A blog dedicated to who will be the next World Bank President.

Nod to Dan Drezner.

From a reader in response to the latest column:

Thomas More on incremental relativism:

"When the king remarried even after failing to secure a lawful annulment,
More was asked not to be such a stickler for law. But, he answered,
if we allow one law to be felled like a single tree in the forest, why
not the next, and the next, until soon the whole forest is flattened,
and there remains nothing to protect us from the north wind?"

Your article speaks to my condition. Thank you.

I don't think this is an ideological point: You can tell where a pundit or blogger resides on the ideological spectrum based upon what he or she assumes is self-evidently damning.

So, here is Atrios compiling what he apparently considers to be a bunch of self-evidently damning statements on my part.

Anyway, without getting into the weeds, I guess I just think Atrios is a bore.

Michael Newdow is at it again:

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) -- An atheist who sued because he did not want his young daughter exposed to the words "under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance has filed a suit to bar the saying of a prayer at President Bush's inauguration...

Militants abducted three senior Iraqi officials, beheaded a man who worked for the U.S. military and killed at least four others, officials said Saturday, a day after a U.S. general warned that insurgents may be planning "horrific" attacks ahead of Jan. 30 elections.

"I thought we in the media were supposed to be watchdogs, not lapdogs," Bryan Monroe, an official of the black journalists' group and an assistant vice president at Knight Ridder, said in the statement.

But public relations executives said that the government distribution of prepared news segments without on-air disclosures of their origin was a bipartisan practice that predated the Bush administration.

"The Clinton administration was probably even more active than the Bush administration" in distributing news segments promoting its policies, said Laurence Moskowitz, chairman and chief executive of Medialink, a major producer of promotional news segments. After the Government Accountability Office decision last spring, he said, his firm began advising government clients to disclose each tape's nature in its script.

I'm sorry I ever linked to this Gilliard guy. Not because I take back anything I said. If anything I was probably kind. But because Gilliard's making a fool of himself. He's now calling me, Rich Lowry and NR racists, comparing us to Klansmen and writing what would be called a sophomoric racist parody of a thin-skinned black liberal having a hissy-fit -- if it weren't actually written seriously. I don't really take offense because I can't take this guy seriously. All of his language is hackneyed (Oh how clever! An uncle Tom barb! Never heard one of those). His "ideas" are a caricature and, judging from his (several) fans' email to me, all he's got going for him is a rather sad persecution complex. How else to interpret this sort of hysteria but as a perfect -- if trivial -- example of the moral exhaustion of black liberalism. Am I supposed to cry because he called me a racist over something like this?

Seriously, Steve, take a few deep breaths. If you're going to call me a Klansmen for criticizing you and Armstrong Williams, how do you expect to have any moral authority for, well, anything? Maybe someone else can explain this to him?

But I think this guy's post about Armstrong Williams is flat-out racist, and it's not like I throw that around lightly.

I found it while searching Technorati for what the blogosphere was saying about Armstrong Williams. I don't know much about Steve Gillard. Okay I don't know anything execpt I've come across the name in searches before and Technorati says it's fairly well-known.

Anyway, I find the Williams thing to be a total trainwreck, but I don't think it warrants lame slave jokes and the like. Then again, I don't think anything warrants even non-lame slave jokes. Shame on this guy whoever he is.

) Two network anchors treated as a noble and credible cause, not as an unworthy publicity gimmick without any factual basis, the move by a few far-left cranks in the House and Senate to object to the certification of the Electoral College vote in Ohio in favor of President George W. Bush. ABC's Peter Jennings noted that "the Democrats knew that it was a pretty ceremonial objection," but he stressed how they "regarded it as important." Brian Williams, from Singapore, teased Thursday's NBC Nightly News by assuming facts not in evidence as he presumed there were "problems" in Ohio, "Protesting the vote: Congress forced to interrupt its ceremonial counting of the electoral votes because of problems on Election Day in Ohio." NBC's Chip Reid proceeded to relay, without citing any evidence, how "the objectors cited irregularities in Ohio from alleged intimidation of minority voters to too few voting machines."

Peter Jennings held his January 6 World News Tonight coverage to this short item: "In the Congress today, they officially certified the results of the presidential election. It was not without incident. One Democratic Senator joined a Democrat from the House in objecting to the results from Ohio, which forced reconsideration in both houses. The Democrats knew that it was a pretty ceremonial objection, but regarded it as important."

