my office door for a few minutes on a Friday and asked for telephone calls to be withheld so that I can pray. If I have been late back from lunch because of prayers, employers have been understanding and that's how it should be - a private arrangement. "Things like praying time or rooms or holidays should be for employers and employees to decide and not be dictated from above."

He’s right.

Of course, quite why religious observance should be favored in this way is beyond me. If the devout are to have ‘prayer rooms’ secular sorts such as myself should insist on a skeptics’ suite where we will be free to contemplate the horrors of the Inquisition, Sharia ‘law’, New Age nonsense, the witlessness of Wicca, Atheist arrogance and the success of Seventh Heaven.

Dishonest crap, apparently.

Here’s the ‘skeptical environmentalist,’ Bjorn Lomborg, a believer, incidentally, in global warming, writing in the Daily Telegraph on the new eco-thriller (eco-chiller?), a movie with an agenda that includes the promotion of the disgusting and destructive Kyoto Treaty:

“If politicians were to see The Day After Tomorrow and act on its agenda, what would happen? Implementing the Kyoto agreement on climate change would cost at least $150 billion each year, yet would do no more than postpone global warming for six years by 2100. That is to say, it would cause temperatures to increase slightly more slowly - the temperature we would have reached in 2100 without Kyoto, we would now reach in 2106. Those families in Bangladesh who will get flooded will have an extra six years to move. Even if the film's creators are right - and the scientists are wrong - and the Gulf Stream current does collapse within a decade, then Kyoto would have made no difference.

“There is another reason why it is wrong - I would even say amoral - to overplay the case for combatting climate change. We cannot do everything. Our resources are limited, and our attention is quickly diverted from one fashionable cause to another. We must ask ourselves if spending $150 billion every year for the rest of the century to postpone warming for six years is really the best use of that money.

“For the cost of implementing Kyoto in just one year, we could permanently provide clean drinking water and sanitation to everyone on the planet. Of course it is unlikely that Emmerich will cast Brad Pitt as a sewage engineer in Kenya for his next glamorous movie. Nor are there many good plotlines to be made from tales of a government which invests in malarial vaccines, or of a global conference called to remove trade barriers. But these are real options that policy-makers face every time they spend a dollar with the intention of easing human suffering.

“The world needs a rational basis for making such priorities.”

And that does not include this hysterical and dishonest movie, a film, incidentally that has been tacitly endorsed by the hysterical and dishonest Al Gore.

Britain’s thuggish restrictions on an individual’s right to own a gun have grown ever tighter over the years. Violent crime, including gun crime, and burglaries have, quite naturally, soared as a result. Now, in yet another attempt to curb the ‘gun culture’ that was supposedly abolished last time it tried legislation, the Labour government is contemplating a new round of controls: on air guns this time and, yes, replicas. Pathetic.

The only consequence of these changes will be to ‘disarm’ the already disarmed and empower criminals.

Gun control kills. It’s that simple.