Those whacky census bureau guys:

A small lake southeast of Lake Stevens has two different names, Bevis and Butthead - almost identical to snickering characters in TV's "Beavis and Butt-head" show.

"That means someone is playing a joke, I think," said Ken Brown, a land surveyor with the state Department of Natural Resources.

Brown said the department calls it Bevis Lake. The U.S. Geological Survey uses that name on its topographic map.

But the U.S. Census Bureau calls it Butthead Lake in its records.

Someone's actually been cataloging my monkey references:

Should Cosmo be concerned?

From your Pragmatic G-File:
"Holmes defended free speech on the grounds that more voices in the marketplace of ideas would be more likely to yield a more concrete answer to the central problems of life (think of a billion monkeys banging on typewriters: the more monkeys you add, the more likely it is they'll write something worthwhile)."

From the G-File you link to in your Pragmatic G-File:
"Just because Bill Clinton always lies doesn’t mean that at some point — like monkeys banging on typewriters — he’ll never stumble on the truth. But in both cases, more than a little skepticism is in order."

It's more than just a favorite analogy: You helped make the cheese-eating surrender species famous. There's the Flying variety to which you've referred on many occasions. It was at this point I got curious and Googled NRO:

12/28/99: "'Well Chuck, there is an outside possibility that mutant computer monkeys will eat your brains and evil hamsters will try to take over the government.'"

Another from '99: "Then, when I return to find the Statue of Liberty poking out of Jones Beach, I will be prepared to start society all over again — I will not let Dr. Zeus make a monkey out of me."

2001: "I can just imagine the Susan Sontag readers of my native Upper West Side on a cultural safari, 'Oh, look how the Shaman shows the monkey pancreas to the bride before he eats it! That's to show the demons are gone. Isn't that marvelous honey?'"

A 2-fer from 10/29/01: "George has been added to our team of web monkeys" and "I don't want to be hyperbolic, but you should click on these ads like a monkey in a cocaine-addiction study trying to get one last pellet. "

I could go on, but my lunch break's almost over and the point is made. Admit it: You just like monkeys. Now, back to Pragmatism. (This is clearly the response you had in mind when you wrote it....)

Please don't send me email explaining why this guy is wrong. I just thought you'd be interested in knowing that I really do hear from people like this guy:

Subject: Insurgents Are NOT Terrorists...!!!

Ask yourself this: What would YOU do if the U.S. was invaded by the Chinese on false pretenses in a grab for natural resources, and the Chinese built permanent bases all over the U.S.--making it very clear that they had no intention of EVER leaving?

Then, what would you do if the Chinese shut down your religious newsletter, destroyed your church, took over your town, broke into your house in the middle of the night, arrested, tortured and sexually abused your friends, and killed your childen and your parents at a checkpoint because they did not slow down enough?

As a patriot, would you fight them any way you could? Or do I overestimate you?

The people resisting the occupation in Iraq are NOT terrorists. They are fighting against an invasion and an occupation by whatever means necessary. When the colonists in the young United States fought against the British during the American Revolution, the colonists were considered "terrorists" by the British, because they used unconventional hit and run tactics, and because they would not stand in a straight line and fight like the British had been doing for centuries. And in case you did not know it: The colonists also attacked and killed American civilians who were working for the British---and there were many.

One man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter. If we were invaded by the Chinese on false pretenses, I hope YOU would fight hard and smart enough to be called a "terrorist" in China.

When your children and grandchildren ask you what you did to speak up against this insanity, what will you tell them?

Communist Woman: Are you two looking for work?

Ernesto: No, we’re not looking for work.

Communist Woman: No? Then why are you traveling?

Ernesto: We travel just to travel.

Communist Woman: Bless you…Blessed be your travels.

The fog of time and the strength of anti-anti-Communism have obscured the real Che. Who was he? He was an Argentinian revolutionary who served as Castro's primary thug. He was especially infamous for presiding over summary executions at La Cabaña, the fortress that was his abattoir. He liked to administer the coup de grâce, the bullet to the back of the neck. And he loved to parade people past El Paredón, the reddened wall against which so many innocents were killed. Furthermore, he established the labor-camp system in which countless citizens--dissidents, democrats, artists, homosexuals--would suffer and die. This is the Cuban gulag. A Cuban-American writer, Humberto Fontova, described Guevara as "a combination of Beria and Himmler." Anthony Daniels once quipped, "The difference between [Guevara] and Pol Pot was that [the former] never studied in Paris."

Noah Millman has an epic-length response to my G-File today and I'm delighted for it. I was hoping for more feedback as this Pragmatism stuff is something of a hobby-horse of mine these days. That said, I've got to work on something else right now and this is way too long to respond to now.

But I will quibble now with his first quibble. He says that "pragmatism" doesn't have a positive connotation. He makes this case by coming up with words which mean the opposite of pragmatism -- principled, for example -- which we like and words which he says are synonyms with pragmatic that we don't like -- "mercenary," for example. That's all find and dandy. But this guilt-by-association really doesn't disprove my assertion that pragmatism is a well-liked word in political discourse. Sure, there are some of us who don't like "pragmatic" any more than we like it when politicians are celebrated for "growing" in office, since both terms are often code for liberal agendas. But this is a rarefied interepretation carrying a lot of ideological freight. In common usage, even among conservatives, the word is well-liked and well-meant.

Update: Okay, I've now just read the whole post. I must say that rumors of Millman's brilliance have received further confirmation. This isn't to say I agree with him on all points, but this is a very impressive bit of insta-philosophizing. Substantive response still to come.

Aaaaargh!

My great pleasure as a child was to cycle around the countryside near my
home town, Northampton, in the east midlands of England. The villages had
fine old names, some of them colorful and curious: Yardley Gobion,
Bugbrooke, Chapel Brampton, Stoke Bruerne.

Well, one of those villages -- it boasted the part-excavated site of a Roman
villa -- was Buttock's Booth, three or four miles out of town on the
Kettering road. Browsing on Mapquest last night, I discovered to my dismay
that Buttock's Booth has DISAPPEARED!

Is this yet another example of Geographical Correctness? -- like all those
American names with "squaw" in them being scrubbed from the maps? Or what?
I note from Google that Buttock's Booth still shows up in bus timetables and
the like. So why doesn't Mapquest know about it?

Anonymous American and British diplomats increasingly suggest that elections cannot be held in the deteriorating security situation, but it is the worsening atmosphere that is driving the Iraqi desire to vote. Iraqis look forward to the January 30 poll, the first free elections Iraq has seen in 50 years. Not only those in the Shia south, but also many Baghdadis talk about voting 169, the position of the Iraqi National Alliance on the ballot. Many others say they plan to vote for President Ghazi al-Yawar's list. Most Kurds will support Masud Barzani and Jalal Talabani's Kurdish list. Few if any Iraqis say they will support Allawi. He has failed them. Re-Baathification may win King Abdullah of Jordan's approval and Syrian President Bashar al-Asad's consent, but the policy will not improve Iraq's security. Insurgents and terrorists may kill Iraqis lining up to vote. They may assassinate winning candidates. But only through voting, can Iraqis choose their own government, one that will have the moral authority to undertake remedies forbidden by professional diplomats and intelligence operatives who have had trouble letting go of the old order. It is time to listen to the Iraqis.

In the meantime, the lessons Bush draws from his victory are the ones that matter most. The man who in 2000 promised to unite and not divide now sounds as though he is prepared to leave as his second-term legacy the Death of Compromise. "I've got the will of the people at my back," he said at the moment of victory. From here on out, bipartisanship means falling in line: "I'll reach out to everyone who shares our goals." Whatever spirit of cooperation that survives in his second term may have to be found among his opponents; he has made it clear he's not about to change his mind as he takes on Social Security and the tax code in pursuit of his "ownership society." So unfolds the strange and surprising and high-stakes decade of Bush.

I'm getting a lot of flack for my point in my syndicated column that Air Force Academy cadets get water-boarded in their training and that therefore it might fall somewhere short of actual torture. Here's a typical email:

dont you think its a bit preposterous to cite torture simulation as a reason that torture is acceptible? "Our soldiers experience torture simulation as part of their training. Thus it's okay to torture prisoners." Do you actually see no difference between a simulation and the real thing? This is not just a ridiculously bad argument as a simple matter of rhetoric, it's a morally despicable argument that reveals some seriously warped thinking.

Me: Of course I see the difference between the two: it's a psychological difference. And while I don't want to be categorical about this and say "as long as it's only psychological, it's not torture" I do think this is an important distinction. For example, I think Ted Kennedy made a very good point yesterday when he denounced the "torture memo" because it would allow cutting off fingers because that doesn't amount to organ failure. Good point. That counts as torture in my book.

Well, you can't "simulate" cutting off fingers either. Telling a prisoner you're going to do really terrible things to him in order to get him to give up the goods doesn't bother me nearly as much as doing those things. Electrocuting the privates of a cadet would be torture, period. I think we're all on the same page on that. In other words, the fact that something can be simulated accurately without offending our sensibilities suggest that when we do it in reality it might not be as terrible as something we would never dream of even simulating. Depriving terrorists of sleep to get them to spill the beans is not torture it's interrogation.

I've never had any beef with Armstrong Williams before. Good guy. Nice guy. Smart guy. But what the hell is this about?

White House paid commentator to promote law

By Greg Toppo, USA TODAY

Seeking to build support among black families for its education reform law, the Bush administration paid a prominent black pundit $240,000 to promote the law on his nationally syndicated television show and to urge other black journalists to do the same.

Williams on being paid to boost NCLB: "I wanted to do it because it's something I believe in."

The campaign, part of an effort to promote No Child Left Behind (NCLB), required commentator Armstrong Williams "to regularly comment on NCLB during the course of his broadcasts," and to interview Education Secretary Rod Paige for TV and radio spots that aired during the show in 2004.

Williams said Thursday he understands that critics could find the arrangement unethical, but "I wanted to do it because it's something I believe in."

The top Democrat on the House Education Committee, Rep. George Miller of California, called the contract "a very questionable use of taxpayers' money" that is "probably illegal." He said he will ask his Republican counterpart to join him in requesting an investigation....

Me: I mean come on. Why do this? Did someone need an operation? Unless some major facts are being left out this just dumb. It looks bad because it is bad.

Update/Clarification:
Sorry if I seemed to be critcizing only Williams. I think it was stupid and unacceptable for the Administration to give him the money. If the Clinton Administration had been paying off liberal pundits to promote his policies we would have gone batty, and rightly so. A better explanation is required. The whole thing seems gross to me. I posted this up top too.

A blogger offers a flattering theory of the universe in which Virginia Postrell and I are the Alpha and the Omega:

Postrel and Goldberg represent the two urges that have created the America we know today, optimism and caution. Both are adherents to a philosophy of process instead of ideology: In Postrel, the unwavering vector towards the future. In Goldberg, a belief that many things were superior in the past, and all movement towards to future (no matter how valuable) must be taken in small increments, lest it overwhelm our sense of where we came from. To Goldberg, the most crucial question in any political debate is "what will anchor us to our values."

Interesing and, again, flattering. But I don't think it's right. First of all, I agree with a lot of what Postrel has to say. Second, for the dichotomy to work I would need to be far more opposed to change than the author -- Darren -- suggests. I'm not afraid of technology, a point I tried to convey, perhaps to subtley, in my column "I'm Not Afraid of Technology" (long time readers will remember it as the column I wrote before I went under the knife). Also, I don't know that Postrel dismisses the wisdom of the past as all this would suggest. It's been a while since I read her book, but I can't imagine she doesn't think important knowledge is cumulative.

Lastly, this guy completely misses my real reason(s) for disliking Pragmatism. One reason I will share here because it is the most relevant to this discussion: Pragmatism is not Hayekian (while Postrel most certainly is).

While Holmes may have liked markets -- philosophically -- this shouldn't be misunderstood to mean Pragmatists were anything like Hayekians. Dewey particularly had contempt for the notion of accumulated, collective, wisdom which might be unknowable to the individual. The whole "Pragmatic razor" was designed to dismantle institutions and dogmas without concern for all of the hidden social attachments and meanings they might have. I think it's very unlikely that any Pragmatist (again, everybody note the capital P) would be opposed to gay marriage.

Hayekians are obviously in favor of change and experimentation, but they are also respectful of the limits of an individual person to see all the angles. Now, Pragmatists might say to this "we are too" respectful of all that stuff. Maybe some are in faculty lounges and editorial boards. But when it came to the political project of the Pragmatists in the 20th century such respect was left in the locker room while the contempt for tradition, hidden law, custom and dogma was brought out on the field.

Note: Link fixed/added.

Tim - did they really call it the "death" of compromise? I mean what are they going to do in, say, 2068 when some President cuts a deal with Congress, issue a retraction? "At the begining of the century we reported that compromise was dead. These reports appear now to have been premature."

Dayton Daily News
Friday, December 3, 2004
EDITORIAL


Jesse Jackson wrong to keep hope alive
By the Dayton Daily News

The effort of some diehards to prolong a sense of uncertainty about the outcome of the presidential election in Ohio is pathetic.

Most Democrats, including Sen. John Kerry, have long since come to terms with reality. But there's a small, hard-core group that trades alleged horror stories over the Internet and that wants to fight on. It has found a high-profile spokesman: the Rev. Jesse Jackson. He's calling Ohio "the "Florida of 2000."

The spokesman is speaking nonsense. For example, he wants Ohio Secretary of State J. Kenneth Blackwell to recuse himself from the whole post-election process.

"You can't very well be a team owner and referee the process," Rev. Jackson says of the Republican secretary of state.

But he needs to take that problem up with the Ohio Constitution. It makes the secretary of state an elective office. And the secretary's main job is to oversee the administration of elections. If he is going to recuse himself now, he might as well recuse himself from office.

Anyway, however much some Kerry supporters might need a partisan monster to point to - a Katherine Harris of 2004 - Mr. Blackwell does not qualify. He has made decisions favoring both parties. His office was instrumental in keeping Ralph Nader off the ballot, something a Democratic secretary of state would have been eager to do. And, just before the election, he tried to keep Republican challengers out of the polling places.

True, he fought for a strict interpretation of the law about counting provisional ballots, taking a position the Democrats didn't like. But the courts upheld him. (And, anyway, the vast majority of those ballots are being counted.) And, yes, at one stage he did make an embarrassing fuss about the kind of paper that could be used for voter registrations; but he backed off.

He was also the Republican who tried after 2000 to replace the punch-card system that Democrats had railed against. And now he is complying with the legal demand of the two minor-party candidates for a recount.

At any rate, the sense in which Secretary Blackwell administers elections is very sharply restricted. Elections are essentially run, and votes are counted, by local election boards that are evenly divided between the two parties. Partisan checks and balances are the essence of the system, prevailing down to the precinct level.

Says Rev. Jackson, "We can live with winning and losing. We cannot live with fraud and stealing." By whom? Are the Democrats at elections boards and the polling places complaining about the Republicans? No.

At one stage, some Kerry supporters were hoping that the provisional ballots - those cast by would-be voters whose names weren't showing up on the lists at polling places - would help their candidate. That isn't happening to any large-enough degree.

So the problems that are showing up here and there - 8,000 provisional ballots being rejected in Cuyahoga County, for example - don't have the potential to overturn the 130,000-vote margin that President George W. Bush came out of Election Day with.

Still, a little more "process" is in order, some examination of problems that arose, with an eye, if nothing else, to avoiding such problems in the future.

What's not in order is the suggestion of some great fraud where there is none. Some people will take advantage of the inevitable flaws of elections to confuse other people, to sow doubts. Those people do harm, not good. They undermine the legitimacy of every close election outcome. The fact is, the system worked pretty well. People should know that.

"Some senators . . . have gone to Ukraine to investigate that election," Jackson said. "They've gone to Iraq. But not one has gone to Columbus, Ohio."

COMSTOCK: the geneva conventions require things beyond humane treatment like monthly pay and uniform to interact with the other al qaeda and get and say don't tell them about los angeles or the bomb plot in chicago.

MATTHEWS: why did the candidate say today the geneva conventions do apply to the fighting in iraq?

COMSTOCK: because they do. they always have.

MATTHEWS: the people fighting in iraq are not terrorists?

COMSTOCK: when we went into iraq, we were met with soldiers.

MATTHEWS: the people over there now, are are they terrorists?

COMSTOCK: we've gone under geneva conventions. you have a situation where people aren't wearing uniform. they're going and the, that is a problem. because iraq is a signer of the geneva conventions.

MATTHEWS: may be you can help here. we watched the fighting in fallujah. we watched our gi's getting kill. we see the other side getting slaughtered. we captured their people are they covered by the geneva convention?

COMSTOCK: we are complying with geneva soldiers, for the iraqi soldiers. i don't know if there is a different situation.

MATTHEWS: let's find out. we're not fighting guys in uniform. we're fighting militia.

COCCO: could i raise this historical point? because barbara has referred to history a couple of times. during vietnam war, this issue of whether we should treat the viet cong who were an indigenous gorilla, insurgent group integrating themselves in villages, wearing civilian clothes and hiding in rice paddies. the united states decided then as a matter of principle, not as a legal requirement but as a matter of principle, we would apply the prescribes to captured viet cong. why? because our soldiers were at risk of being capture. and one of the main reason we have the geneva conventions is so that when our military personnel and civilian personnel are captured by the enemy, we want them treated humanely. and we want them treated in acore with the geneva congress geneva convention. we said we'll do the right thing.

COMSTOCK: and we do it in iraq even though they behead us.

MATTHEWS: you're right on everything. i mean it. i'm trying to get the facts on one thing. alberto gonzales said he is against torture today unoads. the senate judiciary hearing. we also have a memorandum that he had a role in. we're be sure what the role is in term of the august memo 2002 where he clearly delineates what is in and what is acceptable. like cruelty, humiliation. that sort of thick. do you consider those categories, do you call that torture? are those things your idea of torture?

COMSTOCK: that memo is not in effect anymore. the memo that's in effect is the december memo where they've taken out some of the language because people have misconstrued that as being a policy when all that was was looking at what the senate had defined as the haw. that was a legal interpretation of what the senate said.

MATTHEWS: so alberto gonzales was a hard liner in terms of trying to get information out of prisons. the phrase used often was forward leaning. that's obviously a rumsfeld phrase. in this case, getting information out of them. is that your understanding?

COMSTOCK: everybody in the administration after 9/11, when you captured someone like….you want to get the maximum information out. that was the policy of the american people.

COCCO: why were so many f.b.i. agents so shocked, apalled -- appalled, blanching at the conduct at guantanamo bay that there is now a flood of memos by f.b.i. agents. i have met a lot of f.b.i. agents and none of them are pansies. they don't blanch at blood. they blanched at what was going on at guantanamo bay.

COMSTOCK: now you're mixing apples and oranges.

MATTHEWS: your position is that this administration is not formally or informally turned its side or ignored cases of torture.

COMSTOCK: no we're investigating them now. the geneva conventions do not apply in gitmo.

MATTHEWS: i didn't know it was part of our interrogation process. i had no idea that we're not allowed to torture people to get information out of them.

COMSTOCK: that's the legal guy up in harvard, that's his policy that we should do that. but that's never been the policy.

MATTHEWS: i feel much better. thank you. i'm serious. i hope it's true. thank you. i really mean it.

But in several instances, Kerry attacked what he called the "horrendous judgments" and "unbelievable blunders" of the Bush administration. The mistakes, he said, included former U.S. occupation leader Paul Bremer's decisions to disband the Iraqi army and purge the government of former members of Hussein's Baath Party. Both moves are widely believed to have fueled the largely Sunni insurgency.

"What is sad about what's happening here now is that so much of it is a process of catching up from the enormous miscalculations and wrong judgments made in the beginning," he said. "And the job has been made enormously harder."

He added, however, that it was time to move forward.

So many readers have made variations of this point, many, many from personal experience:

After I was captured, my hands were tied behind my back and I was struck repeatedly in the face with an open hand. After enduring the beating I was thrown on the water board, where under questioning the enemy would drown you till the verge of losing consciousness, only to revive you and start all over again. Then a black bag was secured around my head and throat which made it difficult to breathe. I was confined to a three by four foot tiger cage with a coffee can for a toilet. Loud music blared from speakers in the compound and I was repeatedly dragged from my cage for more beatings and interrogation. At night when it was freezing the guards would pour cold water on me. I was deprived of any food for five straight days.

Sounds pretty bad, doesn't it? Well that is only part of what EVERY U.S. Navy and Air Force pilot and flight crew goes through in survival school. The Army does it for their special forces guys as well. We do this to our own people for training but we can't do it to terrorists?
Incredible.

For nearly three years, the Bush Administration has been harshly criticized by various media and legal elites for its interpretation of the Geneva Convention and its legal conclusion that al Qaeda fighters are not POWs and thus not entitled to the privileges afforded to POWs by that convention – despite overwhelming legal evidence and international scholarly support favoring the Bush interpretation.

Yet, at today’s confirmation hearing for Judge Alberto Gonzales, both of the two legal experts called by Senator Leahy to testify against Judge Gonzales conceded that al Qaeda fighters are indeed not POWs. Due to the extensive questioning of Judge Gonzales, the two legal experts did not begin their testimony until very late in the afternoon.

Following that testimony, Senator Cornyn asked the two professors: if someone is determined to be an al Qaeda fighter, “would they be entitled to the protections of the Geneva Convention?”

Dean Harold Koh gave a somewhat wordy response that eventually concluded with this clear, unequivocal statement: “they are not POWs.” Following Dean Koh’s response, Dean John Hutson said: “I take the same view.”

To be sure, Deans Koh and Hutson vociferously disagree with other aspects of the Administration’s war on terrorism policies and legal positions. But this concession – by Senator Leahy’s two legal experts no less – that Geneva POW privileges and protections DO NOT APPLY to al Qaeda fighters constitutes a remarkable and important concession. Unfortunately, this concession could be missed by the general public, however, due to the lateness in the day of the questioning by Senator Cornyn.

Dear Feminist Activists,

Today Senator Barbara Boxer (D-CA) will join Representatives John Conyers (D-MI) and Stephanie Tubb-Jones (D-OH), as well as several other African-American members of the U.S. House, in objecting to the Ohio presidential election results as Congress certifies the 2004 election. Representative Conyers has issued a 100+ page report documenting serious election irregularities in Ohio in the 2004 presidential election.

If you recall in Fahrenheit 911, no Senators in 2001 stood with African-American members of Congress who objected to the Florida presidential election results.

Senator Boxer, in a historic and courageous move, will stand with the House members today so the Senate and House will be forced to discuss for two hours the election irregularities, which disproportionately disenfranchised African-American and minority voters, women, and students.

We believe Senator Boxer will be targeted by the right-wing for her courageous stand. The women’s movement and progressives must vigorously support her.

Please send an email thanking Senator Boxer for her courage and vision. And please send an email to Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) expressing your support for Senator Boxer and urging them to take a leadership role in election reform.

We also believe Senator Boxer will be targeted by talk shows and newspapers. Please show your support for Senator Boxer by writing letters to the editor and calling radio and TV talk shows.

The Ohio election irregularities led to the discarding of some 92,000 ballots, principally in inner city districts. Lack of voting machines in, again, inner city districts led to lines of 4-6 hours where voters who could stay were often forced to stand in the rain. On college campuses, lines were also long, with one college reporting lines that were 11 hours long. For more information on the many problems in Ohio, click here.

We must have election law reform to guarantee a paper trail and to guarantee that voters in metropolitan areas and college communities have the same number of voting machines per number of voters as do voters in the suburbs and exurbs.

Please, send an email now to Senator Reid and Congresswoman Pelosi urging them to support Boxer and lead the fight to reform our election system. And do not forget to thank Senator Boxer for her courage. With champions like Senator Boxer, we can make a difference.

For Equality,
Eleanor Smeal
President

NATION SEEKS WEB EDITOR

The Nation seeks a full-time web editor with progressive politics, boundless energy and a strong commitment to help amplify the influence and scope of the magazine's online presence.

The web editor will work closely with magazine editors as well as business staffers in developing the site. Major responsibilities include planning, creating and implementing new Nation online features; Conceiving and executing the creation of online enhancements to articles originating from the print magazine; Assisting in outreach to other online media; Coordinating breaking online news coverage, and editing original Nation online articles.

Ideal candidate has at least three years experience working at a political website, closely follows the news media--print, broadcast and online, has broad familiarity with the progressive community, keeps abreast of alternative and youth culture, works well with a wide array of individuals, internal departments and outside organizations, and is comfortable with very tight deadline pressure. Familiarity with HTML, and online production and content management a plus. Applicant must work in The Nation's New York City office. 

Position offers generous benefits and a convivial work atmosphere. The Nation is an equal opportunity employer, people of color and other minorities strongly encouraged to apply.  Email resume, cover-letter and salary requirements to: webjob@thenation.com. No calls please.

It is too late.<